Question 1

Is Premation a free motion editor?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Premation is 100% free and open-source under the GNU AGPL v3.0. The desktop motion graphics editor runs completely offline on your local machine with no mandatory accounts, no cloud dependencies, and no paywalls for core editing features. Projects are stored as open .motion files on your disk.

Question 2

Is Premation a free alternative to Adobe After Effects for motion design?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Premation is designed as a fast, native desktop After Effects alternative for motion design and animation. It adopts AE's Classic 3D layer model, timeline keyframing, bezier graph editor, all 38 blend modes, track mattes, nulls, adjustment layers, and standard keyboard shortcuts (V, W, Y, G, Q, U, F9), making switching seamless.

Question 3

What motion graphics formats can Premation export?

Accepted Answer

Premation exports to 9 formats: MP4 (H.264), WebM (VP9 with alpha channel), MOV (lossless ProRes 4444 with alpha), Lottie (Bodymovin JSON), PNG sequences, JPEG sequences, GIF, still frames, and WAV audio. Exports are strictly deterministic, ensuring identical frame-perfect results every time.

Question 4

Is Premation ready for real motion design work?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Premation is used for production motion design. It is in public beta (v0.4.0) and covered by thousands of automated tests and a pixel-level render test harness to ensure rendering reliability across complex compositions, vector paths, and 2.5D cameras.

Question 5

What are the hardware requirements to run Premation?

Accepted Answer

Premation requires a GPU supporting WebGPU or WebGL2 (such as Apple Silicon M1-M4, NVIDIA GeForce, or AMD Radeon). There is no sluggish software rasterizer — every frame is rendered natively on your GPU for fluid 60fps+ playback.

Question 6

Do I need ffmpeg to export video in Premation?

Accepted Answer

Only for MP4, WebM, GIF, and ProRes exports. Premation automatically detects bundled ffmpeg or your system's PATH. PNG sequences, image sequences, still frames, and Lottie exports work out of the box with zero external dependencies.

Question 7

Can I import vector artwork, SVG, and Lottie into Premation?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Static SVGs import as vector layers; animated SVGs (CSS/SMIL) are converted into editable keyframe tracks. Lottie JSON animations import as editable tracks. Premation also supports raster images, videos (with frame-accurate seeking), and audio tracks.

Question 8

How does Premation handle 4K footage and complex motion graphics?

Accepted Answer

Via automatic background proxy generation. Premation transcodes low-resolution stand-ins for smooth viewport playback without blocking editing. When rendering the final export, the engine automatically uses full 4K source assets.

Question 9

Is the AI motion assistant required or charged with credits?

Accepted Answer

No. The AI assistant is optional and bring-your-own-key (BYOK) with Anthropic, OpenAI, or Gemini. There are zero added credit fees. It executes 61 typed operations directly on the timeline, and every action is placed on the standard undo stack (Cmd+Z).

Intro to AI Prompt-to-Motion