Overview

• Core Training Value: Learn how to use After Effect’s native effects to create a beautiful dynamic texture controlled and animated by it’s base colors. and create a custom “control panel” to animate it. The design options hidden within this technic are endless and depends entirely up to you.
• Difficulty: Beginner

Preview

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Tutorial

Preview

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Step 1

Before we get started I must say that the final rendered output of this comp will take a huge amount of time, but I hope the final result will be worth it. I will be using After Effect CS4 for this tutorial. Also you will need Trapcode Particular 2.0 version of this plugin, because we need its shadowlet feature. Optional plugins: Trapcode Form and Lux, please download demo versions from Trapcode site. So let’s start with After Effects by creating a few folders in the project panel. I created four folders: ‘ALL Comps’, ‘pictures’,’sound’.

Step 2

It’s easier to build the scene using guide pictures. You can use any picture of space nebulas that you want. As for me, I used beautifull work of Greg Martin (www.artofgregmartin.com) called ‘EUPHORIA’. You can download it from his site. We will just use it as guide to understand location of each element in 3D space.

Step 3

Download and import it into your picture folder in the project panel. Then select folder ‘Pictures’, and select File->Import->File. Choose your picture and click OK.

Step 4

Now let’s create a new composition. Select Composition->New Composition. Use preferences as it is shown on the screencap below.

Step 5

Select your guide picture, which we imported in the previous steps and place it to the timeline. Scale it down to 60% in my case and make it ‘Guide Layer’ with right click on it. In that case After Effects will be ignored in final render output. After all, with this layer selected, hit ‘Enter’ and rename it as ‘guide nebula’.

Step 6

Next we need to create our light array for future particle system. We need six light layers for it. First of all, create new Point Light layer by clicking Layer->New Layer->Light. Change name to ‘Emitter Top L’, type – to Point, color as on the screencap below. The reason why we used such dark color, is because Particular would be affected by light intensity, but more information about it is in the following steps.

Step 7

With the Emitter light layer selected, hit ‘P’ button on the keyboard, change position properties as shown on the screencap below.

Step 8

Now duplicate this layer 5 times by selecting Edit->Duplicate. Change it x,y positions as shown below. Finally, its renaming depends on position of each layer. I used Emitter Top, Emitter Mid L and R (left and right), Emitter Down L and R.

Step 9

Now let’s take a look at our guide picture. As you can see, nebula has some “corns” like things that go radially from the center of it in z-space and x,y space as well. In the next steps we can try to imitate this using particles of the Particular and Lights as emitters of particles. But first let’s add some keyframes for position of the lights. And then add Particular to the comp.

Step 10

Select all light layers, and hit ‘P’ on the keyboard. Then click on the stop watch, this action makes first keyframe for us.

Step 11

Now deselect all by ctrl+click on ‘Emitter Top L’ layer. Move your Current Time Indicator to 02:00 seconds, change position of the light as shown below.

Step 12

Change position value for other layers as shown below. Adjust traectories of emitters as shown below. For better results change Z position value for some layers.

Step 13

Create new solid layer by choosing Layer->New->Solid. Name it BG, make it comp size. Place it below all layers and turn off eyeball of the guide nebula layer.

Step 14

Apply 4-Color Gradient effect for ‘BG’ layer Effect->Generate->4-Color Gradient. I used next colors: color1- #203262, color2 – #2B3042, color3 – #171B29, color4 – #1C2230. Change values as shown below. Or use just simple Ramp Effect.

Step 15

Create new Solid layer. Layer->New->Solid. Name it Particular nebula, make it comp size, color doesn’t matter.

Step 16

Apply Particular plugin for it. Select Effect->Trapcode->Particular. Don’t forget that this must be 2.0 version of this plugin!

Step 17

Change settings of the plugin as shown on the screencaps below.

Step 18

For this moment our nebula is black – it’s ok, because we didn’t add lights to the composition. But before we do this let’s ‘freeze’ our nebula for some time. Move your current time indicator to the 2:00 seconds. Then go to the particular “Physics” submenu and click on the ‘Physics Time Factor’stopwatch . This will create first keyframe, then hit PageDown button on the keyboard and change value from ‘1′ to ‘0′.

