Animation Video File Sizes?

Bob G · Post by **Bob G** » Thu Apr 05, 2012 9:36 pm

Thanks to some excellent help from Jonbo on image importing, I've been able to complete my first animation video but I was pretty surprised by how large the file was. This is my first experience with creating and managing animation video files and I'd like a sanity check on what size to expect. QUESTION: Is the file size of about 700MB+ reasonable for the animation video describe below....I hope this description is sufficent.

1. Video type: AVI
2. Video duration: About 18 seconds
3. Animation: 1 Static Character made up of 1 bone layer and 4 image layers but not animated. 1 Dyamic charater structurally the same as the first but animated and following a follow path for all of the 18 seconds.
4. 3 image layers made visible on and off to create a blinking effect.
5. Audio: About 6 seconds of audio on one track.
NOTE: When I saved as an AVI file, I selected "interlaced" vs. "non-interlaced".

All help appreicated.
Bob G.

Post by **Víctor Paredes** » Thu Apr 05, 2012 9:44 pm

No, I recommend you to try quicktime mov h264, or some other quicktime format.

Bob G · Post by **Bob G** » Thu Apr 05, 2012 10:03 pm

Selgen,
Thx. for the response. I'm using Anime Studio Pro 8 and it gives me the following options when I try to export a video: AVI movie, JPEG, BMP, Targa, PNG, PSD, and Flash (SWF). Given that set of choices, how can I get to a "Quicktime mov h264" end result???
Cheers,
Bob G.

Post by **Víctor Paredes** » Thu Apr 05, 2012 10:05 pm

You need to download quicktime player, once you have it installed, AS will offer mov export format.

Bob G · Post by **Bob G** » Thu Apr 05, 2012 10:12 pm

Selgen,
Got it. Thx. I'll give that try. Note: I happen to have a new system and I've not yet downloaded Quicktime.
Cheers,
Bob G

hayasidist · Post by **hayasidist** » Fri Apr 06, 2012 1:21 am

for sure AVI can be big files but 700Mb for an uncompressed AVI is what I'd expect... obviously depends on frame rate and size - an SD TV frame is way smaller than a cinema quality 4K.. but, for example, HDTV - 1080p25 [1920*1080] is (+/-) ...

25 fps * 18 secs * 2 Mb per frame = 900Mb.

if you want smaller files then you have to accept that many (not all) codecs are "lossy".

Bob G · Post by **Bob G** » Fri Apr 06, 2012 2:29 am

hayasidsit,
Thx. for the input. My use case is lightweight when it comes to image quality because it only requires posting video's on things like Facebook and YouTube. I figured that 700MB+ for 18 secs was a bit much for that. Hopefully the Quicktime will reduce he file size to something that is good for my use case. I'll try it tonight.
Cheers,
Bob G.

Bob G · Post by **Bob G** » Fri Apr 06, 2012 3:03 am

selgen, hayasidist...
Anime is pretty slick software. I downloaded QuickTime, closed and re-opened Amime without doing a system restart, and successfully exported my animation to QuickTime in less than 20 mins. or so

I used the default compression type MPEG-4 Video and the file size went from 700MB+ with AVI to 4.7MB with QuickTime! The rendering of the movie was perfectly fine. I can't see any difference between AVI and QT.
Thanks again for you help.
Cheers,
Bob G.