Why doesn't media encoder use same frame numbers as after effects comps when you export?

[E_Cook]

I render out a lot of image sequences at work, b/c if you have a small change in the middle of an animation with lots of layers and effects, overwriting a few frames is a lot faster than a whole mp4. It drives me crazy that I can't patch up a few frames in the middle of a sequence with media encoder. I have to take the time to let AE render them, or downsave to another version which is inefficient.

Why isn't there the option of using the same frames numbers as the after effects comp that's been exported? I officially request this option in future updates. Unless anyone knows of a work around? I haven't been able to find one.

[Dave_LaRonde]

Mp4's use time code, not frame numbers.  So AME can't put frame numbers on them.  That's life.

It should be a fairly easy task to make changes in AE, render out the modified frames in a different folder, then do a copy & replace to the original folder.  You're set to make the whole thing again in AME if you wish.

[tmouffe2]

This question isn't answered - I am running into this problem as well.

When rendering out of AE, I can chose to use the Composition Frame number - making it easy to render out pieces of a comp and replace only those frames in the folder.  However, Media Encoder seems to only start it's counting at 0, making it not a useable option for image-sequence updates.

I second the request for Media Encoder to be able to "Use Comp Frame Number" when naming the images in a rendered image sequence.

[Dave_LaRonde]

tmouffe2  wrote

Media Encoder seems to only start it's counting at 0, making it not a useable option for image-sequence updates.

Why not?  A lot of image sequences start with Frame Zero.

[tmouffe2]

I use image sequences because I can update sections without rerendering the whole video - but I rely on AE to render the images with the Comp frame number so I only have to replace those frames.

So if I want to update the section from 0400 to 0950, I can render that section of the composition, then replace those frames in my folder, and my referenced image sequence now shows the update without relinking anything. If it always names the beginning frame 0000, then I have to rename that section using an Automator process so the right section of the sequence is updated.

[Dave_LaRonde]

No, that's not right.  if you want to re-render just a range of frames, then set the Work Area to that range of frames.  Render away.

[tmouffe2]

Yes, that works well out of AE, but Media Encoder doesn‘t provide the option to name the images based on their Comp frame number. If I set the range to 0400 - 0600, then it renders frame 0400 first, but names it 0000. It would be great to have Media Encoder able to render frame-stacks and name the files based on their frame in the composition or timeline.

[miles_els]

I have the same issue. Needing to insert fixed frame segments into a larger frame sequence (via AME rather than AE). I don't think Dave gets it.

There are other more fiddly file renaming methods as an alternative work around.

I think best we can do is file a feature request and hope for the best in the future.

[diogo.sa.vfx]

Hi Dave, sorry but caps locking an info that is not accurate just doesn't feel right does it?
Yor comment is from 2019 so there's a chance that AME simply didn't have that feature yet, but anyways, you currently can export in image sequence files like EXR sequences for example and maybe there should also be other formats that allow you to export image sequences. The only problem with AME, that still exists, is that no matter which frame it is in After Effects that you start the export on, AME will always rename the first frame to frame 0.

[Dave_LaRonde]

tmouffe2  wrote

Yes, that works well out of AE, but Media Encoder doesn‘t provide the option to name the images based on their Comp frame number.

Do you know what that means?  YOU CAN'T USE AME!  Use AE's Render Queue instead.    AME does allow you to make image sequences, so I don't know what your particular deal is.

[miles_els]

Sorry Dave, didn't mean to troll you.

One of the problems going forward is that we are being pushed more to render with AME rather than direct from AE. Thats great for some things (e.g. mp4s) but some render options are slowly being removed from AE and certain features are not yet available in AME (such as the above example of not being able to render a segment of a file sequence with the AE comps frame numbers)

[tmouffe2]

Yes, so unfortunately problem still stands, and the “answer” seems to be “AME can’t do this thing we want it to do.”

[Soluis02]

For someone who considers himself an expert and has a habbit of talking down to people who are beginners Dave seems fairly ignorant of how AME works compared to AE when rendering frames, please read the post before trying to give an unghelpfull answer and asking the poster to restate the obvious. 

