How to add effects to after effects

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In this article, we will explain how to install a new plugin in Adobe After Effects (Ae) software and review the top 8 plugins for 2021.

Table Of Contents

Adobe After Effects and plug-ins

After Effects (Ae) is one of Adobe Creative Cloud’s software programs. The After Effects program allows you to animate, alter, and composite visual elements to produce motion graphics. After Effects works with different video formats, image formats, audio formats and is compatible with mac and windows systems.

To expand the software’s features and push your video-making skills to the next level, we highly recommend you add plugins. You’ll get more attractive results when animating or compositing video clips together into one project.

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What is an After Effects plugin?

A plug-in is a piece of software, also called a script, that adds a specific feature to another existing program and enhances its capabilities.

Plugins add new functionality and tools to After Effects. They can be effortless, like adding a new title or shade or doing more complex things like motion tracking, 3d object creation, and animation.

Plug-ins costs

Third-party developers usually create these plugins. Some After Effects plugins are free, but most of them cost money.

How to install plugins in Adobe After Effects (Ae)?

CC 2019 version and above: 3 simple steps to install plug-ins

2- Open After Effects Program, login, and go to:

Locate the plug-ins you downloaded in the folder, and double click on the one to install. Restart After Effects.

3- All installed plugins appear at the bottom of the «Window» page. Open «Window» and check your script is activated. You’re all set.

Older version than CC 2019: explaining plug-ins installation

Installing a plug-in on an older version will take you a few extra actions. In this example, let’s call the plug-in «EXAMPLE PLUGIN».

1- Download your plug-in in the common folder.

2- Copy your script in the adequate After Effects plug-ins folder.

Once downloaded in your common folders, copy the «EXAMPLE_PLUGIN.jsxbin» script file to the After Effects plug-ins folder. Here are the shortcuts to access the location of the After Effects folder from your desktop, depending on your operating system.

For Mac users: Applications\After Effects (your version here)\Scripts\ScriptUIPanels

For Windows users: Program Files\Adobe\Adobe After Effects (your version here)\Support Files\Scripts\ScriptUIPanels

Note: After Effects can also load plug-ins from a MediaCore folder, which is intended to contain plug-ins that both After Effects and Premiere Pro may use. Don’t install plug-ins in the MediaCore folder as this is not the adequate plugin location folder unless specifically instructed to do so. If you install a plug-in in this folder that is not supported by one of the applications that read from it, you might encounter difficulties and error messages.

3- Restart After Effects.

To activate this script, you must first close the After Effects program and then restart it.

4- Open your plug-in in After Effects

To run it, simply click the «EXAMPLE_PLUGIN.jsxbin» link in the «Window» menu and your script panel will show you. Dock your script panel wherever you’d like within the After Effects user interface (UI).

Make sure to allow plug-ins in your Ae preferences.

In order to use installed plug-ins, go to:

A window will pop up. Go to «Scripting & Expressions» and click on «Allow Scripts to Write Files and Access Network.”,

You’re now ready to use a whole new panel of tools to use for your next After Effects project.

Top 8 After Effects plugins in 2021

We compiled a list of some of our favorite plugins that allow creating remarkable video clips for mac and windows users.

Autofill

This plug allows you to fluidly fill the balance of your layers and save you hours of masking and keyframing. Autofill uses your layer or image transparency as a guide for which direction to grow and fill. You can use the analogy of watercolor painting on a drawing that has lines encircling the paint. This plugin is excellent for video clips such as dissolves, transitions, realistic handwriting, and more.

Subtitle Pro

Subtitle Pro allows you to create subtitles for your videos directly in the program you’re using. It works in both Adobe After Effects (Ae) and Adobe Premiere Pro (Pr). You can write out the subtitles manually or import them from any format. You can also easily translate your subtitles or import a YouTube srt file.

FreqReact

This tool permits you to drive your animations with specific audio frequencies. You can create an infinite number of visuals. FreqReact is amazing for artists who want to link their music frequencies to their videos clips and visuals.

GEOlayers 3

You can create and animate stunning maps with the GEOlayers3 plugin in Adobe After Effects. It features various maps from different online sources that allow you to animate countries’ borders, the world’s rivers, driving routes, and much more.

Easy Bounce

It’s a simple two-steps process tool that allows you to create realistic bouncing animations and significant visual effects. You can download Easy Bounce for free directly on the Adobe site.

Lockdown 2

This powerful plugin allows you to track warp surfaces. Lockdown script is used for beauty retouching and difficult cleanup jobs, for example.

Shadow Studio 2

Shadow Studio 2 is a fantastic plugin to increase your shadow game. With Shadow Studio 2, you can draw long diffuse radial shadows quickly.

Expression Universalizer

This plugin is essential if you like to create and sell projects and modern templates with After Effects. It converts the expressions in your Ae projects to ensure they run in After Effects and any language. It is also really fast.

If you are using an older version of Adobe After Effects, you might not be able to install some plugins. It’s important to check requirements before buying a plug-in and make sure your system and program version can support it.

Conclusion

You can now enhance your video clips with your newly installed plug-ins. Several user-friendly plugins for After Effects will make your movies and creations more attractive and allow you to increase your creativity by tenfold.

We hope that you found this article helpful. If you’d like more information about After Effects and Adobe software, feel free to check out other articles on our site.

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Effects and animation presets overview

Animation presets overview and resources

With animation presets, you can save and reuse specific configurations of layer properties and animations, including keyframes, effects, and expressions. For example, if you created an explosion using several effects with complex property settings, keyframes, and expressions, you can save all those settings as a single animation preset. You can then apply that animation preset to any other layer.

Many animation presets don’t contain animation; rather, they contain combinations of effects, transform properties, and so on. A behavior animation preset uses expressions instead of keyframes to animate layer properties.

After Effects includes hundreds of animation presets that you can apply to your layers and modify to suit your needs, including many text animation presets. (See Text animation presets.)

You can browse and apply animation presets in After Effects using the Effects & Presets panel or Adobe Bridge. To open the Presets folder in Adobe Bridge, choose Browse Presets from the Effects & Presets panel menu or from the Animation menu.

A great way to see how advanced users use After Effects is to apply an animation preset, and press U or UU to reveal only the animated or modified layer properties. Viewing the animated and modified properties shows you what changes the designer of the animation preset made to create the animation preset.

Downloading, installing, and moving animation presets

You can add a single new animation preset or an entire folder of new animation presets to either of the Presets folders.

When After Effects starts, it searches both of the Presets folders and their subfolders for installed animation presets and adds them to the Effects & Presets panel. After Effects ignores the contents of folders with names that begin and end in parentheses; for example, the contents of the folder (archived_animation_presets) are not loaded.

Animation presets appear in the Effects & Presets panel only if they are located in one of the Presets folders or a subfolder of one of the Presets folders. If you move a preset to a new folder, place a shortcut (Windows) or an alias (Mac OS) of that folder in the Presets folder.

Animation presets are loaded and initialized only when the Effects & Presets panel is shown. If the Effects & Presets panel is closed or hidden behind another panel, the animation presets are not initialized.

Save an animation preset

Select any combination of properties (for example, Position and Scale) and property groups (for example, Paint and Transform). If you are selecting only effects, you can select them in the Effect Controls panel.

Choose Save Animation Preset from the Animation menu or from the Effects & Presets panel menu.

Specify a name and location for the file, and then click Save.

For the animation preset to appear in the Effects & Presets panel, it must be saved in the Presets folder.

If the animation preset does not appear in the Effects & Presets panel, choose Refresh List from the Effects & Presets panel menu.

