@Jeff Thanks for the response I can’t seem to find any obvious errors by looking at the log. I sent the files to the email that you provided. Thanks

@Ridvan Thanks for getting in touch with us. We’re currently working on integrating native srt support into the next version of Templater. Once set up, this process would be very similar to the way that Templater already reversions other assets, like footage or text. We currently have a method to support .srt file-swapping in Templater, but it does require some customization to get up and running. You can check that out at this link on our GitHub Page. Hopefully, that helps, but if there’s anything else we can do to help, please feel free to reach out. Thanks, Jeff

@eric_dean shoot us an email at support@dataclay, and we’ll send you a build that should work with the new flags. Also, let us know which platform (MacOS or Windows).

@Jeff Thanks so much! That all makes perfect sense. I was quite pleased to have reasoned out the solution I did, so your confirmation that it matches your recommendation is all I needed!

@ermalr If you continue to have issues with speed and performance over time, I’d recommend getting in touch with us directly at support@dataclay.com so we can get some more specific details on how the project is configured. Outside of enabling the “Remove unused footage after each job” and “Purge all memory caches after each job” in the Templater Preferences panel, as @ariestav mentioned, it might be necessary to take a look at the templater.log file to see if we can narrow down exactly where the issue is occurring. Let’s start by enabling those options, and if we still run into issues, go ahead and send us a message, and we’ll see if we can’t make some more specific suggestions based on the project’s operating environment. Thanks, Jeff

@1337err I’ve had a similar problem with my replication just stops and keeps crashing/loading until I eventually force quit AE. In my case it was a special character in the “output” filename (a “€” sign) that caused the crash. Replaced it with “eur” and things are running smoothly again. Haven’t read your thread thoroughly, so might not be the case for your project, just thought I’d give a shout.

@Jeff Thanks!

@Maris The legacy price isn’t just for subscriptions. It applies to Rig purchases and pre-paid licenses of all durations. From a business standpoint, it just makes much more sense to manually offer individuals and small businesses this discount since that combined revenue represents only a small percentage of our total revenue. But we still want to make that available - and since launching this policy at the start of 2023, it has been incredibly effective. So just email suppport@dataclay.com with any legacy purchase request and I’ll be happy to help you out.

@ermalr Hmmmm. This could be a bit tricky as this use case would be relatively uncommon in After Effects. However, I can think of a couple of methods we might use to achieve the desired result. The first wouldn’t be a “true” randomization and would require some generation of placeholder assets, but the upside is that it would be relatively simple. For this method, we’d want to generate several “dummy” clips of various lengths that contained no audio or video. These files could then be used in conjunction with Templater’s Time Sculpting feature to determine the placement of our random audio clip. So, for example, we could create clips that were 15, 48, and 50 seconds long. We could then set the audio clip to start and the endpoint of the “dummy” clip. This would allow us to move the audio clip in a relatively straightforward fashion using Templater’s Time Sculpting feature. The downside to this method is that, depending on how much granularity was needed, it would require quite a few “dummy” clips to be generated. It would also require some sort of mechanism to randomly designate a dummy clip for each Job that we wanted to create. We might be able to accomplish that with a Google App Script for Google Sheets or a Zapier process if we’re using QUE. The other method would be a “true” randomization, but it would require Templater Bot and the use of the Event Scripts feature. Event Scripts allow users to create After Effects ExtendScripts that can be run at various points throughout the Templater process. With that in mind, it should be possible to create a script that adjusts the inPoint of the audio layer to a value generated using Math.random(). This would give us a “true” randomization for the inPoint of the layer but might be a bit more challenging to set up, depending on your familiarization with AE’s ExtendScript language. Hopefully that helps, but if you have any other questions, please feel free to let us know. Thanks, Jeff

@ermalr It’s difficult to say without more specific information about the layer in question, but it’s possible that it could be a format issue, a logic problem with Time Sculpting, or some other issue that’s not immediately apparent. One technique that might help to find more detailed information would be to temporarily uncheck the “Suppress all After Effects notices, warning, and error dialogs” in the Templater Preferences panel. This option is meant to keep Templater running in the event that AE displays a dialog box, which would halt the reversioning process until it’s clicked away. This can sometimes result in a scenario where After Effects error dialogs are hidden during the layout and preview process. Temporarily unchecking this option may allow us to see a more detailed error message when the project is previewed, which could help us get a better idea of what’s going on. However, it should be noted that as of the most recent release of Templater, all After Effects errors should be logged to the templater.err file, so this is less of an issue than it used to be. Based on the previously posted information, it seems the After Effects error is " An unexpected error occurred while exporting a composition." Unfortunately, this error is so vague that troubleshooting the issue would likely require much more information about the project file, the layer in question, and any dependent layers it might be referring to. If unchecking that option in the Templater Preferences panel doesn’t change anything, it might be worthwhile to try removing any Time Sculpting and/or Expressions from the layer to see if that changes anything. Either way, with an error this vague, we would need to find out more information about how things are set up in order to make a better suggestion about what’s causing the issue. Thanks, Jeff

@ermalr To add to Jeff’s post, Templater ships with both Render Settings and Output Module templates that can add multiple pre-made presets. There are direction on this page on how to import them into After Effects.

