Great alias, "wastingyourlifeaway" (sounds like one too many hours toiling away in a darkened room) I just tested. A couple of things: - In Illustrator there doesn't seem to be a way to an external SVG. It's vector graphics, and embedding, as opposed to linking, is the only option. - In Photoshop you can link to an external SVG, so you get the benefit of changing the SVG to update the PSD, but you nonetheless lose resolution when scaling. - There's actually no reason to export HTML to SVG. If you can make HTML dynamic, you can do it to SVG as well. But going back to the bigger picture: The goal of all of this is to find ways to gain powerful, coherent control over large numbers of motion graphics, making use of Adobe-based templates to control the look, and external data sources to deliver the content. With this architecture you would get huge benefits: - Change a template, and you affect everything in the show using based on that template - Re-assign any particular text graphic to a different template (say "ID Lower 3rds Left" to "ID Lower 3rds Right"), to surgically make one change, retaining the source data (e.g. name & ID) - Change a data content for any entry at any time, in such a way that responsibility for proper info, spelling, legal concerns etc. lies outside the edit bay -- and text graphics update with minimal down time in the edit bay. For shows that use a small number of lower 3rds or maybe use a lot of them, but have been around a few seasons, you don't necessarily this level of sophistication. But as shows become increasingly elaborate with their integration of style elements and content -- think sports, game shows, new generation science shows, and up and coming web content -- especially during the development stage, the above strategy can be mean time & money savings, fewer errors, and quantum improvements in style and creativity. Suddenly you're able to do develop and continually update large numbers of sophisticated, motion graphic text elements. We're currently using a custom-developed system that can take Adobe templates (PS, AI, ID, and esp. AE). That system generates external files using rigorous naming conventions so that updates appear in the timeline the moment the render finishes. This external file approach has certain benefits in that it can be used across all editing platforms: Premiere, Avid & FCP. But the All-Adobe approach would conceivably be a smoother overall workflow environment. Live Text Templates held out the promise not using external files, but it turns out there are a few down-sides: - The data is maintained in the edit system, so entries, updates, typos, etc. remain the burden & responsibility of the editor. - The data content is reviewable in with the kind of oversight and management power you get from a database or spreadsheet. - Switching between templates requires re-entering the data content. Custom Panels are not yet an alternative because - Automating the importing of Comps from AE to PPro is not yet possible - Moving data between AE and PPro is not yet there (though, per Bruce's suggestion, you could create temporary data transfer files to compensate) (Bruce, LMK if I'm wrong about this. Always looking for better ways to achieve this) The HTML idea outlined above seems like an intriguing extra opportunity. You wouldn't get nearly the design sophistication of After Effects, but they'd be quick to create, and can leverage the expertise of web designers, coders and data wranglers.
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