3_Project

The Project View mirrors our project structure for working files, allows us to catalog tasks based on shots, and keeps track of renders.

Tabs

Different tabs mirror different folders in the file structure and allow us to track information in each one.

AE tab

1. This + button adds a new shot. It will bring up a dialogue and ask for a shot name. Each project will probably have a different naming structure, but the general rule is "brief and logical--either a shot number or a tasks description, and often prefixed with a two-three letter organizer".

2. The After Effects Projects grid shows all the current shots and allows for Status, Phase, Assignment, and Priority tracking.

   • Status options
     To Do
     For Approval
     Retake
     Approved
     Posted
     None

   • Phase options
     On Hold
     Offline
     Online
     Shipped
     Killed
     None

   • Phase options such as Shipped, Killed and On Hold will dim the task so you know they are not currently in play.

   • Priority will highlight the task to mark it as "important."

3. This area is reserved for thumbnails. Click to select a new image from your computer, and it will transcode that image to a thumbnail and upload it to the app.

4. This area is for a brief note about the shot. This note can be a status note or any other form of reminder/FYI--it's akin to our old Budibase "artist note," if anyone remembers that.

5. This panel will list all the project files for the shot. Double-clicking on a project will open it.

6. This panel tracks all the renders in the shot's render folder.

7. Right-clicking on files in these views will create an additional context menu with more actions, including link-sharing and path-copying functions.

Open in Windows Explorer

This section will show the file path for a shot and provide a button to open that folder in Windows Explorer.

AE Rendering

In this view, you can render a project with aerender from the context menu.

Click Start Rendering to begin a render.

3D Tab

Functionally similar to the AE tab, the 3D tab will instead show folders for image sequences in the render section. The + icon up top will create a new shot with our project template.

3D Rendering

You can send a file to render in Deadline in the Project Files context menu.

In the Deadline dialogue, set a frame range like 1-120 and a frame chunk (how many frames each node is allocated in a single task) like 5 and press submit.

Premiere tab

(functionally the same as the AE tab, but for Premiere projects)

Assets tab

In this tab, we are cataloging project assets. The left panel lists root folders with asset names in our Assets folder. The right panel shows the folder contents.

1. The Add New Asset button creates a different dialogue than our previous tabs. In this window, we can create a new folder and tag the folder with category names. Press Cntrl to select more than one category. You don't need to add a date to the file name; type a brief folder name, and the window will automatically append a prefixed date-stamp.
2. This button will open the folder in Windows Explorer.

NOTE: As of right now, you can't drag or drop from to/from Windows Explorer, but that would be nice to have eventually.

Posts Tab

Functionally Similar to the Assets tab, the Posts tab shows a post where we stage postings for groups of files. Essentially, this folder is an "organized" renders folder for sharing multiple files with other departments or outside parties. We copy renders from AE or Premiere and place them here for an organized "share."

Our New Post Folder button allows us to select a posting type for organizational purposes.

MP4 Transcoding

A unique context menu function for Posts is Transcode to MP4. This function will transcode a selection of files to MP4 for postings online (like in Frame.io).

A progress bar will appear, and transcodes will be rendered to a mp4 subfolder.