With the new Motion Graphics Template (.mogrt) file type, and Essential Graphics panel introduced by Adobe not long ago, the workflow between Premiere and After Effects has been changed forever.
This more compatible workflow has also significantly blurred the lines regarding what constitutes a true Premiere-compatible project file. Especially considering the Essential Graphics panel accomplishes the exact same things in both Premiere and After Effects.
Technically, all .mogrt files are specifically prepared for use within Adobe Premiere. However, these files can also be opened within After Effects and contain full editability in their original .aep form.
As some of you may already know, there are basically 2 ways to make an After Effects project compatible with Premiere:
- Use the Essential Graphics panel within After Effects to build a Premiere-compatible file for exporting as a .mogrt.
- Build your .aep file as a .prproj for full placeholder editability within premiere (or Export as Premiere Pro project).
Both of these methods produce a Premiere-compatible project, but only the .prproj format will contain full editability features within Premiere.
Because of the current editability limitations, not all .aep templates are easily converted into .mogrt format, and in some cases, a .aep is better converted to .prproj instead (especially projects that contain a lot of image/video placeholders that need to be replaced by the user).
However – and this is the main point – not all .aep files are compatible with Premiere. An After Effects project needs to be made compatible with Premiere via the Essential Graphics panel… so any author that cusotmized their .aep to be exported as a .mogrt has essentially taken enough steps to make that project Premiere-compatible. On the contrary, an author who has not taken the steps to convert a .aep into .mogrt format, has not qualified that project to be Premiere-compatible.
Therefore if a customer was looking for an Ae-only version, they could still purchase that version and not have to revert the .mogrt back to .aep to accomplish this. Not all users have the same skills across all Adobe software, but with the advent of the Adobe Creative cloud, the assumption is most customers have access to both After Effects and Premiere.
So far, we haven’t received any negative feedback from customers who’ve purchased a Mogrt that requires Ae to edit the logo, and most authors provide sufficient help/tutorial documentation helping the customer through the simple editing process.
With all of that said, there is no simple answer here. Adobe has greatly blurred the lines between applications, and the fact that we allow a mogrt file to require editing in After Effects first (such as replacing the logo), provides the greatest amount of flexibility for both the customer and the author.
In future releases of Adobe’s CC software, this line will begin to blur even more. For example, CC2019 now allows .mogrt font customization inside of Premiere, which was not previously possible. In future releases, its not out of the question that Adobe will allow media placeholders to be easily swapped out (perhaps like the Apple Motion Drop Zones?), so Ae may not need to be used at all.
Authors should always ben 100% straightforward in their descriptions. For example, if a project requires Ae for swapping out the logo, then that author should clearly express that in the item description, and be sure to select BOTH “Adobe Premiere Pro” and “Adobe After Effects” from the software dropdown menu.
However, to reiterate, customers so far seem to be relatively pleased with the greater flexibility, and have not expressed any issues about the current structure. Of course that could change in the future, but for now it has not prompted any concern.