Today we’re moving our Adobe Creative Cloud integration beyond the NLE. Our real-time collaboration layer has revolutionized how editors work in Adobe Premiere Pro. Now, the same toolset has been integrated into Adobe After Effects.
Once again, this provides interaction with the entire Frame.io application. The custom Frame.io panel is directly accessible in the After Effects UI.
After the incredibly successful release of Frame.io for Premiere Pro at NAB 2016, which has now reached over 200,000 filmmakers around the world, we’re now adding all of those collaboration capabilities into Adobe After Effects.
We’ve brought all the time saving, real-time collaboration features of Frame.io like time-based comments, annotations, and version control, and redesigned them to feel completely at home in After Effects. We adapted the underlying technology with features that we added specifically for the shot-based environment of After Effects.
As you work, you’re never more than 2 clicks away from uploading a queued composition. When a shot is ready to render, click Upload at the top of the panel and choose Upload Queued Comps. You choose a local location to save the rendered file, then click Upload. The shot renders in the Render Queue, and once the render is complete, it automatically uploads to the project and location open in the panel.
Real-time comments and annotations
One of the most inventive additions to this new release is the integration of comments and annotations. When you choose to sync your After Effects project, Frame.io displays verbal comments and visual annotations in a Guide Layer. It appears at the top of the layer stack in the corresponding After Effects comp.
A Guide Layer is specifically designed not to render. Where you see a marker in your composition, there is a frame that contains a comment, annotation, or both. The comment itself looks like a subtitle. You can read it right Composition Viewer. The text includes information on who added the comment, and when it was made.
Annotations that are drawn on the frame in Frame.io are also displayed via the non-rendering Guide Layer. They use Shape Layers, another toolset that is already part of After Effects.
If you’re an After Effects artist, that means you can work directly with these comments and annotations and simply disable the layer when you want to preview without them. The rendered version of the shot doesn’t include them.
Auto version every change you make
After Effects is all about iteration. Once you’ve addressed changes to a shot, we all know that shot isn’t necessarily final. That’s why this integration stacks multiple numbered versions of a single shot.
When you upload a queued comp that was already queued and uploaded, you won’t see a new item in the Frame.io project. Instead, the shot thumbnail image adds a number to indicate the number of iterations. Update the same shot for a fifth time and you’ll see the number 5 in the upper right corner.
What’s more, all of those versions remain available with their comments and annotations. We designed Frame.io to make it easy to view A/B comparisons. With this feature, all of the version of the shot are directly available in one place for easy comparison.
This even solves a pesky problem in After Effects: naming conventions. Instead of giving each version of the same shot a unique name, you can use the same name for all of them. That way, there’s less clutter and no possibility of losing track of the shot due to a typo or other mistake.
Upload project files and folders
You can also choose to upload the project itself in a single click. Because any After Effects project also depends on source clips, there is also one-click access to create a new folder on Frame.io that matches a folder in the After Effects Project panel. The Frame.io folder contains all of the same source files.
So if your goal is to share a project and source files, you can choose to do so at any time with just a couple of clicks. When you choose to upload the full contents of the project, the organization of files and folders in Frame.io is the same as the Project panel This even includes nested folders.
Highlight features:
- Upload a queued After Effects comp in 2 clicks
- Sync real-time comments and annotations to your comp
- Import comments and annotations into your comp as live shape layers
- Auto version every change you make
- Share or backup project files and folders
About Frame.io
Frame.io, a video review, sharing, and collaboration platform is designed to replace the hodgepodge of Dropbox for file sharing, Vimeo for video review, and e-mail for communication. Headquartered in New York City, Frame.io was developed by people who love creating content, but not the process for creating it. We are filmmakers, VFX artists, and post-production pros who realized there must be a better way to collaborate and communicate creative feedback.
Our customers such as Buzzfeed, Disney, Facebook, VICE, DJI, News Corp, TED, The Onion, New York Post, and the Wall Street Journal rely on us to upload video, privately share it, and easily capture actionable feedback that they need to swiftly drive creative projects forward. This is our first major product launch since announcing that we raised $10.5 Million dollars from Jared Leto, Top VC’s and more.
For more information, please visit https://frame.io
