Packaging With Project Manager & Exporting Files in Premiere Pro

Topics covered in this Premiere Pro tutorial:

Packaging With Project Manager, Using Adobe Media Encoder, Export Settings, File Types

Exercise Preview

Exercise Overview

In this exercise you will focus on features Premiere Pro has for helping you stay organized and keeping track of your media. You will also learn about multiple ways you can export video files from Premiere Pro.

Packaging With Project Manager

Project manager is the tool in Premiere Pro that collects all of the necessary project files for back–up, archival or hand–off.

1. If you have a project open in Premiere, choose File > Close All Projects.

2. Choose File > Open Project or hit Cmd–O (Mac) or Ctrl–O (Windows).

3. Navigate to Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Intermediate > Exporting Files.

4. Double–click on London Travel Promo - Missing File.prproj to open it.

   NOTE: If you see a dialog about Converting Project (from a prior version) refer to Fixing Version Compatibility Issues section in Exercise 1A. If the Link Media dialog opens refer to Locating Missing Media in Exercise 1A.

5. Go to File > Save As.

   • Name the file Your Name - London Travel Promo.prproj
   • Save it to Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Class > Exporting Files.

6. Choose File > Project Manager.

7. In the Project Manager window, confirm that the London Travel Promo sequence is checked on.

8. In the Resulting Project section, make sure Collect Files and Copy to New Location is selected.

9. In the Options to the right, uncheck Exclude Unused Clips.

   This will make sure that you backup the entire project including any clips that you are not currently using in the sequence.

10. Under Destination Path click on Browse.

    • Navigate to Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Intermediate > Exporting Files > Exports and click Choose.

    • If you want to check how much space the backup project folder will take up, you can click the Calculate button.

11. Click OK to backup the project.

12. Minimize Premiere Pro and navigate to Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Intermediate > Exporting Files > Exports.

13. Open the Copied_Your Name - London Travel Promo folder. Notice that all of the files used in the project, along with a copy of the project and folders for previewed files and media cache are in the new folder.

    NOTE: The project manager cannot copy of fonts. If you’re using text and need to send a copy of your fonts, you’ll need to copy them into the folder manually.

14. Return to Premiere Pro.

15. We’re done with this project, so choose File > Close Project.

Exporting a Section of the Timeline

Sometimes you don’t want to export the entire Timeline. In a few steps you can control which part of the Timeline exports and which is ignored.

1. In Premiere Pro, choose File > Open Project.

2. Navigate to Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Intermediate > Exporting Files and open Before You Accuse Me - Export Timeline.prproj.

   NOTE: If you see a dialog about Converting Project (from a prior version) refer to Fixing Version Compatibility Issues section in Exercise 1A. If the Link Media dialog opens refer to Locating Missing Media in Exercise 1A.

3. Choose File > Save As and:

   • Navigate to Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Intermediate > Exporting Files.
   • Name it Your Name - Before You Accuse Me.prproj and click Save.

4. In the Timeline panel, move the playhead to 1:00:00

5. Press the O key to set the Timeline’s Out point. The In point will automatically be set to the beginning of the Timeline.

6. At the top left of the window click on Export. You can also hit Cmd–M (Mac) or Ctrl–M (Windows) or choose File > Export > Media.

7. Set Preset to High Quality 1080p HD.

   NOTE: Match Source - Adaptive High Bitrate is probably the most common preset you’ll use, as it keeps the current video resolution and adapts the settings accordingly. This HD preset would convert higher resolution video (like 4k) down to HD resolution (which is useful in certain cases).

8. Next to Location click on the blue text.

   • Navigate to Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Intermediate > Exporting Files > Exports.

   • Name it Before You Accuse Me and click Save.

9. On the right side of the window, towards the bottom confirm that Range is set to Source In/Out.

10. Click the Export button at the bottom right.

    NOTE: While Premiere Pro is exporting a file (a process also known as rendering a video) it can’t be used for anything else.

11. Choose File > Save or hit Cmd–S (Mac) or Ctrl–S (Windows).

12. You can minimize Premiere Pro and navigate to Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Intermediate > Exporting Files > Exports to preview the video file.

Exporting Using Adobe Media Encoder Queue

In the previous exercise you exported a file directly from Premiere Pro. The problem with this is that the application is useless to you while it is rendering your video files. To solve this problem Adobe gives you the Adobe Media Encoder to use as Premiere Pro’s alternative rendering tool.

1. You should still have the Your Name - Before You Accuse Me project open.

2. Click on the Timeline panel to make it active.

3. At the top left of the window click on Export. You can also hit Cmd–M (Mac) or Ctrl–M (Windows) or choose File > Export > Media.

4. Set Preset to Match Source - Adaptive High Bitrate.

5. Click on the Send to Media Encoder button at the bottom right to send this render job to the Adobe Media Encoder app.

   NOTE: When you send a project to Adobe Media Encoder to be rendered, Premiere Pro makes a temporary copy of your project file.

6. Once the Adobe Media Encoder app opens (be patient, it can take a while):

   • Mac: At the top, go into the Media Encoder menu and choose Settings (instead of Settings it will be Preferences on older versions of macOS).
   • Windows: At the top, go into the Edit menu and choose Preferences.

7. In the General category:

   • Under Queue, check on Play chime when finished encoding.
   • Under Output, check on Append preset name to filename.

8. Click OK.

9. In the Preset Browser at the bottom left, search for youtube

10. Drag the YouTube 1080P Full HD into the Queue panel below the current render job to add a second export.

11. We can get a better video quality by changing the export settings a bit. In the Queue, click on the blue text YouTube 1080p Full HD

12. Locate the Video tab and use the scroll bar to the right to scroll down until you reveal the Bitrate Settings section. We avoid scrolling with a mouse or trackpad here because scrolling over a menu will accidentally change it’s value!

13. Change Bitrate Encoding to VBR, 2 Pass.

    NOTE: Two pass encoding, also referred to as multi–pass encoding is an encoding technique used to retain the best quality during the video encoding process. During the first pass, the video data is analyzed and stored and then in the second pass that data is used to compress the file.

14. The Target Bitrate should already be 16, but change the Maximum Bitrate to 24.

    The higher Max bitrate will give the encoder the opportunity to use more data to encode move complex areas of the video.

15. Click the Save Preset button at the top right of the dialog (to the right of the Preset menu).

16. Name the new preset 1080P - 2Pass - HQ and click OK.

17. Click OK to close the Export Settings and return to Media Encoder.

18. Click the blue text under Output File for the first encoding job and navigate to Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Intermediate > Exporting Files > Exports.

    • Click Save to finalize the new destination for your saved file.

19. Click the Output File link for the second encoding job and again navigate to Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Intermediate > Exporting Files > Exports.

    • Again click Save to close the dialog.

20. Click the Start Queue button at the top right of the window.

    Media Encoder is background process so you can work in Premiere Pro, other programs or even get yourself a cup of coffee while it runs. When the Media Encoder is finished you will hear a chime and can return to check your files.

21. When Media Encoder completes the video rendering jobs, you can click on the Output File links to open the folder with your exported files and preview them.