Step 19

Now move your Curent Time Indicator back to the 2:00 seconds on the timeline. Then hit ‘B’ on the keyboard – this action sets the beginning of our composition for final render output.

Step 20

Now let’s add camera to the composition. Select Layer->New->Camera.

Step 21

Also we need Null object to control camera rotation. Add null object to the composition: Layer->New->Null Object.

Step 22

Rename it: “Cam Null’.Turn on 3D swith for Cam Null Object.

Step 23

Roll mouse cursor over pick whip, press down and hold left mouse button, release it when you will be over with ‘Cam Null’ layer. This action will parent our camera to the null object.

Step 24

Then move your timeline indicator to the 2:00 seconds. Select ‘Cam Null’ layer and with layer selected, hit ‘R’ button on the keyboard. This will release Rotation properties of the layer. Then click on the ‘Y-rotation’ stopwatch. Hit ‘End’ button and then change y-rotation value from ‘0x -0,0′ to ‘1x -0,0′. This action makes loop rotation for us.

Step 25

OK. Let there be light! Make new Light layer: Layer->New->Light. Name it ‘Violet point’, type – point light and I used this color #30204D.

Step 26

With ‘Violet point’ layer selected, hit ‘P’ button on the keyboard. Change the position values of the light as shown below.

Step 27

Create new Light layer: Layer->New->Light. Change type to ‘Spot’ and use position and light settings as shown below. Color I used was #3A7FFD.

Step 28

Create new Light layer: Layer->New->Light. Change type to ‘Spot’ and use position and light settings as shown below. Color that I used was #3A7FFD.

Step 29

Create new Light layer: Layer->New->Light. Name it ‘Global brown’. Use ‘Spot’ type, change intensity to 150% and use position and light settings as shown below. Color that I used was #BC7300.

Step 30

Duplicate ‘Global brown’ layer: Edit->Duplicate. Change position value as shown below. Color that I used was #FF9C00.

Step 31

Create new spot light layer: Layer->New->Light. Name it ‘Orange Spot’, use color #FDA100, change settings as shown below.

Step 32

Duplicate ‘Orange Spot’ layer: Edit->Duplicate. Change position and Point of Intrest values.

Step 33

Now adjust position of ‘Cam Null’ layer and Camera as shown below. After that move your Current Time Indicator to the 16:16.

Step 34

Add new light layer: Layer->New->Light. Name it ‘Dark blue point’, use color #0A1F3D. Change position values as shown below.

Step 35

Duplicate light layer: Edit->Duplicate. Use color #0A0C3D. Change position values as shown below.

Step 36

Add new Solid to the composition: Layer->New->Solid. Name it ‘Particular stars around’, comp size, color doesn’t matter.

Step 37

Move your Current Time Indicator to the beginning of the composition by pressing ‘Home’ button on the keyboard. After that with ‘Particular stars around’ layer selected, apply Trapcode particular to it: Effects->Trapcode->Particular.

Step 38

Select preset ‘t2_StarfieldStatic1_HD’. After that move your Current Time Indicator to 2:00.

Step 39

Modify plugin settings as shown below.

Step 40

Place “Particular stars around’ layer below ‘Particular nebula’ layer.

Step 41

Create new Solid layer: Layer->New->Solid. Name it Form Stars.

Step 42

Apply Trapcode Form plugin to it: Effect->Trapcode->Form. Actually, you can use only Particular for this action, but I prefer combination with Form plugin.

Step 43

Change Form plugin settings as shown below.

Step 44

Let’s add some planets into the scene. First you need to import texture for your planet. Actually, I used three planets, but we can use only one for these three, just will play with shading. I used textures from my collection, you can download some of similar type from here (CGTEXTURES.com). For tutorial I used ‘ConcreteBare0035′ texture. After that import it into the project by choosing picture folder and select File->Import->File.

Step 45

Rename texture by selecting it in the project panel and hitting ‘Enter’ on the keyboard: ‘planet’. Then place it to the timeline.

Step 46

Pre-compose layer by choosing Layer->Pre-compose. Choose ‘Move all atribute into the new comp’ option. Name composition as Big planet.

Step 47

Apply CC Sphere plugin to the following layer Effect->Perspective->CC Sphere. Adjust settings of the plugin.

