After Effects
 

I'm playing around with after effects..

what's the best export mode I should use? FPS and format?

And I'm doing test on exported files.. how do I make it render just the first 30 secs and not the entire song?

Now it just randomly stops rendering at 16s and it doesn't render anymore in preview..

Help!

Thanks~

Not sure if this is what you're trying to do, but you should able to drag this bar to specify your work area:

http://i43.tinypic.com/dvissg.png

Then when you go to render, the Render Queue tab should pop up, click on Best Settings and choose whether you want to render work area only or full length of the composition. or I guess you can specify the start and end time on the left too.

Hmm I've got CS3 and my interface doesn't look like that.. I'm not sure where my render setting is... found a render setting template but it doesnt give me all the options u've got..

but it seems like if I lower my resolution in the RAM preview, it works... maybe the RAM's been overworked.. (though I only had like 6 pictures over 30 seconds)

I'm also exporting it to FLV files.. it seems to keep the quality and have a low file size...