Duplicate Frame Remover

Version: 2.04 Sign up to be notified by email when a new version of this script is posted
Using the same engine as Magnum The Edit Detector, this script scans the footage and removes the duplicate frames by setting hold keyframes on the layer’s time-remapping channel. This could come in handy on roto jobs where the footage has funky pulldown or any other occasion where you need to remove duplicate frames from a clip. Version 2.0 introduces a Region of Interest feature which allows you to localize the area where the script will look for changes in the footage to detect the duplicate frames.
Thanks to Patrick Smith for allowing us to use his footage in the demo video
- Duplicate Frame Remover 2.0 UI
Version History
- 2.04 Made compatible with non-english versions of AE – March 2011
- 2.03 Fixed work area calculation – July 2010
- 2.02 Fixed help window, blessed for CS5 – May 2010
- 2.01 Fixed small outPoint bug – April 2010
- 2.0 – Added dockable UI and Region of Interest feature – April 2010
- 1.0 – Initial Release – Feb 2008
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Very useful script. It helped me with a roto job that had a lot of duplicate frames and made my life much easier
Thanks Lloyd!
Alex
Wow, I don’t believe this, I just had a job where I’d rendered 23.98 comps to 29.97 duplicating frames instead of putting pulldown in it (part of the project was built at 29.97 native and I didn’t want to deliver a mix of pulldown and progressive, it was a big job with at least 4 animators working to different specs as usual), the client didn’t want to pay for a pal conversion and then when they couldn’t do it themselves wanted us to do it for free (bastards!!)
Anyway I was laying awake thinking about how to do it last night and reckoned that if I couldn’t get rid of the duplicate frames by nesting correctly I’d try to re-engineer your Magnum script to help me spot the duplicates.
Nesting worked but I decided to give writing a script a go anyway , I come here you’ve already built the script for me!!
Damn!! How will I ever learn if you keep doing the work for me you bastard!!
Seriously, thanks a million, I know I’ll need to use this someday, you’re the man!!
glennser
Just what I was looking for. Tip: comp that the clip is placed in should be no longer than the duration of the clip you are cleaning up.
Tip: If you are trying to use this script with a layer that has a bulit-in alpha channel and the script is removing all the frames, try precomping the layer with a solid bg (ie. to remove the transparency) and it should work as expected.
gracias
every time i run the script it says the script doesn’t work in line 48 because null is not an object. im using ae cs3. is there maybe another version of the script that i could try out?
big thanks,
david
Hi David,
Are you running AE in english? This script only runs properly in english.
Yes, the problem was my cs3 was set on german. In the english version it works perfectly. Thank you very much.
By the way… The easyest way to run AE in English is to open the LANGUAGES Subfolder and Select the English Version. Basically, this does nothing more than putting the -L EN Addition to the Shortcut, but its already prepared and ready to go.
veryg ood
Is it possible to modify this to just mark all duplicate frames without setting hold key frames?
I am looking for a simple way to create seamless loops by finding the two outer most matching frames.
Thanks for sharing this..
A great help.
I’m amazed, thank you very much! Please be free to contact me if you need anything regarding architecture, 3dstudio max and dvd authoring.
Hi,
I have purchased your duplicate remove script but when i use this script footage speed was increase. so how can i keep my speed as well as.
When I use it, it only divides up the frames. But the repeats still render. I would have to manually go through and delete repeated frames. What am I doing wrong?
Thanks
I run the script and the scripting toolkits opens and highlights line 199 of the script.
AE can run out of memory if you are trying to process too many frames at once (like 1000 or more) so it is best to break up your sequence into pieces and run the script on each part individually.
Removes too many frames with the Threshold at .4 and not enough at .3. Any ideas? How do I set for increments in between one tenth?
I’m running AE V7 on a PC and it simply shts AE down. Do you have a version that runs on PC ?
This script is not compatible with AE7. The icons on the top right show what versions of AE each script is compatible with. This script requires CS3 and above and is compatible with both mac and windows.
So i tried this, hit “do it”, but there is no loading bar displayed, instead it creates a layer “_magnum_at_work_” wich has all the changes in it.
What version of the script, After Effects and OS are you running? Does this happen with any footage you try or only a specific clip?
Script version 2.03, AE CS4 and i tried it with two clips now.
ok so i tried the english Version of AE and it seems to work now. Thanks for your Attention ^^
And awesome script. EXACTLY what i need.
Do you think your script can do the job for the task explained in this website?
http://vimeo.com/22289605
there is a software idea development there, take a look.
Don’t think it will work as in the comments the author explains that the duplicate frames are not identical. This will cause the script to assume they are not the same and therefore not remove them. However if a certain part of the frame stays similar enough then if you use the Region of Interest plus a high enough threshold it might work. No guarantees of course.
Hey Lloyd
My videographer made a mess of the video shoot he was on by accidentally clicking the strobe effect button on the dv camcorder he was using. As a result, The video has got 5-10 duplicate frames for every frame that is right. It is important that i fix the problem. It is the only reason why i went out and purchased the after effects package. I was wondering, Since i am a total beginner at the software, would you be able to write me a walk through to delete those frames ?
The demo video linked above shows how to use the script.
CS3/Mac
I find it produces runtime errors after it has “scanned” the footage. If I choose to clear the error and continue, I do that a couple times and it then finishes. But it went into debug mode and all that for me. Just FYI.
Can you tell us what the actual error you got said?
I have a video that is 17982 pixels… How would I use this on my precomps which are way too big and I would run out of RAM. Is there an easy way to break this up into pieces and take out the duplicate frames. There are maybe 300 or so frames that I actually need.
I would pre-comp it to reduce the resolution and then split the layer (Using Cmd-Shift-D) to break it up into short chunks for best results.
I am so thankful this script got released. I’ve done a video I couldn’t have without this script which is now finished: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D06_SOuibP8
Very cool! Thanks for sharing. Did the game record has lots of duplicate frames?
yep, my PC couldn’t record at 30fps…
Thanks for creating a great AE script. Since the footage is sped up when played back after, what steps do you recommend to maintain or fix sync issues when using it on film footage with sync audio. Thanks
To maintain sync you would need to re-introduce the duplicate frames which would defeat the initial purpose of the script. What exactly are you trying to do?
My thought for duplicate frame removal was to take game footage that studdered and apply pixel motion to generate intermediate frames to make it appear smoother.
I can approximate this effect by guessing at a constant frame loss factor, but I can’t have it replace every duplicate frame with a pixel-motion generated one.
I do that a couple times and it then finishes
does this work with premiere pro?
No, it only works in After Effects.