Importing rendered images in video editors

[streameru]

I hope I understand your question correctly...

Assuming you render out of maya with an alpha channel of your animation (with a video codec or image format that supports alpha channels), you should be able to bring in your live video with you 3d video and overlay the 2 with your video editing app / compositing app of choice (premiere, final cut express or pro, avid, shake, afx, nuke, fusion, combusition, jakarta, motion, etc).

If you don't have an NLE or composting app and you absolutely need to use photoshop, have you thought about making a "photoshop action" to automate the process?

I do know that Quicktime's Animation codec set to 100% quality will support an alpha channel ("million of colors +" I believe is the option when rendering out as a quicktime movie).

Most people that I know, prefer to render out image sequences from there 3d app. Image formats such as tiff, tga, and png can support alpha channels. This workflow has the advantage of a quicker recovery if the render crashes. You only lose the frame that was being rendered and any remaining frames...not the whole quicktime/avi file...

just some thoughts....

me

[DJStratoArt]

I'm trying to layer a 3D animation with a transparent background over a live action footage. The current method for me is to go frame by frame in photoshop. It's taking too much time. What I want to do is render an image sequence in maya and import it as a video file without losing the transparent background. It works frame by frame, you just place frame 1 of 3D animation over frame 1 of video footage but its time consuming. I wonder if there is a way to do this video to video instead of frame by frame.

The best way (and easiest) is to use Adobe After Effects or Final Cut Pro. I use Cinema 4D and AE myself. I just render out the 3D animation with an alpha and bring that into AE and drop it on the live action (or behind it, depending on the scene).

Photoshop was never meant to be a video effects editor, that's what After Effects and FCP are for.

If the price is too steep you can check out Open Source Alternatives which are free. Just be mindful that these may not be as powerful as AE and FCP but they may be just what you need rather than using Photoshop, which is really meant for static imagery. Here's the link to the open source stuff. http://www.osalt.com/ (http://www.osalt.com/)

Good Luck,

~DJ

[DJStratoArt]

I don't know why this posted twice, please delete duplicate

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