Step 48

Turn on 3D switch for this layer. After that with layer selected, double press ‘A’ very fast, this will reveal layer material options. Turn off ‘Accepts lights’ option.

Step 49

Adjust position and scale of the planet. Also, because our planet is fake 3D (flat actually) we need to apply some tricks to hide this when our camera will be rotating around nebula. With layer selected, go to the Layer->Transform->Auto-Orient->Orient Towards Camera. After that our planet always will be facing to the camera.

Step 50

Then go to the effect control panel with ‘Big planet’ layer selected. Reveal ‘Rotation’ menu of the CC Sphere plugin, then Alt+Click on the ‘Rotation-Y’ stopwatch and add this expression (case sensitive!): thisComp.layer(“Cam Null”).transform.yRotation . This will synchronize rotation of our planet with main scene camera rotation.

Step 51

Now if you make Ram-preview (hit 0 on the Num Pad) you’ll notice that our planet isn’t obscured properly with nebula. It’s because there are some plugin restrictions. But, you can use this cool script. Or do some additional work for it like I do. We need two different layers for our planet. One above Nebula and one below it. First place ‘Big planet’ layer right below ”Particular nebula’ layer. Then duplicate it: Edit->Duplicate, and place copy above it. Name it ‘Big planet 2′.

Step 52

With ‘Big planet 2′ layer selected, hit ‘T’ button on the keyboard. Move your current time indicator to 08:24. Click on the ‘Opacity’ property stopwatch. Then move to the 10:00 – change Opacity=0%; move to the 24:00 – simply click on the stop watch (check value=0%); move to the 25:01 – change Opacity value to the 100%. Check animation with Ram preview (I recommend to set resolution of the ram preview to Quarter and skip 5 frame to get faster, we just need check out how elements interact now). Now, everything must be working properly!

Step 53

If you want to add more planets just repeat steps above, principle is the same. I add two more planets with different size and with different Z-space values. For example, you can add planets on the back side of nebula.

Step 54

Let’s add some more elements, for example, smoke. This will add some depth to our scene. I used Form for it, but you can use also Particular for it. Create new Solid: Layer->New->Solid. Make Comp size, color doesn’t matter, name it ‘Form Smoke’. After that apply Form plugin: Effects->Trapcode->Form. Change setting as shown below.

Step 55

Put ‘Form Smoke’ layer below ‘Form Stars’ layer. Change blending mode to ‘Screen’, and reduce Opacity to 20%.

Step 56

Let’s do some color correction to our planet a little bit . Select ‘Big planet’ layer, double click on it (Alt+ double click if you not in CS4). Select our ‘planet’ layer and apply: Effect->Color Correction->Brightness&Contrast, then Effect->Color Correction->Tint and after all Effect->Color Correction->Curves. Adjust your settings.

Step 57

Now let’s add Lens Flare. Create new black Solid: Layer->New->Solid. Name it ‘Lens Flare’, comp size, color black. After that apply Lens Flare: Effect->Generate->Lens Flare. Use 105mm Prime type.

Step 58

Select ‘Emitter Top R’ layer and hit ‘P’ on the keyboard. Next Select ‘Flare’ layer and Alt+click on the Flare Center stopwatch. After that take pick whip and select ‘Position’ of ‘Emitter Top R’ layer, and modify generated expression as shown below. Now our flare will be moving in 3D space with all the rest elements.

Step 59

Select ‘Flare’ layer and apply ‘Unmult’ plugin: Knoll->Unmult (it’s free, download from here).

Step 60

Select ‘Flare’ layer and apply ‘Fast Blur’ plugin: Effect->Blur&Sharpen->Fast Blur. Set amount to 10. Change layer blending mode to ‘Screen’.

Step 61

Let’s add some vignette. Create new Black Solid: Layer->New->Solid. Name it ‘vignette’, comp size. After that select Pen Tool (hit ‘G’ on the keyboard) and draw mask shape as shown below. Change mask properties and layer blending mode to ‘Classic Color Burn’.

Step 62

Now we can add some additional group of stars near our emitter lights. For that create new solid: Layer->New->SOlid. Name it ‘Form stars down L’. And apply Trapcode Form to it: Effect->Trapcode Form. Place this layer below ‘Particular nebula’.

