With some reflection, it would have come from a time when After Effects only processed images in 8-bit, so if a 3rd party plugin such as Ultimatte was doing internal calculations in 16 or even 32bit, maybe (just maybe…) there was something to be gained by letting the plugin work with the original data… but I think I’m being kind.Īround this period I had the good fortune to win a raffle at a local user group meeting, and I was able to prove for myself that this advice was best ignored.
Over twenty years later, I have no idea where I read that or why I remember it. Pre-processing was just stripping out useful detail that the plugin needed. The rationale was that dedicated keying algorithms were more sophisticated than After Effects itself, and so it was best to deliver as much information to the plugin as possible. At some point early on in my career, I came across a post that said when keying in After Effects, you should not pre-process the footage. As with all online communities, there could be good advice, bad advice, advice which was good but became outdated, rumours, speculation, all intermingled with a healthy dose of enthusiasm. As video production moved to desktop computers, online communities sprung up with users from all around the world offering advice, sharing experiences and eventually making and sharing free tutorials. The introduction to this series outlined the many technical changes to video production since the late 1990s, the period we can call the “ desktop video revolution“. To pre or not to pre, that is the question
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