When a Projector payload stalls, the fastest fix starts with one question: which stage did the mission reach? Projector runs a mission through a short chain of tasks, and each documented failure sits at one link of that chain. Find the link, then check the settings that belong to it.
Dataclay’s own Projector troubleshooting article is short. It holds one entry, about a projection that reports no missions to deploy, and it tells you the other tips are scattered through the related articles. This page gathers those tips in one place and arranges them by stage, so you can work from the symptom to the setting. Where the saved documentation does not say something, we say so instead of guessing.
Find the stage before you touch a setting
A Projector mission is one job inside a payload. According to Projector’s terms page, a mission can include any or all of five tasks: export data-merged Autografs to digital files, transcode the output, deploy the output files to a storage and streaming platform, log metadata from those platforms back to the connected data source, and clean up the scratch assets the other tasks create. A payload is the collection of missions, and a number of settings live at the payload level. Transcode settings, for example, apply to all the missions in a payload.
So the first move is to work out where a mission stopped. You have three places to look.
The first is Mission Control, the part of the Projector interface that shows each mission’s status as a graphic. The documentation says it becomes more useful when a payload has a large number of missions, when videos are long, when you are using several Projector capabilities at once, when someone else needs to see progress, or when you are managing other work at the same time. The documentation suggests taking a screenshot of Mission Control when someone else needs to see progress. If you are on release 1.0.7 or later, workers report transcode progress to Mission Control more precisely.
The second is the status columns in your data source. Projector reads render and stream status from campaigns in QUE and from Google Sheets, and it writes information back. Google Sheets always needs the columns render-status and stream-status. The render-status column tracks a job’s progress through Templater and QUE and can hold an error code such as ERR::MEDIA (asset issues) or ERR::AFXHOST (After Effects errors). The stream-status column tracks deployment and ends in onstream (deployed and live) or error (deployment failed). Pending means the row is waiting to be picked up. Read the two together: render-status done with stream-status pending is a row waiting for deployment. Our post on how a render becomes a live video through stream-status walks through that second lifecycle in detail, and what each QUE render status means covers the first.
The third is the job log. Release 1.0.7 made logs from Projector jobs available directly in the QUE dashboard, so you can review what a job did without finding the machine that ran it. Release 1.0.6 brought Projector’s logging in line with Templater’s, using the same categorical logging and masking system, with color output and mintty integration for viewing logs on Windows. If you work with Templater logs already, the Projector logs will look familiar. The saved documentation does not list individual Projector error messages, so we cannot tell you what a given line means. What we can tell you is where to read it and which settings each stage depends on.
Problems before a mission starts
These are the settings that decide whether Projector sees any work at all. Check them first, because every later stage depends on them.
Projection says there are no missions to deploy. This is the one problem Dataclay’s troubleshooting article covers directly. Check whether you selected Enable AEP rendering in the Export pillar. If you did, make sure you did not also select a Video file asset extension when you configured your data source. The documentation states that these two settings cannot be used for the same project. The reasoning follows from what each one means. Enable AEP rendering tells Projector to render finished videos from replicated After Effects project files. A video asset extension tells Projector to process files that are already finished videos. Asking for both gives Projector two different definitions of what a mission is. The setup steps for both QUE and Google Sheets say to skip the extension field when exporting with AEP rendering, so if you filled it in out of habit, clear it.
Projector will not run on the machine you chose. Projector must run on the same computer where Templater is installed and where its output files are stored. The system requirements from Dataclay are Adobe After Effects 2021 to 2026, macOS 11 Big Sur through macOS 26 Tahoe on Intel or native Apple Silicon, or Windows 10 or newer, or Windows Server 2016 or newer. After Effects 2026 support arrived in release 1.0.6, so check your Projector release against your After Effects version. If the machine changed, check licensing too. Projector has no floating license. It uses a node-locked key like Templater, with one or more activations set at purchase, and keys can be manually deactivated and moved.
Troubleshooting order
Work from the front of the chain to the back
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Machine and data sourceProjector must run on the same computer where Templater is installed and where its output files are stored.
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Export settingsCheck whether you selected Enable AEP rendering in the Export pillar, and that you did not also select a Video file asset extension.
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Transcode settingsThe codec you select decides the file type of the finished video; transcode settings apply to all the missions in a payload.
