Output formats

In Plainly, you have the flexibility to control the output format of your rendered video. This includes options for video encoding, resolution, quality, and other properties that can be customized to suit your needs.

The render output format options are accessed through the top right button in the single render form, and can be configured as well using batch rendering, integration-based invocation or API.

Default behavior

By default, Plainly will render out a video in the MP4 format using the following encoding properties:

• libx264 codec for video encoding (yuv420p pixel format)
• aac codec for audio encoding
• frame rate of 25fps

Render format is controlled by the Output Format settings, and there are three ways you can control and adjust the rendering format to your needs.

1. Use presets for output format
2. Use After Effects output module settings
3. Use post encoding settings

Use presets for output format

The first way and easiest is to use presets for output format, which are pre-defined combinations of output module and post encoding settings. These presets can be found by switching to the Presets under the Output Format settings.

Currently, the available presets are:

Use After Effects output module settings

The second way is to explicitly control the output of the After Effects rendering process. If an output module is set during rendering, Plainly will provide the exact video produced by After Effects without any additional encoding by default. This provides a few benefits:

• Get original frame rate, as defined in an After Effects project rendering composition.
• Get output with an alpha channel.
• Get faster rendering times when no additional encoding is specified, but then the video file size will be larger.

Output module settings can be found by switching to Manual settings on the Output Format settings.

Currently, the available options for output module are:

curl -X POST \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -u "[API_KEY]:" \
  -d '{
        "projectId": "[PROJECT_ID]",
        "outputFormat": {
          "outputModule": "H_264_HIGH_BIT_RATE"
        }
      }' \
  https://api.plainlyvideos.com/api/v2/renders

Use post encoding settings

The third way is to use post encoding settings, which add an additional step of encoding the video output by After Effects using the FFmpeg  library.

Post encoding settings can be found by switching to Manual settings on the Output Format settings.

There are a few different post encoding types you can use:

curl -X POST \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -u "[API_KEY]:" \
  -d '{
        "projectId": "[PROJECT_ID]",
        "outputFormat": {
          "postEncoding": {
            "type": "none"
          }
        }
      }' \
  https://api.plainlyvideos.com/api/v2/renders

curl -X POST \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -u "[API_KEY]:" \
  -d '{
        "projectId": "[PROJECT_ID]",
        "outputFormat": {
          "postEncoding": {
            "type": "smallest"
          }
        }
      }' \
  https://api.plainlyvideos.com/api/v2/renders

Custom encoding

Custom encoding settings can be defined using one of or both of the following parameters:

• Encoding format - this is the short name of the encoding format you want to use and where encoding parameters are pre-defined. Currently, the available options are MP4, MP4_H265, MP4_OFR, GIF, MOV, MXF, which will result in a video being delivered in the desired format.
• Encoding parameters - any custom FFmpeg encoding parameters you want to use, allowing you to have full control over the encoding process.

If both encoding format and parameters are provided, the final video format will be determined by the format, however the provided parameters will be used as additional encoding parameters.

curl -X POST \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -u "[API_KEY]:" \
  -d '{
        "projectId": "[PROJECT_ID]",
        "outputFormat": {
          "postEncoding": {
            "type": "custom",
            "encodingFormat": "MP4",
            "encodingParamsLine": "-c:a aac -b:a 192k"
          }
        }
      }' \
  https://api.plainlyvideos.com/api/v2/renders

Scale resolution

If you want to scale the resolution of the rendered video, use the Scale post encoding type.

Provide a percentage as the scaling factor, which can range from 1 to 400. A scaling percentage of 100% keeps the video at its original resolution, while lower values reduce and higher values increase the resolution.

For example, if you want to scale the video down to 50% of its original size, set the scaling percentage to 50. To scale the video up to twice its original size, set the scaling percentage to 200.

curl -X POST \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -u "[API_KEY]:" \
  -d '{
        "projectId": "[PROJECT_ID]",
        "outputFormat": {
          "postEncoding": {
            "type": "scale",
            "scalingPercentage": 50,
          }
        }
      }' \
  https://api.plainlyvideos.com/api/v2/renders

Draft render

If you want to quickly check how the video looks, you can use the draft render option. This renders a video in half resolution and lower quality, but it completes much faster.

The draft render option is available under Settings Template of the Output Format settings, and currently it’s free of charge.

curl -X POST \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -u "[API_KEY]:" \
  -d '{
        "projectId": "[PROJECT_ID]",
        "outputFormat": {
          "settingsTemplate": "DRAFT"
        }
      }' \
  https://api.plainlyvideos.com/api/v2/renders