Playblast Settings - Danimation/Animation-Resources GitHub Wiki

Playblast settings can be changed at any time but I have a few preferred settings that I usually use.

When setting up your playblasts you want to be aware of a couple of settings:

1. Format and Encoding
2. Quality
3. Display Size
4. File name and save location

Format and Encoding

By default, Maya has two options for formats Image and Avi. But you can get a third option if you have the QT/H.264 Codec which you can get by installing Quicktime.

• Image

Will create an image sequence from the viewport. I don't recommend using this format unless you are planning to bring the sequence into a Premiere or After Effects. You can use multiple encoding options but I recommend PNG.

• AVI

This is Maya's default video format for playblasts. It works fairly well but tends to create fairly large files as opposed to other formats. There are a couple of encoding options for AVI but I recommend using the IYUV encoding as it creates a fairly small video file.

• QT

This is the format that uses the Quicktime Codecs and creates an MP4 video file. The advantage of using this format is that it creates a much smaller video than AVI. When it comes to encoding for the QT format I recommend using H.264 encoding option, this will create a relatively small .mp4 file for your playblast.

Quality

When you change the values in the quality settings, a scale of 0-100, it changes the quality of the video but not the resolution of the video. Ideally you want to keep this value between 80 - 100. Lower values tend to cause Pixelation which can make it hard to make out smaller details in your hands and facial features.

Display Size

This will adjust the size of the video and can be controlled through the render settings.

To access the render settings you can use two different methods:

• Navigate to Window > Rendering Editors > Render Settings.

• Alternatively, you can click on the Maya status line.

In the render settings you can change the size of the playblast by choosing one of the options in the Presets drop down.

I recommend choosing either the HD 720 or the HD 1080 option for a decent resolution video.

File name and save location

You want to make sure that you have selected the option to save your playblast or you wont be able to access your video after you close the media player.

Maya's default location for playblast will be either the "Movies" or "Data" folder in your set project, so make sure you always set your project before you start animating.

To make sure you know what your playblast is going to be named and where it is going to save, you want to change the text in the "Movie File:" to the name you want to have for your playblast, then you can click the "Browse" button to choose where the file is going to be saved.