Comments

StormMarc wrote on 7/7/2008, 4:43 PM
Personally I like the way After Effects works much more than Boris. I've never had much luck understanding the interface and the tutorials were always lacking. However Boris does integrate somewhat as a plugin in Vegas. With AE you need to export your movies and bring them into Vegas.
JohnnyRoy wrote on 7/7/2008, 7:06 PM
> Which of these programs would integrate best?

Hands down, Boris RED.

As StormMarc said, After Effects has absolutely no integration with Vegas. You'll have to render everything out and process it in AE and render it again to bring it back in. While this is workable, I find that I use programs less if I have to start rendering in the middle of a project just to get a transition or FX.

Boris RED integrates as a plug-in to Vegas. You can use it to easily add transitions, FX, titles, etc. without ever leaving Vegas (just drag and drop). Not saying which is better because I've never used AE but I do use Boris RED all the time and I wouldn't be without it.

~jr
Coursedesign wrote on 7/7/2008, 8:40 PM
Think of Boris RED as After Effects with a whole bunch of plug-ins.

They both require a fair amount of work to learn.

AE can go farther, but RED will be much less effort in daily use, as long as you use the features that it has, or use the built-in gasket for [some, not all] AE plug-ins.

And as JR said, unlike AE, Boris has integration with Vegas (although the interface has limitations).

AE can be had for about half of Boris RED if you buy on eBay (old version of AE+upgrade to CS3 in one box). I did this and verified with Adobe that everything was legit.
TeetimeNC wrote on 7/8/2008, 6:51 AM
JR, I am able to export AAF files from Vegas to AE, so there is this limited degree of integration. I then render in AE to Quicktime Animation Codec for import back into Vegas. For my projects, I use AE for special effects, titling, etc and it works well. The limited integration would be problematic if I were regularly rendering very long clips in AE for use in Vegas.

Jerry
farss wrote on 7/8/2008, 6:55 AM
TeeTime,
thank you. I was about to ask how well going down this path would work. I'm about to install AE Pro so I would have had the answer for myself anyway but it's always nice to know it should work i.e. if it doesn't it's most likely me that's messed up.

Bob.
[r]Evolution wrote on 7/11/2008, 3:12 PM
RED integrates w/ Vegas but After Effects is easier to learn.
AE has that classic Adobe look & feel so it's fairly familiar already.
RED is like nothing I've worked on before so my RED things normally consist of very elementary stuff whereas my AE things can get to be a bit more intricate.

I do like RED's extruded text feature... but I like 3D Invigorator's even better.
JohnnyRoy wrote on 7/11/2008, 8:49 PM
> AE has that classic Adobe look & feel so it's fairly familiar already.

I don't own any Adobe products so this is not true for everyone. There is nothing "familiar" about After Effects to me. I didn't find Boris RED hard to learn and use at all. I also have Boris BLUE and the two interfaces are almost identical so once you learn one you know both. It's all a matter of what you learn.

~jr
kentwolf wrote on 7/13/2008, 1:44 AM
>>...I also have Boris BLUE...

Nice to see I'm not alone. Blue makes some really cool stuff. I don't even have one of the officially supported video cards, but it works great.

Yes, the Blue inteface does look identical to Red, but there are definitely differences in the way some things work.

Red 4 is excellent too. The vector trace pallet is an especially nice addition to Red 4.

It took me about 10 seconds to see that Blue would be a terrific addition to my video apps.

Regarding plugging into Vegas: I think it's worth one's time to get proficient at using Red as a stand-alone app. Makes life easier.
rsp wrote on 7/13/2008, 2:10 AM
Red 4 is excellent - working from within Vegas is ok but working in the standalone app is Great!

Also helpful for starters is the Boris newsletter with tutorials/podcasts with valuable tips

Rudi
kairosmatt wrote on 7/14/2008, 7:14 PM
I really want to like Boris, but I'm still finding it buggy/twitchy. Maybe some of you guys on this post can help, here are some of my major problems:

1. Sometimes when I put in numbers for things like duration, or position values etc, Boris changes them to something else, usually fairly close. Then I have to keep changing my numbers till it puts it where I want it.

2. I get strange behaviors sometimes when I want to JUST move a picture on top of an EPS. when I grab the x or y arrow, the picture reshapes and distorts as well as moves.

3. When using a 3D container to zoom in on a bunch of things positioned, they no longer line up like they did zoomed out.

4. I do mostly 16x9 stuff. in preview it looks great. When I go to render, if I want it letterboxed for 4x3 TVs, everything letterboxes except for the Boris, it fills up the screen.

hope somebody can help!!
kairosmatt
Seth wrote on 7/14/2008, 9:00 PM
To answer the original question, ask yourself the following question, "Do I use Photoshop, Flash, or any other applications included in the Adobe CS3 Production Premium bundle?" If the answer is yes, then you should absolutely make the effort to learn Adobe AE. Why?
1) For the price of 2 apps you can get the bundle instead of just After Effects and Photoshop.
2) As was mentioned before, the keyboard shortcuts for many of the tools are the same between Photoshop and AE, and
3) You'll get some other cool apps in the bundle; Ultra 2 and DV Rack are very useful programs that could be used to great advantage in a Vegas-centric workflow.

On a personal note, despite Boris' integration in Vegas as a plugin, I can't bring myself to learn it. The live demos at NAB were impressive, but lacking in some ways; the UI is lacking an inviting, intuitive interface like Vegas, so it doesn't integrate well in that way. And, as was mentioned, it seems to misbehave quite often. I'd much rather use a more powerful, established, reliable, and flexible tool like AE, and have the added bonuses mentioned above.