Over the last year we’ve been getting really serious about Adobe After Effects here at Envato. Since our double launch late last year of VideoHive and Aetuts+, the two sites have been growing really quickly! Aetuts+ has grown into a stellar library of After Effects tutorials bringing a half million visitors a month, and VideoHive has rapidly grown into THE place to get After Effects project files with popular items selling as much as $12,000 worth and traffic exceeding 1.5 million pageviews a month!

Today I’m extremely happy to announce that we’re joining forces with another industry powerhouse: Rerendered.com and visionary After Effects producer Justin McClure. We have combined our inventory, providing you quick access to content from two of the leading sites in the AE Project Files game! The merge brings hundreds of new project files, many of which are already migrated over into our Project Files category. With our powers combined we are continuing to make VideoHive THE marketplace for Adobe After Effects!

VideoHive + Rerendered

By merging sites we’re combining our inventories into VideoHive’s After Effects Project Files category. This means you visit one site, from one account and have access to all of the great files from both sites. Alongside the file migration, we’ve also brought over new authors and buyers to join our community! Of course with a larger author base brings more file submissions, so you’ll have more frequent submissions and more of a variety to look through when searching for that perfect project to suit your needs.

Interview with Justin McClure

To kick off the merge, VideoHive site manager Mark Brodhuber sat down for a chat Justin McClure (one of the masterminds behind the creation of Rerendered) about his thoughts regarding the merger, and the future of VideoHive.

Q. Tell us a little bit about why you got started in video?

A: When I was 12 years old my brother and I would borrow my parents (then state-of-the-art) VHS video camera and create short films which were entirely edited in camera WITH music being pumped through a tape walk-man that was duct taped to the microphone. Yep, that is where it all started. My true passion developed later in college with my first After Effects 4.0 course. I was a Design major, but at Fort Hays State University you were required to have a final portfolio on an interactive CD. So along with learning programs like Director and InfiniD, After Effects for the animation and interactive components was essential. I was hooked. I mean, come on… Photoshop in motion? I was in love.

Q. Why After Effects, and why not a different software package?

A: I have never been opposed to trying new things. When Motion first came out I must of gave it a good full month of test driving, because I was sure that it was the next big thing. I also bought Shake when it first came out, I knew it wasn’t really motion graphics driven, but I wanted to have multiple tools for different needs. In the end, After Effects was just so easy to use and robust, it was really the only tool I needed.

Q. Are you a Mac or a PC? Any specific reasoning?

A: I am totally a MAC snob. I don’t have an apple sticker on my F-150 anywhere, but I can’t even begin to figure out how to adjust the volume on a PC. MAC is all that I have ever known, even since the days of Lemon-aid Stand and Oregon Trail… I realize I just hit a soft spot with a certain age group.

Q. We all love to hear each other’s war stories. Got any great horror jobs?

A: Not so much a war story, but my first week at CMT was a rough one. I was given a very small introductory project, I was to develop and animated a logo for a 5 sec open that would be on CMT.com. So I of course started where I always start, sketching and filtering through my available fonts. For some ungodly reason, Extensis Suitcase was giving me huge headaches. I think because CMT has a trillion fonts first of all, and secondly because I was of course like a kid in a candy store activating all of the cool new ones I had never seen before. Reggie, our groups IT guy, took a look and seemed to fix the issues I was having, but I was left with zero fonts activated… got to have at least the basic ones right? Anyway, at some point while activating, waiting, watching pin wheel, activating, waiting, watching pin wheel, I mistakenly ‘Activated All Fonts’ bringing the already slooow G5 to a screeching crawl and the issue that had been fixed was back again and I was too embarrassed to tell anyone. My Art Director at the time, Amie Nguyen, somehow without fail only walked by my workstation while I had my hands over my mouth, staring at my fonts with the pinwheel rotating. Gut wrenching and nerve racking experience, I was already the newbie treading water in the deep end of the pool and I thought for sure I was going to get fired before I even finished my first project. I hope Amie reads this, because I’m pretty sure even to this day, she thinks I have some kind of weird font fetish.

Q. You’ve worked with some amazing clients, such as the Discovery Channel and Dell. What’s been your experience working with such large clients, and what’s the project you’re most proud of.

A: I have had the opportunity to work with a large range of clients, some big and some small, but the recipe to do great work is the same every time. There maybe a few more pages in the branding guidelines and a couple more levels of reviews for the bigger fish, but that is to be expected. All in all, the process remains the same. I think I am most proud of the CMT Coyote Ugly show package, It was my first big solo project at CMT and I was able to get my hands dirty from start to finish. Directing the green screen shoot wasn’t so bad either.

Q. Can you tell us why you decided to launch Rerendered?

A: Rerendered started out as my personal library of experimental After Effects tests and cutting room floor materials. It certainly didn’t start out as a marketplace, it was simply an online location to keep my files available for download, instead of being scattered across multiple hard drives at home, work and in between. My friend, and later business partner, Larry Penrod, who at the time was helping me set up the site, had asked me if it maybe worth including other After Effects artists and also selling the files. We agreed to try it, but also agreed it should to be more like a garage sale and less of a corporate type of site. It was meant for AE artists to download and share files, very simple files, files that could save an hour perhaps and other files just to inspire creative things a third party plugin could do.

Q. What makes you feel that Rerendered is a good fit with VideoHive?

A: I think Rerendered is a great fit for VideoHive, because it fills a void. Most of the files you find on the current site are much more elaborate files that a producer might be more inclined to purchase as opposed to an After Effects artist. Having these types of smaller presets and pre-comp type files allows AE artists another outlet. Artist such as myself are not looking for, “replace photo & type here” plug and render types of files. But, I am however searching for little nuggets that I can change and alter very quickly and then sprinkle into a commercial or promo. Items such as trees and birds, simple little particular effects for a quick transition and so on and so forth. I am really excited for more of these types of files to start showing up, and I am looking forward to downloading them.

Q. In your opinion, what are the advantages that come with using stock motion graphics?

A: Besides the advantages I listed above, I would say the other big advantage, is introducing different styles and elements to your work. Of course they are also great time savers as well. One of the most creative things i have been exposed to while working in this field, is collaborating with multiple artists on a single project. I have always grown creatively every time, with no exceptions. Whether it is being exposed to a different way of animating or simply an introduction to a different style, I believe we all can grow from interacting with and learning from other artists and this can easily be achieved via stock items and the online community of VideoHive as easy as it can be from working with another artist sitting right next to you.

Q. Tell us a bit about SqueezeMe.tv?

A: SqueezeMe.tv started out as another internal idea actually. I wanted to create a home page that had nothing but the latest motion graphics industry’s news, highlights and tutorials all in one place. It is simply a one stop shop and I think if you are in to motion graphics or video at all, you will fall in love with it. Special thanks to Dominic Flask (link: www.dangerdom.com) and Jeff Lang for bringing it to life.

Q. Where do you see the industry going in the next ten years?

A: Without giving up my plot to rule the galaxy, here are a few things to be aware of. First off, there is a great new tool coming out soon called the internet. It will be amazing; you will be able to collaborate with people from around the world from the luxury of your very own home. All joking aside, most agencies and studios still are not utilizing this amazing tool, they simply don’t get it. They want to hire people in house and on site, and build with bricks and mortar. This method is on the brink of extinction, or at least a silent revolution. Times have changed, and a new trend has been set in motion and will remain to be the norm for the next 5 to 10 years. Everyone is looking for a bargain, including big businesses. I’m not saying you should lower your price tag, but you better be able to offer something new and have incentives for your customers. And if you are a big agency or studio you better be able to leverage your overhead, by hand picking temporary talent for each particular project as opposed to hiring someone full time with benefits that is mediocre because you think they can fill multiple rolls. You also might want to rethink those round trip plane tickets to Los Angles for your two creative directors, because you no longer need to be sitting right next to an editor, to be art directing. You no longer have to have everyone is the same building to collaborate effectively, you just need to have them on the same page.

Q. Do you have any advice for aspiring video artists?

A: Find something you love and then work your ass off owning it.

Visit VideoHive

We couldn’t be more excited about the decision. We welcome the Rerendered team, authors, and buyers over to VideoHive. We’re looking forward to a long lasting relationship, and some really great files! Be sure to stop in at VideoHive and check out all the new items as well as our Popular Files page, featuring the best and brightest of VideoHive each week! And be on the lookout in the coming weeks for a Best of Rerendered article highlighting some fantastic Rerendered files!