Adobe Premiere Pro CS4 - Manual (Page 97)

91 USING ADOBE PREMIERE PRO CS4
Capturing, digitizing, transferring, and importing
Last updated 11/6/2011
Preparing still images before importing
Before you import a still image into Premiere Pro, prepare it as completely as possible to reduce rendering time. It’s
usually easier and faster to prepare a file in its original application. Consider doing the following:
• Make sure that the file format is supported by the operating system you plan to use.
• Set the pixel dimensions to the resolution you will use in Premiere Pro. If you plan to scale the image over time, set
image dimensions that provide enough detail at the largest size the image has in the project.
• For best results, create files with a frame size at least as large as the frame size of the project so that you don’t have
to scale up the image in Premiere Pro. Scaling an image larger than its original size can cause loss of sharpness. If
you plan to scale up an image, prepare it at a larger frame size than the project’s. For example, if you plan to scale
up an image 200%, prepare the image at double the project frame size before you import it.
• Crop the parts of the image that you don’t want to be visible in Premiere Pro.
• If you want to designate areas as transparent, create an alpha channel or use the transparency tools in applications
such as Photoshop or Illustrator.
• If final output will be shown on standard television screens, avoid using thin horizontal lines (such as 1-pixel lines)
for images or text. These may flicker as a result of interlacing. If you must use thin lines, add a slight blur so that
the lines appear in both video fields. See “
Interlaced video, noninterlaced video, and progressive scanning ” on
page 287.
• Save the file using the correct naming convention. For example, if you plan to import the file into Premiere Pro in
Windows, use a three-character filename extension.
• When you prepare still images in applications that support color management, such as Photoshop, colors may
appear more consistent between the application and Premiere Pro if you prepare images in a video-friendly color
space, such as sRGB or NTSC RGB.
Preparing 3D images or animations for import
When creating 3D images or animations for use in Premiere Pro, follow these guidelines whenever possible:
• Use broadcast-safe color filtering.
• Use the pixel aspect ratio and frame size specified in the sequence settings in Premiere Pro.
• Use the appropriate field settings to match your project.
• If you’re generating the sequence in After Effects, select Include, and choose either Project Link, or Project Link &
Source XMP Metadata, so that you can open the sequence in After Effects after importing it into Premiere Pro.
Importing Photoshop and Illustrator files
You can import files from Adobe Photoshop 3.0 or later, or from Adobe Illustrator. You can control how layered files
are imported. Empty (transparent) areas of nonflattened files are transparent when imported into Premiere Pro,
because the transparency is stored as an alpha channel. This lets you import graphics and superimpose them over clips
in other tracks with no extra effort.
You can import layered Photoshop files either with selected layers imported as individual clips into a bin, with selected
layers imported as individual clips into a bin and sequence, or with selected layers merged into a single video clip.
Also, you can import Photoshop files that contain video or animations if they are saved from Photoshop in timeline
animation mode.
Note: Individual layers moved from a Photoshop composition into a Premiere Pro project may not behave as expected.