Essential Graphics Panel vs. Title Tool (Titler)

[thxapproved2]

Just updated to Premiere 2017.1 and have been introduced to the new "Essential Graphics" panel (EGP) and Title tool.

As of right now, I am both excited and frustrated.  I'm excited that this will allow for creating graphic presets in After Effects and creating some really great animated titles.  I also like the fact that when you add a Photoshop file, the transparency actually works (something that was SO frustrating about the original titler. You could add a "logo," but alpha channels or Photoshop transparency was ignored. Was all based on luminance).

HOWEVER, this is where it ends... currently. This is said, knowing full-well that the original titler tool is still available.

I am having real difficulty with a few things:

- This was not phased in.  Went to quickly create new title in a project by pressing CTRL+T and discovered a surprising, but not necessarily pleasant result of a strange box appearing over my video in my source monitor... Only to finally discover this was part of the new EGP.

- Rolling / scrolling titles:  How does one create them in this new workflow?

- Many of the title styling options are missing.

     - How do you apply gradient colors to fonts?

     - Drop shadows are missing "size (density)" option.  They have "angle," "distance," and "spread (blur)" only.

     - No ability to place to change stroke from  "inner" or "outer."

     - No ability to add sheen or texture

- Can't double-click on select box to switch back to editing text (convenience feature).

- When you create a title with the new "titler," it does not place anything in the bin.  This will make organizing reused titles quite difficult to locate and modify. There needs be a way to show all titles available within a project.

I could potentially see getting rid of the old title tool, if some of these issues were addressed.

If there are ANY insights to this new "feature," I would greatly appreciate.  Have not been able to find ANY comprehensive tutorials on the Adobe website for these above items.

Thanks!

-Todd

[R Neil Haugen]

I'd say you've not read through this or a number of other threads on the EGP, given the statements you make. In general, these forums are provided as user-to-user, and it's not expected there will be much development team participation. There are some very experienced folks from all sorts of pro backgrounds who "monitor" and respond with assistance on many questions. We're not paid staffers, but ... the available expertise is rather solid. And no, for most threads members of the development team will not be responding. Nor would I want them to ... I'd rather they be working on the program.

Kevin Monahan, Product Support Manager for the Digital Video Apps (yea, big company, big job titles ... ) does monitor these forums as part of his job, and pops in on a lot of threads ... he's a long-time editor/colorist, even used to be a certified teacher for FCP back around 5/6 or somewhere there. He both helps here at times with his knowledge of editing & PrPro in specific, and of course he and his staff communicate on behalf of the users that post here with the development staffers.

Stefan Gruenwedel, a staffer within PrPro (particular title escapes me), has also posted a number of replies on this thread and others.

James Strawn, one of the development team for the EGP itself, has been on here a ton on his own time ... and helped with a lot of questions on both this thread and others concerning the EGP. He's also produced a very good overview of the EGP he published on Vimeo, and that will be in the links I post at the bottom.

For anyone who's been to say NAB or the other main showcases of video post work, or been online viewing the various pieces published about the EGP by Adobe staffers or others, well ... it's been very clear this first roll-out of the EGP was the "0.9" version, and they expected to get a ton of comments, which they were planning on using to determine part of the direction of the panel. They did a darn poor job of handling that with the initial roll-out, that's for sure. I couldn't figure heads nor tails of this thing to begin with myself!

That said ... the directions they've shown they are taking this, and why, go way deep into tying into AfterEffects and eventually other graphics programs to push graphics capabilities within PrPro far, far past where they have been. The stuff we're going to be able to do fairly soon will be amazing ... which is part of (for me) why the many limitations on the current release are so frustrating. It can't do some things yet that it needs to ... but will eventually.

iMovie? Give me a break ... that can't even touch the base of where the EGP is designed to go.

Neil

[R Neil Haugen]

And though I've posted them above, and on other threads, here's a selection of four tutorials ... the first two good quick overviews (the second is by James Strawn, one of the developers) ... and the second pair are longer and more detailed use-scenario tutorials.

Neil

Essential Graphics Links:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAoZme5rOfM&t=205s

https://vimeo.com/211404007

http://www.retooled.net/?p=1693

http://www.retooled.net/?p=1696

[Thrill Media]

OH GOD! This does make me worry!

[R Neil Haugen]

?

[nickgates100]

Firstly i-movie was in brackets?  My point was that Adobe are desperately trying to simplify and automate PP to capture the more lucrative market of hobbyist, weekend warriors, home enthusiasts - whatever you want to call them. From a market point of view I get that, but that doesn't help people that use the software everyday - even though we are probably in the minority.

Also, no-one, certainly not I, am aiming criticism at you and the other good folk that post replies to queries and questions on this forum. You a do great job.  I (we) are just venting at the frustration of having to constantly waste time and unnecessarily adapt the way we work. Time is money as they say.

I understand fully how and what Essential Graphics is for, I do not need a tutorial but.... a big but... it is not finished and should never have been released until it had been. I can see that one day it will be great (as Donald would say), but today is not that day.

