Color management workflow in Adobe After Effects CS4
4
Workflow overview
This workflow takes you through the following steps:
1 Setting up the After Effects project.
2 Importing footage, including still images.
3 (Optional) Editing images in Photoshop CS4.
4 Outputting files.
Step 1: Set up the After Effects project
1 Start After Effects and create a new project (choose File > New > New Project).
2 Open the Project Settings dialog box (choose File > Project Settings). In the Project Settings
dialog box, select the following options:
Choose 16 Bits Per Channel from the Depth menu.
•
Working with 16 bits per channel
when compositing reduces artifacts and image degradation when pixels are altered
in the After Effects project. Even though a project may be rendered and output to
8 bits per channel, the additional pixel information protects against unwanted and
unnecessary quality loss in final output.
If you are concerned about preserving overbrights, consider using the 32 Bits Per
Channel (float) option. However, some After Effects effects will not work in 32 bpc
mode, and render time will increase.
Choose the HDTV (Rec. 709) ICC profile from the Working Space menu.
•
Choosing
a working color space for the project turns on color management for the project,
allowing you to convert the colors of imported footage into a common color space
for compositing. Compositing in a common color space allows for more consistent
rendering of the effects that you apply in your After Effects project. The HDTV (Rec.
709) profile is a good choice for a project’s working color space. The primary colors
and gamma are a close match to those used in HDTV camera equipment, and the
defined luminance is based on scene lighting, not the darker lighting found in pre-
sentation viewing environments.
Check Compensate For Scene-referred Profiles.
•
Checking this option allows After
Effects to make necessary gamma and contrast adjustments to your footage. See
the “Scene and presentation environment profiles” section of Appendix B for more
details.
Step 2: import footage, including graphics
After you have created your After Effects project, you are ready to import and work with footage,
including movies, still raster images, and vector graphics from other sources. In some cases,
files that you import will have ICC (International Color Consortium) color profiles embedded
in them. Examples of this case may be still images created or edited using Photoshop. In these
cases, you can import the footage confident that you will see colors as the producer of the footage
originally intended. In other cases, footage will not have an ICC profile embedded; QuickTime
video files and GIF still images are examples of this type of footage. In this case, you can assign
an ICC profile in the Interpret Footage dialog box and bring that footage into the After Effects
project for accurate color viewing and compositing.
1 Choose File > Import > File and select the footage you wish to import.
2 Choose File > Interpret Footage > Main and click the Color Management tab. This dialog box
allows you to select an ICC profile to define the color appearance of your footage, independent
from the color characteristics of your monitor.
For DV files:
•
After Effects will automatically select the correct color space for DV
files and files using an uncompressed YCbCr format. You will not have an option
to select a color space in the Interpret Footage dialog box. For formats that aren’t
handled automatically (e.g., third-party codecs), you can choose the color space
in the Interpret Footage dialog box. For this case, if you know that a particular
QuickTime DV file was created using standard-definition camera equipment, choose
linEAr lighT ComPoSiTing
After Effects allows you to composite footage and
images using a gamma of 1.0 (linear light). You can
use this feature by selecting the Linearize Working
Space option in the Project Settings dialog box. This
option allows you to apply effects and composite
colors for a more natural rendering of colors and tone.
A color depth of 16 or 32 bpc is recommended when
using this feature.
NOTE:
Because the video-out path for preview on ref-
erence monitors is not color-managed, colors defined
using a gamma of 1.0 will not correctly render to the
reference monitor screen. Colors will look excessively
dark. If you would like to work using a linear light proj-
ect working space, then view compositions, layers,
and footage on your computer monitor instead of
your reference monitor.
linEAr blEnding in PhoToShoP
If you would like to use linear blending in Photoshop,
specify linear blending in the Photoshop Color
Settings dialog box (choose Edit > Color Settings).
Click the More Options button and select Blend RGB
Colors Using Gamma. Use the default value of 1.00.
Interpret Footage
- QuickTime movies (MOV)
(
HDTV (Rec. 709), SDTV NTSC, SDTV PAL
)
Interpret Footage
- vector graphics (PDF)
(
ICC profile embedded in image
)
Interpret Footage
- raster graphics (TIFF, JPEG, DNG)
(
ICC profile embedded in image
)
computer monitor
(
your monitor profile
)
project working space
(
HDTV (Rec. 709)
)
HD reference monitor
Figure 2 - Interpreting footage and assigning ICC profiles to
footage. After Effects converts footage and image colors to
the project working space for compositing.
