After Effects rendering produce pixelated video...

[arminio]

I have DVD video (shot with small DVD camera) which I need to edit and add some effects. I converted MPEG2 to AVI using huffyuv codec, edited it in Premiere and exported also as huffyuv. Original and edited AVI exported from Premiere are in excellent quality and without any artefacts and problems. Then I imported it in After Effects, add FX and render out also as huffyuv - and result is full of banding and pixelation in dark scenes (daylight scenes are fine)! Now, I tried with DV codec, Picvideo, I even tried to render from After Effects WITHOUT any FX - just plain video as it is imported, and result is always the same: lot of banding, lot of pixelation in dark scenes! I tried working in 16bpc, 32bpc, changed colorspaces, different render codecs (Microsoft DV, cedocida DV, MainConcept DV, huffyuv, picvideo - every codec set to the best possible quality... I tried even uncompressed video!)... and nothing helps - while preview in AE window is excellent, rendered AVI is horribly bad!

Any ideas what's the problem and how to fix it? Because I am stuck and out of ideas and can't figure out how to fix it and I tried everything I can think of

[poisondeathray]

Doesn't make any sense.

What version of AE?

Check the render settings, make sure everything is on full resolution and best , and Clear the media cache before you render

How are you viewing or determining this ? If you are using a media player , only use 1 instance at a time (only 1 can use graphics overlay). Or import back into AE , how does it look ?

[budwzr]

Is it a PAID or BOOTLEG version? Sometimes the bootlegs crap out from lack of updates.

[arminio]

Paid version. 7.0 (old one and not update since I installed it - because I have rather slow PC and this version works well on it )
Everything is set to "best". I didn't clear media cache (I never did that but I'll try).
I see this on any player I try on PC (running 1 instance is "a must", I know ) - it is also visible after I convert rendered AVI to DVD - playing on PC and standalone player is the same - banding and pixels in dark scenes.

I forget to mention that I have problems only on this video I converted from DVD (I don't have these problems with DV AVI but I have when DV AVI is made from MPEG2 as in this case).

Now, I think that problem is in video itself - To check source, I tried to brighten source AVI video (and MPEG video also) and then I see some pixelation (but not banding and not much) - which is kind of normal for MPEG2. But in AE nor in Premiere I didn't touch any filters for brightnes (no contrast/brightnes, no HLS, I didn't even overlay any layer over video which can brigthen source). So, I assume that AE mess something with brightnes during rendering...

[poisondeathray]

Did you re-import the uncompressed AVI back into AE ?

Sounds more like a display issue with gamma, or playback issue

[budwzr]

Or a hoser? Eh?

SiC

[arminio]

Did you re-import the uncompressed AVI back into AE ?

I'll try that later (need to make uncompressed test video)

Sounds more like a display issue with gamma, or playback issue

I though that too - but original MPEG looks fine both on PC and on TV via standalone DVD player.
Converted original MPEG to huffyuv AVI, edited and converted back to DVD plays fine both on PC and TV.
Converted original MPEG to huffyuv AVI, edited, rendered through AE (with or without any effects, rendered in DV, huffyuv or uncompressed) and converted back to DVD plays bad both on PC and TV.

Now, problems are much more visible when I add effects - if I just render through AE without touching antyhing, banding and pixelation are less present - but still present while in original MPEG they are practically invisible.

Or a hoser? Eh?

Well, I am starting to think that something is either wrong with me or my PC configuration. Well, since I can't reinstall myself, looks like a good solution will be to reinstall Windows and AE from start

[budwzr]

Not necessarily Windows, but re-installing whatever Adobe products you have might be helpful. And then I would run all the updates on it. PDR is a Premiere expert, I'm not though.

Make sure you go into the Windows Programs folder and completely clean out Premiere, and start over fresh.