till now -Trapcode every customers have, OF, of course
uniquefx saidI think from Videocopilot’s point of view the license agreement is very well though out.Minimize the possibility of people reaping the benefits of the plugin without owning it.
Just look how much “Optical Flares” the buyers are getting from here without owning the plugin or paying a dime to the creator of the plugin itself.
I’m guessing this is the reason for a new,more restrictive license.
Fair comment about Optical Flares, but I still think it’s ill thought out for Element.
Since you’re not allowed to use any of the built in models (which incidentally does make sense), then you’re going to need to manufacture your own models using a 3D program. So if you’re using Element for templates, you also have a 3D program. You’re not allowed to use Element to create pre-renders. So create them in that 3D program.
Oops… Don’t need Element at all. Lost sale.
I expect Element will be rather popular as a live… err… element of projects. But I can’t help but feel that if Videocopilot had allowed pre-rendering, they would have gotten a lot more sales from us guys
than sales they’d lose because a part of a project is pre-rendered.
Maybe there’s some…err… element… to this that I’ve missed.
felt_tips saidMaybe there’s some…err… element… to this that I’ve missed.
Because the Video copilot crashed the plane due to a blinded sight caused by the optical flare in the sky?
Wait… Wait… So, I can buy plugin that will be basically useless in my freelance work (and Videohive projects) because I’m not allowed to sell video that I made with it? Why would anyone buy it then? Just for personal usage? That licence means that I’m not allowed to use Element 3D if some client hire me to make him video (not project file that he will then customize), right?
I was really impressed with possible usages of plugin, but now - it all disappeared when it’s said that you can’t use it in professional work… Hope AK will realize limitations and side effects of his decision. For now, I’m sticking with Cinema 4D, and whoops - AK got one sale less. Multiply it by number of authors and artists that feel the same, and he got big loss in sales. We will be doomed if Maxon decide that we can’t sell rendered videos… Or worse - Adobe limits After Effects to personal usage 
I expect Element will be rather popular as a live… err… element of projects. But I can’t help but feel that if Videocopilot had allowed pre-rendering, they would have gotten a lot more sales from us guys than sales they’d lose because a part of a project is pre-rendered.
I agree, as always what Mr Felt says.
Also how do you know how we pre render?
Elements have it s own close in box light/environment/materials system.If you do a pre render from another 3D app it will be similar but different, and chance are that your 3D render from a real 3D program will be much better than the Element project.
The licence as she is now,close some main doors to templates authors.
AK choice.
acuredreamgift : the pre-render restriction only applies for creating templates / stock footage.You can still render normally for clients.
johnnybd saidfelt_tips saidMaybe there’s some…err… element… to this that I’ve missed.
Because the Video copilot crashed the plane due to a blinded sight caused by the optical flare in the sky?
I would guess it would be a Knoll lens flare that crashes the Video Copilot plane.
wow. long time follower of Andrew Kramer and while this is the first bad choice i’ve seen him make… it’s a BIG one, so if i understand correctly, we cannot use the built in materials or the Pro Shaders kit for anything in a template, and we cannot pre-render anything from it… that is really harsh, although i would like to see him enforce the pre-render bit…
I agree with uniquefx. I bought the plugin and already made my money back doing one small project for a client. Very useful plugin and fast too. I’ve purchased some 3d logo animations from VH and most of them take hours to render. I just rendered stunning 3d logo from element in about 5 minutes. Took me about 1 hour to build. Worth it to me. Building your own assets for Element is good idea anyways. This won’t stop me from producing templates with Element 3D. Low sales might but not challenges. I think if your file is good enough, people will buy it no matter what plugin they need.
we are sure that the license prohibits prerenders of exclusively MY content? (no video copilot content included of any kind)
that license defines Content as:
refers to the proprietary objects, images, presets and other
digital files owned by Video Copilot and its licensors that are included in certain
Products to facilitate Your creation of special effects, and may include various
audiovisual content such as videos and clips, photographs, models, drawings, wire files,
textures, motion files and music.
there is nothing in this definition referring to content created or owned by me.