Step 63

Select ‘Emitter Mid L’ layer and with the layer selected, hit ‘P’ on the keyboard. Now when you can see its position, copy it values to the Base Form x,y,z. Adjust another settings as shown below.

Step 64

Repeat prevoius steps and add some more stars groups near nebula light emitters using the same principle.

Step 65

Add some glow effect to the ‘Big planet’ and ‘Big planet 2′ layers: Effect->Stylize->Glow. Adjust your settings. Color A #960000; Color B #FFBE61.

Step 66

Add some glow effect to the ‘Big planet’ and ‘Big planet 2′layers: Effect->Stylize->Glow. Adjust your settings. Color A #960000; Color B #FFBE61. I also increased contrast inside ‘Big planet’ composition, set Contrast to 83,0.

Step 67

Next steps drastically increase your render time! Duplicate ‘Particular nebula’ layer:select layer, then go to the Edit->Duplicate. Rename it ‘Particular nebula blur’. Change blending mode to ‘Darken’.

Step 68

Apply CC Radial Blur to ‘Particular nebula blur’ layer: Effect->Blur&Sharpen->CC Radial Blur. Adjust your settings.

Step 69

Duplicate ‘Particular nebula’ layer one more time: Edit->Duplicate. Place it above ‘Particular nebula blur’ layer and change blending mode to screen.

Step 70

Finally add adjustment layer:Layer->New->Adjustment Layer. Name it ‘Global glow’. Apply glow effect to this layer: Effect->Stylize->Glow. After that place it above ‘vignette’ layer and also put ‘Flare’ layer on the top of all layers. Adjust settings of the glow.

Step 71

With ‘Global glow’ layer selected, hit ‘T’ on the keyboard. Reduce opacity value to 25%. Now you can render out your scene! You can play with color correction of the whole scene, add some titles, spaceships, change textures etc.

That’s it. Hope you’ll find this tutorial helpfull and usefull! Have a nice day and greetings from Ukraine!

Requirements

• Trapcode Particular You can download a trial version here.

Overview

• Core Training Value: We will be jumping further into Particular’s “Aux Particles System” to generate a grass-like particle trail.
• Difficulty: Intermediate

Preview

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Tutorial

“>Download Preview .flv

File size 3MB ]]> http://ae.tutsplus.com/tutorials/motion-graphics/grow-a-grassy-field-with-particular/feed/ 28 http://ae.tutsplus.com/tutorials/motion-graphics/simulate-a-glowing-neon-light-sign-of-your-logo-2/ http://ae.tutsplus.com/tutorials/motion-graphics/simulate-a-glowing-neon-light-sign-of-your-logo-2/#comments Wed, 17 Feb 2010 11:00:36 +0000 Juan Carlos Navarro http://ae.tutsplus.com/?p=5666 ]]> I know we all have busy schedules with lots of things to do during the day…. and ya know, that’s the very reason we stay open late here on AEtuts+! Ok, it’s a website so that doesn’t really work, but if we had a store front we would stay open late just for you… you and the date you brought who doesn’t think it’s gonna work out…. sorry, they told me not to tell you… hmm… awkward… Here’s how to create an “Open Late” sign yourself.

Overview

• Core Training Value: In this tutorial we will not only create a realistic neon light, but a set of controls for the light intensity, the amount of flickering, and a switch to turn it on or off, everything with simple expressions.
• Difficulty: Intermediate

Preview

Want access to the full AE project files and assets for every tutorial on Aetuts+, including this one? Join Ae Plus for just $9/month. You can view the final effect preview video below.

Tutorial

Requirements

• Adobe Photoshop.

Overview

• Core Training Value: Working with masks, creating and animating basic broadcast elements such as placeholders, moving stripes, unique super-cool backgrounds with a help from Photoshop and a couple of powerful plugins (Only AE’s native plugins!). See how to use pretty simple techniques to create a nice graphics.
• Difficulty: Beginner

Preview

Want access to the full AE project files and assets for every tutorial on Aetuts+, including this one? Join Ae Plus for just $9/month. You can view the final effect preview video below.

Step 1

Open Photoshop and create a new document 1000×1000 pixels. Make the background Transparent.
Grab the Custom Shape Tool (U), pick a “heart” and draw an accurate shape (don’t rasterize it).

