Tutorial overview of After Effects basics at Video Co-pilot. (Watching at least the first 11 minute video before Friday would be helpful).
As mentioned in Week 5, the Lynda.com video tutorial site is an amazing learning resource now available free to all RMIT students. It’s an expensive service to use commercially, so get all the value out of it you can while studying! It features well organised tutorials broken up into lots of little video chunks. The service can be used off-campus, but you need to login to Lynda via an RMIT page first, as mentioned and linked here. Then you’ll need to set-up a Lynda.com account to use it. Again, any browsing of After Effects tutorials before Friday would be useful.
Please bring 3 things on Friday :
– some raw material to use for our exploration of After Effects. ( eg photographs + videos you want to composite).
– at least 3 questions about After Effects., covering what areas you want to learn, or what specific composition techniques you think you will need for your next project.
– If you didn’t complete the time lapse sequence we experimented with in Week 5, please try to bring a completed time lapse on Friday. Take a sequence of say 100 photos, then with all of those in one folder, watch this straightforward tutorial about how to create a time lapse using After Effects ( or see other time lapse options mentioned last week).
A Crash Course in After Effects Compositing
– The interface. (workspace and workflow) layers on a timeline
– Creating a composition (composition basics)
– Adding layers to a timeline (layers overview) (splitting layers / sequencing layers)
– Adjusting parameters over time (using keyframes and the stopwatch)
– Using masks to control areas of an image.
– Using effects.
– Rendering and Exporting (overview)
Very Useful AE Keyboard Shortcuts (also see the full reference list)
When a layer is selected in the timeline, press to show the properties:
S for scale, P for Position, R for rotate, T for opacity
Z for zoom, space bar + move mouse to navigate around a larger image
C cycle through camera tools, G – cycle through Pen tools
J or K – go to next visible important part of timeline ( eg an edit, keyframe etc )
i + o – navigates to beginning or end of a chosen layer on timeline.
U – show only properties with keyframes or expressions (+ press again to hide)
Up and Down arrows – go fwd / backwards 1 frame.
UPDATE:
A couple of things we didn’t get to with the last class >
Painting and drawing with After Effects (Creative Cow tutorials below)
AE Basics 47: Paint 1 Creating and Customizing Brushes
AE Basics 48: Paint 2: Panel Options: One
AE Basics 49: Paint 3 Panel Options Part TWO
AE Basics 50: Paint 4 Panel Options Part THREE: Timeline
AE Basics 51: Paint 5 Panel Options Part FOUR: PATHS
AE Basics 52: Paint 6 Spot & Blemish Removal
And also relevant > AE Basics 30: The Write-on Effect
Making (and animating) abstract shapes in After Effects:
The Beauty of AE Shapes: Vector Art
AE Basics 17: Shape Layers Part 1
Creating masks / selecting areas of video to highlight or cover up…
Creating & Using Masks in After Effects
We can also use the masking concept directly within Resolume and IR Mapio:
– To create a simple mask in Resolume using 2 layers, place a black and white image as your topmost layer ( the one closest to the top of the resolume interface). Set the blend mode of this to ‘multiply’. Use another video or image in a layer underneath. To see the blend mode working, you will need to either – ensure both layers have A or B selected under them, then move the crossfader to halfway between A+B – or if you prefer, deselect any A or B selections, and just use the ‘V’ icon next to your layers to reduce the opacity of your top ‘multiply’ layer to half.
Using this method, anything that is black in your top most image, will mask out the projection, and anything that is white will allow the bottom layer to be visible.
– IR Mapio has a few mask options – within the IR Mapio interface, select the Effect pull down menu and choose Polygon or Ellipse masks (or their inverted options), and click ‘enable’. If using IR Mapio on your overall Resolume Composition (rather than merely on a Resolume layer, or clip), you can also replicate the masking option described above – with the bonus of being able to create your mask in real-time, while looking at your projection. To ensure you are masking out the entire image, it’s best in this case to have one IR Mapio Quad layered above all other Quads within IR Mapio. Then on that quad, you can use the mask effect to mask the entire projection ( which may have many bent shapes underneath it. Notice too – that if you choose from IR Mapio Effects, the ‘Image Mask’ option, this will give you the option of loading up pre-made masks – just choose ‘select file’ in the left hand IR Mapio menu.
As you are probably noticing, a lot of projection mapping can be broken down into two areas – mapping shapes to specific surfaces, and creating masks to avoid light landing outside those surfaces.