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Premiopolis
Premiopolis
Inspiring
October 4, 2017
Question

MOGRTs vs LTTs (Motion Graphics Templates vs Live Text Templates) in an AE / PPro Workflow

  • October 4, 2017
  • 2 replies
  • 3572 views

After working with both MOGRTs and LTTs for a number of projects involving complex texted graphics, we've working toward understanding the pros and cons of each.

This post follows up on a discussion over in the PPro forum,  at the request of jstrawn.

And before the cons listed below ruffle any feathers, a huge thanks to Adobe for taking on texted graphics with such sophistication.  Tough stuff and no other edit system seems to be taking this on in any serious way.

Here's a brief overview...

MOGRTs

Pros

- Allows control over which AE properties are and are not passed to PPro.

- Properties controls can be passed as sliders to PPro (and hopefully more UIs soon)

- Creates a static file that cannot be edited -- protecting the AE side design work.

Cons

- The static file that cannot be edited also cannot be replaced, meaning design updates on the AE side will not update the PPro side instances.  PPro-side timeline instances must be selected and replaced manually.  That's not practical in a fast-paced multi-sequence, many-MOGRT workflow.

- New and deleted properties applied AE-side do not translate reliably over to PPro.

- The process of passing AE-created MOGRTs to PPro requires a lot of steps that become impractical (outlined here and here )

- The behind-the-scenes architecture lends itself to media- and project-management confusion and disorder (at the OS level 2 file types: .mogrt & .aegraphic, with multiple subfolders, stored by default in a hidden folder, landing in PPro in required sub-folder off root)

LTTs

Pros

- AE-side updates automatically update all PPro-side instances.  No steps.  Just save on the AE side and all PPro instances are updated.

- Any and all design changes modified AE-side make the voyage to PPro.

Cons

- Property controls cannot be passed to PPro directly.  It can be achieved by using hidden AE text layers which are used by expressions to control properties and then passed to PPRo for editor control -- a little kludgy but does work.

- No ability to limit and control which text layers are passed to PPro.  Any and all AE-side text layers are passed to PPro.

- No sliders or other UIs possible.

Conclusion

The extreme convenience of LTTs' instant and robust AE-to-PPro updating, vs the cumbersome (and unreliable / somewhat risky) process required to update MOGRTS led us to completely abandon MOGRTs in favor of LTTs.

But ideally

...we're looking to have our cake and eat it too.

- AE-to-PPro effortless updating you get from LTTS

- Masterful control over what properties and UI controllers pass AE-to-PPro you get from MOGRTs

In the end it would seem the real difference between MOGRTs and LTTs that matters is whether or not you're providing an editable AE file or a static .mogrt/.aegraphic package

Additional LTT v MOGRT note: dependencies vs independence

When it comes to PPro-side property changes:

- MOGRTs timeline instances are independent of one another other.  Changing PPro-side properties of one does not affect the others

- LTTs timeline instances are dependent on bin instances.  Changing the timeline instance changes the bin instance, affecting all the others.  It's the bin instances that are independent of one another.

The MOGRT approach is compelling because it's very easy to create a independent titles without littering bins with a bunch of items.

But for our purposes the LTT logic ultimately turned out to better for with more sophisticated graphics requirements. (More here)

Again, thanks to Adobe for even taking on texted graphics in the first place.

    This topic has been closed for replies.

    2 replies

    Kevin-Monahan
    Community Manager
    Kevin-MonahanCommunity Manager
    Community Manager
    November 30, 2017

    More of a discussion than a question. I'll mark it as such.

    Thanks,
    Kevin

    Kevin Monahan - Sr. Community and Engagement Strategist – Adobe Pro Video and Audio
    Roei Tzoref
    Roei Tzoref
    Legend
    October 4, 2017

    as always Premiopolis​ great documentation and contribution.

    I am afraid I have to take one MGT Pro of the few we have anyway

    Creates a static file that cannot be edited -- protecting the AE side design work.

    On Windows:

    you could trace the .aegraphic file that is created after you import the mogrt to premiere, and open that in Ae and have access to the original template the mograt was made from, including all the assets, expressions and secrets.

    On Mac, I read this works:

    you can have full Ae access to the design and expressions by Changing the extension from mogrt to zip, then Unpack the zip, then Change the extension of the resulting file to zip, and unpack it, which will end up with a folder that has an editable AE project and media in it.

    also, maybe one Con for LLT is not accurate:

    - No ability to limit and control which text layers are passed to PPro.  Any and all AE-side text layers are passed to PPro.

    it states in the documentation for LLT that locked text layers do not pass as editable  in the LTT workflow but I am not near a computer with Ae to test it.

      Premiopolis
      PremiopolisAuthor
      Inspiring
      October 4, 2017

      https://forums.adobe.com/people/Roei+Tzoref  wrote

      as always Premiopolis  great documentation and contribution.

      I am afraid I have to take one MGT Pro of the few we have anyway

      Creates a static file that cannot be edited -- protecting the AE side design work.

      On Windows:

      you could trace the .aegraphic file that is created after you import the mogrt to premiere, and open that in Ae and have access to the original template the mograt was made from, including all the assets, expressions and secrets.

      On Mac, I read this works:

      you can have full Ae access to the design and expressions by Changing the extension from mogrt to zip, then Unpack the zip, then Change the extension of the resulting file to zip, and unpack it, which will end up with a folder that has an editable AE project and media in it.

      Happy to stand corrected.  Really fascinating.

      (Albeit your double-zipped unpacking sounds suspiciously like some kind of madhouse to-do list which may well be an accurate summary of the meaning of life)

      I tested your mac workflow.  All the parts are there as described, but changes to the .aegraphic inside the .mogrt had no effect.

      I'm not sure what the .mogrt file is doing, but it doesn't seem to be the media support for PPro.

      Instead, the media file supporting PPro is a different .aegraphic file, one of several that can be found inside the "Motion Graphics Template Media" folder (alongside the .mogrt file you described).  There you find a series of what appear to be UID-named folders, inside of which are .aegraphic files that can be edited in the way that you described.  If you edit those in AE, it will indeed change the content of your MOGRTs in PPro

      BUT

      So far I'm not able to use AE's Essential Graphics to control which properties, sliders, value range pass to PPro.

      The whole exercise raises interesting observations and questions:

      - To the extent MOGRTs obscure (as opposed to secure) an original AEP file, protecting artistic property is not an issue here.

      - It suggests LTTs and MOGRTs are basically using the same process to feed PPro.  A MOGRT is really just a packaged AE file.

      - Would it conceivably make more sense for Adobe to re-conceive of the AE Essential Graphics panel for MOGRTS to really just be a UI for both LTTs and MOGRTs.  In other words, if you apply sliders to your AE file, drag properties to Essential Graphics, edit the ranges, apply the names, etc. etc. -- why not re-imagine those features as being applied to the AE file as opposed to the Exported MOGRT.  In so doing Adobe would be giving matching functionality to LTTs and MOGRTs.

      Roei Tzoref
      Roei Tzoref
      Legend
      October 4, 2017

      we can only guess the complexities that are involved and why this or that is happening. We need functionality and we need the ability to make changes to a master template and for it to affect its instances, and we need many more less critical things added to MGT workflow. the effort to make these issues known and heard by users and the team was largly contributed by you and thanks for that. All we can do now is wait for this to happen or for some Ae wizard to create a tool or to show us a decent flexible workflow that makes sense in a real production.

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