Step 2

Right click on the shape layer, open Blending Options
(or select the shape layer and go to Layer>Layer Styles>Blending Options)
Check “Color Overlay” and choose some red color (I went with #f0120e)

Step 3

Now, to be more precise, bring on the grid by pressing CTRL+’ or go to View>Show>Grid.
Select the Elliptical Marquee Tool (M), set its style to “Fixed Size” and enter the value of 64 pixels for both Width and Height.
Create a new layer (name it Keyhole) and click anywhere within the canvas to bring on a selection, fill it with black color (SHIFT+F5) and orient it like shown on the image below (it will automaticly stick to grid lines)

Step 4

With the “Keyhole” layer selected, pick the Polygonal Lasso Tool (L) and make the rest of the keyhole.

Step 5

Fill it again with black, then CTRL+Left Click on the “Keyhole” layer thumbnail to make a selection of it

Step 6

Select the heart shape layer and create a new layer mask.
Turn off the eyeball for the “keyhole” and that’s it, now we have a heart with a keyhole in it.

Step 7

Save the document as a TIFF file using these settings:

Step 8

Create a new document of the same size (1000×1000px) with transparent background.
Use the Custom Shape Tool (U) again, pick an “ornament” and draw a shape staying within the canvas borders. Make it white. Export as a TIFF file using same settings as for “Heart“

Done with Photoshop, switch over to After Effects.

Step 9

We’re in After Effects. Create a new composition by pressing CTRL+N, name it “1st“, use HD 720p preset but change the frame rate to 30fps, also make it just 3 seconds long.

Step 10

Go to File – Import and import our two images.

Step 11

Create a new solid layer by pressing CTRL+Y, make it compsize. Color doesn’t matter, since we will apply a Ramp Effect.
Select the solid and go to Effect>Generate>Ramp, change its shape to Radial, change colors and adjust the Start/End of Ramp options.

Step 12

Drop the ornament image into this composition, it should be pretty small so scale it down.

Step 13

Create a new adjustment layer by pressing CTRL+ALT+Y, name it Kaleida.
Apply CC Kaleida effect (Effect>Stylize>CC Kaleida), try changing the rotation value until you see a nice shape. In my case it was +65°.
Adjust the size to fill the screen with alot of those ornament things and also change the mirroring mode to Starlish

Step 14

Animate the Kaleida. Go to the 1st frame and set a keyframe for CC Kaleida’s rotation, leave it +65°. Move to the end of the comp and set another keyframe, change the rotation value to +240°.

Step 15

Select “ornament” and “kaleida” layers, pre-compose them. Change this pre-comp’s blending mode to overlay and lower the opacity.

Step 16

Turn off the eyeball for the “heart” to not be distracted by it, create new text layer (Layer>New>Text) and type something nice. Center your text. Rename this layer as “text”
You might like to add shadow to your text, to do this go to Layer>Layer Styles>Drop Shadow.

Step 17

Go to Layer>New>Null to create a null object that we’ll be using to animate the camera, make it 3D.
Add a camera. 35mm preset should be just fine.
Parent it to the null object.
Make the “text” and “Heart” layers 3D as well.

Step 18

Change the “Z” position value for both “heart” and “text” layers to push them farther from /closer to camera.
I’ve also moved the text to align it better with other layer. Do the same with your text.

Step 19

Time to animate our camera (using null as stated above).
Select the null. Go to the beginning of the composition, set a keyframe for position without changing any values.
Move forward 1 second (30frames) and set another keyframe, change the Z position to 60px.
Go to the very end (or to 1 frame from the end) and set another keyframe, change the Z position to 2250px.

Step 20

Create an adjustment layer (Layer>New>Adjustment layer). Call it “Blur” and place it between the “text” and “heart“.
Apply blur by going to Effect>Blur & Sharpen>Fast Blur. Check Repeat Edge Pixels.
Go to the beginning our the comp and set a keyframe for Blurriness, change its value to 50.
Move forward 1 second and 10 frames and set a keyframe by changing the Blurriness value to 30
Move forward 10 more seconds and make it 20. And finally, go to the end and set the last keyframe, Blurriness value = 30

Step 21

Apply the same effect to the “text” layer (CTRL+SHIFT+ALT+F) and animate Blurriness.
Go to 1 second and set a keyframe, value must be zero at this moment. Go to the end of the comp and change it to 1000.

