Is Adobe CC Now an Affordable VFX Powerhouse? Updates to Premiere Pro, After Effects, and 3D Modeling

If one could use a word to describe the 2022 fall update for Adobe Premiere Pro and After Effects, the term "refinement" may be the most appropriate.

That’s because, in addition to adding Frame.io Camera to Cloud (C2C) support for RED and Fujifilm cameras to Creative Cloud, Adobe is offering an expansion to Premiere’s titling capability, plus improvements to visual performance.

After Effects, by contrast, gets a few new features, including selectable track mattes, 50 new animation presets, faster template performance when transferring titles, and motion graphics to Premiere. But that isn’t all, as Character Animator gets a few new tools, plus there’s a new app in Creative Cloud that will enable artists to create objects in 3D easily.

Titles with Premiere

Over time, Adobe has steadily improved the Premiere Pro Titling tool to make it more capable. With the Fall 2022 release, this is no exception. Adobe has added flexible alignment controls, which make designing titles easier and faster. 

Users can now line up text and shape them when designing titles in Premiere Pro Program Monitor. The alignment will enable objects in relation to each other to snap into place within the video frame and edit the titles in bulk on the timeline. 

Moreover, Adobe has fine-tuned Premiere to import motion graphics from After Effects more efficiently, improving render times by 200%. This is largely thanks to the multi-frame rendering tool, which provides what the company calls “significant speed gains” during the handshake from one app to another.

Adobe has also improved performance using GPU Acceleration for 10-bit AVC-Intra formats in Apple Silicon. The result is smoother playback and scrubbing along the timeline, especially with Sony, Canon, and Panasonic AVC Intra codecs. The Lumetri scopes also use GPU acceleration more efficiently.

Lastly, Adobe has added support for the ARRI ALEXA 35 cinema camera with ARRIRAW and Apple ProRes video files, with Apple Silicon finally getting native AAF support without relying on Rosetta Mode.

Elevating Motion Graphics

Over at After Effects, VFX artists can now design any graphics later as a selectable track matte, making it easier to combine visual effects more precisely. Users can apply a single matte to as many layers as needed, making compositions easier to manage and making global changes faster. 

There are also 50 new presets to save time laying down common tasks to build up a comp. These presets include animations for text, elements like map pins, and a 2D text body. AE also adds new comp presets for frame rate and size, as well as presets for social media, vertical video, and 4K video.

Native H.264 encoding is now hardware accelerated, making it faster to export video files directly from AE without having to pass through Adobe Media Encoder first.

Adobe is also testing 3D model import into a comp without third-party plugins, plus a new Properties Panel that shows tools needed to edit an item so that users don’t have to drill down through layers while editing. Lastly, housekeeping tweaks to OpenColor IO and ACES Color improve image quality for those workflows.

Character Animator

Currently in Beta, Adobe is adding a vast Motion Library of over 350 premade animation motions for user characters. This includes fighting, dancing, and running. The key for artists is ensuring their animations are properly rigged for Body Tracking.

The result is that user characters come to life in new and exciting ways, making them look more life-like through full-body character animations captured by professional MoCap artists.

Modeling with Substance 3D

In what may be the most significant expansion of Creative Cloud since the addition of Character Animator, Adobe is launching Substance 3D, a suite of 3D modeling apps that will enable 3D artists to create custom models within the Adobe universe without having to rely on a third-party 3D app.

Substance 3D Modeler will sculpt and assemble scenes with 3D Capture image data or use basic shapes within the simple UI to build up a model within a few minutes by combining and subtracting basic shapes to create new 3D objects. It’s kinda like Tinkercad on steroids.

Adobe also added layers that can be independently and non-destructively manipulated to the model for more complexity. Symmetric and warp features enable the user to add details all around the model and even curve details to wrap around the layer. 

Once built, it's possible to add skins and textures using Substance 3D Painter before sending the model to Substance 3D Stager to create, light, and add reflections according to what the camera sees.

Photogrammetry Built In

Substance 3D Sampler can also take data from the real world and convert them into 3D digital assets. Adding layers and effects. Great for creating virtual scenes to put actors in. They can also capture objects from the real world using photogrammetry, where a camera or mobile device takes still images from around the subject, imports them into a 3D sampler, and merges them to generate a 3D object.

Lastly, Adobe’s hybrid VR/Desktop workflow allows for automatic switching between old-school desktop editing or crafting within a virtual space using virtual reality. All the artist needs to do is put on their virtual headset, and they are in the virtual space, with complete access to all Substance tools and options.

 

Adobe Comes Out Swinging

All these updates are available now through Creative Cloud after updating the interface. However, Character Animator users must be subscribed to the All Apps Creative Cloud subscription.

They will also need to join the Beta Test by clicking on the Beta Apps options to the left of the Creative Cloud Sidebar, choosing the app, and selecting join. Then, select update and install to get the Beta version of Character Animator. This will install a separate version of Character Animator, so users will have access to both versions during the Beta Test.

With VFX and motion graphics becoming available to all sorts of creatives thanks to open-source programs like Blender and, most recently, Moonray, Adobe seems to want a piece of that audience. By having all of these tools under one umbrella and one subscription plan, creatives are getting a lot of bang for their buck. However the landscape will change in the future as competitors evolve to compete, it's clear that creatives will be the ones winning.