Adobe After Effects workshop

Introduction to after effects, how to set up a page and what each section is.

Anywhere selected in blue means thats the active panel, just like in photoshop when you're working on the layer selected.

This is the timeline bar. 

The time ruler allows you to see what happens at each moment in time.

Layers bar.

How to make a new composition: 

Click on the project bar then composition in the toolbar
Preset - PAL D1/DV widescreen square pixel  (were using standard definition)
Pixel aspect ratio- square pixel option
Frame rate must be 25 per second
Duration = 15 seconds for our final animation

After setting up the composition and then you realise it need changing, just go to composition , then composition settings and you'll be able to change your presets.

How to create a shape that we then learnt how to move 

First highlight comp 1
Then go to layer-new-solid
Set the size as you wish, today we worked with 100 by 100 pixels.
You can duplicate your shape by using cmd + d and then move these layers around in the timeline so that they appear at different times.
The red bar that then appears in the timeline is how long that image lasts - the duration.
In after effects you can only have one layer per asset.

To play back your moving shapes, its best to avoid the play button if you have a lot of information stored in the programme it may playback at the wrong speed, which won't give you a good indication to precision when making the animation.
Instead its best to use Ram preview instead, which is just to the right go the play button. This option always gives you an accurate playback.

Lowering the resolution allows you to see a lot more in a preview, and then you can go back and change it back to full for maximum quality.

Layer properties

The small arrow next to the layer palette when clicked reveals a transform button which when clicked displays the properties of each layer as shown above.

Properties give more information about position within composition.

Key Frames

This is the little blue diamond that appears when you click the stop watch button next to position. A key frame is a moment in time when a significant change occurs. 

Move the time bar then drag the object you're moving which will create a start and end point.

The closer the key frame is in the timeline, the quicker the change takes place.

Exporting work

To export, go to the composition menu- add to render queue.

Blue text = must make a change.

Time span- length of composition. 

Output module - Lossless - Were making a quicktime movie, so format options- video codec (H.264) = the video equivalent of a jpeg.

Output to wherever you're saving it and then click RENDER (right hand side) 

Taadaa…first steps of After Effects