Is there a way duplicate a set of layers so they repeat to the end of the composition?

[Lynnette7]

Hi all, I'm an author and I'm getting ready to upload some of my audiobooks to YouTube. To do this I of course have to make a video of the audio. So I'm using After Effects, which might not be the best program, but it seemed easier than Premiere Pro. 🙂 

What I've done so far is input all the audio files. And I have a static image above the audio that displays for the whole way through the audiobook. Above that, I have four layers of text that I would like to repeat over and over until the end of the book. They say things like Support the Author by Clicking Like and Subscribe, Share this free book with a friend, etc. Each layer fades out, and the next one fades in. But after the 4th one, I just want this sequence of text layers to repeat until the book is finished. 

I don't know the right terminology to search, I guess. Do I just have to duplicate them and drag them into the right place a gazillion times? The book is over 10 hours long. 

[Rick Gerard]

Premiere Pro is by far the better application for editing and rendering your audiobook video. After Effects is for creating shots that you can't create in an NLE, and most comps created by professionals are no longer than a single shot. Mine are usually less than 7 seconds long because the average shot in a movie is now about 7 seconds. 

That said, Whenever you want to repeat an animated layer in After Effects, you must duplicate the layer and move it down the timeline.  The only other option would be to pre-compose the animated layer, making sure you move all attributes, then Time Remaps the layer and add a loopOut() expression to time remapping. You then need the right values for the Time Remapping keyframes.

If I were doing the project you describe, I would drop your audio layer and your background image in Premiere Pro, then open the Graphics workspace and add the graphics on a single layer. 

You could use After Effects to create a custom MOGRT for Premiere Pro that animates your Support The Author, Like, and Subscribe graphics. The workflow would be to open the Extended Graphics Workspace, study the user guide on creating MOGRTs by typing MOGRT in the Search Help Field in the upper right corner of After Effects, then create your graphic. You export it, load it into Premiere Pro, and then all you have to do is drop it in the PPro timeline, edit the text if you want to, and then drop in the next graphic or copy and paste them. It will take about 2 minutes to add each graphic. 

The other advantage is that Premiere Pro will render four or five times faster than After Effects, you have far better control over the final audio mix and any audio repairs, and once you have one of the sequences done, all you have to do to build a new one is to duplicate the Sequence in the Project, or swap out the audio track for the new book and adjust a little timing. 

I hope this helps. 

[Lynnette7]

Thanks for the reply. I've figured out that the book is too long to do in one file. Not sure why AE let me import them all and I was able to scroll all the way to the end of the 15 hours at first, but then the next time I opened it, it was only 3 hours long. 

I tried Premiere pro, but it kept glitching on the import of some of the audio files. They are all exactly the same - MP3s. But there was at least one that it refused to import and I don't understand why. The file played perfectly fine. 

I also tried the whole 15 hours MP3 and it would not add that. So... Ugh, I'm going to have to create the book in parts. I'm currently rendering the first part and hope that I now have a pattern to use for future ones. (I just want to write books! 😉 )

[Rick Gerard]

The production standard for audio is a 48 kHz 16-bit wave file. It is easier for Premiere Pro to extract audio from a wav file than an MP3 because the audio is highly compressed.

A 15-hour project would normally be broken up into chapters, even if it is a novel hosted on a podcast/video cast channel. It would be rejected even if you could upload a 15-hour video to YouTube. The maximum file size, I think, is still 28GB, and the maximum length is 12 hours.

You also have to consider the listener/viewer. Nobody is going to want to download 15 hours of video. 

I suggest you check first with the firm that will host the podcast and see what their file recommendations are.  Feature films are cut into scenes, and the scenes are assembled into acts, and the acts are combined to make the final movie. A pro would never start on the first shot and cut to the last shot in a single timeline. You should consider the same thing for your video book. The audiobooks that I download or stream are almost always in chapter sections. That would be the way to produce your video novel.