User Guide

CHAPTER 11
348
Managing Projects Effectively
Using a prerendered movie in place of a nested composition also saves time and memory
when you render the final version of the main composition. Just be sure to apply your final
output settings when you prerender the nested composition. For more information about
rendering options, see “Changing render settings” on page 358.
There are three phases to prerendering a composition:
• Creating a composition. See “Creating a composition” on page 101.
• Rendering the composition you created. See “Understanding rendering and compres-
sion” on page 354.
• Creating a proxy using the rendered composition. See “Substituting a low-resolution
proxy for footage” on page 99.
To edit a prerendered composition:
1 In the Project window, click the proxy indicator for the prerendered composition until
it displays an empty box. This turns off the proxy so that After Effects uses the actual
composition in the project.
2 In the Project window, double-click the composition from which the proxy movie was
rendered.
3 Edit the composition.
4 Save the project.
5 Render the composition into a movie again, using the same filename as the previous
version of the movie.
6 After rendering is complete, set up the movie as a proxy for the composition. The next
time you view the composition containing the movie, the new movie is displayed.
Understanding precomposing
Sometimes it’s necessary to nest compositions after you have already created a complex
project hierarchy. It can be tedious or difficult to use nesting in an existing composition.
Precomposing is an easier way to nest layers within an existing composition. Precomposing
moves the layers to a new composition. When you want to change the order in which layer
components are rendered (see “Understanding default rendering order” on page 343),
precomposing is a quick way to create intermediate levels of nesting in an existing hierarchy.
UG.book Page 348 Wednesday, February 21, 2001 12:05 PM