Sorry, I’m been off AE for a bit as busy with Symphony recording that happens Friday and last big upgrade of gear (2 more 64GB workstations, total storage to 250 TB etc.).

 

But here’s what can be done in AE and what problems you will have.

 

1.       First, unless people are going to be closer than 2 feet to the TVs, 4K per screen does no apparent good. I sold my Seiki 50” 4k and got a Dell 32” 4K Ultrasharp. You need to be about 18 to 24 inches to discern distance.

2.       Second, I routinely use 30,000 x 30,000 comps (AE’s max) as I have quite a few image sources that are far larger than that. Due to AE’s frame buffer limitations, that requires manually tiling any bitmaps and/or nesting comps with effects that require a solid and frame buffer storage. The only good news is collapse transformations can be used here.

3.       A vector based composition with math type effects that don’t require solids and frame buffer storage (I’m speculating here on AE’s internal architecture) i.e. text works fine at those resolutions. Also, if you can work at 8-bit it helps a lot. 16-bit (my minimum) and 32-bit (about half my film) really make things hard.

4.       If you do use footage, stills etc. that require frame buffer processing, you will need as much RAM per core as possible. I require 6GB per core for my 6K comps that many have nested comps up to 30,000 x 30,000 with tile images.

5.       Get the an SSD dedicate to AE cache – you will want 256 to 500 GB for decent fast cache for 4K previews. Even a 1TB would not be overkill if your master is over 4K.

 

stephen van vuuren

336.202.4777

 

http://www.insaturnsrings.com/

http://www.sv2dcp.com/

http://www.sv2studios.com/

 

A film is – or should be – more like music than like fiction. It should be a progression of moods and feelings. The theme, what’s behind the emotion, the meaning, all that comes later.

–Stanley Kubrick

 

From: After Effects Mail List [mailto:AE-List@media-motion.tv] On Behalf Of Teddy Gage
Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2014 12:40 PM
To: After Effects Mail List
Subject: Re: [AE] Thoughts on ultra-high resolution