Previewing Effects
Most effects must be rendered so you can preview them properly. Some effects can be displayed in the OpenGL view, but most of them must be rendered and previewed in the Render Mode of the Camera view.
Once you preview your effect, you may want to adjust it. By default, as soon as you modify a parameter, Harmony will recalculate the preview image. If your scene is heavy and you do not want the preview rendered automatically, deselect the Auto-Render option and do the preview update manually.
You might also need to play back your animation and see the final effect before final rendering. But first, you must connect a Render Preview node to each effect.
You cannot play back your animation in Render mode. You must perform a render or a preview render to see your animation with the final effects
To make your previews calculate faster, you may want to render them at a smaller resolution. You can use the Preview Resolution command so you will not have to modify the resolution of your scene every time you make a check preview.
The Preview Resolution command allows you to quickly get a preview at three-quarter, half, one-third, or one-quarter of the scene resolution. You can even customize the preview resolution size.
- In the Camera view status bar, click the Render Mode button.
In the bottom-right corner of the Camera view, the progress bar indicates the status of the render. Depending on the size of the frame to render, it may take several seconds.
- In the Camera view status bar, click the Auto-Render button. In the top menu, you can enable and disable Scene > Render > Auto-Render.
Once the Auto-Render option is disabled, you must request the preview update by clicking the Auto-Render button.
- In the Camera view status bar, click the Render button.
- To adjust the effect's visual controls in OpenGL mode, from the Node Library view, drag a Render Preview node to the Node view. Connect it between the effect and the Composite nodes.
- In the Camera view, enable the OpenGL mode to see the rendered effect in OpenGL.
As you modify the effect's parameters and controls, the frames are rendered to ensure a real-time playback. The larger the resolution and the heavier the effect, the longer the rendering process will take. Green frames are rendered, red frames are pending and yellow frames are rendering.
- To display the controls, select the node in the Node view, and do one of the following:
‣ | In the Camera View toolbar, click the Show Controlbutton. |
‣ | From the top menu, select View > Show > Control. |
‣ | Press Shift + F11 (Windows/Linux) or ⌘ + F11 (Mac OS X). |
The controls appear.
- In the Tools toolbar, select the Transform tool or press Shift + T.
- In the Camera view, adjust the controls.
- To set the preview parameters, click the yellow square properties button on the Preview Render node.
The Preview Render properties display.
Parameter Description Name Allows you to change the node's name.
Preview Resolution Lets you set the resolution used to generate the preview. Resolutions range from 1/4 to 1/64th of the scene resolution. Outdated Images Mode Do Not Render: Does not render any effects in your scene.
Show Without Effects: Shows the outdated images without any effect.
Use Previously Rendered: Uses the previously rendered images. The old images will be used until the new ones are rendered.
Pre-render Next Frames Starts a pre-render job for every frame of the timeline.
- In the Playback toolbar, click the Render and Play button.
The Play node opens and loads the frames.
- Once the frames are loaded, click the Play button in the Play window.
- Select Scene > Render > Cancel Preview Render to cancel the rendering.
NOTE: While previewing effects, you can press the Spacebar to stop and start playback.
- From the top menu, select View > Preview Resolution and one of the following:
‣ | Same as Scene Resolution |
‣ | 3/4 of Scene Resolution |
‣ | 1/2 of Scene Resolution |
‣ | 1/3 of Scene Resolution |
‣ | 1/4 of Scene Resolution |
‣ | Custom |
If you selected the Custom option, the Custom Preview Resolution dialog box opens.
- In the dialog box, select a resolution from the presets or type a new X-Y value.
- Click OK.
- Preview your effects animation.