OK, I'm at school trying to import the .MPG file into after effects CS4 on one of the school PCs, but instead of the problem I had on my Macbook Pro where it would look crappy when imported, on the school PC it seems like After Effects just plain freezes up when I try to import it.

Am I going about this the wrong way? I was under the impression that color correction should be done to the footage before editing starts, but I heard that there are other people who will do the editing first and then take care of everything in After Effects afterwards. This would certainly solve some problems for me, since After Effects seemingly refuses to load the MPG files correctly, but they work fine in Premiere. If I did the editing first and then saved the color correction for later, that would save me a lot of trouble (although I am a bit worried about the footage being re-compressed too many times if I accidentally do this in the wrong order).