Inner shadow or bad aliasing/black outline on red text when rendered

[Nick2049]

Does anyone know how to rectify this in AE?

It does'nt seem to matter what render settings I use I can't seem to get AE (or AME) to render red type correctly.

As you can see from this screen grab, the viewport displays red on white exactly as it should, but the render seems to add a black outline, almost like an inner shadow.

Thanks in advance

[Mylenium]

Nothing to fix because nothing is broken. It's an inherent limitation of rendering to compressed formats like MP4) - the color information is reduced (chroma subsampling) and reconstructed from adjacent pixels, which can mean that not all color channels line up exacxtly. That and of course you have the most unfavorable scenario there one can imagine - red vs. white is causing an extreme contrast plateau, which any compression algorithm will have a tough time to accommodate in its limited color range. The only option here would really be to adjust the colors or employ old tricks liek adding subtle noise/ dithering or blurring the outlines to at least reduce the contrast and by way of that also give the algorithm also more "mushy" pixels to work with.

Mylenium

[Nick2049]

Thanks for the info. So basically, at it's current saturation, it's impossible to avoid this without first degrading the denisty/reolution of the text?

[Roland Kahlenberg]

Without looking at your Timeline, Effects Control Panel, Comp Settings and Render Settings, this looks like a case of Chroma Crawl - https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=chroma+crawl

Try reducing the Saturation level of the Red. Also, try rendering from AE to a high level format and then using this output in AME, to output to a H264 format/file.

[Nick2049]

Thanks for the info.

I can't really modify the colour as it is part of a clients brand.

I've tried rendering DNxHD from AE and then transcoding to H.264/5 via both AME and Handbrake. No such joy.

With regards to settings they are as follows:

16bit sRGB workspace

1080/30 comp

The only effects on these layers are 'Fade in+Out Frame' but I've tried with and without, other than that it's just a basic text - Myriad Pro Light.

Render settings varies but the last attempt was DNxHR/DNxHD 1080p HQ 8-bit

[Roland Kahlenberg · Accepted solution]

No TV or display unit (other than color calibrated units) will display colors exactly as per RGB settings. You actually have some leeway.

Tell your client of the issue and ask for access to previous works of theirs with an identical color scheme. Then check for identical issue. There is a 99% chance they have used a different color scheme - Branding Red + White Background and not have had the same issue.

I will then adjust the Red saturation by 5%-10% until the Chroma Crawl issue is no longer visible.

Also, I should have asked earlier, what are your compression settings in AME/HandBrake? Low quality settings will also lead to such issues.

[Nick2049]

Fair point, I'll see how much the shift needs to be before rectified. Thanks.

AME/HandBrake both high bitrate settings, but the issue is already visible on the master export from AE.

[Nick2049]

It would seem that even dropping the saturation by 25% (which would be too much anyway) still does not rectify the issue. Do you tink I'll just have to resort to the tricks Mylenium suggested?

[Roland Kahlenberg]

Do whatever is necessary cos you're in a difficult situation and only trial and error will let you know when you've found a sweet spot.

Can you provide the RGB values for the Red. I'm also assuming the white background is a full-on white?

[Nick2049]

Yup, solid white background.

The red is:

#cb1142

203 / 17 / 66

[Roland Kahlenberg]

The RGB allocation for the Red doesn't seem to be extreme. This just looks like a sad case of Chroma Crawl. Hence, the goal is to minimize the artefact as much as possible. This entails choosing an ideal Color Space to work within as well as for output.

In Project Settings, WorkSpace to Rec 709 Gamma 2.4. Under the View Menu, enable Color Management. In the Render Dialog, ensure you have Rec 709 Gamma 2.4 when outputting to a high quality CODEC. In AME, use CBR and at something no less than 10 - go as high as you can without making smooth playback an impossible procedure, to see a high datarate helps to lessen the issue.

[a.koksh]

install ffmpeg if you haven't already)). render uncompressed avi and run this command in the folder with the file.

ffmpeg -i filename.avi -c:v libx264 -profile:v high444 -preset slower -tune animation filename.mp4

Replace "filename" with the name of your file.

[Teddy Hose]

I had this same problem with a white-on-magenta contrast and this is what solved it.
I exported a ProRes4444 mov file, though I don't think it matters what Quicktime subsetting you choose as much, long as you export with Channels: RGB + Alpha. My video didn't even have any transparent parts but this is what fixed it.