Online resources for animation presets

If you apply an animation preset from the Animation Presets > Shapes > Backgrounds category, you can see a custom Animated Shape Control effect in the Effect Controls panel. This custom effect is a specialized expression control effect that was created specifically for these animation presets. You can copy and paste this effect to other layers, or you can save it as an animation preset itself so that you can apply it elsewhere.

You can also download animation presets from many After Effects community websites, such as the AE Enhancers forum.

For a list of animation presets included with After Effects, see Animation preset list.

Andrew Kramer provides many animation presets on his Video Copilot website.

Effects overview and resources

After Effects includes various effects, which you apply to layers to add or modify characteristics of still images, video, and audio. For example, an effect can alter the exposure or color of an image, add new visual elements, manipulate sound, distort images, remove grain, enhance lighting, or create a transition.

Effects are sometimes mistakenly referred to as filters. The primary difference between a filter and an effect is that a filter permanently modifies an image or other characteristic of a layer, whereas an effect and its properties can be changed or removed at any time. In other words, filters operate destructively, and effects operate non-destructively. After Effects uses effects exclusively, so changes are non-destructive. A direct result of the ability to change the properties of effects is that the properties can be changed over time, or animated.

Path operations on shape layers, such as Zig Zag and Pucker & Bloat—which you apply through the shape layer’s Add menu—are called effects in Adobe Illustrator, but they function differently from other effects in After Effects.

You browse and apply effects using the Effects & Presets panel. You modify effect properties using the Effect Controls panel or Timeline panel or by moving effect control points in the Layer panel or Composition panel.

You can apply multiple instances of the same effect to a layer, rename each instance, and set the properties for each instance separately.

If you open a project that uses an effect for which After Effects has not loaded the plug-in, a warning dialog box appears, and instances of the effect have Missing: at the beginning of its name in the Timeline panel and Effect Controls panel. To show all instances of missing effects in the Timeline panel for the active composition, press FF.

Because effects are implemented as plug-ins, you can install and use additional effects that parties other than Adobe provide, including effects that you create yourself. You can add a single new effect or an entire folder of new effects to the Plug-ins folder, which is located by default in one of these folders:

(Windows) Program Files\Adobe\Adobe After Effects CC\Support Files

(Mac OS) Applications/Adobe After Effects CC

When After Effects starts, it searches the Plug-ins folder and its subfolders for all installed effects and adds them to the Effect menu and to the Effects & Presets panel. After Effects ignores the contents of folders with names that begin and end in parentheses; for example, the contents of the folder (archived_effects) are not loaded.

After Effects comes with several third-party plug-ins, including Foundry Keylight, Synthetic Aperture Color Finesse, Imagineer mocha shape, fnord ProEXR, and CycoreFX HD plug-ins. These plug-ins are installed by default with the full version of Adobe After Effects software. (See Third-party plug-ins included with After Effects.).

The installers for some plug-ins install their documentation in the same directory as the plug-ins themselves.

The EXtractoR and IDentifier plug-ins from fnord software are included with After Effects to provide access to multiple layers and channels of OpenEXR files. See ProEXR plug-ins, IDentifier, and EXtractoR.

You animate effect properties in the same way that you animate any other properties—by adding keyframes or expressions to them. Usually, even effects that rely on animation for their normal use require that you set some keyframes or expressions. For example, animate the Transition Completion property of a Transition effect or the Evolution setting of the Turbulent Noise effect to turn a static effect into a dynamic effect.

Effect opacity

The property group of each effect includes a Compositing Options property group. There is a new Effect Opacity property which provides similar functionality to every effect as the Blend With Original controls. With the Effect Opacity property, you can change the global opacity and it affects the entire effect. There is no need to add a mask separately.

The Blend With Original controls group lets you precisely apply any effect to a particular area of an image by masking the desired area.

For more information, see the Blend With Original effect section.

The order in which After Effects renders masks, effects, layer styles, and transform properties—called the render order—may affect the final result of an applied effect. By default, effects appear in the Timeline panel and Effect Controls panel in the order in which they were applied. Effects are rendered in order from top to bottom in this list. To change the order in which effects are rendered, drag the effect name to a new position in the list. (See Render order and collapsing transformations.)

An effect applied to an adjustment layer affects all layers below it in the layer stacking order in the Timeline panel. (See Create an adjustment layer.)

Expression Controls effects

Expression Controls effects do not modify existing layer properties; rather, these effects add layer properties that expressions can refer to. (See Expression Controls effects.)

Preventing edge clipping with the Grow Bounds effect

Because an effect is applied to a layer, the results of some effects are constrained to within the bounds of the layer, which can make the effect appear to end abruptly. You can apply the Grow Bounds effect to a layer to temporarily extend the layer for calculating the results of other effects. This process is not necessary for newer effects, which tend to be 32-bpc effects.

Managing effects and effect properties with scripts

Paul Tuersley provides a script on the AE Enhancers forum with which you can search compositions for effects and turn them on or off.

Paul Tuersley provides a script on the AE Enhancers forum that makes synchronizing changes to Effect properties on multiple layers easier.

Effects applied with tools

Some effects—including the Puppet effect, the Paint effect, and the Roto Brush effect—are applied to a layer with a tool, rather than being applied directly in the same manner as other effects. (See Animating with Puppet tools, Paint tools and paint strokes, and Transparency, opacity, and compositing.)

Resources for Cycore FX HD effects

CycoreFX HD is included in the installation of After Effects CC and CS6. There is 16-bpc support in all effects, and 32-bpc (float) support in 35 effects. CycoreFX HD plug-ins have support for motion blur, lights, more controls, and options.

Documentation—including tutorials and example projects—for the Cycore FX (CC) plug-ins is available on the Cycore website.

Bob Donlon provides the following tutorial about the CC Particle Systems II effect on the Adobe website:

Eran Stern provides a video tutorial on his website that demonstrates the CC Particle System II and CC Mr. Mercury effects.

Compound effects and control layers

Several effects rely on a control layer (or layer map) as input. These compound effects use the pixel values of the control layer to determine how to affect the pixels of the layer that the effect is applied to (the destination layer). Sometimes, the effect uses the brightness values of the pixels in the control layer; in some cases, the effect uses the individual channel values of the pixels in the control layer.

For example, the Displacement Map effect uses the brightness values of a control layer to determine how far to shift pixels of the underlying layer, and in which direction. The Shatter effect can use two control layers—one to customize the shapes of the shattered pieces and one to control when specific parts of the destination layer explode.

The compound effect ignores effects, masks, and transformations of a control layer. To use the results of effects, masks, and transformations on a layer, precompose the layer and use the precomposition layer as the control layer.

Most compound effects include a Stretch Map To Fit option (or a similarly named option), which temporarily stretches or shrinks a control layer to the dimensions of the destination layer. This provides a pixel in the control layer corresponding to each pixel in the destination layer. If you deselect this option, the calculations for the compound effect are performed as if the control layer is centered on the destination layer at its original size.

You can create control layers by drawing or painting in an image-editing program, such as Adobe Photoshop.

Tips for creating control layers:

For many compound effects, neutral gray pixels in the control layer correspond to null operations. Therefore, a neutral gray solid layer is a good starting point for creating a control layer.

Apply the Turbulent Noise effect to a layer and precompose it to create a good control layer for turbulent or atmospheric results.

You can create a control layer by precomposing a white solid layer, a black solid layer, and a mask on the top layer that determines which areas are white and black. Increasing the feather of a mask softens the transition between black and white values.

The contrast between adjacent pixel values determines how smoothly the values change across the surface of the control layer. To create smooth changes, paint using a soft or anti-aliased brush, or apply gradients. To create abrupt changes, avoid intermediate shades, using a few widely spaced shades, such as 50% gray, black, and white.

