Rendering

[Liam]

I have tried to export my animation but every time it comes out blurry, no matter the output settings. I've installed FFMPEG and quicktime and changed the options in the file settings of each but it's still blurry. The output settings are 1920 by 1080, the same as the animation's resolution and FPS is 24, the same as the animation. Change other settings also does seem to have much effect. I have tried rendering in every file type including MP4, MOV and AVI but they all come out blurry. 

The only solution I have found is to record the animation which does improve the quality slightly but it is still lower quality than the animation. I'm wondering if anyone has experienced anything similar and knows a fix or if anyone knows what I'm doing wrong. Thank you for you're time.

I have shown an image of a character in the animation and an image of the same character in the preview to show the difference. Every character and part of the background is like this no matter if I view the animation in the preview or if I render the entire animation.

[DarrenT]

The 2nd picture is much smaller for some reason and it has no lines. So something has changed with your columns. Having these small images doesn't really help us see the problem though. If you could render a full frame and share that. Or even better would be a short animation. Because often new users try looking at a single image and zooming in. Then see that as you zoom in, the image looks pixelated, which it will. But when someone looks at your animation, they'll be seeing it at 100% zoom.

[Liam]

The reason the images were smaller because they were screenshot using ShareX in the render-preview. It was just an example to show the difference in quality. The images on the animation are not pixelated at all, even zoomed in. These images are not zoomed in, the higher quality is the frame currently in the scene and the lower quality is in the render preview.

Here is a a comparison between the project and the project when rendered.  

[DarrenT]

Your final rendering is missing the black lines, so something strange has happened there. Maybe you've changed something in your fx schematic.
It looks like you're rendering to a lower resolution. Perhaps you've added a value into the "Shrink" option in the output settings. It should be set to 1. I think sharing a screenshot of your camera settings and all of your output settings could help us diagnose the problem.

[Liam]

I've fixed one part of the problem but not the entire problem. The reason there were no black lines was because the thickness of the lines were at 0 and brush sizes at 0 do not render. I found this out by doing some research and I came across this forum post which has made a slight improvement https://github.com/opentoonz/opentoonz/issues/2895

As for the issue of it rendering in a lower quality than the animation, I still have this issue and have been trying to fix it all day today. I have tried to render this project about 15 times using all different file types in both 1920 by 1080 and 4K but it doesn't change anything.

Another strange thing about this is if I open the rendered file it is the same quality as the animation in opentoonz but if that file is placed into editing software or uploaded to YouTube the quality drastically declines and becomes pixelated.      

I was thinking it could be because I'm working in Vector and I tried to change the levels but that didn't work. Honestly I've tried everything I can think of, really not sure now.

Here is the FX schematic and the output settings. The settings under MP4 are both set to 100

[DarrenT]

These all look fine to me. I don't know what else to suggest apart from possibly sending me your project to take a look at myself (or create a similar test project that shows the same problem). If you wanted to, then zip up your project folder and you can email it to me at: Darren...@outlook.com.

[Liam]

Thanks for taking the time to help me out with this, it's really appreciated. As I said the problem occurs when taking the project into editing software. For me it's Da Vinci Resolve. It's either I have done something wrong in the settings of Opentoonz or there is something I need to do after placing the animation into editing software. If not these two then it could be a hardware problem.

I've had a couple of emails since the last post saying the gamma setting should be 2.4 - 2.6 which was a good suggestion, and something I didn't think of but the problem still persists.

[DarrenT]

I actually meant for you to share your OpenToonz project with me, not the rendered video as you originally said that the video looked blurred when rendered out of OpenToonz. I assume that the video you sent over was the render direct from OpenToonz. But as it happens, the video looks crystal clear to me, so having your project won't help.

But with your later comment about the problem now being with bringing it into your video software, I decided to bring it into my video editor (Shotcut). I re-rendered it out from there and it still looks clear. So it sounds like it's an issue with your video editor in some way. So that's the place you need to look for solutions. I don't use Da Vinci Resolve, so I can't help you out there. Sorry 'bout that.

Darren

[Liam]

Sorry about that I misunderstood. Yes the video sent was the rendered video from Opentoonz. I assumed you were going to find a problem with the animation in Opentoonz or take the rendered product to editing software and find a fix to the problem. This has helped as now I know it is a problem with Da Vinci Resolve. For some reason Da Vinci Resolve the quality lowers in certain editing software. I'll find different editing software.