My greatest fear is that PP is moving closer to FCP (nothing in brackets) - which frankly is a toy. That's the point.

Again, I apologise if I offended in any way, not intended, your contributions are very much appreciated by everyone I'm sure.  This is an open forum and everyone has the right to voice positives, negatives and frustrations otherwise what would be the point?

[R Neil Haugen]

Thanks for the elucidation.

I've been around for "only" five years with this app, and constantly, there has been the fear that it is being dumbed-down. For example, when the Essential Sound panel was introduced. That was seen by many posting on here as a certain sign that it was just a dumbed down limited "addition" for the amateur crowd. At the same time, they did remove or restrict a couple of the older compressor options, so together ... we wuz on the road to perdition.

I can understand the lack of a couple of the compressor functions drove those who used them routinely nuts. And I disagree with that sort of thing in general ... but the ESP is a fast tool for me, as someone who's "into" editing & color correction far more than sound. Plus ... there's still Audition, which has been upgraded. So we got a faster tool for most things, still a full tool set and especially a pretty decent full-sound app ... hmmm.

So perhaps the ESP wasn't the road to perdition it was said to be.

To me, the biggest potential dumb-down move was the removal of the Direct Link process with SpeedGrade after the introduction and a couple minor tweaks to the Lumetri panel. Lumetri was a huge jump forward in most respects over the older color tools ... however ... nowhere near the grading app that SpeedGrade is/was. I am hoping that the recent change in leadership of the PrPro team could help with that, but ... we'll know when they do something, won't we?

I would partially agree as to problems with the way the rollout of the EGP was handled. James and others 'over there' have heard my complaints on that one. I can understand why they rolled it out without more tools ... to get users used to it and to get more feedback, I get that.

But why in the world couple that with making the old (and much reviled) Titler harder to find plus removing a couple of its tools? I'd have suggested just adding it in as-was for people to work with as they found it useful.

Talking with the engineers and managers at NAB, they're certainly not interested in simply running an app for the "weekend warrrior" crowd.

Neil

[karla521]

I too have no desire to offend.  But the truth of it all is that the entire industry is changing daily.  You've been around, you're in a project, so you know not to upgrade... you get that break, you upgrade, then things are missing.  Premiere is a great program for getting things done, short and sweet.  You need more dynamic graphics, etc you go to AE, but the basic "Legacy Titles" enabled me to not have to go to AE for a project that just doesn't have the budget for me to work in AE.   That's it.  Let's all stay on the same team and help Adobe help the professionals.

[R Neil Haugen]

It's when a change suddenly stops your workflow that it becomes terribly annoying, isn't it? That I most certainly see.

At times, the roll-out process causes more disruption than the change in tools should have made. That's unfortunate. And someplace it's probably good for us all to give a bit of feedback.

Neil

[nickgates100]

"Talking with the engineers and managers at NAB, they're certainly not interested in simply running an app for the "weekend warrrior" crowd."

That's good to hear. Thanks for the insight.

Here's a thought: Maybe this is one of the downsides of monthly subscription software?  The provider has to give the user something new and the user expects something new much more often than the old days of eighteen month upgrades.  For me it's phycological, if there's an update I just have to click the button!  I just need to be more restrained. Then, maybe I won't get so wound up.

[R Neil Haugen]

Oh, but it's so easy to get wound up when you click to update to get the newest toys, and ... they freakin' did WHAT! is the first thing that pops outta your mouth. Yup, been there done that.

Although ... normally ... after I see what's going on, it's a better operation than before. And well ... at this time, I've got the fewest versions of PrPro installed than I've run for quite some time, as most everything I'd been working on seems to have migrated to 2017.1.2 just fine.

You're right about the ups & downs and the psychology of a subscription software. And it's been fascinating to learn that different Adobe programs handle how quickly ... and how minor ... they run out bug-fix releases versus just rolling everything into maybe three releases a year.

That can generate the odd hour of discussion also ...

Neil

[hanrmark]

I use drop shadow size all the time! I am missing it desperately right now, as I'm in the middle of a series of patient testimonials for a dental office, and now the text won't look fluid and constant among the videos. Please bring drop shadow size back!

[R Neil Haugen]

File a feature report ...

https://www.adobe.com/cfusion/mmform/index.cfm?name=wishform

They don't respond, but all those filed are put on a sort of spreadsheet collated form of some kind, delivered to all managerial types.

Neil

[RobertoAlfieri]

In my small opinion, even after having read the whole post, I still can't understand how it is possible that it is impossible to UPDATE an AE-made essential title:

- I can create a title with AE (may be, a lower third)

- I export the title using TEXT attributes as an Essential Graphic object

- I use the object several times in the Premiere project chenging text attribute locally one by one

- Then the customer says something as "well, the font is bad, please change to COMIC SANS"

- I change the AE composition

- I re-export to Premiere Essential Graphic folder (and AE says: object is existing, replace? YESSS)

now nothing changes, i have to rebuild all the occurrences of the object one-by-one

how is it possible??? this is BAD!!! But... may be i have not understood something...  I'm looking for a solution since several weeks but NO SUCCESS at all... someone has ideas?????