@1337err Hmmmm. Typically, when we’ve seen issues like this occur in the past, it’s generally related to either a logic issue with the Time Sculpting setup or some kind of problem with an After Effects Expression that makes adjustments to the layout before the Time Sculpting process can be completed. Either way, we’ll likely need to start by simplifying the project to see if we can narrow down which layer is causing the issue. For this project, I’d recommend starting by creating a backup copy that we can use for troubleshooting. Once we’ve got our backup opened up, I’d recommend removing all of the layers in the project except for B Small Message2, [cameratemplate_15.wav Comp 1], and camera_2_photo_5 since those are the layers that seem to be having a problem. We might need to adjust the properties on [cameratemplate_15.wav Comp 1] and camera_2_photo_5 if they’re being Time Sculpted to other layers. Once that’s done, we can try refreshing to see if B Small Message 2 lines up correctly. If that works, we’ll want to restore our backup and try removing layers a few at a time to see if we can isolate which one is causing the issue. Once we’ve identified our problem layer, we should be able to address whatever is causing the hangup in the Time Sculpting operation. This process can be a bit tedious, but I’ve found it to be the most efficient way to track down logic issues that cause this sort of problem. Typically, issues of this nature occur when a layer is set to adjust to another layer that can’t finish its Time Sculpting calculations until yet another layer is changed. This results in a scenario where the Time Sculpting can’t complete on its first run and requires two refreshes to complete. One last suggestion. While Templater should process the Time Sculpting rules in whatever order makes the most logical sense After Effects tends to load layers in the order that they’re presented in the stack from top to bottom. So, it’s never a bad idea to make sure that the layers are ordered logically based on how they should be Time Sculpted. So, for example, if layer A is being adjusted to the position of layer B, layer B should be placed higher in the stack than layer A. This should ensure that A doesn’t get processed before B. If we still run into issues after performing these troubleshooting steps, we’ll likely need more information about how the project file is set up. If you’d like to get in touch with us directly, please feel free to email us at support@dataclay.com, and we’ll be more than happy to help. Thanks, Jeff

@1337err Thanks for reaching out. The most common cause of this particular error occurs when Time Sculpting is applied directly to an audio layer in After Effects. After Effects treats pure audio layers differently than footage layers since, by default, they don’t have any video data. This causes AE to read audio layers differently than video layers, which changes how their time codes interact with other footage in the project file. This frame difference is the most common cause for the “invalid image buffer size” error that you’re seeing. The easiest way to test if this is what’s happening is to either temporarily remove any audio layers or disable Time Sculpting and see if the error message persists. If it does turn out that audio layers are causing this issue, there are a few ways to get around this. First, we could try pre-composing the layer and then applying the Time Sculpting to the pre-comp instead of the audio layer. Pre-composing audio footage in After Effects will add video frame data to the layer, preventing this issue. The other solution is to pre-render any audio files you might want to use into a format with frame data, like an .mp4 or .mov file. Even if the rendered file has blank “video” data, it should still cause After Effects to generate the frame information needed for Time Sculpting. Hopefully, this is an easy fix, but if this isn’t the cause of the problem, or you encounter anything else we can help with, let us know, and we’ll see where we need to go from there. Thanks, Jeff

@ThomasH The general process for using Templater with mogrts is usually pretty simple as long as the mogrt files can be opened and rigged in After Effects. Once the mogrts have been rigged up to a data source and the text can be swapped out as needed, we’ll basically need to keep Premiere and After Effects open simultaneously. In After Effects, we’ll cycle through the preview data using Templater. This should update the mogrt’s text layers, which should be reflected in the Premiere project. From there, each iteration of the data can be exported as needed from Premiere. Unfortunately, Templater doesn’t have any ability to automate the output process in Premiere, so if we were looking for an entirely hands-off implementation, we’d need to get the project loaded completely into After Effects. Once that was done, Templater Pro or Bot could be used to process the videos in batches using the translated language data. Hopefully, that helps as an overview, but if there’s a more specific question or concept that we can address, just let us know, and we’ll be more than happy to help out. Thanks, Jeff

@Jeff I just emailed for more info.

@SteveUlrich Glad to hear that we were able to get the previous issue resolved. As far as the erroneous Spot Check goes, we did have a bug a few versions back that would cause this to happen when Projects were using some specific frame rate options. What version of Templater are we running? If it’s anything older than 3.2, I’d recommend updating to the latest version (3.3.2, download link here) to see if that changes what we’re seeing. If that doesn’t make any difference, we’ll likely need to get some more information on how exactly Spot Check is set up and what frame rate options we’re using for this project. If we end up needing to go down that road, please feel free to open a troubleshooting ticket with us at support@dataclay.com if you don’t feel comfortable sharing project details here. Either way, let us know how it goes, and we’ll see where we need to go from there. Thanks, Jeff

@ermalr yes, you use the Time Sculpting rules to accomplish this. Watch the videos in this playlist. You can also register ExtendScripts to Templater events to manipulate and alter things in your project for each re-version. You can learn more about that by reading the docs on event scripts and Templater’s ExtendScript API. If you’re going to go that route you would probably register your script to the “After Update” event. I think Time Sculpting is what you’re looking for though. Let us know if this help! Thanks!