Step 22

Create a new solid, call it “Matte” choose white color! Place this new layer right under the “heart“!
Using the “Pen Tool” create a triangle-shaped mask that covers the keyhole but not going outside the “heart”

Step 23

Now the important note, make the following adjusments strictly in this order:

1st – Parent the “Matte” layer to “heart”
2nd – Turn the “Matte” into a 3D layer.

Step 24

Create a new comp (CTRL+N) and name it “2nd“. Use the same settings as for the “1st” but change the duration to 7 seconds.
Now, we will need the same background layer and “kaleida” for this comp, so go and get them

Step 25

As you can see, the “kaleida” is just 3 seconds long and our comp is 7 seconds long. Well, not to mess up anything, let’s simply duplicate it 2 times and offset all three layers like this:

Step 26

Select the background layer and go to effect controls pannel. Change the Ramp colors to create a different look.

Step 27

Create a new white! solid (CTRL+Y). Grab the “Rounded Rectangle Tool“.
Grid will help you alot so bring it on. Draw a shape (this will be our screen/placeholder, whatever):

Step 28

Now, we need sort of a frame for this screen.
Duplicate it (CTRL+D), rename the top one as “screen” and the other one as “frame” .
Select the “frame”, go to solid settings (CTRL+SHIFT+Y) and change its color to black
Select the “screen” and scale it down (remove constrain proportions before that).

Step 29

Select those two layers and pre-compose them.
Now, go to this new pre-comp and make both layers 3D. Parent “screen” to “frame” as well.

Step 30

Add a new text, parent it to “frame” and make it 3D!

Step 31

Let’s animate our screen/placeholder now.
Select the “frame”, go to the beginning of the comp and hit “R” to bring up the rotation property of this layer.
Set a keyframe, change Y Rotation value to +15°
Move forward 3 seconds and change that value to -5°. This makes the screen slowly and smoothly rotate during the first 3 seconds.
Move forward 1 second and change that same Y Rotation value to -165°. This will rotate it around exactly as much as we need.
Go to the end of the comp and set the last keyframe, change value to -195°. Select all keyframes and hit F9 to ease them.

Step 32

If you still haven’t renamed text layer, do so. Then go to the moment of time when the screen/placeholder is near 50% rotated (in this case it’s the very middle of the comp) and trim out the text layer (ALT+]).

Step 33

Create a new text layer (Layer>New>Text) and write something else. Go to the end of the first text layer (again in this case it’s the very middle of the comp) and trim in the new one.
As you can see, this new text get flipped as the placeholder rotates. To fix this, go to Layer>Transform>Flip Horizontal. Fixed.

Step 34

See how the timeline should look like at this moment.

Step 35

Create a new comp, same settings but make it 12 seconds long. Now, go back to previous comp, select the background layer and press CTRL+C to copy it. Switch to newly created comp and press CTRL+V to paste it.
Go to the project pannel, take the “2nd” comp and drop it into current one, above the background layer.

Step 36

Select the “2nd” layer, go to Layer>Time>Enable Time Remapping. Now, look at the time remap property.
It has 2 keyframes, one at the beginning and the other at the end of the layer.
Select the 2nd keyframe, move backward a few frames (use Page Down) and add a new keyframe.
What we just did? We create a freeze frame at the end of that layer so we have original animation and when it finishes – it freezes.
Select the last keyframe, move it to 9 seconds mark and extend the layer.

Step 37

Create a new solid, call it “stripe” (on the images it will be shown as “Line!”, I hope it’s no problem). Make it 2560×720 pixels. Color code is on the image:

Step 38

Create a new mask using the “Rectangle Tool” (see the image).
Select the layer for which we used time remapping. Hit “U” to see all its keyframes.
Move to where the last keyframe is, select the stripe, hit “M+M” to bring up mask properties and set a keyframe for Mask Path.
Go to where the previous time remap keyframe is, make sure the stripe is still selected and set another keyframe for Mask Path.
Select two right vertex points of the mask and drag them to the left until mask is out of the screen. Tip: hold shift while moving mask points.

