SFM/Rendering at Higher Resolutions

When the Source Filmmaker exports your movie, its default is to render at 720p. This means that your movie will be 1280 pixels wide by 720 pixels high, which is an average resolution for most movies made with the SFM.

If you want to render at higher resolutions, you must set the appropriate command-line startup option before you launch the SFM.

Note:Rendering at higher resolutions will take longer than rendering at 720p, especially with older/lower-end hardware.

Note:SFM may complain about the resolution being too high. This will not affect rendering.

Warning:Having the SFM resolution set too high may severely degrade viewport performance. For this reason, you might want to only switch to it when you are ready to perform your final movie layoff.

Rendering

1. Look up the width and height for your desired resolution, e.g. 1920 by 1080 for 1080p.
2. Quit the Source Filmmaker if it's open.
3. In Steam, right-click Source Filmmaker, click Properties, and where it says LAUNCH OPTIONS, add -sfm_resolution [height] -w [width] -h [height] to the end, replacing [width] and height with the width and height you looked up, respectively.
4. Launch the Source Filmmaker.

You can also use this command-line switch in a command prompt or in a desktop shortcut.

Once Source Filmmaker is running, you will be able to select higher export resolutions via the Export Movie panel. This also affects the resolution of image exports.

If you want to change back to the default render setting of 720p, just remove what you added from your launch options.

Bug:SFM will crash if you attempt to export as an image after changing the export resolution without first saving and reloading the session.

Bug:SFM will crash if attempting to load a session with the export resolution set higher than the current launch option.

Tip:If working at higher resolution, mark the file name appropriately to avoid confusion.

See also

• List of all launch options for SFM