After Effects rules of thumb

[LAfilmaker]

HEy everybody...I am going to be doing some titles and a minimal amount of motion grafix for a project I am working on. I wanted to see if anyone could perhaps give a few rules of thumb in terms of resolution, source file resolution, usable color pallete, ntsc colors...you know, things of this nature. If we could base it around DVD production, which is what I think everyone here is probably familiar with, that would be cool!!

[BEENYWEENIES]

hoo boy. Well, there's a lot of stuff depending on the specs of your particular project, but here's some good general rules of thumb - and sorry if you are already aware of these things, others may not be.

If you are creating graphics in an outside "paint" program such as photoshop, make your files 720X540 without fail. Ever seen motion graphics or imagery where their circles were oblong? They didn't do 720X540 photoshop/Illustrator files. Since art programs (and computer displays) are square-pixel based (video pixels are rectangular), AE examines all imported files and, based on their dimensions, decides how it should treat them (square pixel vs. non-square). If you're art is 720X486 AE assumes it is rectangular pixel video and displays it as such, which means square pixel art gets stretched horizontally. You will lose resolution and sharpness if you simply stretch the artwork up to compensate. If you make a comp out your 720X540 artwork (by precomposing it or dragging it to the "make composition" button in the file window), the comp will also be 720X540 so nest THAT comp in a 720X486 comp before you render. Confused yet?

If you are doing any artwork in Illustrator, one thing I always do is create a seperate layer and draw a one-pixel wide box around the border (again, make your file 720X540). When you import illustrator files into AE it does this dumb thing that is difficult to explain, but essentially unlike a jpeg or even a photoshop file, AE only imports your art, not the "pasteboard." In other words, if your file is 720X540 but the logo inside it is only, say, a box 100X100 pixels, AE only imports that 100X100 pixel area. If it were text, AE would clip the file right up to the edges of the text. This makes it more difficult to work with, and by putting a 720X540 border on a seperate layer, AE will pull in the full 720X540 frame and you can simply delete the frame layer.

If you can give more specifics about your project I could probably give you some better tips.

[Mino]

Hey...Beenyweenies (I gota come up with a short version of that name real fast) You seem to know a fair amount about this software. Which reading material would you suggest to learn after effects?

Thanks mino

[BEENYWEENIES]

[quote author=mino link=board=AE;num=1102813412;start=0#2 date=12/11/04 at 23:59:39]Hey...Beenyweenies (I gota come up with a short version of that name real fast) You seem to know a fair amount about this software. Which reading material would you suggest to learn after effects?

Thanks mino[/quote]


There's actually too much material out there, it's really tough weeding through it all. I would, however recommend the following:

After Effects and Photoshop: Animation and Production Effects for DV and Film
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...s&n=507846

Creating Motion Graphics with After Effects (#1 AE learning book of all time)
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...s&n=507846

Total Training Presents: Adobe After Effects® 6 (Professional Version)
http://www.totaltraining.com/prod/ad...ro.asp?mscsid=

On the web there is www.creativecow.net, which has tons of really good tutorials, tips and tricks, and then there's this guy:
http://www.ayatoweb.com/ae_tips_e.html

His english is pretty bad, but his techniques will give you some good ideas of how to pull off various looks. He does rely heavily on the Trapcode plugins (which are priceless and should be purchased by any serious AE user) but you can get free demos from their website at www.trapcode.com.

I am always willing to answer any questions too, so fire away!

B

[Mino]

Thanks a lot B

[LAfilmaker]

thanks beeny.....i wasnt aware of that 720x540 trick. I guess the thing I am thinking about is why dont my animations look like the wrap arounds on MTV for instance. I tend to be a little soft around the edges when I do a final output, or the text seems to "dance" a little bit. I just cant seem to figure out if thats a color thing or reso thing?? Any ideas?

[BLUESPIDER]

lafilmmaker- if you want your stuff to look MTV, talk to Kai. That man knows whats up!

[LAfilmaker]

Hi Beeny, I am trying to so a simple expression where a font looks like a light ready to blink out and then does. Any ideas??

[BEENYWEENIES]

[quote author=LAfilmaker link=board=AE;num=1102813412;start=0#7 date=12/14/04 at 16:07:11]Hi Beeny, I am trying to so a simple expression where a font looks like a light ready to blink out and then does. Any ideas??

[/quote]


I would probably manually keyframe something like that, any expression would be more work than the payoff in my opinion. But you could try this:

I'm assuming you are using a glow effect, or a seperate on-state bulb layer (glowing light bulb) you can key off and on to get your look...
1. import an audio file, preferably rock music or something pretty dynamic. roll out its parameters till you can see the amplitude parameter.
2. ALT click the stopwatch for the opacity/glow parameter of your "blinking bulb", which enables the expression for that parameter. Drag the curly noodle whip from this expression over the amplitude parameter of the audio file. This will tie the glow (or opacity) to your music's amplitude, giving it a jumpy organic feel.
3. If you need it to be more pronounced, click into the expression AE wrote out for you and add *2 to the end (which means "times 2"), using whatever number you need to get it how you like. You can also divide (/2) if it is too strong. So if the amplitude is 64 at a given frame and you divided it by 2, your opacity at that frame will be 32.
If the glowing bulb layer is seperate from your "off" bulb layer (good for you) then you can just chop that layer off where you want it to "die" so it will flicker with the music, then disappear when the layer is chopped off. Another option is to use Animation > Keyframe Assistant > Convert Expression to Keyframes, then delete the keyframes you don't want, leaving if fully bright until the moment you need it to start flickering.

You can use this trick for all kinds of cool shiznit, tying the audio amplitude to blur length, position, scale etc. There is one thing though, it has to be a parameter that only uses one dimension, such as scale Y, blur is ok, position X, etc. The audio amplitude is only feeding one number so it can drive only one parameter. AE will warn you if you blew it, so don't worry too much about hidden surprises at render time!

Good luck, there's better ways and if this doesn't work for you let me know and I'll try something else.

[nathan_at_dcs]

Just did a test in AE6.5 and it doesn't seem to exhibit the ellipse vs. circle problem.

Nathan