Effects with a Comp Camera attribute

Some effects can use the camera and lights within the same composition. These effects include Card Dance, Card Wipe, and Shatter. Some of these effects always use the composition camera, whereas others include light and camera options in the Effect Controls panel.

The Live Photoshop 3D effect behaves as an effect with a Comp Camera attribute. This effect only appears on a layer when the layer is a 3D object layer from a PSD file. See 3D object layers from Photoshop.

When you apply an effect with a Comp Camera attribute to a 2D layer, the effect can track the camera and light positions within the composition and render a 3D image on the 2D layer that it is applied to. The results of the effect appear to be three-dimensional; however, the layer with the Comp Camera attribute applied remains a 2D layer and therefore has the following characteristics:

3D layers above and below it in the Timeline panel cannot intersect with each other or cast shadows on each other.

It cannot intersect with 3D layers or cast or accept shadows.

The image is rendered on the layer, not the composition, so make sure that you apply these effects to layers that are the same size as the composition and are exactly centered in the composition.

Effect Controls panel

When you apply an effect to a layer, the Effect Controls panel opens, listing the effect you applied and controls to change the property values for the effect. You can also work with effects and change most effect property values in the Timeline panel. However, the Effect Controls panel has more convenient controls for many kinds of properties, such as sliders, effect control point buttons, and histograms.

The Effect Controls panel is a viewer, which means that you can have Effect Controls panels for multiple layers open at once and can use the viewer menu in the tab of the panel to select layers.

Effects and Presets panel

Browse and apply effects and animation presets with the Effects & Presets panel. An icon identifies each item in the panel by type. Numbers within the icons for effects indicate whether the effect works on a maximum of 8 bits, 16 bits, or 32 bits per channel.

You can scroll through the list of effects and animation presets, or you can search for effects and animation presets by typing any part of the name in the search box at the top of the panel.

The options that you choose in the Effects & Presets panel menu determine which items are shown:

Show Effects For All Color Depths

Shows effects that work with any color depth, not only the effects that work with the depth of the current project.

Generate effects

Third-party effects in this category included with After Effects:

CC Glue Gun effect

CC Light Burst 2.5 effect

CC Light Rays effect

CC Light Sweep effect

CC Threads effect

4-Color Gradient effect

The 4-Color Gradient effect produces a four-color gradient. The gradient is defined by four effect points, the positions and colors of which can be animated using the Positions & Colors controls. The gradient is composed of four solid-color circles blended together, each with an effect point as its center.

This effect works with 8-bpc and 16-bpc color.

Higher values create more gradual transitions between colors.

The amount of jitter (noise) in the gradient. The jitter, which reduces banding, affects only those areas where banding could occur.

The opacity of the gradient, as a fraction of the Opacity value for the layer.

The blending mode to use in combining the gradient with the layer.

Advanced Lightning effect

The Advanced Lightning effect creates simulations of electrical discharges. Unlike the Lightning effect, Advanced Lightning doesn’t self-animate. Animate the Conductivity State or other properties to animate the lightning.

The Advanced Lighting effect includes the Alpha Obstacle feature, with which you can make the lightning go around designated objects.

Chris Zwar provides a detailed description on his website of how he used the Advanced Lightning effect to simulate blood vessel capillaries.

Eran Stern provides a video introduction to the Advanced Lightning effect on the Motionworks website.

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

Specifies the characteristics of the lightning.

note: The type determines the nature of the Direction/Outer Radius contextual control. In the Breaking type, the branches are focused toward the Direction point as the distance between Origin and Direction increases.

Specifies the point of origin for the lightning.

Direction, Outer Radius

This control changes depending on the Lightning Type:

The Direction or Outer Radius control is not available if Lightning Type is Vertical.

Specifies the distance that the lightning travels from its origin. This control is enabled if Omni or Anywhere is selected as the lightning type. Use it to terminate the lightning at a defined distance from the origin.

Specifies the direction that the lightning travels. This control is enabled if any of the following lightning types are selected: Direction, Strike, Breaking, Bouncy, and Two-Way Strike.

Changes the path of the lightning.

These controls adjust various characteristics of the core of the lightning.

These controls adjust the glow of the lightning.

note: To disable the glow, set Glow Opacity to 0. This setting can speed up rendering time greatly.

Specifies the influence of the alpha channel of the original layer on the path of the lightning. When Alpha Obstacle is greater than zero, the lightning attempts to wrap itself around opaque areas of the layer, seeing them as an obstacle. When Alpha Obstacle is less than zero, the lightning tries to stay inside the opaque areas, avoiding the transparent areas. The lighting can cross the boundaries between opaque and transparent areas, but Alpha Obstacle values further from zero cause the crossing to happen less often.

note: If Alpha Obstacles is set to a value other than 0, it’s not always possible to preview the correct result in less than full resolution; full resolution may reveal new obstacles. Be sure to check the result in full resolution before final rendering.

Specifies the amount of turbulence in the lightning path. Higher values result in a more complex strike containing more branches and forks, and lower values produce simpler strikes with fewer branches.

Specifies what percentage of a branch is forked. Turbulence and Alpha Obstacle settings influence forking.

Specifies the amount of continuous decay or dissipation of the lightning strength and influences where the opacity of the forks begins to fade.

Decay Main Core

Decays the main core along with its forks.

Composite On Original

Composites the lightning with the original layer using the Add blending mode. When deselected, only the lightning is visible.

Specifies the complexity of the turbulence in the lightning.

Specifies the minimum pixel distance between new forks. Lower values create more forks in the lightning. Higher values result in fewer forks.

Specifies the level at which a path terminates, based on resistance in the atmosphere and possible alpha collision. At lower values, the path terminates more easily when encountering resistance or alpha obstacles. At higher values, the path more persistently moves around alpha obstacles.

note: Increasing Turbulence or Complexity values causes resistance to increase in some areas. These areas change as conductivity changes. Increasing the Alpha Obstacle value causes resistance to increase at alpha edges.

Main Core Collision Only

Calculates collisions only on the main core. The forks aren’t affected. This control is relevant only if you select Alpha Obstacle.

Specifies the type of fractal turbulence used to create the lightning.

Specifies the percentage by which the core strength is drained when creating a new fork. Increasing this value reduces the opacity of the core where new forks appear. Because forks draw their strength from the main core, decreasing this value reduces the opacity of the forks as well.

Specifies the opacity of the new fork. This amount is measured as a percentage of the Core Drain value.

Specifies the amount of variation in the opacity of the fork and determines how much the fork opacity deviates from the amount set for Fork Strength.

Audio Spectrum effect

Apply the Audio Spectrum effect to a video layer to display the audio spectrum of a layer that contains audio (and optionally video). The effect displays the magnitude of audio levels at frequencies in the range that you define using Start Frequency and End Frequency. This effect can display the audio spectrum in several different ways, including along a mask path.

Jerzy Drozda, Jr. provides a demonstration of the Audio Spectrum effect on the Motionworks website.

Audio Spectrum uses the audio source footage without time-remapping, effects, stretch, or levels. To display the spectrum with such effects, precompose the audio layer before applying the Audio Spectrum effect.

To prevent other masks on the layer from clipping the output of the Audio Spectrum effect, set their mask modes to None. (See Mask modes.)

This effect works with 8-bpc, 16-bpc, and 32-bpc color.

The audio layer you want to use as input.

Start Point, End Point

Specifies the position at which the spectrum starts or ends if Path is set to None.

The mask path along which to display the audio spectrum.

The path starts from a single point and appears as a radial graph.

