Best Setup for rendering Animation?
 

I am using a series of images produced in a 3d modeling program to create an animation. The animation is running at 24 fps. The desired output is wmv for web distribution. It will be in widescreen.

Should I use the DVDA 24p widescreen, the HDV 720p widescreen or is there any difference if wmv is the output? Should I interpolate or blend?

I notice that when I bring the images into the timeline and step through them I see double images on the 3rd or 4th frame which is part of the 24p setup and cadence. I don't see this on the 29.97 interlaced. I want this to be 24 frames per second to match the animation image sequences. Does this all sound as it should?

For WMV what is the largest image I should go with? I will have this on a website - not necessarily youtube. Tks!

Starting at the end - decide the size and bitrate of the WMV based on your best evaluation of your online audience. Will they be broadband? Will they be patient if the player has to buffer for 30 seconds? Once you have a target bitrate, test different sizes with your content at that bitrate to see what is the best compromise for your content.

Sorry but there is no magic number to shoot for. IMHO the sweet spot for internet distribution of streaming WMV starts about 300Kbps through about 1.2Mbps for standard def. Note that DSL from Qwest, our local telco here in the upper left corner, tops out at 1.5Mbps for most residential customers. Some will have 896Kbps, some 2Mbps plus. Comcast cable is incredibly variable because it's a shared connection with everyone in your neighborhood. Say, 200 to 3000 Kbps, varies with time of day.

720p (1280x720) is probably the widescreen upper limit for useful resolution for computer playback.

Now, set up a Vegas project at that size using custom settings in the properties. You can start from one of the progressive templates.
Width & Height: per your output size
Field order: None (progressive)
Deinterlace method: None
PAR: depends on your source, could be "1"

If your graphics were created at something other than your final output res, then it is a good idea to select "Best" for video rendering quality in the custom render settings dialogs, because you'll be rescaling the source graphics. The best workflow would have you creating source graphics in the final output resolution, in which case select "Good" as the rendering quality.

The standard for animation in film was double-12fps for decades and decades, because it looked good enough. Designed for 12fps, then each frame doubled for 24fps. With our tools you can create a 12fps WMV.

Don't disregard 12fps out of hand, it's worth testing because at some (small?) sacrifice of motion you get double the bits for each frame.

I'm pretty much stuck at doing this at 24fps. I don't mind it just takes forever to render from the 3d modelling program. I'm trying to find the right trade off of best render from the 3d to the render in Vegas.

I would appeciate anyone else's thoughts on this.