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Archive settingsIf you configured the payload to archive posters, GIF clips, or both in the Transcode pillar, you must also enable and set up archiving.
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Streaming accountA payload can authorize several services but cannot send to more than one of them in the same payload.
The data source is connected but nothing is picked up. A payload takes one data source, either QUE or Google Sheets. With QUE, you choose between All ready jobs and Ready jobs in selected campaigns, and then you can filter by ID or by date created. The Render Status and Stream Status filters are listed as not currently used, so do not expect them to narrow anything. If a job you expected is missing, check whether an ID or date filter is set. With Google Sheets, check the Data URL, the exact Worksheet name, and the Input file directory. The Data URL accepts either the Share link or the browser URL. Also check the two required columns. Since the initial release, the stream-title and stream-description columns are no longer supported for video titles and descriptions. You configure those in the Projector interface with tokens. The aep and target columns are no longer required either. For QUE users, Projector writes its data as sub-properties of one required JSON key, stream.
Google keeps signing you out. Google authorization expires after seven days. Since the initial release, Projector signs you out automatically and prompts you to authorize again. Before that fix, a user with an expired authorization could not even log out. If a payload that ran last week is silent this week, the sign-in is a cheap thing to check. Projector also polls Google more carefully now, to reduce rate limiting errors while Projection is enabled. The Check every field in the Projection section sets how many seconds pass between checks. Release notes for the initial release say Projector improved its Google polling to reduce rate limiting errors while Projection is enabled. The saved documentation names no interval to use.
Before you dig deeper
Quick checks when a mission stalls
- Confirm Projector is running on the same machine where Templater is installed
- Check that Enable AEP rendering and a Video file asset extension are not both selected for the same project
- Verify the render-status and stream-status columns exist in your data source
- Re-authorize Google Sheets if the payload ran more than seven days ago
- Enable archiving if you configured posters or GIF clips in the Transcode pillar
- Check the privacy setting on the streaming service if a deployed video is not visible
The After Effects drop-downs are empty. When you enable AEP rendering, Projector tries to fill in the After Effects version. You also set the After Effects location, which is the root directory containing After Effects, found in the installation path set in Adobe Creative Cloud preferences. The Output Module and Render Settings drop-downs can come up empty. The instruction is to type the name manually, and it must match the name in After Effects exactly. A near match is a miss. Dataclay also supplies its own sets, loaded from dataclay-output-modules.aom and dataclay-render-settings.ars in the Dataclay folder, and the documentation says that if loading shows an error message you can safely ignore it and click OK. One more tool is worth knowing. You can clear the AEP Output Module and AEP Render Settings fields on purpose, which the release notes say can help isolate potential issues with AEP rendering.
Problems during render, transcode, and archive
Once missions start, the trouble moves from visibility to behavior. The symptoms here are slowness, files in the wrong format, and artifacts that never reach your storage.
Rendering is slow or memory climbs. After Effects processes one video at a time. Projector’s parallel processing gives each processor core its own video. By default it uses half of the available cores, so a quad-core machine runs two workers. The documentation gives a rule of thumb for what to expect, that a quad-core machine can process four videos in roughly the time After Effects would take for one, which is an example, not a benchmark. If you see slow rendering or excessive RAM use, the documented fix is to lower the worker count. Open Mission Control, drag the Number of Workers slider to the left, and click Save.
Release 1.0.7 changed how concurrent workers behave. The release notes say it isolates each worker’s After Effects output directory to prevent file collisions between concurrent workers, and that it improves aerender reliability with regex parsing fixes and more accurate handling of Windows’ small buffer size. Check which release you run.
The finished files are the wrong type. The file type comes from your transcode settings and your export settings together. In the Transcode section, the codec you select decides the file type of the finished video. The documentation adds a note that is easy to miss. If you do not enable export, Projector uses that file type for every video in the payload, even when your Google Sheets data source has an output-ext column with other values. The output-ext column only takes effect when Export is enabled, and only with Google Sheets as the data source. So a sheet that lists MOV for one row and MP4 for another will produce one type until export is on.
