Pre Render in After Effects, huge files, better way to export and save?

[Letty2019]

Hello, I wanted to do all my color correction and Upscaling for a long project (90mins proejct) in After Effects.

I would export a few scenes in PPro and import (dynamic link) to AE, then Upscale/clean up, add color.. then Pre Render lossless.

I thought I would Pre Render lossless so when PPro uses it thru dynamic link, it will be easier to process when burning to disc... ?? is that right??

But problem is, the file size on the PreRendering is huge.  I'm using lossless...  14 sec clips at 2 GB ? yikes.  Good for a few scenes, but can't do a whole movie.

Should I just do color correction in AE and use dynamic link back to PPro, without doing that lossless Pre Rendering?  

OR should I be using PPro for all the corrections and don't bother with AE?

Thing is, I need to Upscale and AE has that great upscale tool and removes noise with bicubic settings, that can multiply 1 pixel into 5.  Gives the scene a nice smooth look.  PPro doesn't have that, PPro only has regular frame size upscale increase, looks OK, but it's not as smooth with AE's bicubic and noise reduction. 

I wish PPro had some kind of noise cleaner, that took on pixel and turned it into 5 , like AE.

So to wrap up:  I need AE Upscale (unless PPro has something like it?)  and should I use dynamic link for the whole film (in many pcs) OR use AE's pre render lossless and make lots of videos and bring those back into PPro?

You awesome advice is highly needed and appreciated.

Thanks for reading.

Letty

[Szalam · Accepted solution]

I wouldn't render completely lossless out of AE. I'd use QuickTime format with the ProRes codec (422 is probably fine).

Smaller file sizes and it's still visually lossless.

That said, I wouldn't use Dynamic Link at all. When I'm doing this sort of work, I usually edit in Premiere Pro, import my Premiere Pro project into AE (using AE's Import Premiere Pro Project command, and then do my work all in AE. Then render out ProRes (or Cineform or DNxHD) out of AE and (if needed) import those back into Premiere Pro for audio work, etc.

[Letty2019]

Thanks Szalam, that sounds great.... because then PPro won't have to deal with all the loose ends of finding pieces of data and rendering stuff and no dynamic link, which probably slows down disc creation.

OK, I am jazzed up now!!

1 Big question left:

When I pre render out of AE, using ProRes, and then importing those ProRes files back into PPro, is there a problem making a disc because the film clip was compressed twice?  ie: ProRes compression and then H.264 for bluray creation.  (my final destination is Bluray)

thank you, Thank You, THANK YOU!!

Can't thank you enough, looking forward to your reply.

Letty 🙂

[Szalam]

There's no issue doing it that way because of how high quality ProRes is.

You can test this by doing ProRes 444, if you want (which is technically lossless) and comparing it to ProRes 422. There's no quality loss at all going to 444, but I doubt you'll notice a difference between that and 422. 

[Letty2019]

Thanks again! 

[Szalam]

No problem!