Start Frequency, End Frequency

The lowest and highest frequencies, in hertz, to display.

The number of frequency bands into which to divide displayed frequencies.

Maximum height, in pixels, of a displayed frequency.

Duration of audio, in milliseconds, used to calculate the spectrum.

Time offset in milliseconds used to retrieve the audio.

Thickness of the bands.

How feathered or blurry the bands appear.

Inside Color, Outside Color

Inside and outside colors of the bands.

Blend Overlapping Colors

Specifies that overlapping spectrums are blended.

If the value is greater than 0, the frequencies displayed rotate through the hue color space.

Dynamic Hue Phase

If selected, and the Hue Interpolation is greater than 0, the Start color shifts to the maximum frequency in the range of displayed frequencies. This setting allows the hue to follow the fundamental frequency of the spectrum displayed as it changes.

If selected, and the Hue Interpolation is greater than 0, the start and end colors are the same. This setting allows color continuity on closed paths.

Specifies whether to display frequency as Digital, Analog Lines, or Analog Dots.

Specifies whether to display the spectrum above the path (Side A), below the path (Side B), or both (Side A & B).

Specifies that audio frequencies are averaged to reduce randomness.

Composite On Original

If selected, displays the original layer with the effect.

Audio Waveform effect

Apply the Audio Waveform effect to a video layer to display the audio waveform of a layer that contains audio (and optionally video). You can display the audio waveform in several different ways, including along an open or closed mask path.

note: Audio Waveform uses the audio source footage without time-remapping, effects, stretch, or levels. To display the spectrum with such effects, precompose the audio layer before applying the Audio Waveform effect.

To prevent masks on the layer from clipping the output of the Audio Waveform effect, set their mask modes to None. (See Mask modes.)

This effect works with 8-bpc, 16-bpc, and 32-bpc color.

The audio layer you want to display as a waveform.

Start Point, End Point

The position at which the waveform starts and ends, if Path is set to None.

If set to None, the audio waveform is displayed along the path of the layer.

Number of samples to display in the waveform.

Maximum height, in pixels, of a displayed frequency.

Duration of audio, in milliseconds, used to calculate the waveform.

Time offset, in milliseconds, used to retrieve the audio.

The thickness of the waveform.

How feathered or blurry the waveform appears.

Inside Color, Outside Color

The inside and outside colors of the waveform.

Mono combines the left and right channels of the audio layer. Nonstereo audio layers play as Mono.

Digital displays each sample as a single vertical line connecting the minimum and maximum source sample. This option simulates the display used on digital equipment. Analog Lines displays each sample as a line connecting the previous and next sample from either the minimum or maximum audio source sample. This option simulates the retracing seen in the display of an analog oscilloscope. Analog Dots displays each sample as a dot representing either the minimum or maximum audio source sample.

Composite On Original

Composites the audio waveform with the original layer using the Add blending mode. When deselected, only the audio waveform is visible.

Beam effect

The Beam effect simulates the movement of a beam, such as a laser beam. You can make the beam shoot, or you can create a wandlike beam with a stationary start or end point. The beam looks best when motion blur is enabled and the shutter angle is set to 360.

John Dickinson provides a video tutorial and example project on the Motionworks website that demonstrate the use of the Beam effect.

This effect works with 8-bpc, 16-bpc, and 32-bpc color.

The Length control specifies the length of the beam based on a percentage of the Time specified. For example, a setting of 100% means that the visible beam length is at its maximum when the Time control is 50%. Time specifies the time of the beam’s travel from start to end as a percentage. The 3D Perspective control uses 3D perspective based on start and end thickness if Time is animated.

Cell Pattern effect

The Cell Pattern effect generates cellular patterns based on cellular noise. Use it to create static or moving background textures and patterns. The patterns can be used in turn as textured mattes, as transition maps, or as a source for displacement maps.

John Dickinson provides an example project on the Motionworks website that demonstrates the use of the Cell Pattern effect in a seamlessly looping background animation.

Richard Harrington provides additional information and examples for using the Cell Pattern effect on his website.

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

The cell pattern to use. HQ denotes high-quality patterns that render with more definition than their unmarked counterparts. Mixed Crystals is available only as a high-quality option.

note: The Static Plates option is identical in appearance to the Plates option. However, when evolving, the static plates retain a uniform lightness value, whereas the plates shift the lightness of the cell pattern.

Inverts the cell pattern. Black areas become white, and white areas become black.

Specifies the contrast of the cell pattern when you use the Bubbles, Crystals, Pillow, Mixed Crystals, or Tubular cell pattern. The control specifies sharpness for any of the Plate or Crystallize options.

note: The option chosen from the Overflow menu affects the contrast.

How the effect remaps values that fall outside the grayscale range of 0-255. Overflow isn’t available if sharpness-based cell patterns are chosen.

Values above 255 are mapped to 255. Values below 0 are mapped to 0. Contrast amount controls how much of the image falls outside the range 0-255; higher contrast amounts result in a mostly black or white image, with less gray. Therefore, less subtle cellular detail appears at higher contrast settings.

Remaps grayscale values to fall inside the 0–255 range. Contrast appears reduced; cells are mostly gray with few areas of pure black or white.

Values above 255 or below 0 are reflected back into the 0-255 range. For example, a value of 258 (255+3) is reflected to 252 (255-3), and a value of ‑3 is reflected to 3. With this setting, Contrast values above 100 increase complexity and detail.

How randomly the pattern is drawn. Lower values cause more uniform or gridlike cell patterns.

note: If you set the Disperse value above 1.0, set the layer to Best quality to avoid artifacts.

The size of the cells. The default size is 60.

Determines the portion of the fractal shape used to create the pattern.

Choose Enable Tiling to create a pattern built of repeating tiles. Cells Horizontal and Cells Vertical determine how many cells wide and how many cells high each tile is.

Animating this setting results in changes of the pattern over time.

note: Although the Evolution value is set in units called revolutions, it’s important to realize that these revolutions are progressive. The Evolution state continues to progress infinitely at each new value. Use the Cycle Evolution option to return the Evolution setting to its original state at each revolution.

Evolution Options provide controls that render the effect for one short cycle and then loop it for the duration of your clip. Use these controls to pre-render cell pattern elements into loops, and thus speed up rendering time.

Creates a loop that forces the Evolution state to return to its starting point.

The number of revolutions of the Evolution setting that the cell pattern cycles through before it repeats. The amount of time between Evolution keyframes determines the timing of the Evolution cycles.

note: The Cycle control affects only the state of the cell pattern, not geometrics or other controls, so you can get different results with different Size or Offset settings.

Specifies a value from which to generate the cell pattern. Animating this property results in flashing from one cell pattern to another (within the same cell pattern type), which is not usually the result that you want. For smooth transition of the cell pattern, animate the Evolution property.

note: Create new cell pattern animations by reusing previously created Evolution cycles and changing only the Random Seed value. Using a new Random Seed value alters the cell pattern without disturbing the Evolution animation.

Checkerboard effect

The Checkerboard effect creates a checkerboard pattern of rectangles, half of which are transparent.

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

The point of origin of the checkerboard pattern. Moving this point offsets the pattern.

How the dimensions of the rectangles are determined:

The dimensions of each rectangle are the dimensions of the rectangle with opposite corners defined by the Anchor and Corner points.

The height and width of a rectangle are equal to the Width value, meaning that the rectangles are squares.

Width & Height Sliders

The height of a rectangle is equal to the Height value. The width of a rectangle is equal to the Width value.

Thickness of the edge feather within the checkerboard pattern.

The color of the nontransparent rectangles.

The opacity of the colored rectangles.

