After Effects is primarily used for creating motion graphics and visual effects. After Effects allows users to animate, alter and composite media in 2D and 3D space with various built-in tools and third party plug-ins, as well as individual attention to variables like parallax and user-adjustable angle of observation.

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 COURSE OUTLINE 

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KNOW THE WORKFLOW

• Creating a project and importing footage

• Creating a composition and arranging layers

• About layers

• Adding effects and modifying layer properties

• About the Tools panel

• Animating the composition

• About the Timeline panel

• About time-code and duration

• Previewing your work

• Optimizing performance in After Effects

• Rendering and exporting your composition

• Customizing workspaces

 

BASIC ANIMATION USING EFFECTS AND PRESETS

• Creating a new composition

• Working with imported Illustrator layers

• Applying effects to a layer

• Applying and controlling effects

• Applying an animation preset

• Previewing the effects

• Adding transparency

• Rendering the composition

 

ANIMATING TEXT

• Installing a font using Type-kit

• Creating and formatting point text

• Using a text animation preset

• Animating with scale key-frames

• Animating using parenting

• About parent and child layers

• Animating imported Photoshop text

• Animating type tracking

• Animating text opacity

• Using a text animator group

• About text animator groups

• Animating a layer’s position

• Timing layer animations

• Adding motion blur

 

SHAPE LAYERS

• Adding a shape layer

• Creating custom shapes

• Duplicating shapes

• Duplicating and modifying a composition

• Positioning layers with snapping

• Adding compositions to a 3D project

• Adding the finishing touches

• Extra credit

 

ANIMATING A MULTIMEDIA PRESENTATION

• Adjusting anchor points

• Parenting layers

• Precomposing layers

• Keyframing a motion path

• Animating additional elements

• Applying an effect

• Animating precomposed layers

• Animating the background

• Adding an audio track

• Supported audio file formats

• Editing audio files in Adobe Audition

 

DISTORTING OBJECTS WITH THE PUPPET TOOLS

• About the Puppet tools

• Adding Deform pins

• Defining areas of overlap

• Stiffening an area

• Animating pin positions

• Squash and stretch

• Recording animation

 

WORKING WITH MASKS

• Creating a mask with the Pen tool

• Editing a mask

• Feathering the edges of a mask

• Creating a Bezier mask

• Replacing the content of the mask

• Zooming and panning by touch

• Adding a reflection

• Creating a vignette

• Adjusting the timing

• Using the Rectangle and Ellipse tools

 

ANIMATING LAYERS

• Preparing layered Photoshop files

• Simulating lighting changes

• Duplicating an animation using the pick whip

• About expressions

• Animating movement in the scenery

• Adjusting the layers and creating a track matte

• Animating the shadows

• Adding a lens flare effect

• Adding a video animation

• Rendering the animation

• Retiming the composition

 

USING THE ROTO BRUSH TOOL

• Creating a segmentation boundary

• Using Adobe Premiere Pro with After Effects

• Fine-tuning the matte

• Freezing your Roto Brush tool results

• Refine Soft Matte and Refine Hard Matte effects

• Changing the background

• Adding animated text

• Outputting your project

 

PERFORMING COLOR CORRECTION

• Previewing your project on a video monitor

• Adjusting color balance with levels

• Adjusting color balance with Color Finesse 3

• Replacing the background

• Color-correcting using Auto Levels

• Motion tracking the clouds

• Replacing the sky in the second clip

• Color grading

 

USING 3D FEATURES

• Creating 3D text

• Using 3D views

• Importing a background

• Adding 3D lights

• Adding a camera

• Repositioning layers

• Adding a text layer

• Working with Cinema 4D Lite