Gone are the days when you could buy a plug-in collection for a fixed price and then use it for years. Most providers have switched to subscription models, which can be paid for either monthly or annually. This can be advantageous for users who only need a specific effect or collection for a short period of time and remember to cancel their subscription in good time. In most cases, however, users pay many times what the collection would have cost (in the past) as a one-off purchase. And at least once a year, you are painfully reminded of this when another £250 is debited from your credit card for an FX set that you haven’t used in ages.

The situation is similar with stock footage from relevant databases: in the past, if you bought a collection in the truest sense of the word, you could use it for numerous productions and essentially forever (somewhere in our cupboard, we still have the Artbeats collections “American Cities” and “African Animals” in wonderful NTSC resolution in MotionJPEG format). Nowadays, you either buy expensive credits (as with Adobe Stock) or subscribe (e.g., Envato) to get the material you need.

The manufacturer Production Crate offers a combination of both in its suite: a plug-in collection that includes an extensive database of visuals, music, and sound effects, available by subscription, of course. In this review, we take a closer look at whether the model is worth its USD 300 annual price.

Scope and management

The entire (paid) suite consists of just over 40 plug-ins, around a quarter of which are freely available, i.e. do not require a subscription (we have taken a brief look at the most interesting effects below). According to the manufacturer, the scope of the assets, i.e. the stock material, exceeds 10,000 elements, ranging from simple explosions to animated Valentine’s Day hearts to confused zombies.

The database is divided into VFX, motion graphics, music, sound effects, and 3D models, including Blender assets, with Pro Suite customers entitled to 50 downloads per day. Plug-ins and assets are managed via a central app called ProductionCrate Portal. Depending on their preferred software and workflow, users can install plug-ins for After Effects and Premiere, tools for Blender, or extensions for direct access to assets from the host software. The idea is not new (even Envato now offers a plug-in for Premiere), but it is quite helpful when you need an atmosphere, a background or a nuclear explosion quickly.

Pro plug-ins

The set of both free and subscription-based plug-ins is designed for Premiere Pro and After Effects, with most of the tools working in both host applications. Only plug-ins that don’t really make sense in Premiere (such as unmulting layers or working in 3D space) are only available in After Effects. Otherwise, it must be said that the ProductionCrate Suite offers few surprises.

Most of the effects will be familiar to users, as they have been integral parts of other plug-in collections for decades, such as Glow, Old Film Effect, and HyperGlitch. Nevertheless, the ProductionCrate effects are very cleanly programmed (i.e. few crashes or problems when loading) and also proved to be easy to use – once you’ve experimented a bit and halfway understood what the countless controls are for.

Let’s start with the obvious: turn new video into old film. Or old video. Or old television. Production Crate provides a handful of plug-ins for different applications. The “Retro Film” effect transforms the video into 8, 16 or 35mm film with all the trimmings: faded or blurred colours (or even black and white), dust, hairs, scratches and lots of wild camera shake. The settings are relatively clear and understandable, yet comprehensive, so that the user will hardly miss any options for converting to old film.

Particularly interesting are the presets, where the user can choose among a 1960s home-video style, a Tarantino-esque grindhouse effect, or an old Italian western. All presets are lovingly designed and even include aspect ratios tailored to the look, which you don’t often find. The individual settings range from blur/sharpen to saturation, framing and lens errors to hair length and scratch depth. So basically everything you need for a quick old film effect. The preview and rendering are also pleasantly fast and of sufficiently good quality.

This is followed by the VHS effect, which does exactly what you’d expect from the name: it converts digital video into old VHS footage. Both the presets and the settings are a lot more limited than with Retro Film, but they’re more than enough to achieve a cool 80s look (what else do you really need to adjust with VHS?). In fact, you don’t need much more than the “default” preset; if that’s not enough destruction for you, you can switch to “Found Footage” or “Corrupted” to generate more magnetic interference, distorted colours or jumping line skips. Other custom options include colour softness, grain, jitter and block formation, as well as the number and colour of line skips.

Speaking of line skipping (a factor that used to exist in post-production, but which should no longer be a burden to you, dear Gen Z): a very interesting effect can be found in the CRT Factory (CRT stands for Cathode Ray Tube, or tube monitor for short). The effect transforms digital video into an old television or video monitor, with all the trimmings: curvature, pixels, interlacing, discolouration, optical deviations and strange glows. Here, too, the presets are extensive and lovingly programmed, covering numerous looks, including arcade monitors, billboards, monitors from different decades, LEDs, and plasma TVs. Especially in combination with the VHS effect, but also as a standalone tool, for example, for screen captures or the animation of screen content, impressive results can be achieved here.

And, before we forget, there is, of course, also a proper film grade effect. Unlike other plug-in collections, in which realistic film material from Fuji, Kodak or other (now bankrupt) manufacturers is meticulously reproduced, “film grade” at Production Crate is more of an interesting gimmick. Presets such as Polaroid, Miami, Pop or Retro are available, which already indicates that these are not serious stock simulations. Nevertheless, it’s fun to click through the presets, which here and there are even sufficient to achieve a look that is worth seeing and, in any case, creative. Numerous options are available for customising the image, from colouring, saturation and grain to light rays and, of course, a vignette. Strangely enough, when applied to a video element, the effect switches the comp size to 1,440 x 1,080, so you should proceed with caution here. Whether this is intentional or not is something only the manufacturer knows.

If you take a closer look at the ProductionCrate Suite, you can’t overlook Easy Glow. Although Easy Glow is certainly not the only filter on the market that makes bright areas of an image glow (hardly any plug-in collection comes without a glow effect), the result is extremely impressive and stands out from the competition thanks to its many detailed presets.

The presets range from sunset to retro to science fiction films and always look professional, neither overdone nor understated. The individual settings are not overly extensive, but they still serve their purpose. Of course, you can adjust the intensity of the effect, the colour scheme, as well as shifts and optional light streaks. All in all, Easy Glow is one of the best “make me glow” filters we’ve seen so far — and we’ve seen a lot.

One last filter from the Pro series deserves a more detailed introduction: Hyper Glitch. As the name suggests, this plug-in generates video glitches — from “very subtle” to “completely unrecognisable”. The effect is programmed in a very interesting way and offers a variety of looks, while the individual settings remain simple and easy to understand. Once you have decided on a preset, you can, of course, adjust the strength of the effect to your liking, as well as its intensity, size, colours, jittering, halftones, and speed. Ultimately, there is hardly a setting that you cannot freely design and, of course, animate. Once again, the combination of Hyper Glitch and the CRT monitor makes particular sense for achieving a realistic effect of transmission errors and an old screen.

Surprisingly, the ProductionCreate Suite (in the Pro version) includes numerous other filters that are not really documented or described anywhere (at least not on the website). Installing the collection is like opening a lucky dip: you find an incredible amount of stuff you didn’t expect, and which you probably won’t have much use for until you actually need it. For example, there is an aurora effect that generates northern lights from any image (something you’ll probably need once or twice in your life, if at all).

Or the Fractal filter, which creates 3D fractals like those from a spaceship in films from the 90s. The bokeh effects used to create soft lighting environments are also interesting. Or the Glass filter, which makes text and graphics appear as if they were made of glass, and can actually be used as a virtual window pane with corresponding glass edges. The list goes on, but the space in this report (and our readers’ attention span) is limited.

Free plug-ins

As mentioned above, Production Crate does not necessarily require a subscription for effects and assets, but also offers a handful of useful and interesting plug-ins (and elements) that can be downloaded and used free of charge from the website. We won’t go into more detail here, but we recommend trying them out on your own computer.

One of the free effects that deserves a special mention is certainly “Black Hole”, which is either useful for very specific applications or for promoting the nerdiness of individual DIGITAL PRODUCTION employees (we reported: https://digitalproduction.com/2026/01/15/diy-gravity-make-your-own-black-hole-in-afer-effects/).

DIY Gravity: Make Your Own Black Hole (In After Effects)

The Chromatic Aberration effect is also very useful. It refracts the wavelengths of different light colours to simulate faulty (or very cheap) lenses, which, especially in combination with other effects, produces amazing results. The ASCII filter (also known as the Matrix effect) is also always welcome, as it transforms video images into a shower of characters.

One last free filter that should not go unmentioned here is Long Shadow, which casts a shadow of any length based on an alpha channel of text or graphics. This shadow is not comparable to the realism of a drop shadow or the shadow of a virtual light source in After Effects, but it can be very helpful in designing interesting logos and graphic animations. And, as mentioned, all of the filters mentioned in this section are available free of charge.

VFX footage

We have already mentioned that Production Crate also offers many thousands of assets in its subscription. The focus is less on real stock footage, as is the case with Envato and its ilk, and more on all kinds of elements for designing more or less elaborate special effects. In the “SciFi” submenu alone, there are hundreds of assets for space battles, cyberpunk environments or a remake of Minority Report. Most of the VFX graphics are rendered films with optional alpha (choose from HD to 4K, in ProRes or MP4), but you can also find real images with alpha or green screen (usually when it comes to people who are either shooting wildly or staggering around as zombies).

As we mentioned, the number of downloads is limited to 50 per day (in the Pro version), but this is certainly sufficient if you know in advance what you actually want to design. The VFX section alone is divided into 16 categories (explosions, fire, smoke, blood, flying objects, and so on), which are in turn sorted into subcategories (e.g. explosions on land, in the air, and nuclear), so users should be able to find what they are looking for quite quickly.

Within the VFX section, things can also be a little less brutal if, for example, you are looking for weather phenomena such as snow or rain, or animals such as birds or fish. The motion graphics section is quite interesting, but somewhat less extensive. Here you will find all kinds of animated backgrounds, lens flares, animated icons and buttons from popular portals, cute emojis, and lots of transitions, textures, and quite elaborately designed captions.

Users of 3D programmes such as Blender will be delighted with the numerous 3D objects, most of which are once again very martial in nature (lots of war toys, apocalypse and sci-fi), but there are also things from normal, everyday life, such as cars (that aren’t standing around as bombed-out wrecks), trees, sports equipment and delicious doughnuts with pink frosting.

SFX footage

In addition to the numerous visual assets, the Production Crate subscription also includes sounds in the form of sound effects and royalty-free music (editor’s note: “royalty-free” does not necessarily mean “free for commercial use” — if in doubt, check the terms of use with the provider). The selection of music tracks is not overly extensive, but it offers a pretty good start for use as a layout, at least. The music tracks are divided into categories such as rock, disco, epic and action, so you should be able to find at least a small selection of music for every application.

In terms of quality, the tracks are in the middle range, meaning they meet the standard of a professional sound database, but do not particularly stand out. In addition to numerous music tracks, Production Crate offers more than 5,000 sound effects that can be used at will within the subscription. These are also divided into categories for ambient sound, animals, accidents, organic sounds (such as breaking bones) and various vehicles. However, it is clear that the martial approach prevails here too, i.e. there are significantly more explosions and muzzle flashes than delicate birdsong. Nevertheless, the range is extensive and of high quality.

As a special gimmick, Production Crate offers a plug-in that allows access to the sound effects directly from Premiere. Using a separate window in the editing programme, users can browse the sound library, listen to samples, and, if they find what they are looking for, download the element with a single click and insert it into the timeline at the position of the playhead. The plug-in is clever enough not to overwrite existing elements in the sequence but instead to create a new audio track.

Conclusion

Anyone interested in compositions, effects and motion design within After Effects (or sometimes even Adobe Premiere) should definitely try out the numerous free plug-ins from Production Crate. Whether a subscription is worthwhile depends, of course, very much on the individual working environment and production requirements.

Production Crate leans heavily into sci-fi, fantasy and action, which is why a large part of the material on offer and some plug-ins are not particularly suitable for, say, “normal” productions (documentaries, reports, cooking shows, weather reports, Sunday sermons). We would therefore recommend the Production Crate subscription to users from the aforementioned fictional areas. Nevertheless, it is worth taking a closer look at what is on offer for the majority of users. In fact, there is also a “beginner subscription” available for USD 9 per month (USD 100 per year), which includes the plug-ins but does not allow access to most of the footage database. So if you only want to use the effects, the starter pack is a good choice.

Info box

ProductionCrate Suite Skills (plug-ins only) $100/year
ProductionCrate Suite Pro (Plug-ins and 50 downloads/day) $299/year
ProductionCrate Suite Enterprise (plug-ins and 100 downloads/day) on request

Check current pricing and options here.

Host application: Adobe After Effects/ Adobe Premiere Pro

Further information: https://www.productioncrate.com/

The post ProductionCrate Plug-in Suite with docked footage database first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Andreas Zerr.

For those who don’t know the tool: Adobe After Effects is Adobe’s motion graphics, compositing and visual effects software in Creative Cloud. It sits alongside Premiere in postproduction and motion design workflows, and this update extends native 3D and typography capabilities with new core features.

Adobe has released After Effects 26.0 as the first major update of 2026. The release focuses on native 3D geometry, material workflows, typography enhancements and performance improvements. Official documentation and Adobe announcements confirm availability through the Creative Cloud desktop app.

Meshes

After Effects 26.0 adds native parametric meshes that let artists create and animate basic 3D shapes, such as spheres, cubes, and cones, directly in compositions without external 3D modelling tools. Users can customise the size, shape, and material properties of these meshes in the Properties panel. Integral to this 3D workflow is support for Substance 3D Materials inside After Effects. These are .sbsar procedural materials that can be applied to both imported 3D models and native parametric meshes. Controls exposed in the material allow artists to adjust colour, roughness and pattern parameters without rebuilding assets.

Typography

Typography and vector workflows see notable upgrades. The release introduces support for Variable Font axes in OpenType fonts, enabling animation of weight, width and style from a single file. This gives precise typographic control in dynamic titles and motion graphics.

On the vector import side, After Effects now imports SVG files as native editable shape layers that preserve paths, fills and transforms, ready for animation. Illustrator layer conversion has also been improved to retain gradient fills, strokes and transparency when converting into native shapes.

Unmult

Compositing and keying tools are extended with a new Unmult effect that removes solid black or white backgrounds while preserving foreground detail, easing integration of stock elements into scenes.

Performance and workflow improvements include lossless compressed playback, which reduces disk space during longer previews without visual quality loss, and a refreshed Preferences UI for quicker access to key settings. Native support for Windows ARM devices aims to improve performance and efficiency on ARM based systems.

Lighting in the Advanced 3D renderer now supports multiple light types that cast shadows in 3D compositions, offering more realistic depth and integration for scene lighting.

The release also introduces new built-in audio effects, Distortion, Compressor and Gate, that provide essential sound control within compositions without external tools. Expression and scripting enhancements simplify navigating keyframes and reading text values in scripts.

Adobe lists After Effects 26.0 as available now via Creative Cloud. As with all major updates, artists should test new features in isolated projects before adopting them into production to ensure compatibility and workflow stability.

https://blog.adobe.com/en/publish/2026/01/20/new-ai-powered-video-editing-tools-premiere-major-motion-design-upgrades-after-effects

The post Adobe After Effects 2026 Lands With 3D, Text and Performance Boosts first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

Battle Axe has released Overlord 2.6, expanding its well-known Illustrator-to-After Effects bridge into Photoshop territory. The update introduces a direct Photoshop connection, enabling the transfer of native PSD layers, including text, masks, gradients, and layer styles, into After Effects as editable AE layers ready for animation.

Until now, After Effects users importing Photoshop files were confined to flattened or grouped layer structures. Overlord’s new system translates Photoshop data into true layer objects, retaining editable text and design attributes.

More Than a Patch

Version 2.6 also adds an image scale selector, giving users control over how imported imagery is sized during transfer. Battle Axe has rewritten the messaging system, lifting the image transfer ceiling from 16 MB to 265 MB, and redesigned the application interface. Preference handling has been moved to the app itself for faster response. Other interface adjustments include a Figma panel redesign, now hiding settings behind a gear icon.

Maintenance and Hotfix

A follow-up build, Overlord 2.6.1, was issued the next day to fix a bug that caused a blank app panel for new users. The changelog also lists fixes for Illustrator and Figma panels, resolving issues with paragraph alignment, linked file handling, and text justification.

What It Means for Production

Overlord has long served as a time-saver for motion designers bridging design tools and After Effects. The Photoshop connection extends this to one of the most common layout sources in VFX and motion pipelines. As with all major workflow updates, studios should test version 2.6 thoroughly before deploying in production to verify compatibility with existing projects and AE builds.

The post Photoshop Joins Overlord 2.6 first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

Adobe’s latest beta release of After Effects lets users preview HDR compositions directly within the software. Designed for professionals working with HDR content, the feature enables real-time HDR playback on HDR-compatible monitors. According to Adobe, this ensures better accuracy in visualizing brightness and color when working with HDR projects, especially compared to earlier workflows requiring third-party tools or cumbersome conversions.

Adobe After Effects Beta: HDR Preview and Enhanced Caching

The new After Effects beta introduces a groundbreaking feature: HDR preview. For motion designers and VFX professionals, the ability to view HDR compositions on HDR-compatible monitors eliminates the need for guesswork. This feature ensures that every highlight, shadow, and color appears exactly as intended, simplifying workflows for HDR projects.

The update also brings support for widely used HDR color spaces, including Rec.2100 PQ (Perceptual Quantizer) and Rec.2100 HLG (Hybrid Log-Gamma). These industry-standard spaces are crucial for delivering content compatible with platforms such as Netflix and other HDR streaming services. Artists now have the flexibility to work confidently, knowing that their output aligns with current media standards.

Beyond HDR, Adobe has also enhanced the caching system in After Effects. By optimizing RAM and disk usage, the beta delivers faster playback and smoother previews, even for large compositions. This improvement is especially valuable for professionals working on intricate VFX or motion graphics, as it reduces interruptions and enhances overall efficiency.

While the HDR preview in After Effects beta is promising, it’s essential to approach the feature with caution in live production environments. Like most beta features, its stability should be thoroughly tested in smaller projects before incorporating it into high-stakes workflows. The After Effects beta, including the HDR preview feature, is available to Creative Cloud subscribers. For more information or to download the beta, visit Adobe’s official site here.

Adobe Premiere

The Premiere Pro beta adds AI-powered Media Intelligence, simplifying the search for specific clips in extensive projects. This feature automatically analyzes footage, recognizing objects, locations, camera angles, and metadata like recording dates or camera types. Editors can now type in descriptions, such as “sunset drone shot,” into a search bar, and the system will locate the matching clips instantly. Importantly, the analysis runs entirely on local systems, ensuring data privacy. Hopefully! But, if it works, it might be one of the most usefull AI-Features we have seen in a while!

Another feature in the Premiere Pro beta is Subtitle Translation, a addition for filmmakers expanding their content’s global reach. The feature supports native translation of subtitles into 17 languages, making it easier to create localized versions of projects. This significantly reduces the reliance on manual translations, which often slow workflows and add to production costs. For more details on the Premiere Pro beta and its features, visit Adobe’s official page here.

The post Adobe After Effects Beta: HDR Preview for Precision Workflows first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

Professionals experienced in teamwork will probably already be familiar with the following. But what about everyone else who, after initial successes, approaches projects that involve real money and real customers? Mistakes in the workflow and the need to fix them can push your real hourly wage well below the minimum promised by your government, not to mention the loss of your first important client.

We will highlight the challenges of roundtripping (i.e. the reciprocal handover of editing steps) with Premiere Pro (PPro for short) and DaVinci Resolve (DR for short). But the solutions are similar for other pairings, although the DR manual contains considerably more information on exchanging with Avid and even Final Cut Pro X than for Premiere. The two manufacturers probably don’t like each other that much …

The Problem

Unfortunately, some semi-informed people in the infinite expanses of the Internet keep claiming that such a co-operation is quite simple. But what’s much worse is that some project participants pick up on such information and even believe it (kind of reminds you of Corona, doesn’t it?). If these people then have something to say in the project – perhaps even more than those who are better informed – the whole thing can become exhausting. There’s little point in trying to talk a team member who really wants to do the rough cut on their own device out of their usual programme if the production is behind it.

It’s better to warn this person about the risk of working with original files – possibly even on the chip from the camera – and having to look at dull clips in log (and grumble about the camera person). You’d better tell them that you’ll provide them with carefully backed up and prepared material for the edit, which will also run on a less powerful laptop or even a tablet (yes, Luma Fusion can export an XML). The biggest remaining risk then is that the person on the other end uses effects that are lost in transit. In addition to the ones we’ve done here, you’ll need your own tests and then precise agreements on what is and isn’t allowed. Hard cuts always work, but even a fade can cause problems.

Hand over Entire Projects?

Forget it! First of all, we must unfortunately clarify what does not work: You can’t transfer projects between different NLEs. No! Nope! No way! Nada! The project management and their file formats are too different, as are the individual tools and their possibilities. You don’t even have to assume that the manufacturers are deliberately closing themselves off. These systems have literally grown over decades, and file management is ultimately the foundation of non-destructive video editing. Nobody changes this without absolutely compelling reasons.

Technical development alone means that software is usually not even fully compatible with its own previous versions. Even if some programs offer to save in an older format, it is better for everyone involved in the project to use the same version. If it is necessary for reasons of hardware performance for someone to work with an older version, the same procedures and tips apply as below, just as if you were dealing with different software, unless compatibility is expressly guaranteed by the manufacturer. Even then, we recommend carrying out your own tests. We are not alone in this opinion: ProVideo Coalition.

In addition, each manufacturer has its own solutions for working with specialised software, i.e. for compositing, audio editing (DAW) or video compression. Adobe has After Effects, Audition and Media Encoder with Dynamic Linking – not always entirely painless, as you can find out in the relevant forums. Apple has Motion, Logic Pro and Compressor, but in essence this only involves the semi-automatic transfer of rendered files or files to be compressed. Logic Pro can read XML files from FCPX, but even here there are stumbling blocks, as you can read at macProvideo. DaVinci Resolve goes the furthest by having integrated Fusion and Fairlight years ago. However, until today the separate version of Fusion is still more stable, the transfer can be done via the VFX Connect Clip and is then similar to the procedure with FCPX and Motion.

I won’t go into sound editing here, but if you want to work with Logic Pro, you can read the article above and take the diversion via FCPX if necessary. The same applies to Audition, see Larry Jordan‘s workflow here. The topic of working with Pro Tools would require a separate, extensive article by an audio specialist (no, it’s not uncomplicated either, even though this is repeatedly claimed). And if it doesn’t always work within the family, how is it supposed to work with the competition? As I said: Forget it! Anyone presenting serious tips and workflows on the internet will therefore talk about timelines and not entire projects.

Editing Material

For all non-conformists around here: Make friends with the term conform! This requires a clear division of labour, detailed agreements and careful testing of the workflow, but then you can definitely cut with one system and do the colour design with the next. As a rule, versions of the camera clips that are easier to save and edit are created for this purpose – the offline clips. The resulting edited versions have to be precisely linked to the camera originals for grading. DR was originally a pure colour grading system. It therefore offers a wide range of options for combining edited versions from other systems with the originals via re-conform, which the manual describes in detail in Chapter 56 “Conforming and Relinking Clips”.

The most common one is probably the collaboration between Premiere for editing and Resolve for colour grading, simply because of their widespread acceptance, as both programs are available for PC and Mac. We don’t want to start a religious war here about who is better (or has the fairer business model). The fact is that some people have been editing on PPro for years, but DR has the more comprehensive grading. Even though both programs largely (but by no means completely) understand the same video formats, you only really need the full quality of elaborate RAW or high-resolution log files when grading. An online/offline workflow is particularly helpful if you are not sitting next to each other, being connected to shared storage.

Creating Offline Material in Resolve (Proxies)

It is therefore advisable to use DR to capture and back up the originals. The Clone Tool is available for the backup if you don’t want to use one of the specialised programs such as ShotPut Pro. After backing up to several physically separate media, import the clips into a timeline with the appropriate frame rate.

This is where the first pitfall occurs: even though Resolve can handle a timeline with mixed frame rates (fps = frames per second), this is not recommended for roundtripping. Since such clips with deviating fps are often only intended for slow motion, the originals should be set to the target speed in the Clip Attributes. This results in the best image quality without any additional computing effort. In principle, Resolve can also handle different fps rates when importing from PPro, but this only makes sense if the final render is also carried out in Resolve.

Other changes such as speed ramping can be problematic (more on this later). If, on the other hand, clips are to retain their different fps or the other party wants to work with more complex fades and effects, you should point out possible problems and allow for additional work. It is better to limit yourself to simple cuts and fades for this approach during offline editing in PPro and to do more complex work together on a well-equipped Resolve workstation. Then you just have to make sure that your originals all contain a correct timecode (TC for short). They shouldn’t all start with 0:00:00:00, which usually indicates unreadable TC or none at all, and should have unique names.

Separately recorded sound should already be prepared (and checked) in Resolve, synced by TC, with Waveform or, if necessary, by hand. The best way to do this is to create a timeline with the maximum number of audio tracks that any of your clips require. Then put all the clips, e.g. for a working day, into a timeline as a day roll and the originals into an appropriately named bin. If the recordings are in a log format or the camera operator used a special LUT when recording, you should convert them to Rec. 709 or include the LUT so that there are no complaints regarding the picture from uninformed people. DR offers extensive options for the naming and bin arrangement of such clips with its “Smart Bins”.

It is best to include the TC and the file names in the image, so that you have an additional option to check for placement (unless the recipients object). The automatic creation of proxies in DR is now capable of such “burn-in” for the tasks described here, by activating “Render timeline effects” while rendering with the option “Individual clips”. If you have a very high shooting ratio, you can save lots of space by first sitting down with your partners to cull, creating a rough cut and consolidating it using Media Management. Be sure to link to the new clips and render the result as proxies first. Unfortunately, there is no option when transcoding with Media Management to burn information into the image or make an initial colour correction in Media Management itself. You therefore have to output the timeline as individual clips via the Deliver page.

The sound always comes across as the original without corrections, but if desired in several tracks or even in separate files. Linear PCM in 48 kHz is recommended as the format; also with a higher bit depth or sample rate if some sources allow this. For the image, use an I-frame codec that does not place too much load on the receiver’s computer and is readable in any case. MOV (and not MP4) is recommended as the container because there are no problems with the TC track. ProRes is suitable as a codec for all systems, but CineForm or DNxHD/HR is just as good for PCs. MXF in OP1A as a container is also okay for Premiere (but as MXF OP-Atom only for Avid). Surprisingly, PPro can write ProRes into MXF, while DR doesn’t offer that combination.

These codecs are easily scalable in terms of quality and file size, but are of course larger than H.264/265. Nevertheless, you should avoid such GOP codecs, because depending on the hardware performance, they may run worse on the target computer. Even when producing in 4K or UHD, offline editing can be done in HD if the originals have been checked for image sharpness beforehand. As DR allows two installations, you can run the transcoding on a weaker second computer, as it blocks the workstation for a little longer depending on the hardware. DR will point out any missing clips. If your proxies carry the same name and are in a subfolder named “Proxy” under the one with the full-res originals, DR can switch between them automatically.

Attention, Pitfalls!

Some semi-professional cameras pack a non-standard TC into an MP4 header, which is then not read everywhere. It often happens that TC in MP4 is recognised by PPro, but not in FCPX, for example. If you determine with MediaInfo that there is a TC, you can re-wrap the material to MOV, then the TC should be fully readable. This can be done quickly and losslessly with a tool such as Shutter Encoder (donationware), even in batch processing.

If there is no TC at all, you can use QTchange from Videotoolshed to add one to the MOV based on the creation time. This is not necessarily accurate enough for sound synchronisation, but at least it is close. Alternatively, you can find a few Python scripts in the Resolve forum. It is also quite bad when amateur cameras keep assigning the same names after changing the storage medium. This can often be fixed in one of the camera menus, but if it has already happened, it is better to also use the “Reelname” or “Reelnumber” field in the metadata (in PPro and FCPX this is called “Tape” or “Tape name”).

This field should always be used to ensure the link back to the originals. In the professional sector, it is usually already filled in by the cameras, but they do not generate duplicate clip names anyway. If this information is missing, it can be added in QtChange too. However, it is not read by every programme. If this is not the case, as in Resolve, you must place the clips of each memory chip in a separate bin and use this specifically for conforming (Conform from Bin). Now you can pass the rendered material through for editing. But how do the editing decisions get back to Resolve from PPro, FCPX or other editing programmes?

Via EDL

The oldest method is an EDL (Edit Decision List), which recognises a maximum of 2 video tracks and 4 mono audio tracks. The most common format is CMX3600, named after an editing control system from the 1980s when people still worked with three mechanical tape machines. This is practically always understood, but unfortunately only consists of the TC information for hard cuts and any crossfades, plus the clip names. Some of the other fades are named in the EDL, but they become fades in DR. Any effects are ignored.

Anyone who turns up their nose at such a stone-age format should realise that it is quite useful for a very reliable and uncomplicated transfer method. However, this requires a clear division of labour and discipline (how awful). It is also not ideal for RAW formats and not perfect for roundtripping, but rather a one-way street from editing to grading if the material or parts of it have not been prepared in Resolve (see above). Rather, the editors cut the originals in their favourite program and render a high-quality version in one piece at the end.

Advantages: All the options that the editing programme is capable of, including resizing, speed ramps, frame rate adjustments, etc., are baked into a single film file at this point. Titles, motion graphics or VFX can also come from a programme such as After Effects. This rules out any misunderstandings on the side of the target software. However, you should switch off any grading attempts beforehand, as the transfer to Resolve may take place in a slightly reduced colour space (and probably not without good reason).

For sources with high compression and a maximum colour depth of 10 bits, such as from filming photo devices or mobile phones, DNxHR HQX 10 bit or ProRes 422 HQ is completely sufficient for transfer. For better sources, DNxHR 444 12 bit or ProRes 4444 (for pixel peepers with a lot of storage space also in XQ) is used. This film should, however, be finally approved as far as editing and effects are concerned, because now only the grading is done. For this purpose, an EDL is also output for the timeline, which is imported into DR as a pre-conformed EDL in addition to the film. In the last step, you have to point to the folder of the clip from PPro. DR then splits everything into individual cuts again, allowing colour grading for each clip.

Disadvantages: You cannot colour grade picture-in-picture effects or superimposed graphics separately in DR. There are two options for this: You can either adjust the colours in the editing program using its tools or, if there are only a few elements that require time-consuming correction, you can place them individually at the end of the timeline (preferably separated by a short black) and grade them in Resolve. The result can then be inserted back into the original programme at the desired position. The same applies to dissolves, because the two clips are not accessible separately for the fade period. DR recognises a dissolve based on the EDL, but this contains clips that have already been mixed. If necessary, a sliding correction with keyframes can serve as a workaround here. This technical limitation is hardly noticeable with short dissolves.

In addition, the metadata of the camera originals is not available in DR, so you have to take care of the colour management yourself. This method is therefore not suitable if you have sources in RAW or changing log formats. With semi-professional cameras, this hardly matters because information about their image profiles is usually missing in DR anyway. Careful note-taking and good coordination are therefore required. However, the EDL itself provides some clues, as at least the names of the originals appear there, which usually allow the camera to be identified. Although DR also offers two quite powerful methods for automatically recognising cuts, these are not 100% reliable for fast action or some effect transitions and are more recommended for archive material for which an EDL no longer exists.

The big advantage: There are no misunderstandings between the programmes, and formats that DR does not like on PC (such as DV), or generally incompatible ones like MPEG-2 or ProRes RAW, can be used. Any changes to the cut must be made in DR. However, these are limited to hard cuts with a change of position or shortening, as the original files are not accessible to DR in this way – and therefore no extensions or new transitions. For titles and graphics, however, you can pass a duplicated timeline without these elements to DR, render the result from the grading and add the rest in the original editing software. Finally, you can adjust their colours and contrast directly without having to use DR.

Darren Mostyn has the best tutorial on this, but even he is somewhat superficial and does not mention many problems. Ultimately, we are dealing with destructive editing here, whereas any modern editing system (NLE) works non-destructively in that you can access the unaltered (and hopefully saved) original files at any time. Such restrictions are certainly not to the taste of anyone who is used to the endless tweaking of digital media right up to the last minute. If all the material was initially prepared by DR and delivered to PPro, access to the original files also works via regular import of an EDL, but XML can do much more.

Via XML

The abbreviation stands for Extensible Markup Language, so it is a universal language that is not only suitable for editing information. As an open standard, it is used for a wide variety of data descriptions and is (somewhat) readable for both humans and computers. Apple has already used it in Final Cut Pro 7 for the exchange of editing information. This oldest format (XML 1.0) has developed into a quasi-standard and is the only one that PPro reads or outputs if Final Cut Pro XML is selected for export. These files transport much more information than an EDL, but are still compact enough to be sent by e-mail or cloud service. Unfortunately, you should still not expect the target programme to understand all of the source’s options. We have therefore thoroughly tested how well PPro and DR understand each other via XML.

Premiere to Resolve

In Premiere, we simply select the desired sequence and go to File > Export > Final Cut Pro XML. We can still assign a name, but DR does not read it anyway, instead the one in the XML file. PPro kindly creates a text file called FCP translation results, but this is largely worthless: there are far fewer references than there are actual problems. A tip for importing: First load all sources into the media page, sorted neatly into bins if you like. Then load the XML from Premiere via Import > Timeline, but switch off the automatic import of the media. You can also change the name of the timeline here. If only it were that easy in Premiere (see below)!

At first glance, we are pleased that all video and audio tracks of a timeline with over 4 hours arrive without errors. Even timeline markers are included. Although they are all blue, their position and duration are correct, and a comprehensive commentary text also arrives – a very welcome tool for team coordination (called notes in DR). Clip markers, on the other hand, don’t work. Another communication aid is to switch off video tracks (this does not work for audio tracks). That’s helpful, because you can simply place Adobe-specific items such as titles or linked After Effects clips on a deactivated track for export.

As for fades, there is of course the cross-dissolve (sadly only the “video” version, “film” may look nicer), a fade to white or black and even a wipe from PPro is coming across as an edge wipe. Caution: Temporally asymmetrical transitions get centred on the cut. All other transitions become crossfades. This is stated in the aforementioned protocol, but does not fully correspond to the information in the DR manual. Regarding filters, even standards such as a Gaussian blur or unsharp masking do not come across, even if both NLEs offer them. Perspective effects are also lost, although both programmes are capable of those too.

Level changes of the audio tracks are ignored, but video opacity values are even transferred with keyframes. Only very slight deviations can be detected in all functioning keyframes, but do not tinker with the interpolation method! Even speed changes arrive including keyframes, but don’t get too excited: linear interpolation is arriving in DR, as with the other animated values. At best, you can use it to suggest what you want, but the aesthetic fine-tuning has to be done during final production. Still images are lost, so you should turn them into video clips at the source. Finally, stereo audio tracks get turned into mono for no apparent reason. You’ll need to reconfigure them in the Clip Attributes.

A smaller pitfall is the TC of the timeline. It normally starts at zero for PPro and at one hour for DR – this can easily be changed on import, in the project or for the single timeline. Scaling and position, even rotation, are coming across, including animation. There is another issue to take care of: PPro has two methods to scale a clip to the timeline resolution. If the clip is set to “Scale to frame size” that is a virtual scaling and it will not be observed in the XML, accordingly the clip will arrive in DR at its original size. “Fit to frame” will look just the same in PPro, but the clip will be scaled in DR too.

You can set this behaviour in the presets before importing media to your PPro project to make it the default. But please don’t change the anchor point, that would ruin everything. Behind this is a fundamental difference: PPro is working in absolute pixel values, while DR is resolution independent (generally) and works in percentages. Unfortunately, only linear interpolation is used here too, so it is not always looking nice. Scaling of different source sizes can be set in the DR project too, or be fixed in the Inspector. Also pay attention to the resolution of the timeline, or it will be switched to the format of the largest video source.

Resolve to Premiere

Pay attention to the format when exporting from DR: Only FCP 7 V5 XMLs are accepted by PPro via the import command. First of all, the positive: Not only do all tracks and even still images arrive here, but also the information for muting audio or deactivating video tracks. However, this almost exhausts the communication options: only clip markers are received, but they are useless without any text or names, and duration markers are not received at all. At least you don’t have to limit communication to notes on paper: right-click on the timeline and select Timelines > Export > Timeline Markers to EDL to get a list of timecodes, comment texts and the colour specification as text (note: no clip markers).

Crossfading is possible, but only in the standard version (video). Dip to colour usually becomes a black fade, but with pure white it also works in this direction. Edge wipe comes across, even with a change of direction, but don’t get overconfident straight away: A free choice of angle becomes the next 45-degree step. Opacity, zoom, position and rotation including keyframes only work if the project in PPro has already been set accordingly. If the individual clip is subsequently rearranged in DR, all keyframes are removed. Here too, the anchor point must remain in the centre, otherwise you get nonsense – without any warning. Speed ramps seem to work at first glance, but they are completely wrong. Filters: Forget them! Adjustment layers too.

What can be easily deactivated in DR can be a bit annoying in PPro: Every time a timeline is re-imported, some clips are re-imported as duplicates, even though they already exist. At some point, you may end up with an endless list of identical clips. But there is a workaround if it happens to you: Create a temporary project, load your XML timeline there, link all the media that may still be missing and save it. Now switch to the original project, go to the temporary project in the Media Browser and link it using Dynamic Link. You can now navigate to the imported sequence and open it in the source window. It can then be dragged into the current project without reloading all clips. Cumbersome, but clearer in the end. All this considered, the path from PPro to DR works much better than the other direction.

Advice

It should be clear that this information can only be a snapshot, as both NLEs are constantly being further developed. We have tested with DaVinci Resolve 19.1.3 and Premiere Pro 25.1 and have by no means tried out all the transitions and filters – this could fill several pages. In chapter 55 of the Resolve manual under “Preparing to Move Your Project to DaVinci Resolve” there are detailed tables on this, but in our own tests they were by no means correct in all points (although Premiere is hardly mentioned anyway).

It is therefore essential to carry out extensive workflow tests with your own material and all the desired design tools. If this is not respected by the production company, it is better to keep your hands off the project or make it clear in the contract that the corresponding additional services will be charged by the hour. Of course, with the XML method, only the information is handed over for editing and not the video material. We must therefore ensure ourselves that it can be found by the other system. This can be particularly confusing under Windows if the respective drive has been assigned a new letter. The link commands in the respective NLE usually solve the problem.

To be sure that the whole edit has arrived correctly, a reference clip should always be rendered on the source system, preferably again with TC and clip names burnt in. You can load this in DR as “offline” in the left-hand viewer, then it is linked via TC and runs constantly synchronised with the right-hand image of the timeline (pay attention to the start TC!). Alternatively, you can right-click on “Difference” in the timeline viewer. Then everything except the burn-ins should remain black when scrolling through if no errors have occurred.

Updated on September 10th, 2025

As of today, DR is supporting ProRes RAW too, so it can be transferred and used on both sides.

The post What about Roundtrips? Premiere Pro and DaVinci Resolve first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Uli Plank.