Rendering

When you are done with motion tracking, i.e. one or several segments were created, arranged, and processed and the Preview shows satisfactory results, the next step is to extract the results from PatchMaker. You have the following options:

To output the obtained object or background motion in a format accessible by other applications (e.g., AE). This is most suitable when additional effects are to be selectively applied to the overlay or underlay, such as Motion Blur, available in AE, which relies on the knowledge of motion. The File|Copy Transforms command copies the obtained motion data to the Windows clipboard in the text format, while the File|Export Transforms… command stores these data in a specified file. On the other hand, PatchMaker comes with an AE plug-in that takes care of easy data exchange (including motion data) between AE and PatchMaker. See Communicating After Effects^® for details.
To produce a video sequence showing the moving overlay with an alpha channel alone. Their motion will be synchronized with that of the underlay. You will still need a compositing tool to combine both into one, but now you do not need to worry about the motion parameters.
If no further processing is planned for the underlay and overlay, their composition can be rendered by PatchMaker itself.

To use options 2 or 3, you need to choose the appropriate command from the File|Render menu:

All rendering operations apply only to frames in the composition work area.

If the current task is stabilizing (the Task property of the composition is set to Motion Compensation) then the Composition… command can be used to export the stabilized underlay alone or the underlay composed with the overlay. What is actually rendered depends on the current display mode. If the overlay is visible, it is included in the output sequence.

Having selected one of these two commands, you will be asked to specify a folder for the output sequence:

The File Name field contains the given name for the first frame in the composition work area. The output file names are derived from those of the underlay and cannot be changed unless the output sequence is an AVI file. However, you can select the output image format by changing the file name extension.

When the rendering starts, a progress indicator will appear, and frames being saved to disk will be displayed in the View window. You can abort the operation at any moment by clicking Cancel:

The default rendering format and other settings can be changed by selecting the menu item File|Preferences|Rendering Format:

Here you have a choice between AVI and other image sequence formats. In the case of AVI you have to select and adjust a codec for video compression. In the submenu, all installed AVI codecs are listed. The check on the Alpha item indicates that the alpha channel will be saved.

The last submenu, File|Preferences|Rendering Format|Field, defines the interlacing mode. By default, field operations are disabled. If the Upper First or Lower First item is selected, then only every second frame will be rendered, containing odd (upper) rows from the nearest odd frame and even (lower) rows from the nearest even frame.