Nexrender: Is it able to bridge AME to render?

[chawyehsu]

It looks like it's a tool designed for After Effects, but AME has much more output configurations while AE doesn't, like, nowadays AE doesn't have H.264/MP4 codec by default.

update 2020-02-02: AME scripting guide docs

[inlife]

It was designed for a bit older AE versions indeed. They still had h264 codec.

I'm not sure however if there is a way to bridge those two. However thats something im planning on researching in the future

[inlife]

https://forums.adobe.com/thread/2230567

ability to create a a render job for AME using scripting

// Scripting support for Queue in AME.
// Requires Adobe Media Encoder 11.0.
{
    if (app.project.renderQueue.canQueueInAME == true)
    {
        // Send queued items to AME, but do not start rendering.
        app.project.renderQueue.queueInAME(false);
    }
    else {
        alert("There are no queued item in the Render Queue.");
    }
}

possibly can be implemented as an additional driver alongside the default aerender

[chawyehsu]

AME is still a good alternative to AERender, especially with its multiprocessing/multicore rendering functionality, not only the codecs part. It's really helpful and life-saving on reducing rendering time. This feature of implementing an optional AME driver should be considered to have a higher priority.

[dukuo]

Hi! is there any updates on this? I tried rendering a 1 frame JPEG image and it takes 15 seconds, which is already impressive being outside of AfterFX but its still a lot of time for a single frame.

[inlife]

Unfortunately no updates.

[dukuo]

@inlife thanks for the reply.

My current solution is to take a screenshot within a JSX script:

// Takes a screenshot of a composition and saves it.

{

    var curItem, myComp;
    var compNames = [];

    var theCompName = "TEST_COMP_PREVIEW_FRAME";

    for(var i = 1; i < app.project.items.length; i++){

        curItem = app.project.items[i];

        if(curItem instanceof CompItem){
            compNames.push(curItem.name);

            if(curItem.name == theCompName){  //Will grab only the first name match
                alert("FOUND COMP, attempting to take a Screenshot...");

                // Select the newly found item as activeItem
                app.project.item(i).selected = true;

                // Global Vars
                var theComp = app.project.activeItem;

                var time = 0;

                // Save frame to PNG
                theComp.saveFrameToPng(time, File("C:/path/" + curItem.name + ".png"));

                break;

            }

        }

    }

}

Is there any way to avoid rendering and just execute a script?

[dukuo]

Also, I didn't know how to properly add a composition to the queue, so for anyone that's wondering, here's the code I've gathered :

// Scripting support for Queue in AME.
// Requires Adobe Media Encoder 11.0.
{

    var curItem, myComp;

    for(var i = 1; i < app.project.items.length; i++){

        curItem = app.project.items[i];

        if(curItem instanceof CompItem){

            if(curItem.name == "TEST_COMP_PREVIEW_FRAME"){  //Will grab only the first name match

                var qItem = app.project.renderQueue.items.add(curItem);
                qItem.outputModules[1].file = new File("C:/path/output.mp4");

                break;

            }

        }

    }

    if (app.project.renderQueue.canQueueInAME == true) { // Send queued items to AME, but do not start rendering.
        app.project.renderQueue.queueInAME(true);
    } else {
        alert("There are no queued item in the Render Queue.");
    }
}

[chawyehsu]

I just found the AME scripting documentation and attached it to the issue. A quick look and I found it's possible to start AME render queue by run app.getEncoderHost().runBatch(). I don't have much time currently. Let's see if someone would like to dive into it.

[atitkothari]

Also, I didn't know how to properly add a composition to the queue, so for anyone that's wondering, here's the code I've gathered :

// Scripting support for Queue in AME.
// Requires Adobe Media Encoder 11.0.
{

    var curItem, myComp;

    for(var i = 1; i < app.project.items.length; i++){

        curItem = app.project.items[i];

        if(curItem instanceof CompItem){

            if(curItem.name == "TEST_COMP_PREVIEW_FRAME"){  //Will grab only the first name match

                var qItem = app.project.renderQueue.items.add(curItem);
                qItem.outputModules[1].file = new File("C:/path/output.mp4");

                break;

            }

        }

    }

    if (app.project.renderQueue.canQueueInAME == true) { // Send queued items to AME, but do not start rendering.
        app.project.renderQueue.queueInAME(true);
    } else {
        alert("There are no queued item in the Render Queue.");
    }
}

I used this and it started rendering in AME. Although, it does not pick up any of the dynamic assets that I pass in the jobn.json file. I'm injecting the jsx script as a type:"script" in the job.json file.
How do I make sure it picks up all the dynamic assets and then renders in AME?

[atitkothari]

Ah, I just answered my question.

If I pass the script as the last object in the assets array, it works as expected!

Which brings me to my next question. How do I make sure aerender does not start rendering. Right now, both AME and aerender starts rendering the comp.

Thanks!

[inlife]

Hey @atitkothari

Essentially what aerender does is triggers commandLineRenderer.jsx script, which in turn eventually triggers the execution of this line: https://github.com/inlife/nexrender/blob/master/packages/nexrender-core/src/assets/commandLineRenderer.jsx#L783

What you could do, is comment out this line in your version of the file in the Scripts folder and you would achieve what you are looking for.

[atitkothari]

@inlife Thanks for getting back so quickly!

Commenting that line in /Applications/Adobe After Effects CC 2019/Scripts/Startup/commandLineRenderer.jsx worked!

Thanks 🎊