Motion 5 new features and Shake

[Jimmylee Remillard]

I don’t know Shake but I know Motion 5 really well. Motion 5 is amazing for motion graphics, in my opinion it surpasses After Effects (without plugins) in this area. You get a lot of FREE content to put into your projects and it has realtime playback. With the new integration of rigging and publishing Motion 5 is the go to software for Lower Thrids, Titles, and Transitions.

Where it falls behind is compoisiting. Granted it has received an upgrade Chroma Keyer which is really good, it lacks major round tripping features and it also lacks support from third-party plugins (hopfully the $50 price tag helps with this)

Jimmylee Remillard
Partner / Production Manager
iMotion Video Corp.

[Burt Hazard]

Well basically Apple had integrated some of the keying, tracking, and optical flow technologies from Shake into Motion.

[Jim Bachalo]

Thanks
So I can safely use Motion 5 (knowing I made the best choice) for
1-Titling & Lower thirds
2-Transitions
3-Keying(which has received an upgrade)

What about some of the other built in effects like particles? I have a particular effect I know I can do using the Trapcode Particular plugin. How does the built in particle effect in Motion compare?

Local is the new global

[Shawn Miller]

Hey Jimmy, when you say that Motion surpasses AE (without) plugins, what do you mean? Are you talking about functionality or workflow? Are you saying that there are things that AE can’t do that Motion can?

Thanks,
Shawn

[Shawn Miller]

Hey Jim,

Titles, lower thirds and transitions are easy in AE… but they’re probably easier to do in Motion. Having used Particular and the cousin to Motion’s particle engine (Particle Illusion), I can tell you that Particular is much deeper… unless the Motion 5 particle engine has been re-written or uses a different library than M4. FYI, Video Copilot is coming out with a new particle plugin for AE, so you may want to stay tuned for that.

Thanks,

Shawn

[Stefan Buhrmester]

In my opinion, the biggest differences are these:

– After Effects is a lot more powerful than Motion because it allows you to script anything and drive everything through expressions. Motion does not have any scripting capabilities.
– Motion is much better for 3D, particles and motion graphics, because in Motion everything lives in a real 3D world instead of layers.
– You can use After Effects compositions directly in Premiere Pro, while Apple has removed the functionality to directly import Motion files into FCPX. Hopefully they’ll re-add this rather soon.

I never used Shake and can’t comment on that.

[Shawn Miller]

“- Motion is much better for 3D, particles and motion graphics, because in Motion everything lives in a real 3D world instead of layers.”

Actually, it’s the same as AE… 2D layers in 3D space. I’m not sure what you’re basing the rest of your statement on. Is there something that you can share to help me understand why you say that? I haven’t seen anything “high-end” or complex done in Motion… I’m not saying it hasn’t been done, just that I haven’t seen it.

Thanks,

Shawn

[Stefan Buhrmester]

I’m saying that because AE cannot do 3D particles, and it does not have replicators or behaviors. It’s very limited in that regard unless you purchase plugins like particular for a few hundred dollars.

[Simon Ubsdell]

Lots of good points already made here but I would add that Shake was (and is insofar as it still works fine) a completely different beast to either AE or Motion. It was never meant to be a motion graphics tool unlike the other two, so things like fancy particle stuff are much better done in AE with plug-ins or Motion with the built-in stuff.

Conversely neither AE not Motion can even begin to approach the compositing power of Shake – we’re talking a completely different league, based partly on the fact that it’s a nodal compositor rather than layer-based, allowing for much greater complexity and speed in compositing.

I have to add too that Motion 5 at its new price point is simply one of the best value apps around – amidst all the flack that Apple have taken for FCPX they have genuinely hit a home run with Motion 5. In addition, the real-time capabilities of Motion have for me always meant that it’s a faster way to work than AE, while AE’s scripting power means that ultimately it still trumps Motion overall – for now!

Simon Ubsdell
Director/Editor/Writer
http://www.tokyo-uk.com

[Shawn Miller]

“I’m saying that because AE cannot do 3D particles”

Sorry, that just isn’t true, AE ships with 4 particle systems – One of them (CC Particle World) is a 3D system.

“and it does not have replicators or behaviors”

No, AE uses expressions…. which are extremely powerful. The only real limits are imposed by your ability to learn scripting and your imagination.

Thanks,

Shawn