FCPX Motion5 compared with Premiere Pro/After Effects

[Phil Hawes]

If the keying tools are the same in Motion 5 as they are in Motion 4 then After Effects is by far your best choice. It comes with Keylight.
This is a very sophisticated tool for keying and has solved many of my green screen woes.

[Alan Okey]

Motion 5 has a brand new keyer that’s really quite good. I’ve come to depend on Combustion’s Discreet keyer and Diamond keyers as well as DVGarage’s Conduit, and I was quite surprised to find that Motion 5’s keyer actually gives them a run for their money. If you’re not an experienced compositor, it’s even more attractive for its ease of use. Best of all, Motion 5 is only $50, so it’s worth buying just for the keyer alone. Even if you end up going with AE/Premiere Pro, you’re only out $50 for a tool that has many great uses, even if you already own AE. A big downside is that there’s no support for proper broadcast monitoring out of Motion 5 and FCP X at this point, and some say that there may never be.

[Phil Hawes]

I tried to like Motion, but every time I wanted to complete a project in Motion 4 something was missing. In the middle of a composite project for example I might want to color correct one layer but the color correction tool was poor. Or I found that I had to save a lot because Motion was just unstable. Once you learn After Effects you pretty much forget about Motion. The Keylight tool in AE has many options so there are many details to learn but that’s a good thing in my opinion.

[Shawn Miller]

I don’t know the capabilities of Motion and FCPX with regard to keying, but I will say that it’s more important to understand the art of keying (at this point). If you’re looking to do quick ‘one click keys’ with pretty good resluts, then just about any tool will do. But if want to do really good keys then you’ll need to dive a little deeper into to art of it. Here are some resources I’ve found useful over the years for understanding composting. Some of these resources are AE centric, but the underlying concepts and techniques should apply to most compositing applications.

https://www.amazon.com/Digital-Compositing-Video-Steve-Wright/dp/B001E050KA/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_3

https://www.amazon.com/Art-Science-Digital-Compositing-Second/dp/0123706386/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1311352618&sr=1-3

https://www.amazon.com/Effects-Visual-Compositing-Studio-Techniques/dp/032171962X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1311352253&sr=1-1

https://www.amazon.com/DV-Rebels-Guide-All-Digital-Approach/dp/0321413644/ref=pd_sim_b_8

https://www.digitaltutors.com/11/training.php?pid=470

Thanks,

Shawn

[Ian Bailey]

Although I’ve heard good things about the keyer in FCPX and Motion 5, I’m in no doubt that you should be choosing After Effects. As well as a fantastic colour keyer, you also need filters that can separate and manipulate colour channels. These didn’t exist in Motion 4 and the word is that Motion 5 hasn’t changed in that respect.

I too would highly recommend the Steve Wright, Ron Brinkmann and Mark Christiansen books. This training material is also spectacular:

https://www.hollywoodcamerawork.us/vfx_index.html

[Robert Brown]

If you want good results it’s a no brainer – CS5.5. I too have tried to like Motion but it’s keyer almost never gives the results I want. Keylight that comes in AE is a top notch keyed that also ships with programs like Nuke. Plus you get Photoshop, Illustrator, and Adobe Media Encoder. There is no comparison.

[Leo Hans]

Did you try the new Motion 5 Keyer? It’s impressive.

Leo Hans
Editor AVID – Final Cut Pro
https://www.leohans.com

[Ed Boasso]

With Motion 5’s keyer, did you find it’s features pulled an excellent key, or would you rather use AE’s for more refinement?

[Ed Boasso]

Are you mostly comenting from using Motion 4, or both?

[Leo Hans]

I made a few tests with RED footage and the results was very good. (The light was perfect and with a very good chroma background at the studio. A woman with swimming suite and blonde long hair moving. The camera speed was at 100fps as I can remember).

Leo Hans
Editor AVID – Final Cut Pro
https://www.leohans.com