Streaming rejects the audio. The transcode steps tell you to choose AAC as the audio codec whenever you are deploying to a streaming service, because streamers require audio in that format. They recommend an audio bitrate of 128 and the pixel format yuv420p unless your videos will be viewed on something other than a standard computer screen or mobile device. These are the documented settings for streaming. For video, H.264 in an MP4 is the format the documentation names for streaming, though other formats are available, and you may want something different for very high-definition work. The bitrate guidance is a range between 3,500 and 6,000 Kbps for 30 FPS web video on a computer monitor, with higher bitrates giving better quality and larger files.
The original file is gone. The documentation says to select the Delete original after transcode checkbox only if you will not need the original again, so check it before you tick it.
Posters and GIFs never show up in storage. This is a trap with a warning label in the documentation. If you configured the payload to archive posters, GIF clips, or both in the Transcode pillar, you must also enable and set up archiving. If you do not, Projector skips archiving completely and those settings are ignored. The documentation describes no error for this case. A related tip from the transcoding page is that streaming services do not use GIF previews, so if you create a GIF preview you should always archive it as well.
S3 will not accept the connection. The archiving setup is a list of exact values. The Access Key ID and Secret Key come from your storage account. The documentation says the secret value is not stored by the storage provider and is very important to keep in a secure location. The S3 Region must match the availability zone where the bucket lives. The S3 Bucket entry must exactly match the name in the storage console. The S3 Folder is created by Projector if it does not already exist. The account you provide can be a root user or an IAM user with public read permissions to the bucket. If your account uses multi-factor authentication, the credential steps differ, because you also note the Multi-Factor Authentication identifier under Security Credentials. If you do not manage your own storage infrastructure, ask your administrator. When a connection fails, compare each value against the storage console.
Problems at deploy and on the streaming service
Deployment is the stage where a stream-status of error appears, and it is where the outside platform’s own rules start to apply. Projector sends to Vimeo, JW Player, or Frame.io. A payload can authorize several services but cannot send to more than one of them in the same payload. If you need two destinations, build two payloads. The same logic applies to settings. If some missions need different global settings, you can split them into separate payloads, or change a video’s settings on the streaming service itself, which makes more sense when only one or two videos differ.
Vimeo. Projector only supports paid Vimeo accounts, because of limits Vimeo puts on API access, storage, and transfers for free accounts. If a free account is the problem, no setting will fix it. The Vimeo app you create for Projector has two required values that are easy to get wrong. The callback URL must be https://dataclay.com/vimeo-auth, and the App URL must be https://dataclay.com/projector. When authentication succeeds for a payload, you see the message you wrote as the app description, which the setup steps suggest should read “You are now authorized to access Vimeo.” If you ever lose the client ID and secret, they display on the page of the API app in the Vimeo developer space. Embed presets have a limit worth remembering. Your presets apply only to Unlisted videos streamed from Vimeo. Public and password-protected videos use the default appearance, and public videos cannot use custom player presets.
JW Player. You must have an API key to use JW Player with Projector. With Admin permissions you can create one under Settings, then API Credentials, in the v2 section, by clicking Add, naming it something clear like Projector, choosing a user role, and clicking Add New API Key. Without Admin permissions, you need your account administrator. The web player is separate. You copy its ID from the Players page. JW Player does not offer free accounts, so an unpaid account cannot be the one you test with.
Frame.io. You need an access token from developer.frame.io and a folder ID. The folder ID is a 32-character string shown in the last part of the Frame.io URL when you browse to a folder or a project. If you are at the root of a project, click Media first, or the URL will not show the folder you meant. The integration moved to the Frame.io V4 API in release 1.0.6, using Adobe’s new authentication method. The integration is one-way. Projector uploads to Frame.io, and approval status is not written back to your data source. A two-way version is on the roadmap.
Streaming platforms
What each streaming service requires
| Service | Account requirement | Key credential needed |
|---|---|---|
| Vimeo | Paid account only; free accounts not supported | Client ID and secret from the Vimeo API app |
| JW Player | No free accounts; Admin permissions to create API key | API key from Settings → API Credentials, v2 section |
| Frame.io | Access token from developer.frame.io | 32-character folder ID from the Frame.io URL |
The video deployed but the viewer cannot see it. Check privacy before anything else. The documentation recommends “No one except the owner can access this video” as the default, because it lets you play through the video and stage videos before a campaign. If that is your setting, a customer who opens the link will not see the video until you change the privacy on the streaming service. Making videos public is described as not recommended in most cases, and the third option, members of the platform only, is also not recommended. The fix for this symptom is to change the privacy once you have verified the video.