The blending mode to use to composite the checkerboard pattern on top of the original layer. These blending modes work identically to the ones in the Timeline panel, except for the default None mode, which renders the checkerboard pattern only.

Circle effect

The Circle effect creates a customizable solid disk or ring.

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

None creates a solid disk. The other options all create rings. Each option corresponds to a different set of properties that determine the shape and edge treatment of the ring:

The difference between the Edge Radius property and the Radius property is the thickness of the ring.

The Thickness property sets the thickness of the ring.

The product of the Thickness property and the Radius property is the thickness of the ring.

Thickness & Feather * Radius

The product of the Thickness property and the Radius property is the thickness of the ring. The product of the Feather property and the Radius property is the feather of the ring.

The thickness of the feather.

Inverts the matte.

The blending mode used to combine the shape and the original layer. These blending modes behave like the blending modes in the Timeline panel, except for None, which displays only the shape, without the original layer.

Ellipse effect

The Ellipse effect draws an ellipse.

This effect works with 8-bpc, 16-bpc, and 32-bpc color.

Eyedropper Fill effect

The Eyedropper Fill effect (formerly the Color Picker effect) applies a sampled color to the source layer. This effect is useful for quickly picking a solid color from a sample point on the original layer or picking a color value from one layer and using blending modes to apply this color to a second layer.

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

The center of the sampled area.

The radius of the sampled area.

Average Pixel Color

Which color values are sampled:

Samples the average RGB color values, excluding the color values of transparent pixels.

Samples the average of all RGB color values, including color values of transparent pixels.

Samples the average of all RGB color values, premultiplied with the alpha channel.

Samples the average of all RGB color and alpha channel values. This setting results in the sampled color also containing the average transparency of the sampled pixels.

Maintain Original Alpha

Maintains the alpha channel of the original layer. If you choose Including Alpha in the Average Pixel Color menu, the original alpha is stenciled over the sampled color.

Blend With Original

The transparency of the effect. The result of the effect is blended with the original image, with the effect result composited on top. The higher you set this value, the less the effect affects the layer. For example, if you set this value to 100%, the effect has no visible result on the layer; if you set this value to 0%, the original image doesn’t show through.

Fill effect

The Fill effect fills specified masks with a specified color. If you want to add both a stroke and a fill to a closed path, the order in which you apply the stroke and fill determines the visible width of the stroke: If the fill is applied before the stroke, the full stroke brush size is visible; if the stroke is applied before the fill, the fill appears on top of the stroke, obscuring the half of the stroke that falls inside the path.

This effect works in 32-bit color.

Fractal effect

The Fractal effect renders the Mandelbrot or Julia set, creating colorful textures. When you first apply the effect, the picture you see is the classic sample of the Mandelbrot set; the set is the area that is colored black. Any pixel outside the set is colorized, depending on how close it is to the set.

This effect works with 8-bpc and 16-bpc color.

Specifies the set used. Mandelbrot is the typical Mandelbrot set. Mandelbrot Inverse is the Mandelbrot set mathematically inverted. Julia always changes depending on the center point from the Mandelbrot set and can produce the set of all possible Julia sets. Julia Inverse is the inverse of the Julia set. To see a Julia set, you may want to set the magnification to a negative value, because these sets tend to fill up the complex plane outside the normal boundary. Mandelbrot Over Julia is the same as Mandelbrot, except that it changes when the Julia center point changes. Mandelbrot Inverse over Julia is the same as Mandelbrot Inverse, except that it changes when the Julia center point changes.

Specify the settings for the specified set. X (Real) and Y (Imaginary) specify the pixels at the center of the image for either the Mandelbrot or Julia set. Magnification specifies the magnification of the effect. Escape Limit specifies how many times the calculation looks for a color for a given pixel before it assigns the color black. It also sets the maximum number of line segments the Selection tool can use when tracing the path of a point. Higher numbers require longer render times.

Specifies the color of the effect:

Displays a ghosted version of the opposite set. For example, when viewing the Julia set, use this control to display a ghosted version of the Mandelbrot set. When you select Overlay, a white cross hair with a black drop shadow appears so you can see the exact point at the center of the opposite set. This control is useful because the Julia set depends on the center point of the Mandelbrot set.

Specifies whether black pixels are transparent. If you choose Solid Color from the Palette menu, this control specifies whether everything inside or outside the set is transparent.

Specifies the palette to use when drawing the set. Lightness Gradient creates a gradient that ranges from black to white, passing through the hue specified by the Hue control. Then it applies the same gradient eight more times, each time using the hue 45° away on the color wheel. The Cycle Steps control specifies the number of colors in the gradient. Hue Wheel uses all the color from the Hue color wheel, with maximum brightness and saturation. Black And White uses alternating bands of black and white. Solid Color turns everything transparent except the inside of the set, which uses the color specified by the Hue control. Select Transparent to get the opposite result.

Specifies the hue for solid colors and the starting hue for color gradients. This control works well for creating smooth color changes or for cycling through the palette. Cycle Steps specifies the number of bands of different color that appear before the cycle starts over. Cycle Offset specifies where, other than the beginning, a cycle starts.

Highlights the edges between color bands. This control requires low-quality mode. If you want to use high-quality edge highlighting, use the Find Edges effect instead.

High Quality Settings

Specify the oversampling settings for the effect:

Specifies the method used to oversample the effect: Edge Detect-Fast-May Miss Pixels performs a simple edge detection and oversamples only those pixels. This option is the fastest, especially in areas with a lot of solid color, such as black, and it generally produces results indistinguishable from Brute Force. Brute Force-Slow-Every Pixel oversamples every pixel in the image. It is slow but precise.

Specifies the amount of oversampling to perform. For example, a value of 4 specifies that each pixel is sampled 16 times (4×4=16) and that the average color is used. Higher values produce better quality output but require longer render times.

Use tools with the Fractal effect

When the Fractal effect is selected in the Effect Controls panel, you can use After Effects tools in the following way. (If you don’t want the Fractal tools active, deselect the effect before using tools.)

Gradient Ramp effect | CC

The Gradient Ramp effect creates a color gradient. You can create linear or radial ramps, and vary the position and colors of the ramp over time. Use the Start Of Ramp and End Of Ramp properties to specify the start and end positions. Use the Ramp Scatter control to disperse the ramp colors and eliminate banding.

This effect works with 8-bpc, 16-bpc, and 32-bpc color.

Ramps often don’t broadcast well; severe banding occurs because the broadcast chrominance signal doesn’t contain sufficient resolution to reproduce the ramp smoothly. The Ramp Scatter control dithers the ramp colors, eliminating the banding apparent to the human eye.

Grid effect

Use the Grid effect to create a customizable grid. Render this grid in a solid color or as a mask in the alpha channel of the source layer. This effect is good for generating design elements and mattes within which other effects can be applied.

John Dickinson provides a video tutorial on his Motionworks website that demonstrates the use of the Grid effect.

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

Use Grid with the Advanced Lightning effect to create lightning forks that follow a grid pattern.

The point of origin of the grid pattern. Moving this point offsets the pattern.

How the dimensions of the rectangles are determined:

The dimensions of each rectangle are the dimensions of the rectangle with opposite corners defined by the Anchor and Corner points.

The height and width of a rectangle are equal to the Width value, meaning that the rectangles are squares.

Width & Height Sliders

The height of a rectangle is equal to the Height value. The width of a rectangle is equal to the Width value.

The thickness of the grid lines. A value of 0 causes the grid to disappear.

note: The anti-aliasing of the grid borders may cause the visible thickness to vary.

The softness of the grid.

Inverts the transparent and opaque areas of the grid.

The color of the grid.

The opacity of the grid.

