Best way to scroll two left justified columns and keep them in sync?

[eboogie]

Hello,

I have to do End Credits for a feature length film where the 1st letter of the character/crew position is left justified and the 1st letter of the cast or crew member's name is on the same line and left justified but clean all the way down. So two left justified columns going straight down with space in the center.

First I thought, no problem, I'll cut cut and past the "left justified" column to Video track 1 and the "2nd left justified" column to video track 2. However after an hour an a half of trying to get the columns to stay in sync with eachother (exact same length but couldn't quite get the spacing between the lines right, we're talking about 200 credits ) I gave up that idea and

Decided to do all one column. Which would seem fine exept to force justify the 2nd column stuff, I have to randomly space forward, check it out, refresh the viewer side and then scroll ALL the way down to where I last left off. Again, 200 lines of this stuff. This will take forever too.

So now I am thinking of just designing one long strip in photoshop but would rather keep it in house in Final Cut Pro, Boris, Motion or Live Type.

Does anyone out there know if there is just some simple little character generator that deals with this specific problem: Just scrolling titles that have 2 left justified columns scrolling simulataneously?

Or is photoshop the best way? (I don't know afteraffects)

Any help would be appreciated as I am going bonkers trying to set up a template that will be the easiest to edit once I set it up. I don't mind taking all day but which ever one is the best investment timewise.

Thanks!

[DAR3]

I would suggest the easiest way is to create the layout in photoshop. save as a layered TIFF file so you can come back and make changes if needed. Bring it into FCP and simply keyframe the beginning point of the scroll and key frame the ending point of the scroll. Render and you're done.

[eboogie]

This is great advice! The only problem is, when I bring it into final cut pro and keyframe it, it looks like absolute dog meat. In fact, it looks better unrendered. It shimmies, has jags on it and is blurry AFTER RENDERING.

I'm even merging and rasterizing my video layers so it's just a graphic.

My edit timebase is 59.94 and it's HD 960X720. Any idea if I'm just preparing out of FCP wrong?

My photoshop file is the same size.

And when still in FCP timeline it looks great. Sharp beautiful. It's just as soon as I hit play.

Not playing out to a monitor but it really looks weird. Lots of wobbling.

Any ideas? Any papers on preparing titles for 960X720 HD? Much thanks for response.

Erin

[debe]

You're not going to see full quality on the Canvas. It's the way FCP is designed. The Canvas shows approximately 1/4 resolution.

Full quality is going out the FW port or your I/O card, should you be so equipped.

You can't judge final quality on the Canvas. You need an external monitor.

debe

[eboogie]

So if it looks gorgious still in the timeline it will look just as sharp moving? Anything extra I need to do?

Again, thanks for these answers. I have been googling testing and researching for hours. Just want to make sure before I celebrate.

Thanks for your input.

Erin

[eboogie]

Exported a QT sample and watched it, it looks great. Thank you so much for your advice.

Erin

[DAR3]

Glad that worked out for you. I've always used Photoshop to create my credit/title layouts and keyframe in FCP. It's the fastest and easiest way and gives me the opportunity to make changes to the graphic file in photoshop if any changes need to be made.

[agar]

Originally Posted by DAR3

Glad that worked out for you. I've always used Photoshop to create my credit/title layouts and keyframe in FCP. It's the fastest and easiest way and gives me the opportunity to make changes to the graphic file in photoshop if any changes need to be made.

What pixel rate do you use in PS? I tried making a scrolling title in LiveType and it shimmered.

AGar