In the case of a project that use Element 3D with all the models, materials, everything created by me (nothing from Video Copilot) that license doesn’t apply in my opinion. If someone can find a passage that denies me to render my content with Element 3D and sell it on stock websites I will like to read it.
This is very bad news for me since I don’t have Cinema 4D (only maya which is ok but does not export to .C4D and blender which i HATE) and have no desire to wear a pirate hat 
As i see, E3D required OSX 10.6 and above. But i have 10.5.8 and don’t update (hardware limitations), and it’s normal working process with AE CS4. This means that I can not use a template, which uses E3D because it will not been pre-rendered. It sad.
MediaGalaxy saidAs i see, E3D required OSX 10.6 and above. But i have 10.5.8 and don’t update (hardware limitations), and it’s normal working process with AE CS4. This means that I can not use a template, which uses E3D because it will not been pre-rendered. It sad.
Sounds like there are rather a lot of limitations. Is there a minimum system requirement for Windows too?
Hey Guys,
Thanks for checking out the plug-in and giving your honest feedback. I didn’t make this decision lightly and I considered all of our customers, including the ones here who make templates.
I understand the points made above and I know it will affect template creators in many ways but I’d also like to point out some of the benefits for those interested. There are a lot of alternatives to using Element for templates such as Cinema 4D or CS6 text and many others, in fact we encourage people to use the best creative tool for the job. Element is a tool and we’ve worked very hard to offer powerful features but it is not the only 3D software in the game.
Pre-Rendering:
I understand the main challenge of excluding pre-renders in templates is that a potential customer may not own the plug-in and therefore not want to buy it. This is a big one for authors and it may limit sales at first. This rule only applies to templates and stock media. Now I also get that the main purpose of pre-rendering is to allow someone to make use of a template for job without actually owning the plug-in. (Sometimes pre-rendering is done to make projects render faster but with Element that is not a problem.) The simple answer is that we want the creative producers and artist who benefit from our plug-in to own it.
We tried to make it really affordable too, It’s only $149.95 to buy a full copy of the plug-in, not $300 or $400 and certainly not the cost a full 3D program. It also works on graphics cards and computers from the last 4 years, it renders fast and you get some great features. Yes, there is a premium for buyers that don’t have the plug-in but once they see what is possible it elevates capabilities of just After Effects beyond what was previously possible, plus it gives them greater control with an easy to use plug-in.
Included Assets:
We want people to be creative! Templates are about selling your creativity and if everyone uses the same included assets or packs, then it dilutes our product AND the template market. Instead we want to encourage artists to bring new ideas to the plug-in and create something that is not readily available. I’d be happy to share some tips on creating your own materials and even 3D objects for anyone interested. You can even use Blender to make some great 3D objects for free.
I personally think that Element Templates could be an opportunity for sellers to charge a premium on projects that go beyond 2D layers and bring a new level of production value. And once they see the speed and quality, it might be hard for them buy anything else. OK, I’m a little bias but you get the idea!
Here is a project I created recently with Element that took about 2 hours to make less than 7 minutes to render at 720p.
Template Tip:
For anyone interested in making templates with Element, although we do not have a collect files option, what you can do is create a folder next to the project file and put the models and texture into it. When AE opens the project, Element will look there to relink the files. Just be sure to use unique names like Baseball_Diffuse.jpg etc so it doesn’t confuse asset names.
Let me know if there are any questions that I can help with!
Best!
Hello Andrew and thanks for joining the discussion.
I have a question.I am running a late 2008 Macbook with a NVIDIA 9400M card with 256mb of memory.On the list of supported cards this is listed under “diminshed” performance.Could you maybe open up that term a little bit more.
I am looking to create moderately simple logo reveals which would mostly have cubes,spheres or other primitives,so no complex geometry.
Probably something along the lines of this example : http://www.videocopilot.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/animation_sample.mov
Are all the features still there,even for older cards,but with slower performance?