The blending mode to use to composite the grid on top of the original layer. These blending modes work identically to the ones in the Timeline panel, except for the default None mode, which renders the grid only.

Lens Flare effect

The Lens Flare effect simulates the refraction caused by shining a bright light into the camera lens. Specify a location for the center of the flare by clicking anywhere inside the image thumbnail or by dragging its cross hair.

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

Paint Bucket effect

The Paint Bucket effect (formerly Basic Fill effect) is a nondestructive paint effect that fills an area with a solid color. It works much like the Paint Bucket tool in Adobe Photoshop. Use the Paint Bucket effect for colorizing cartoon-type outlined drawings or replacing areas of color in an image.

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

The effect fills an area that contains the Fill Point. The area is determined by analyzing pixels that neighbor the Fill Point and expanding the fill area by adding matching pixels. How far the fill color spreads depends upon the Tolerance setting, as well as the option you choose from the Fill Selector menu.

Which values to operate on:

Specifies that the effect fills the RGB and alpha channels of the fill area with the new color.

Specifies that the effect fills only the RGB channels of the fill area with the new color.

Specifies that the effect fills only the transparent areas near the fill point. You must set a fill point in a transparent area for this option to work.

Specifies that the effect fills only the opaque areas near the fill point. You must set a fill point in an opaque area for this option to work.

Specifies that the effect fills either the opaque or transparent areas in the whole image, depending upon the alpha channel value at the point you set the fill point.

How far the color values of a pixel can be from the Fill Point color values and still match. Higher values expand the range of pixels that the effect fills.

Shows what pixels match—that is, which pixels are within the Tolerance value of the color values of the Fill Point pixel. This option is especially useful in tracking leaks. If a small gap exists, the color can flow over and fill areas not intended to be filled.

How the effect treats the edges of the filled area:

Anti-aliases the edges of the filled area.

Creates a feathered edge for the filled area. Feather Softness values create a more gradually disappearing edge.

Expands the area of the fill color. The Spread Radius value indicates the number of pixels the fill color extends beyond the edge of the fill area.

Contracts the area of the fill color. The Spread Radius value indicates the number of pixels the fill color shrinks from the edge of the fill area.

Confines the fill to only the border of the selected area. The Stroke Width value indicates the width of the stroke, in pixels.

Opacity of the filled area.

The blending mode to use to composite the result of the effect on top of the original layer. All of these blending modes operate like the blending modes in the Timeline panel, except for Fill Only. Use Fill Only to show only the fill.

If you apply multiple instances of Paint Bucket to a layer, be sure not to set more than one to use the Fill Only blending mode. If you set more than one instance to use this blending mode, only the first application of the effect is shown.

Radio Waves effect

The Radio Waves effect creates radiating waves from a stationary or animated effect control point. You can use this effect to generate pond ripples, sound waves, or intricate geometric patterns. Use the Reflection control to make the shapes bounce off the sides of the layer. You can also use Radio Waves to create realistic wave displacement maps that work well with the Caustics effect.

Satya demonstrates animation of the mask that the radio wave shape is based on. He also demonstrates that you can get smooth, organic contours (rather than discrete waves) by using a very high value for Frequency, together with carefully chosen Fade-in Time and Fade-out Time settings.

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

The point from which the waves appear.

Parameters Are Set At

Specifies whether parameters can be animated for individual waves. Birth specifies that each wave maintains the same parameter settings over time. Each Frame specifies that the waves change as the parameters change. For example, if you create a star wave with an animated rotation property, select Birth to offset each star from the previous one to create a twisting tunnel, or select Each Frame to make all the stars rotate in unison as the rotation property changes.

Controls the quality of the output. Radio Waves creates smooth, anti-aliased shapes by rendering high-resolution versions of the shapes and then scaling them down by oversampling. For example, to create a 100×100-pixel image, it may generate a 400×400-pixel image and then scale it down using 4x oversampling. Oversampling provides high-quality results but results in long render times. This option works only with Best quality mode.

What to base the wave shape on.

What kind of polygon to use for the wave shape. These controls are available if Polygon is chosen for Wave Type.

Three sides create a triangle, four create a square, and so on. Size values above 64 result in a smooth circle. You can also approximate a circle by setting Sides to 3, Curve Size to 1, and Curvyness to about 0.62.

Specifies how much of each side is curved at each point.

Specifies how extreme the curve is at each point of the wave.

Specifies that the polygon is shaped like a star. To change the number of points on the star, change the number of sides.

Specifies the angles of a star by controlling the distance between inner points and the center of the star.

Specifies the mask used to create a wave. This control is available if you choose Mask from the Wave Type pop-up menu.

Image Contour controls

You can base the wave shape on the contours of an image by choosing Image Contours for Wave Type.

The layer to use as input for the creation of the image contours. Select an animated layer to emit moving shapes. A well-defined outline, high-contrast grayscale layer, or alpha channel works well as a source. The Radio Waves effect detects edges and converts sources into outlines.

Specifies the center point of the shape, relative to the source layer. For example, if you isolate a shape that is positioned in the left half of the frame, the shape radiates to the left by default; you can move the source center anywhere on the layer.

The color attributes of the source layer used to define the image contours.

Inverts the chosen value channel option.

Specifies the threshold for the chosen value channel. It determines the percentage value at which everything below it or above it is mapped to either white or black. This control can make a big difference in the shape of the wave.

Smooths out the value channel before the value threshold is sampled. If you have a high-contrast image, such as white on black, and you want the wave to follow the edges very closely, set this option to 0.

Defines how tightly the wave conforms to the layer. A high setting results in sharp corners; a low value can make the wave shape more sensitive to noise.

Specifies the shape in the source layer that you want to use as the emitted wave. Contour numbers the shapes by their order in the frame from top to bottom, left to right. The shape in the upper-left corner is number 1.

Wave Motion controls

Wave Motion controls specify how the wave emits from the center point.

Specifies the number of waves per second flowing out of the producer point.

Specifies the speed at which the wave travels from the producer point once it is born. This option doesn’t affect the number of waves per second.

Specifies the rotation of the shape at birth around its center point. To animate the rotation, use the Spin control.

Specifies the initial direction of a wave if Velocity is greater than 0. By default, particles are emitted from the producer point in an expanding radial pattern.

Specifies the speed at which the wave moves in the specified direction.

Controls the continued rotation of a shape after it is born.

Specifies the time, in seconds (including the fade-in and fade-out times), that the wave exists.

Tip: To prevent waves from abruptly disappearing when their lifetime ends, use the Fade Out Time control.

Specifies whether the waves bounce off the edges of the layer and back into the scene. This option is effective for generating displacement maps for use as water ripples.

Stroke controls

Stroke controls specify the appearance of the stroke of a wave.

Controls the appearance of the stroke that defines the shape. The outline of the shape is animated in the wave that emanates from the effect point. The quality of the stroke is defined as a 3D wave type.

Specifies the color of the stroke.

Specifies the maximum possible opacity of the stroke. The actual opacity of the stroke takes into account this setting in conjunction with the Fade-in Time and Fade-out Time controls.

Specifies the amount of time it takes the wave to fade into view. Fade-in Time is measured in seconds and begins with 0 opacity at birth. For example, if the Lifespan is 3 seconds and Fade-in Time is 1 second, the stroke is completely transparent at birth and fades smoothly to full opacity at 1 second.

Specifies the amount of time it takes the wave to fade out of view. Fade-out Time is measured backward in time from the end of the Lifespan. If the Lifespan is 3 seconds and Fade-out Time is 1 second, the wave begins to fade out at 2 seconds. If the sum of Fade-in Time and Fade-out Time is greater than the Lifespan value, the intersection point of the two fades is calculated so that the wave doesn’t reach full transparency. If either Fade-in Time or Fade-out Time is longer than the Lifespan, that amount is truncated to equal the Lifespan.