The poster shows the wrong frame. Poster Time is a number of seconds, and the streaming service takes the poster from that point. If a video is three seconds long and you enter 3.5, the service uses the first frame. The documentation warns that this gets tricky when your videos have different lengths. With videos of 1.5, 1.75, and 2.5 seconds, entering 2 means only the third video gets that frame as its poster. The better fix, according to the documentation, is to create a poster image in Projector so you control the frame, and to treat Poster Time as a backup. If you leave the field blank and create no poster, the service uses the first frame.
The metadata you expected is not in the sheet. When Projector finishes deploying a mission, it writes metadata from the streaming service, the storage service, or both back to the data source. The saved capture of the documentation says the exact list of fields was not rendered, so we cannot list them for you. Check the stream-status column first. If it says onstream, the video is deployed and live. If it says error, deployment failed, and the job log is the next place to read.
The order to check things in
Work from the front of the chain to the back. Confirm the machine and the data source, then the export settings, then the transcode and archive settings, and then the streaming account. The AEP rendering and video extension conflict, the output-ext rule, and the archiving requirement are all cases where the documentation ties two settings together.
Projector will not tell you every cause by itself, and the saved documentation does not cover every message it can show. The documentation does name several specific failures, and they are listed above. Start at the stage where the mission stopped, read the status column and the job log, and check the matching section above. If you are new to the tool, our overview of what Projector by Dataclay is explains the pieces, and the QUE and Templater pages cover the products Projector depends on. When a QUE satellite is behind the stall rather than Projector, our satellite troubleshooting post is the right next read. For the full list of guides, see our learn section.
Here are quick answers to the questions the documentation settles directly.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why does Projection say there are no missions to deploy?
Dataclay’s troubleshooting article gives one thing to check. If you selected Enable AEP rendering in the Export pillar, check that you did not also select a Video file asset extension when you configured your data source. The two settings cannot be used for the same project. AEP rendering makes Projector render finished videos from replicated After Effects project files, and a video asset extension points it at files that are already videos. Clear the extension field in the data source setup, save, and let Projection check again.
Why did Projector skip my posters and GIF clips?
If you configured the payload to archive posters, GIF clips, or both in the Transcode pillar, you must also enable and set up archiving. If you do not, Projector skips archiving completely and those settings are ignored. The documentation describes no error for this case. Enable archiving to storage, choose the S3 option, enter your credentials, and click Save/Authorize. The documentation also says to archive every GIF preview you create.
What should I do when Projector renders slowly or runs out of memory?
Lower the number of workers. Projector uses half of your cores by default, and each core used is a worker. Open Mission Control, drag the Number of Workers slider to the left, and click Save. The documentation’s four-videos-on-a-quad-core example is an example and not a benchmark, so measure on your own machine and composition.
Why might my Google Sheets data source stop working after a week?
Google authorization expires after seven days. Projector now signs you out automatically and prompts you to authorize again, so check the sign-in in the Google Sheets settings first. Also confirm the sheet has the required render-status and stream-status columns, the right worksheet name, and the Data URL. The Data URL can be either the Share link or the browser URL. A sheet built for an earlier setup may still carry columns Projector no longer reads.
Can I use a free Vimeo account with Projector?
No. Projector only supports paid Vimeo accounts, because of limits Vimeo puts on API access, storage, and transfers for free accounts. JW Player does not offer free accounts either. Frame.io is the third option, and the documentation says Adobe subscription holders are given a free Frame.io account. Follow the setup steps for the service you choose.
Why can’t my customer see the video that deployed?
Check the privacy setting. The documentation recommends No one except the owner can access this video as the default, so you can review videos before a campaign. If that is your setting, the video stays private until you change its privacy on the streaming service. The other two options, public and members of the platform only, are described as not recommended for personalized video, so decide who should see each video before you switch.
Where do I read what a failed Projector job did?
Start with the stream-status column in your data source, where error means deployment failed. Then read the job log. Release 1.0.7 made logs from Projector jobs available in the QUE dashboard, so you do not need to find the machine that ran the job. Mission Control shows each mission’s status as a graphic. The saved documentation does not list individual Projector error messages, so check with Dataclay about an unfamiliar one.
