How to integrate Premiere Pro with After Effects?

Report · Feb 18, 2021

I've never used After Effects and I'm not interested in becoming an expert in it, but it's installed on my system as part of CC. I have a Premiere Pro project that's a bit grainy and someone said that After Effects has better noise reduction that Premiere Pro. What's the best way to access it?

Currently my project is in clips on my timeline, shown in the attached image. I tried selecting all of them and doing a "Replace With After Effects Composition" but that was a bad idea because it literally replaced the contents of my timeline with a solid pink bar. (I guess that's the "replace" part). So what's the right workflow? Should i finsh all my editing in Premiere Pro, export an .MP4 and then import that into the AE for noise reduction (the "after" part of After Effects) as a new AE project?

Thanks in advance.

Report · Feb 18, 2021

For now you should simply load an actual clip into AE and do the tweaks you want, and see if it helps. After that you can decide whats best to do. For instance you can test the noise reduction on a clip and if it works well, you can export that into a ProRes file and import that into PP. Or you can send your clip over to AE like the way you did it, but likely not for the whole timeline at once.

Play around AE first, make sure you can get what you are expecting.

Report · Feb 18, 2021

I'm sorry; I don't understand your answer. Are you saying that the standard workflow between Premiere Pro and AE is to do it on a clip-by-clip basis? I think that would be pretty cumbersome on a non-trivial project. The example I attached has only 5 clips, but a typical Premiere Pro project has dozens or more clips, and I've had projects, e.g., with lots of quick cuts and edits, with over a hundred clips.

Or you can send your clip over to AE like the way you did it, but likely not for the whole timeline at once.

So if I just select one clip and "replace with AfterEffect Composition" it replaces it in Premiere Pro with an After Effects "Linked Composition" which does not appear to be a Premiere Pro clip anymore, e.g., it doesn't seem to have my transitions. So it still sounds like I should complete my Premiere Pro editing first before involving AE. So I'm still trying to get clarified on the typical workflow between PP and AE.

Or for something like this am I just better off buying a third-party noise-reduction tool?