Specifies the width of the shape at its birth. End Width specifies the width of the shape at the end of its lifespan.

Stroke effect

The Stroke effect creates a stroke or border around the path defined by one or more masks. You can also specify stroke color, opacity, and spacing, as well as brush characteristics. Specify whether the stroke appears on top of the image, on a transparent image, or if it reveals the original alpha channel. To use a path created in Illustrator, copy the path and paste it into a layer in After Effects.

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

Andrew Kramer provides a video tutorial on his Video Copilot website that demonstrates the use the Stroke effect to reveal an image as if it is being written by hand on a wall.

Steve Holmes provides a tutorial on the Layers Magazine website that shows how to create and prepare vines, swirls, and flourishes in Illustrator and then import, reveal, and animate them in After Effects using the Stroke effect.

Specifies the edge quality of the stroke, between hard and soft.

Specifies the spacing between stroke segments.

Specifies whether the stroke is applied to the original layer or to a transparent layer.

Vegas effect

The Vegas effect generates running lights and other path-based pulse animations around an object. You can outline just about anything, surround it with lights or longer pulses, and then animate it to create the appearance of lights chasing around the object.

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

John Dickinson provides an example on his Motionworks website of an EKG (electrocardiogram) simulation created using the Vegas effect.

What to base the stroke on: Image Contours or Mask/Path.

If Image Contours is chosen from the Stroke menu, you specify what layer to take the image contours from and how to interpret the input layer.

The layer whose image contours are used. High-contrast, grayscale layers, and alpha channels work well and are easy to work with.

Inverts the input layer before creating the stroke.

If Layer Sizes Differ

Determines how to adjust the layers if the size of the input layer differs from the size of the layer to which Vegas is applied. Center centers the input layer in the composition at its original size. Stretch To Fit scales the input layer to match the layer to which Vegas is applied.

The color attribute of the input layer used to define the contours.

The percentage value at which everything below or above is mapped to either white or black. This property is important in determining the location of the edges that the effect strokes.

Smooths out the input layer before the threshold is sampled. Set this option to 0 if you have a high-contrast image and want the stroke to follow the edges very closely.

Defines how tightly the stroke conforms to the input layer. A high value results in sharp corners, while low values can make the stroking sensitive to noise.

Specifies whether to apply the effect to a selected contour or to all contours in the layer.

Specifies the contour to use when Selected Contour is selected from the Render menu. Contours are numbered from upper-left to lower-right; the contour with the highest point is number 1, the second highest point is number 2, and so on.

Shorter Contours Have

Specifies whether shorter contours have fewer segments. By default, the effect breaks each contour into the same number of segments. For example, if you apply the effect to the letter R, the outside contour may look fine with 32 segments, but the inside contour may be almost solid. To resolve this issue, select Fewer Segments.

The mask or path to use for the stroke. You can use either closed or open masks.

Specifies the number of segments used to create each stroked contour. For example, if the effect is applied to the word Vegas and Segments is set to 10, the outline of each of the letters, plus the inner contours of e, g, and a, are broken into 10 segments.

Determines the length of the stroke of a segment in relation to its maximum possible length. For example, if Segments is set to 1, the maximum length of a stroke is one complete trip around the object outline. If Segments is set to 3, the maximum length of a segment is 1/3 of the total outline, and so on.

Determines the spacing of the segments. Bunched puts the segments together like boxcars in a train: The shorter the segment length, the shorter the overall length of the train. Even spaces the segments evenly around the contour.

Animates the segments around the contour. For example, to create the appearance of running lights, start with a large number of segments set to 50% of their length, and then animate Rotation to move the lights around the shapes.

Specifies that the stroke starting point is different for each contour. By default, the effect strokes a contour beginning at its highest point on the screen. In the event of a tie, it starts at the leftmost highest point.

Determines how the stroke is applied to the layer. Transparent creates the effect on a transparent background. Over places the stroke over the existing layer. Under places the stroke behind the existing layer. Stencil uses the stroke as an alpha channel mask, filling the stroke with the pixels of the original layer.

Specifies the color of the stroke, unless Stencil is chosen for Blending Mode.

Specifies the width of the stroke in pixels. Fractional values are supported.

Determines how sharp or blurry the edges of the stroke are. A value of 1 creates a slight blur; a value of 0.0 blurs the line so that few solid areas of color remain.

Start, End Opacity

Specify the opacity at the beginning or end of the stroke.

Specifies the opacity of the midpoint of the stroke. This control works in terms of relative opacity, not absolute opacity. Setting it to 0 makes the change in opacity smooth from the start point to the end point, as if there were no midpoint at all.

Specifies the location of the midpoint within a segment: Lower values move the midpoint closer to the beginning; higher values move the midpoint closer to the end. Use this control to move the midpoint opacity from the center of the stroke.

Write-on effect

The Write-on effect animates strokes on a layer. For example, you can simulate the action of hand-writing of cursive text or signatures.

note: A convenient way to animate Brush Position is to use Motion Sketch to create Position keyframes on a new solid layer and then use an expression on the Brush Position property to link it to the Position property on the new solid layer. (See Sketch a motion path with Motion Sketch and Add, edit, and remove expressions.)

This effect works with 8-bpc color.

Other methods of animating paint strokes and text are also available. For example, you can animate text by using the type tools and text animators, and you can animate a paint stroke applied with a paint tool. Paint strokes can have a Write-on Duration setting, which you can use to create similar results as with the Write-on effect. You can also animate shape paths for a similar result with the Trim Paths operation. (See Animating text, Animate and edit paint strokes, and Shape attributes, paint operations, and path operations for shape layers.)

The position of the brush. Animate this property to create a stroke.

Stroke Length (secs)

The duration, in seconds, of each brush mark. If this value is 0, the brush mark has unlimited duration. Use a single, constant, nonzero value to create a snakelike movement of the stroke. Animate this value to make the stroke expand and contract.

Brush Spacing (secs)

The time interval, in seconds, between brush marks. Smaller values produce smoother paint strokes but take more time to render.

Paint Time Properties and Brush Time Properties

Specifies whether paint properties and brush properties are applied to each brush mark or to the entire stroke. Choose None to apply values at each time to all brush marks in the stroke. Choose a property name for each brush mark to retain the value for that property at the time that the brush mark was drawn. For example, if you choose Color, then each brush mark keeps the color specified by the Color value at the time that the mark was drawn.

How the paint stroke interacts with the original image:

On Original Image

Paint stroke appears over original image.

Paint stroke appears over transparency; the original image doesn’t appear.

Reveal Original Image

The original image is revealed by the paint stroke.

Основы работы с эффектами в After Effects и что такое корректирующий слой.

Вот и подошло время для шестого урока мини курса по основам After Effects. Из этого урока вы узнаете, как создать и применять некоторые эффекты.

Вообще, в программе After Effects просто огромное количество самых разных эффектов, благодаря которым можно сделать очень и очень многое с вашим видео. Плюс к этому, есть ещё масса сторонних продуктов, плагинов, которые ещё больше расширяют возможности этой программы. Рассказать обо всех этих возможностях, в одной статье просто нереально.

Если работу с эффектами в After Effects описывать в книге, то для этого понадобятся тысячи, десятки тысяч страниц, а скорее всего, и того больше. Поэтому, на сегодня стоит задача попроще: мы рассмотрим как добавить эффект, и применим всего лишь парочку. Думаю, для начала этого будет вполне достаточно.

