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I need a “User Friendly” titler/animation softrare.
Hello, the subject line says is all. Can anyone point me in the right direction? A few weeks ago I purchased Boris FX & Graffiti. These software appear to be very powerful but are rather complex. I would love to get up to speed with them if someone knows of a site or some basic steps to get me started.
Thank you.
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14 Replies
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Titlers and animation application are actually quite different. While titlers are usually rather simple, Premiere has one), animation applications are always going to be complex, 3D being the most complex. For 2D, and a little 3D, After Effects would be the obvious choice for Premiere.
I would recommend Cinema 4D for 3D, as it is probably the easiest to learn (take that with a grain of salt), yet also one of the most powerful.
If you are looking for a free a alternative, there is one called Blender.
The best way to learn is really with tutorials, and they are often a lot of fun.
Vince
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ProAnimator is the most “user friendly” I’ve seen.
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Take a look at BluffTitler: https://www.outerspace-software.com/blufftitler.html
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For animated text, BluffTitler is dirt cheap and easy to learn.
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Just curious Howard, but is PPRO’s titling tool too hard to use, or are you looking for something that will give you more of a 2D/3D look?
I have used Boris Grafitti and Red over the last few years and found it extremly easy to use the built-in presets (just type in your text, choose the color(s), any additional bevel and shadow effects you want and then render it out, or click the apply button in the bottom corner if you are using it as a plug-in for PPRO or AE).
The nice thing about PPRO’s titler is that it also has a lot of presets, some of which are nice, others look horrible (of course, taste and discretion are both very subjective things), but you CAN build up a library of your own customized presets, which is not all that difficult to do.
I agree with Mike and Blast1, Bluff Titler is very easy to use, and inexpensive (around $63.07 US currency). As Jeron stated ProAnimator is not a bad choice, and once you watch a few tutorials, AE7 or AECS3 is a great, flexible app that grows with you and will do simply amazing things. There are a ton of great tutorials here on the Cows for After Effects, and if you already own it in the creative suite / video collection, it is definitely worth taking another look at later on when you have time to dig into it a bit. Titles are very easy to do without having your brain exploding learning the more advanced features that AE supports.
FYI, there are also PPRO titling tool tutorials to be found out on the web, let me know if you are interested and I will provide a link for you. You can literally create a reasonable title in less than a minute (usually just a few seconds), depending on what you are trying to achieve.
As with anything, the more you use it, the more adept and confident you will become using that particualr tool.
Good luck!
Scot Sheely
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P Pro’s titler is just plain boring, Been that way since version 4.2
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Boring?
Interesting.
The titler changed significantly in version 6.5. The titling tool in earlier versions was truly…rudimentary.
The title designer that was introduced in v6.5 is pretty decent in my mind, but I don’t use a lot of the pre-canned effects that come in the self-contained titling packages anyway. I like how quickly I can compose text elements and I animate or create effects in AE.
For those that need a lot of canned effects inside of a titling tool, I suppose the title designer in PPro doesn’t have that just-add-water animation presets capability.
For me, I am seeing all sorts of elegant, dedicated, single-purpose tools try to add features until it isn’t very elegant anymore. Video editors attempting to be DVD authoring applications (thankfully PPro moved away from that), still image animation tools becoming video editors, titling tools becomng animation/FX apps… Users always seem to complain that they don’t have enough features, but then when all these features get added, users tend to seek out something easier to use (this isn’t a criticism of HowardM BTW, just an observation of mine that goes back quite a few years).
I guess I’ll probably get flack, but I like the title designer and use it to create very high quality titles.
My particular requirements and preferences are not everyone’s however…
TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,Creative Cow Host,
Author/Trainer
http://www.focalpress.com
http://www.classondemand.net -
I find it so easy to modify the presets in After Effects that I don’t see the point in using a third party application.
If I need 3D text, Bluff Titler is certainly easy to use, but I seldom bother with 3D text anymore.
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I really appreciate the input from everone. I’ve learned alot. My only regret is I didn’t ask this question before I made my purchase, silly move on my behalf. By watching a few tutorials on youtube it’s obvoius I should have gone with AE. It seems to have pretty much everything I’l looking for (animated text, aimnations, and some really cool graphics).
Scott – I find PPRO’s titling rather simple to use but I was looking for something a more robust.
Maybe I should have described in more datail what I’m attempting to acclomplish. I’m producing a variety of fifteen minute video segments for our in-house TV Channel. Some of these segments are, Golf Tips, Tennnis Tips and Gardening Tips, just to name a few. What I would like to do is create a intro clip for each segment. For example, the tennis segment would have tennis balls bouncing around while the text “Tennis Tips with XYZ” glides on screen. Could AE produce such a effect?
Thank you for taking the time to reply.
HowardDell XPS 400,
2.80 MHZ,
1 GB Ram,
1-160 GB HD,
Win XP Pro SP2,
Canon XL1,
JVC-BR- DV3000U, -
Tim and Stephen, I appreciate your well thought-out and astute answers, and I have to chime in on those sentiments.
Howard, AE7 or AECS3 (especially since the latter version has that ultra-cool “Puppet Tool”!) is exactly what you are looking for.
While it is NOT an NLE, you can pre-comp multiple layers of video, still images and text and achieve the exact efffects you claim to be looking to achieve.
Of course, there are many stock animation companies like Digital Juice et al who also have sports editions (ETK 8 in the case of DJ, good stuff, but lacking in variety I need, but I do own it). This makes building a composition much easier, especially for lower thirds, titles and transitional wipes. They also have a lot of matted alpha graphic content, both static images and animated that work well in a variety of projects.
Personally, I still find I am creating a combination of hand-crafted animations in AE7 (haven’t upgraded to CS3 yet, probably will after the first of the year) using digital photos of items like basketballs, footballs, beachballs (all of those in recent projects). I have far more flexibility in the motion path that way, but I still pop in a transitional object wipe from DJ or using another company’s stock animations.
Check out some of the many After Effects tutorials found here on the Cows site, most of them are par excellent! A great way to learn is by using practical examples, and you can find a ton of them here.
Thank you, Creative Cow contributers!
Scot Sheely
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