After Effects PC or MAC which is better for FCP integration? any preferences?

[Rafael Amador]

AE works great the same in PC or MAC. The advantage I find in MAC is that you can import and export all the codecs supported by QT and the choice you;ve got in PC is quite short because its only accept the few codecs supported by AVI.
Salud,
Rafael

[Jerry Hofmann]

How fast is the PC? If it’s not pretty fast, you might be just as well off working entirely on the Mac… even while it renders in FCP, it wouldn’t preclude you from working in AE. But there’s nothing wrong with working on the PC while you run things on the Mac either. Just makes you move to another keyboard or whatever…

Jerry

P.S. You should be running FCP 5.1.2, OS 10.4.8 and QT 7.1.3…. Check that the Decklink drivers are compatible (they probably are by now) but it’s better software than you’re running now I think.

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Dual 2 gig G5, AJA Kona SD, AJA Kona 2, Huge Systems Array UL3D

[David Roth weiss]

David,

Another reason to consider AE for MAC is that you can get the Automatic Duck plugin, which provides real integration between FCP and AE, allowing you to export clips, layers, and transisions from the FCP timeline into AE.

DRW

[Matt Callac]

Yes, I use this plug in almost daily, and it makes FCP AE intigration a breeze. Also when you use AE on a mac it makes it easier to archive all materials for a project a lot easier since it’s all on the same machine.

[David Fortin]

Thanks to all that responded. Sounds like I should go with the MAC version of AE. As far as Automatic Duck, I only need “Pro Import AE” correct? Then I render an 8bit Quicktime out of AE to go back to FCP. Is that the proper workflow?

David

Dual 2.5 G5 {OS 10.4.5}
4.5 GB RAM
FCP 5.0.4
NVIDIA GeForce 6800 Ultra DDL
DeckLink SP
ATTO ExpressPCI UL4S
Medea Video Raid RT320
Sony UVW-1800
Pansonic AG-DV2500
Media Cleaner Pro 6
Squeeze 4.2 (PC)
ViewSonic 19″ LCD
Optiquest 21″ CRT
Bella EZ Keyboard

[George Loch]

One thing that hasn’t been mentioned is the Intel-mac issue. It appears that you are a G5 user so it’s not an issue fro you BUT if you are thinking of getting a MBP or a MacPro you will see some performance degradation running AE as it will not be native. Adobe has not discussed the plan for a universal binary version of AE that I have seen so keep that in mind.

You can run the PC version of AE in bootcamp btw and it really flys 🙂 As a matter of fact, The 3.0 MacPro is currently oen of the fastest AE machines available…when operated under a Bootcamp installation of Windows.

-gl