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Over the last few CS versions, Adobe Media Encoder has evolved into a truly useful standalone encoding tool. With CS5.5, Adobe updated the interface, added new device and adaptive streaming presets, and made watch folders much more accessible. In this tutorial, I'll review those updates and detail how to encode a single file into multiple outputs by using watch folders.
The New Interface
Figure 1 shows the new interface, with three configurable panels. On top is the Encoding Queue, which contains files queued for encoding from all sources, including files exported from Adobe Premiere Pro and Adobe After Effects, queue entries added from Adobe Media Encoder, and files from triggered watch folders. The middle panel is the Current Encoding panel, which shows the file that's being encoded. On the bottom is the Watch Folders panel, which contains all watch folders that you've created as well as the associated format and preset.
The interface has changed slightly since CS5, with Adobe making most buttons smaller in favor of adding more real estate for the panels. All the buttons are there though, if you look for them, with the Add, Remove, and Duplicate queue entry buttons on the upper left, and the Start, Pause, and Stop encoding buttons on the upper right.
The new presets are concentrated in two areas. New in the H.264 format are most of the iDevice presets shown in Figure 2. At this point, virtually all streaming producers have to be thinking...