Well hello , let me tell you that this plugin is awesome and you have all my respect for your work with visual effects and also on how you do business on the internet. And maybe I’m not alone when I learn a lot of tricks for After Effects from you.
Now, regarding the prerender issue I’m really confuse. You say:
and if everyone uses the same included assets or packs, then it dilutes our product AND the template market.
this is correct but what this have to do with using exclusively my own 3D models, textures, materials? This can’t dilute the market. They are unique, is stuff that I made, no one else have this.
Now, I understand and is obvious to me that one can’t use materials, 3D objects or other content made by Video Copilot in stock items. You can’t include them, you can’t prerender them.
But again, why deny the prerender of my stuff? I repeat, no video copilot content is included.
This is actually our problem, we don’t want to make money on top of content created and owned by Video Copilot, we want to provide an alternative to our buyers when they use our projects.
Forget to add that I will respect envato decision to not allow prerender elements made with Element 3D (even if one can’t prove that I use the plugin in creating those prerender elements as some people said in this thread)
But I strongly believe that from a legal point of view, Video Copilot can’t forbid me in any way to sell stock items made by using Element 3D plugin (if off course I use exclusively my models, materials …)
There is nothing in Element 3D license that forbids me this thing, so I’m really confuse about this request. You are asking something that is not in the license.
But I will respect envato decision.
Also is a great plugin, good work!
AndrewKramer saidHey Guys,
Hey Andrew. Welcome to the Videohive forum!
I have to reserve judgement on Element, 'cos I haven’t bought or used the plug-in yet, but if it works as fast as it does in the demos, credit to you: you’ve pulled off a 3D trick that Ae CS6 hasn’t really managed. Element looks like a well thought out, tour-de-force plug-in at a great price. I don’t think anyone here would argue that point.
Maybe you’re right about the pre-render thing; maybe it will force a lot of template buyers, who wouldn’t otherwise have thought about it, to buy Element. But my gut feeling is that, on balance, you may be losing a few sales with the limitations.
From a template author’s point of view, maximizing sales is the big issue. Like plug-in sales too, the key is volume. Not allowing the use of pre-renders to broaden the potential scope of a project makes it a bigger risk for authors and may ultimately limit the number of Element templates on VH, which would be a shame. In terms of not allowing use of the VC assets… I’m totally with you on that one.
Any which way, it looks great, I’m looking forwards to trying it out and I think we’ll be seeing quite a few Element projects here over the coming weeks and months.
Pop your head in again sometime and see how it’s shaping up.
Hey Doru,
There are two issues for us, one is keeping content original and the other is our technology being bypassed by pre-rendering as some have mentioned the vibrant use of Optical Flares in various templates.
We think our product (and the work that went into it) is pretty cool and therefore we want those who benefit from the speed and power of this tool to buy a copy. This includes individual artists who make stuff for clients AND people who buy templates to customize for their clients.
See, we don’t mind if you create stuff directly for clients like a commercial using our plug-in but templates are sold directly to other content creators who also sell their services to other clients. We just want these template buyers to also own the plug-in too!
There are other great ways to create 3D content and pre-render without restrictions like using C4D, or 3D max but those products are $3500 per license. With Element a license is only $150 and it provides a dramatic scope of features right inside of After Effects.
We believe this is a fair trade-off for offering a broad scope of new capabilities while still being very affordable.
Thanks felt_tips, you make some good points.
Our hope is that buyers will see the speed advantage and quality of an Element project and be inspired to purchase these more dynamic templates.
The one thing I have learned from Video Copilot is that quality and details are paramount. Even with training, people want to see a cool technique but they respond more to a quality result. In fact, this is one of the reasons I’m not able to make tutorials as frequently, along with my professional work, tutorials demand a lot of work to make them look somewhat professional. It’s not enough to teach the technique, people want to be impressed.
To be honest, getting this plug-in out is a huge relief after working on it for the past 18 months. I’ve got some free time again!