So  in answer to this....yeah  i also find this frustrating. Media encoder will always name its firsts frame as 0 no matter where in the sequence you are and to make it more frustrating if you have to rename these to merge back with the sequence  it doesnt give you the correct padding and there are no options to set this like in AE. so if it renders 10 frames padding will be  00, if 100 its 000 even if your sequence has a padding of 4. It seams very short sighted of adobe not to have the same level of control of this when AME is designed for rendering but seems to have less flexibility and options than AE does.

However i would suggest if you can rendering as a losslless video format rather than an image sequence as image sequences take longer to render to and from than a video file. Pro res, Cineform, AvidDnxHD are all lossless video files which will scrub fast in premiere..also meaning you are more likley to spot mistakes before final render.  I tend to render and call it 'Render name_P0000 so i know what frame it starts at and drop it into my losless composition that i will do my final render from, usually premiere. This doesnt help if you want one clean sequence but i find it a more efficient workflow than using png's all the time. 

[Lcdmourao]

Dude, everyone and their mother knows it can be done in AE, that was never the issue. Nor was MP4 time code.

[Lcdmourao]

Because we need it to start at frame not zero.

[weichenw]

Great, so by the time I post, AME still can't do it. By reading thru the whole post, I reckon Dave didn't get it...It's such a pain in the arse. Is it such a difficult task to implement such a simple feature into AME?

Anyways, what I usually end up doing is to batch rename those sequence images in Bridge, which has a simple and straightforward batch renaming command.

[Lcdmourao]

I'm having the same issue, it was painful to read through Dave's answer. How can it be that hard to understand that the issue is PRECISELY to render a sequence in AME with proper naming? The guy goes around and around talking about MP4 and being condescending. Jesus, that's frustrating.

[maximelabate]

Same issue. 

It was indeed painful to read Dave's answer, who obviously doesn't understand the request.

Adobe, we need to be able to "USE COMP FRAME NUMBER" in AME.

Please.

[Motion Videos UK]

Yes! That is all we need! It should be such as simple thing for them to sort out.

[Ofcourse 88]

Hi guys, i have been facing this crazy issue long time... I cannot understand why this issue is still there 😞

[Lcdmourao]

I thought of a work around this issue, save the sequence to a different folder and use a batch naming program to rename the frame numbers. Just google batch rename files and you will find many ways to do it. 
After you've properly named them move them back to the original sequence and replace the old frames.

[hkrol83]

I'm facing the same issue. I'm rendering using AME (as I think adobe wants me to).

Simply setting the name to frame.0123.exr instead of frame..exr should result in starting the naming at 0123 in my opinion.

[doctorsney]

Hi there, I'm having exact same issue - no disrespect to Dave but he's just not understood the problem and this question is most definitely not answered.

I'm at a clients office and the setup is CC 2019 (and there I was thinking I was being a smarty pants rendering to PNG instead of a complete movie.... FACEPALM)

[Baobaob]

Hi I just want to give my support to all of you guys trying to explain what original poster means, yes we need Adobe Media Encoder to not offer less rendering options than After Effects itself as it is supposed to be a dedicated rendering software, and yet if you need it to name the files according to frame number the same way After Effects does it, you can't, and this doesn't make sense.
If you never encountered this issue or don't care about it, then fine it doesn't apply to your workflow, but for some of us it does, and it is really weird that AE would offer that and they took that feature out for AME. The point os AME is to free AE so you can keep working while you render... And this is not a technical limitation, just poor coordination in the coding department.

[parahulta]

I'm frustrated by the same issue, but with Premiere instead of AE. The bummer is, in addition to AME, Premier native export doesn't support "comp frame numbers" (timecode) either.

My project uses a lot of heavy filters, and exporting the whole timeline is very slow. In the past Premiere has also sometimes crashed in the middle of the render, so it would be really nice to be able to re-export only parts of the timeline at a time and get frame numbers correct.