[R Neil Haugen]

Use the master text options ... create named/saved text styles, use those ... then if you change the style, it ripples through all of the instances.

Neil

[RobertoAlfieri]

first of all thank you, but I WANT to use AE as titler, it has endless possibility far more interesting than even the the new PR titler...

And it is NOT possible to upgrade to master an AE object...

[Roei Tzoref]

more explanations about the limitations in here: MOGRTs vs LTTs (Motion Graphics Templates vs Live Text Templates) in an AE / PPro Workflow

[R Neil Haugen]

No ... but build your mogrt's with master text styles to begin with. That way at least you can "build" yourself out of this, which is a royal pain.

Neil

[kferg99]

Hi Mike Berry,

I like the new Essential Graphics panel, but just like Todd in the first post, I'm troubled by the elimination of "Size" (density) in the drop shadow feature. Are there plans to add it?

-Kevin

[jstrawn]

kferg99  wrote

Hi Mike Berry,

I like the new Essential Graphics panel, but just like Todd in the first post, I'm troubled by the elimination of "Size" (density) in the drop shadow feature. Are there plans to add it?

-Kevin

Yes. It will be in a future release.

[madeinjapantonight]

Just my 2 cents here.  I make videos for a Japanese audience.  It is standard practice to go CRAZY with multilevel fills, strokes, and shadows.  The following are taken from a recent TV clip.  Guess how long it took for all these styles to be used?  90 seconds.  And I did not even include all of the styles used - there are about 10 more.  Although I agree that I do not see complex text styles in the US, they are pretty much required for a polished look in Japan.  My typical title style includes a fill (solid or linear/radial gradient), at least 3 outer strokes (combo of edge and depth), and a shadow (using both size and spread).  Some of the more complex ones have 7 outer strokes! Please at least include all styling options available in the Titler in the new Essential Graphics panel (often these need boxes behind them, so the Essential Graphics layers seemed promising).  I am not sure where you are getting your use info from, but I assure you complex styles are alive and well here.

[jstrawn]

madeinjapantonight  wrote

My typical title style includes a fill (solid or linear/radial gradient), at least 3 outer strokes (combo of edge and depth), and a shadow (using both size and spread).  Some of the more complex ones have 7 outer strokes! Please at least include all styling options available in the Titler in the new Essential Graphics panel (often these need boxes behind them, so the Essential Graphics layers seemed promising).  I am not sure where you are getting your use info from, but I assure you complex styles are alive and well here.

That's why we are working on adding things like stroke size and gradients. It all takes time to develop and test though. Multiple strokes is a separate feature request, and I can submit one internally for you. Your user story is a good one.

[redempt71070702]

I agree with much of above the new Titles and Essential Graphics interface was poorly thought out. It makes the easiest things such as adding a graphic box difficult. Not at ALL intuitive, and worst of all, such things as the type tool no longer work in a similar way to how they work in other Adobe products such as Illustrator, InDesign and Photoshop. What in the world were the people at Adobe thinking!

[jstrawn]

bradb71070702  wrote

I agree with much of above the new Titles and Essential Graphics interface was poorly thought out. It makes the easiest things such as adding a graphic box difficult. Not at ALL intuitive, and worst of all, such things as the type tool no longer work in a similar way to how they work in other Adobe products such as Illustrator, InDesign and Photoshop. What in the world were the people at Adobe thinking!

I don't mean to lessen the validity of your opinion in any way, but I just don't see what you mean. The method for creating a new shape is to select a Shape tool then click and Drag in Program Mon to draw a shape where you want it. The method for creating new text is to select the Type tool, click, and type. That seems easy and intuitive to me. That is also how the Type and Shape tools tool work in products like Illustrator, InDesign, Photoshop and After Effects.

[Alex_MuckRunner_Richard]

HELP! 

I have a time sensitive project and Essential Graphics keeps crashing! im getting this message everytime I try to edit my rolling credits.

Premiere Pro has encounterd an error 

../../../Mezzanine/AP/Inc/ComponentParamActor/TripleComponentParamActor.h_342

My set up 

Computer: Mac Pro (late 2013)

Processor: 3 GHz 8-Core Intel Xeon E5

Memory: 32 GB 1866 MHz DDR3

Graphics: AMD FirePro D700 6144 MB

I have tried setting graphics from Metal to software only and it has not helped

I cant find any help online! Ive filled out 4 crash reports and Adobe is ignoring me. I have a very important project due tomorrow and I need to solve this now. I feel helpless and depressed. It's just titles for shucks sake.. what am I doing worng? It was working earileer.  

[jstrawn · Accepted solution]

For those wishing to create Text Gradients right inside Premiere Pro's Program Monitor without needing the Legacy Titler, we're happy to announce the implementation of Text Gradients as of the latest public release of PrPro 15.2. Please try it out when you can and let us know what you think.

For information about how to apply Text Gradients as well as a couple of short how-to videos, go to this link:
https://helpx.adobe.com/premiere-pro/using/text-gradient.ug.html
Here is a snapshot of a Text Gradient in the Program Monitor: