Adobe’s New Media Replacement Workflow for .MOGRTs

Posted on March 27, 2021 by Larry

New with the March, 2021, update to Premiere Pro, Motion Graphic templates now support “replaceable media.” These are placeholders which are added in After Effects when the template is created, that can be replaced with different media when the templates is applied in Premiere.

This is a surprisingly powerful and flexible technique. Let me show you how it works.

BACKGROUND

When Adobe first released motion graphic templates, graphic designers could use all the creative and animation tools in After Effects to create visually compelling motion graphic templates for use in Premiere.

The Premiere editor could then add one of these templates to their project without knowing anything about After Effects and modify the text to match their project. This vastly simplified importing an After Effects comp and customizing it.

But, while we could change text, we couldn’t change anything else. At least, not without getting back into After Effects.

This new release allows an After Effects editor to add media placeholders to their template. These placeholders can have effects and animation applied in AE, then, when imported into Premiere, all those effects are then applied to the new clip that’s added in Premiere to replace the original placeholder.

This is the best of both worlds: customization without needing to understand After Effects.

ADD IT TO THE TIMELINE

To add a motion graphics template (often called a .mogrt, which is their file extension) to a Premiere project:

Switch to the Graphics workspace
Click the Essential Graphics > Adobe Stock button

NOTE: If you’ve applied templates in the past, you’ll find them already stored in My Templates

Check Free or Premium if you want to isolate the choice. Otherwise, leave both unchecked.

Find the template you want to use and drag it into the project timeline where you want it to appear; this is the same placing any other clip.

NOTE: Many of the templates that support media replacement are labeled that way, as shown in the screen shot.

When you drag the template into the timeline, Premiere downloads it, stores it with other templates on your system, then flags Premiere that the template needs to render. (Indicated by the red line at the top of the timeline.

NOTE: The easiest way to figure out where Adobe stored your templates is to Control-click the template in the timeline and choose Reveal in Finder (at the bottom). I’d show you the path, but it is eight or nine folders deep.

Put the timeline playhead in the middle of the template to display the template in the Program Monitor. That big, black graphic is the placeholder which we will replace with our own media.

CUSTOMIZE THE TEMPLATE

Now, the fun part starts: customizing the template. Every template is different, but based on my example (Modern Media Replacement Title) there are four things we can customize in a template:

Global Controls. These determine the position of the template in the frame.
Text. Where we can change text while retaining existing animation and position.
Media Replacement. Where we can change the image assigned to a placeholder.
Background. Where we can make the background transparent or change the color.

To change text:

Twirl down TEXT
Twirl down the text line you want to change
Change the text in the Edit Text ## box
As necessary, adjust font, style, size, color or position

Footage courtesy: Amy “Catfox” Campion (www.AnticsPerformance.com)

To change the image:

Twirl down MEDIA REPLACEMENT
Twirl down Media Replacement (yup, a second one)
Drag the image you want to add from the Project panel on top of the placeholder graphic

NOTE: This last point is important. The only place to change media is by dragging the clip from the Project panel on top of the Essential Graphics > Media Replacement placeholder. Using Effect Controls won’t work.

To adjust the image:

Select one of the four Scale options that best fits the image into the template.
Click the chain icon between H & W to enable proportional scaling, then adjust the image size as necessary. Asymmetric scaling is on by default. (You know you have it right when the chain links are blue and there is no line through them.)
Adjust X and Y to revise the horizontal and/or vertical position of the image within the placeholder.
Rotate the image, as needed.

NOTE: This last icon – a curly bracket – is the most important. This allows you to change where an inserted clip starts. In my example, I’m starting the inset graphic 5:06 in from the start of the video. This setting is SO cool because we can quickly and precisely set where the inset starts. Premiere generally doesn’t make these kinds of adjustments that easy to make.