With the new Studio Brief in 504 being directed at Design for Screen, I felt extremely eager to make the most of the inductions to re-familiarise myself with After Effects. As I haven't used the program since about Year 10! This meant with all the new Creative Cloud updates I was going to be starting pretty much at square one, but I felt excited to build my basic skills up so I can begin experimenting with the more current motion graphic animations which play such a key role in screen design & advertising nowadays.
We started by covering the basic skills to get up and running with a new canvas/composition to start animating.
Similar to photoshop you can customise the preset outputs. In terms of having a motion graphic saved as a video, 'PAL D1/DV Widescreen Square Pixel' was suggested to us as giving the best dimensions and settings for universal use within our work.
To import any file, shape, sound etc then go to File>Import>File... and import one or more files at a time. It is then easy to drag each file into the document. One thing to remember is that if you import more than one file at a time, make sure to separate the layers using the window that pops up.
We were shown how we can bring a simple object to life, by using the timeline at the bottom to adjust the objects Position/ Scale/ Opacity/ (+ many other effects) at different intervals. Then a smooth transition fills the time space between the two points on the timeline.
With this in mind you can adjust the path of the object, and the way it moves even further with the animation presets.
We were also shown how you can pre-prepare a canvas in Photoshop with all the necessary objects for your animation already layered in and editable. This makes working back and forth between programs easy, you just have to remember to tick Retain Layer Sizes within the composition and keep the layer styles editable.
In the session, we then had a play with what we could initially do with what we had learnt with a pre-setup composition from Photoshop. To start building our creative potential ready to be adapted into our projects. Once happy and finished with a composition, we were shown how to properly export a file in AE, as it is slightly more complicated than when saving a static file.
Step 1: Add Composition to Render Queue
With your finished composition selected, simply add your video to the Render Queue. The Render Queue is essentially a to-do list for After Effects.
Step 2: Adjust Quality Settings
The next step is to adjust the quality of the video you want to export in After Effects. The Render Settings menu will allow you to change the quality of the exported video.
The Output Module will allow you to select what type of video your finished file will be saved as. In our example, we want perfect quality so we will select Lossless.
Step 3: Adjust Name and Location
You can change the name and location of the finished exported video by simply clicking the coloured text next to the Output To link. After you’ve selected the save location and name, simply hit the Save button.
You can change the name and location of the finished exported video by simply clicking the coloured text next to the Output To link. After you’ve selected the save location and name, simply hit the Save button.
Step 4: Hit Render
After you’ve selected your save location and named your clip, it’s time to render or export your video out of After Effects. You can do this by simply hitting the Render button. Depending on your composition, it could take just a few seconds or a few hours. It all depends on how many moving parts and effects are in your video.
Overall, this session was an absolute success for me. I am starting to build some confidence with the program and understand how I can use it to my advantage to create so simple but very effective vector animations for my Design for Screen Module, and then to develop even further!
After the session, I played with my own composition. I just wanted to really trial out the different animation styles I could make the most of, partnering it with sound effects, etc for a professional final outcome that I can use in mockup adverts and other things. I did just make a jokey video inspired by the giant current trend of memes..
After you’ve selected your save location and named your clip, it’s time to render or export your video out of After Effects. You can do this by simply hitting the Render button. Depending on your composition, it could take just a few seconds or a few hours. It all depends on how many moving parts and effects are in your video.
After the session, I played with my own composition. I just wanted to really trial out the different animation styles I could make the most of, partnering it with sound effects, etc for a professional final outcome that I can use in mockup adverts and other things. I did just make a jokey video inspired by the giant current trend of memes..
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