After Effects induction

This post is literally, just notes I've been taking during the AfterEffects induction. Most of the time they might not make much sense...

a few techniques of managing a complicated composition.

break it up into managing chunks.

transferable skills that will apply to any kind of animation or video.

make a new solid layer

make it the size of the composition

t - gives you the opacity property

masks just like in Photoshop, we can apply exactly the same principle in AE

gotta use a vector shape, they're your masks

you can do those in AE, with a pen tool. or a shape tool. etc.

you choose the layer you wanna mask on.

here I just created a simple rectangle

all the bits outside the vector shape are transparent.

when you expand on it you can play around with things

you can edit it by using the move tool.

either by moving the anchor points, or by double clicking on an anchor points you can change the shape with edge and corner handles. 

you can create masks that will outline subject if you didn't use a green screen, to isolate them from a background,

select mask, double click on a rectangular tool to reveal the whole layer.

the layer is fully revealed and well work backwards to create a simple wipe.

animate the mask path here.

so it's a simple reveal of a mask. 

same if someone was moving from left to right you could use the same principal, just rather than scale it move it from left to right etc.

but obviously if it was a complex image, youd have to key frame it a little more, depends on how much movement there is. 

look into layertypes blending modes, a lil more. 

you can have as many masks as you like obvs. 

each mask is acting like a window through which you can see the video. 

youve got like different options, quite useful. 

can use multiple masks to create different effects.

ways on working on number on layers, sort of group them. 

apply keyframes that can animate a number of layers, make your life simple.

parent - child relationship. like in maya. 

duplicate a ball layer. for a back up in case it doesnt work.

appleD for duplicate

then create a solid, and make it a different colour, size is gonna be 200 by 200.

apply a mask to make it circular, eclipse tool then double click on it, that will apply the largest shape that it can to the mask. its now masking it off to be a circle.

then make another mask, use the pen tool and just have a shape inside the circle, set it to subtract and it'll cut a hole in your ball :') 

use convert vertex tool to edit your vertex and shape it however you wanna. 

make square wheels so we can see them rotating. 

establish parent children relationship before turning wheels.

select both wheels

r - rotate shortcut

It will reveal rotation property for both

The only thing the children thing doesn't work on, is opacity.

here you can see where to establish relationships between objects.

Its a small part of our finished animation so there was no need to have the composition huge. 

as long as frame rate etc was the same

this allows you to click on the anchorpoint and reposition it

the best way to move the anchor point

a - shortcut, anchor properties

s - scale

unlink x and y value by unticking this link icon.

animating chimney

changed its position scaled it, and changed the opacity so it fades as is goes off the screen

then obviously rotated the wheels, same way I ddi it before.

to repeat those 2-3 sets of key frames:

could copy and paste the keyframes.

or

use a script. In AE they are called expressions.

Its what makes it an extremely powerful animation software.

Java scripts they are.

hold alt and click the stopwatch

itd be useful to understand java scripts. 

use pick whip you can link two things together, position vs size for example, as it changes position it will scale. 

it can either be a property within the layer you're working on, or the property of another layer.

eg if you had a bouncing ball, rather than having to deal with the shadow you can pick whip the shadow to the position of the ball, so you don't have to key frame it, its just gonna get bigger and smaller and move as the ball bounces. any changes you make to the ball, the shadow will automatically update.

they are case sensitive, gotta be careful

loop script

we already have a ball layer that has a path

select that layer, hold alt key and drag your car composition on top of the ball layer. 

and it will exchange the two, so the car rides along the hills rather than the ball. 

to get something to orient so it follows the curve, we select the layer, go to layer transform, and select option for auto orient.  and choose the option to orient along the path

you can always double click on the composition linked in the other composition, it'll open it up and any changes you make in there, will automatically update to the thing its linked into. so you can edit it all you wanna. 

to fix the smoke, so it doesn't just cut off. it will make all the objects exist, even though in the original composition they were out of the frame.