Premation
A desktop motion-graphics application. Compositions, layers, keyframes, a graph editor, 2.5D space with cameras and lights, effects, masks and mattes, per-glyph text animators, mesh rigging, particles, and a deterministic export pipeline — built on a GPU render engine that runs on WebGPU or WebGL2.
It is modelled on After Effects’ Classic 3D workflow. If you know AE, the tools, the panel layout and most of the keyboard shortcuts are already where you expect them. If you don’t, this documentation starts from zero: what hardware you need, what every panel does, and how to build an animation one keyframe at a time.
Version 0.1.0 — public beta. It is used in earnest, but it is pre-1.0. Expect rough edges, and expect the project file format to still move. Around 4,000 automated tests cover the app and its engine packages, alongside a pixel-comparison render-test harness with committed reference frames.
Start here
What it is good for
Motion design for the web and social. Logo animations, title cards, lower thirds, animated stickers, UI motion studies. Compose, keyframe, export MP4 for sharing or WebM with a real alpha channel to drop straight onto a page.
Animating vector artwork. Import an SVG and it arrives as editable layers, with any CSS or SMIL animation it carried converted into real keyframes you can retime. Import a Lottie file and get its baked animation as tracks.
Character and prop animation without a 3D pipeline. The bone tool builds a skeleton with forward kinematics and IK; the puppet tool deforms a mesh from pins. Both work on ordinary 2D artwork.
Explainers and product shots in 2.5D. Push layers apart in Z, add a camera, animate a move through them, light them. Classic-3D-style shading, extrusion and bevels included.
Templated graphics. Build a composition once, expose the fields that should change (text, colours, images), then fill them per output — the same idea as a MOGRT.
Batch rendering. Queue several compositions and resolutions, choose an output folder, and let them render while you keep working.
What it is not
- Not a video editor. There is no multi-track NLE and no clip-based cutting room.
- Not a 3D application. Imported models, PBR materials and HDRI environments are out of scope. The 3D model is AE’s Classic 3D: flat planes in 3D space, lit and shadowed, plus extrusion.
- Not a collaboration tool. Review comments, the approval flow and shareable review links were removed outright, and live multi-user editing was never built. See Known gaps.
How this documentation is organised
| Section | What is in it |
|---|---|
| Getting started | Hardware, install, first launch, a guided first animation |
| The interface | Every region of the screen, panel by panel |
| Core concepts | Compositions, layers, transforms, keyframes, easing, expressions |
| Animation | Presets, keyframe assistants, per-glyph text animators |
| Shapes, paths & masks | Drawing tools, shape operators, masks |
| 3D & cameras | 3D layers, cameras, lights, materials, navigation |
| Effects & compositing | The effect stack, the 37-effect catalog, blend modes and mattes |
| Rigging | Puppet pins, bones and IK, rigging a logo |
| Media & import | Images, video, audio, SVG, Lottie, particles |
| The AI assistant | The caster architecture, connecting a key, prompting, all 62 tools |
| Export & rendering | Formats, the render queue, ffmpeg, determinism |
| Projects & history | Project bundles, undo, versions, templates |
| Customising & extending | Shortcuts, workspaces, themes, plugins |
| Reference | Shortcut tables, troubleshooting, known gaps, glossary |
A note on honesty in these docs
Where a feature is partial, gated or not implemented, the page says so rather than describing an intention as a fact. The complete list lives in Known gaps. If something here does not match what the app does, the app is right and the page is a bug.