Панель эффектов.

Если вы ничего не меняли в интерфейсе, о котором я рассказывал в первом уроке, то панель с эффектами, будет находится с правой стороны.

И хотя снаружи выглядит это весьма скромно, но раскрыв этот список, мы увидим ещё много эффектов. Но даже это, не сами эффекты. Это всё группы эффектов. Которые также можно раскрыть и уже тогда выбрать нужный эффект.

Добавление эффекта к видео.

Но поскольку эффектов очень много, то при знании нужного эффекта, его проще будет найти с помощью строки поиска.

Для того, чтобы добавить нужный эффект к видео в программе After Effects, вам нужно его перетащить на слой с видео, к которому вы хотите применить этот эффект.

Свойства эффекта теперь будут находится рядом со свойствами видео.

Кроме того, свойства эффектов будут также находится на отдельной панели. Оба эти места, равнозначны. То есть, изменяя свойства эффекта в одном месте, After Effects изменить свойства и во втором месте.

Каждый из эффектов имеет свой набор свойств, которые вы можете изменять. Например, сейчас я добавил эффект Gaussian Blur – размытие по Гаусу. Соответственно, он имеет ряд свойств, в том числе Blurinnes – размытие. Изменяя это значение, я получу размытое видео.

Теперь давайте применим простую маску, как это мы сделали в четвертом уроке, а также разместим снизу еще один слой с видео.

Но что если, мы хотим сделать размытие сразу к двум слоям? Это можно сделать разными путями. Например, добавить эффект по отдельности к каждому слою, и дать им одинаковые значения. Но это сложно и долго. Есть и другой путь, это скопировать эффект с одного видео, на другое видео. Для этого выделяете эффект или группу эффектов которые нужно скопировать, даете команду скопировать, нажав клавиши Ctrl+C, затем выделяете слой, куда нужно скопировать, и даёте команду вставить, нажав клавиши Ctrl+V.

Это хороший метод, и во многих случаях, вполне работоспособный. Но есть и ещё один метод, метод с использованием корректирующего слоя.

Корректирующий слой.

Корректирующий слой, позволяет вам произвести сразу ряд действий над одним единственным слоем, и все эти действия потом будут применены ко всем нижеследующим слоям. То есть если вы дадите размытие на этом одном слое, то размытыми станут и все, нижележащие слои.

Чтобы создать корректирующий слой, зайдите в меню, выберите Layer > New > Adjustment Layer

В результате, вы получите еще один слой на таймлайне.

Чтобы лучше было видно изменения из-за корректирующего слоя, удалите эффект из старого слоя. Для этого сделайте активным пункт Effects и нажмите клавишу Delete. Если же у вас есть и другие эффекты, которые вы хотите оставить только для этого слоя, тогда в Effects, выделите тот, который вы хотите удалить, и уже потом нажмите клавишу Delete.

Окей, теперь, если вы посмотрите в окно предпросмотра, то вы увидите, что оба наши видео стали четкими, без размытия.

А теперь давайте применим размытие по Гауссу уже к корректирующему слою.

Вы увидите, что применив эффект только к одному слою, фактически, мы применили его к двум слоям. Более того, если у вас, как это часто бывает при работе с After Affects, слоев довольном много, то применив всего одно преобразование с корректирующим слоем, мы получим преобразование всех слоев.

Но что если, мы захотим убрать эффект у одного из слоев. Самый простой способ, просто поднять его выше корректирующего слоя.

Таким образом, эффекты, это мощный инструмент в арсенале программы After Effects. И про них можно говорить много и долго. Но сейчас мы этого делать не будем, а перейдем к следующему уроку. А пока, до новых встреч!

Working with After Effects and other applications

Important Reminder:

Flash Player’s end of life is December 31st, 2020. Please see the Flash Player EOL Information page for more details.

Working with Adobe Bridge and After Effects

Use Adobe Bridge to run animation presets; run cross-product workflow automation scripts; view and manage files and folders; organize your files by assigning keywords, labels, and ratings to them; search for files and folders; and view, edit, and add metadata.

Adobe Bridge is part of the Creative Cloud suite of applications and can be downloaded and installed through Creative Cloud. See the help documentation and the Adobe Bridge CC product page for more information.

See this video to get an overview of Adobe Bridge CC.

Working with Photoshop and After Effects

If you use Photoshop to create still images, you can use After Effects to bring those still images together and make them move and change. In After Effects, you can animate an entire Photoshop image or any of its layers. You can even animate individual properties of Photoshop images, such as the properties of a layer style. If you use After Effects to create movies, you can use Photoshop to refine the individual frames of those movies.

Comparative advantages for specific tasks

The strengths of After Effects are in its animation and automation features. This means that After Effects excels at tasks that can be automated from one frame to another. For example, you can use the motion tracking features of After Effects to track the motion of a microphone boom, and then automatically apply that same motion to a stroke made with the Clone Stamp tool. In this manner, you can remove the microphone from every frame of a shot, without having to paint the microphone out by hand on each frame.

In contrast, Photoshop has excellent tools for painting and drawing.

Deciding which application to use for painting depends on the task. Paint strokes in Photoshop directly affect the pixels of the layer. Paint strokes in After Effects are elements of an effect, each of which can be turned on or off or modified at any time. If you want to have complete control of each paint stroke after you’ve applied it, or if you want to animate the paint strokes themselves, use the After Effects paint tools. If the purpose of applying a paint stroke is to permanently modify a still image, use the Photoshop paint tools. If you are applying several paint strokes by hand to get rid of dust, consider using the Photoshop paint tools.

The animation and video features in Photoshop include simple keyframe-based animation. After Effects uses a similar interface, though the breadth and flexibility of its animation features are far greater.

After Effects can also automatically create 3D layers to mimic the planes created by the Photoshop Vanishing Point feature.

Exchanging still images

After Effects can import and export still images in many formats, but you will usually want to use the native Photoshop PSD format when transferring individual frames or still image sequences between After Effects and Photoshop.

When importing or exporting a PSD file, After Effects can preserve individual layers, masks, layer styles, and most other attributes. When you import a PSD file into After Effects, you can choose whether to import it as a flattened image or as a composition with its layers separate and intact.

It is often a good idea to prepare a still image in Photoshop before importing it into After Effects. Examples of such preparation include correcting color, scaling, and cropping. It is often better for you to do something once to the source image in Photoshop than to have After Effects perform the same operation many times per second as it renders each frame for previews or final output.

Exchanging movies

You can also exchange video files, such as QuickTime movies, between Photoshop and After Effects. When you open a movie in Photoshop, a video layer is created that refers to the source footage file. Video layers allow you to paint nondestructively on the movie’s frames, much as After Effects works with layers with movies as their sources. When you save a PSD file with a video layer, you save the edits that you made to the video layer, not edits to the source footage itself.

You can also render a movie directly from Photoshop. For example, you can create a QuickTime movie from Photoshop that can then be imported into After Effects.

Color

After Effects works internally with colors in an RGB (red, green, blue) color space. Though After Effects can convert CMYK images to RGB, you should do video and animation work in Photoshop in RGB.

If relevant for your final output, it is better to ensure that the colors in your image are broadcast-safe in Photoshop before you import the image into After Effects. A good way to do this is to assign the appropriate destination color space—for example, SDTV (Rec. 601)—to the document in Photoshop. After Effects performs color management according to color profiles embedded in documents, including imported PSD files.

Working with Animate CC and After Effects

If you use After Effects to edit and composite video, you can then use Animate to publish that video.

Animate and After Effects use separate terms for some concepts that they share in common. The following table lists the differences between the terms used in the two applications: