After Effect CC

Basic knowledge of the Microsoft Windows or MAC environment

This course is for anyone with a healthy interest in Adobe applications. Social media junkies. Illustrators. Designers. It all comes down to this: if you want to understand After Effect well enough to create your own video productions, even simple object and text animations, and save them in formats that are easy to use for screen or online use, then this course is the key!

GETTING TO KNOW THE WORKFLOW

• Getting started
• Creating a project and importing footage
• Creating a composition and arranging layers
• Adding effects and modifying layer properties
• Animating the composition
• Previewing your work
• Optimizing performance in After Effects
• Rendering and exporting your composition
• Customizing workspaces
• Controlling the brightness of the user interfac

CREATING A BASIC ANIMATION USING EFFECTS AND PRESETS

• Getting started
• Importing footage using Adobe Bridge
• Creating a new composition
• Working with imported Illustrator layers
• Applying effects to a layer
• Applying an animation preset
• Previewing the effects
• Adding transparency
• Rendering the composition

ANIMATING TEXT

• Getting started
• About text layers
• Installing a font using Adobe Fonts
• Creating and formatting point text
• Using a text animation preset
• Animating with scale keyframes
• Animating using parenting
• Animating imported Photoshop text
• Animating type tracking
• Animating text opacity
• Using a text animator group
• Animating a layer’s position
• Timing layer animations
• Adding motion blur

WORKING WITH SHAPE LAYERS

• Getting started
• Creating the composition
• Adding a shape layer
• Creating a self-animating shape
• Duplicating a shape
• Creating custom shapes
• Positioning layers with snapping
• Animating a shape
• Creating nulls from paths
• Previewing the composition

ANIMATING A MULTIMEDIA PRESENTATION

• Getting started
• 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

ANIMATING LAYERS

• Getting started
• Simulating lighting changes
• Duplicating an animation using the pick whip
• 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

WORKING WITH MASKS

• About masks
• Getting started
• Creating a mask with the Pen tool
• Editing a mask
• Feathering the edges of a mask
• Replacing the content of the mask
• Adding a reflection
• Creating a vignette
• Adjusting the timing
• Trimming the work area

DISTORTING OBJECTS WITH THE PUPPET TOOLS

• Getting started
• About the Puppet tools
• Adding Position pins
• Adding Advanced and Bend pins
• Stiffening an area
• Animating pin positions
• Using the Puppet tools to animate video
• Recording animation

WORKING WITH THE 3D CAMERA TRACKER

• About the 3D Camera Tracker effect
• Getting started
• Tracking the footage
• Creating a ground plane, a camera, and the initial text
• Creating additional text elements
• Locking an image to a plane with a solid layer
• Tidying the composition .
• Adding a final object
• Creating realistic shadows
• Adding ambient light
• Adding an effect
• Previewing the composition

RENDERING AND OUTPUTTING

• Getting started
• About rendering and output
• Exporting using the Render Queue
• Creating templates for the Render Queue

USING THE ROTO BRUSH TOOL

• About rotoscoping
• Creating a segmentation boundary
• Fine-tuning the matte
• Freezing your Roto Brush tool results
• Changing the background
• Adding animated text
• Outputting your project
• Review questions and answers

CREATING MOTION GRAPHICS TEMPLATES

• Preparing a master composition
• Setting up a template
• Adding properties to the Essential Graphics panel
• Providing image options
• Protecting the timing of a section
• Exporting the template
• Review questions and answers

USING 3D FEATURES

• Creating 3D text
• Using 3D views
• Importing a background
• Adding 3D lights
• Adding a camera
• Extruding text in After Effects
• Working with Cinema 4D Lite
• Integrating the C4D layer in After Effects
• Finishing the project
• Review questions and answers

WORKING WITH THE 3D CAMERA TRACKER

• About the 3D Camera Tracker effect
• Tracking the footage
• Creating a ground plane, a camera, and the initial text
• Creating additional text elements
• Locking an image to a plane with a solid layer
• Tidying the composition
• Adding a final object
• Creating realistic shadows.
• Adding ambient light
• Adding an effect
• Previewing the composition

ADVANCED EDITING TECHNIQUES

• Getting started
• Stabilizing a shot
• Using single-point motion tracking
• Using multipoint tracking
• Creating a particle simulation
• Retiming playback using the Timewarp effect

RENDERING AND OUTPUTTING

• Getting started
• About rendering and output
• Exporting using the Render Queue
• Creating templates for the Render Queue
• Rendering movies with Adobe Media Encoder

Classroom Courses