Step 39

Apply warp effect to the “stripe”. Go to Effect>Distort>Bezier Warp.
Before playing around with the settings, go to where the mask reaches the right edge of the screen. Distort the stripe by moving handles, make a nice shape.

Step 40

Create a new adjustment layer (Layer>New>Adjustment Layer), call it “Blur2” and place it right under the “stripe” layer.
Go to where the stripe just starts covering the screen and trim “Blur2″ by pressing ALT+[.

Step 41

Stay at the same time mark and apply Fast Blur to this adjustment layer (Effect>Blur & Sharpen>Fast Blur).
Check "Repeat Edge Pixels" and set a keyframe for
Move forward to where the stripe is about 3/4 over the placeholder and set another keyframe, set value to 16.

Step 42

Create a new null (Layer>New>Null Object) and make it 3D.
Add a camera (35mm) (Layer>New>Camera) and parent it to the null.
Select the null, go to where the stripe first touches the right edge of the screen and set a keyframe for position.
Move forward to 9 seconds mark and set another keyframe changing X position to about 1800 so that camera follows the stripe and leave all the rest behind, out of the screen.
Again select all keyframes and hit F9 to ease them.

Step 43

Select the stripe layer, go to 10 seconds mark (1 sec after the camera stops moving), hit "M+M" and set one more keyframe for Mask Path.
Select the left two vertex points of the mask and drag them to the right so that the mask goes out of the screen.
Uncheck "Constrain Proportions" for Feather property and increase the "X value" to 35-40.

Step 44

Add a new text or drop your logo into the comp. I typed "V-DAY TV" and placed the heart, used earlier, between those words and then pre-composed them. See the image below for the refference.

Step 45

Go to 9 seconds mark and trim the text/logo layer (in this case it's a pre-comp). It's better to trim layers than animate the opacity.
Move this layer right under the stripe layer. Play it back and you'll see that your logo/text reveals as the stripe moves out.
All you need is to choose the right size for everything.

Step 46

Add some more texts for tag line(s) and such. Animate their appearing.

Step 47

Go to the project pannel, select "1st" composition, duplicate it and rename as "Final".

Step 48

Bring up the comp settings dialogue (CTRL+K) and change its duration to 12 seconds

Step 49

Again go back to the project pannel, select "3rd" composition and drop it into the current one ("Final").
Place it right under the "Matte" layer and set the track matte to Alpha matte.
Play it back, you should see the "3rd" comp throught the keyhole.
Since the matte is only 3 seconds long, the "3rd" layer won't be visible after that time. So go to 3 seconds mark and trim the "3rd" layer (ALT+]).
Duplicate it and place on top of the comp. Don’t forget to remove its track matte (set it to none).

Step 50

The animation has some frames that we do not need anymore so select all the layers except the top one, go to 2 seconds 25 frames mark and trim them all (ALT+]).
Go back a few frames using “Page Down“, select the top layer and trim it in (ALT+[)
Hit “T” to bring up the opacity property and animate the layer appearing

Step 51

Final step. Let’s add a vignette which is a very important thing in graphics.
Create a new black solid, select it, choose the ““Ellipse Tool”, double click on it and you’ve got a mask.
Hit “M+M” and set mask mode to Subtract, increase the feathering and lower the opacity.

Change “Vignette“’s blending mode to Overlay.

That’s it. Done.

Overview

• Core Training Value: A quick technique simulating a camera following an emitter, a look at organic butterfly movement, and a super simple explanation of position arrays.
• Difficulty: Intermediate

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Requirements

• Trapcode Particular You can download a trial version here.
• Cinema 4D You can download a trial version here.

Overview

• Core Training Value: Learn how to set up a snow blizzard scene with “logo to snow transition” using basics of Cinema 4D particle systems and a mix between After Effects Fractal Noise and Trapcode Particular.
• Difficulty: Intermediate

Preview

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First I’ll make a rough breakdown of the preview so it would be easier to follow the tutorial.
We have a logo and its transition into particles which is made purely in After Effects (using Trapcode Particular). Then there’s the 3D part which includes the snow and smoke flying all over made in Cinema 4D.
3D part probably can also be done inside After Effects with similar results but in the end it lacks a lot of control you can get out of a 3D app.

Let’s start with 3d.

Step 1

Open Cinema 4D and go to Edit>Project Settings. Now, in Attributes panel you can change project settings. I’ll change FPS to 25 and Maximum Time to 150 frames because I plan to have my animation between 5 and 6 seconds long.
Create a new Emitter (Objects>Particle>Emitter). Select it and in Attributes panel highlight Emitter and change X-Size to 270m. Then highlight Particle and change Birthrate Editor to 500 (particle count you’ll see in viewport) and Birthrate Renderer to 500 (particle count that’ll be rendered).
Change Stop Emission to 140F which means that emitter will emit particles until frame 140.
Save.

Step 2

Play the animation and you’ll see that particles are flying completely straight. To give them turbulence, we’ll add Turbulence force under Objects>Particle>Turbulence. Select it and under Object change Strength to 300, Scale to 50% and Frequency to 18%.
Play the animation now and you’ll see them flying like crazy.

Strength basicly is the velocity of particles.
Scale is a threshold of how many particles around each other will be affected – lower the value and particles will move more randomly, move it up and they’ll become more coordinated.

Frequency means how frequently the particle streams will change their direction. If it’s set to 0, there’ll be no change.

Step 3

Now, to have more control over particle direction, add Wind force (Objects>Particle>Emitter). Move it a little back in Z space for easier overview. Its position doesn’t matter, only the direction. No need to change any of its properties.
Save.

Step 4

Press Ctrl+R (Render>Render View) to render the viewport. Nothing. That’s because we haven’t assigned any object to particles.
To do it, create a new Sphere object (Objects>Primitive>Sphere). Under Object properties change Radius to 0.5m. Also, move the object behind emitter.
Now, select Sphere in Objects Manager and drag it on Emitter so the arrow by pointer would point downwards and release.
Press Ctrl+R again and see that every particle is a small sphere.
Save.

Step 5

Next, we’re going to create a camera. Do it by selecting Objects>Scene>Camera. The camera will be created basing on your view. While it’s selected change every value on Coordinates panel to 0 and hit Apply. This way it’ll be positioned right in center.
Select the Rotate Tool and rotate the camera by 90 degrees to the left.

Step 6

In View panel menu select Cameras>Scene Cameras>Camera to change your view to camera’s.
Now you can control the position of the camera by moving around in viewport. Do so to position it as seen in screenshot. You can use the given values.
Save.

Step 7

It’s obvious that there are not enough particles to make the snow as thick as in preview. That’s why we are going to duplicate our emitter 3 times.
Change back to perspective view by going to Cameras>Editor Camera (or clicking the white rectangle right to Camera in Objects Manager).
Select Emitter and duplicate it three times by holding Ctrl and dragging it down. Rename emitters to Front, Mid and Back.
Save.

Step 8

Now position the emitters as in screenshot. The idea is to have them as 3 separate layers of snow thus making it thick enough and giving some depth. They’ll be rendered separately and composited together in After Effects. Also change Y-Size for Back emitter to 300m and Particle count to 800.
Save.

Step 9

Next, the smoke part. We’ll make them by using PyroCluster shader which should already be inside your Cinema 4d. Duplicate Mid emitter and rename it to Smoke. Disable all the other particle layers by pressing on that green checkmarks. Select the Smoke layer. We won’t need so many particles so change their count to 100.

Step 10

When you play through the animation you’ll notice how particles move. We need them to move a little less chaotic, that’s why we need Turbulence to affect it differently than other layers. Duplicate Turbulence layer. Rename the new layer to Smoke_Turbulence. Change its properties to Strength: 40, Scale: 250 and Frequency: 0.
Next we need to move the turbulence box right (220m on Z axis) so it would be inside our camera’s field of view thus making particles move more linear.
Also, since Smoke particles will be directly affected by shader, delete Sphere object from Smoke Child.

Step 11

Now, we need to tell all the emitters which Force to use and which not. For this, there are Include attribute for every emitter. First, select Smoke layer and select this Include property. Exclude mode is already selected which means that every force that is dragged in the Modifiers box will not affect this emitter.
So we want this layer to be affected only by Wind and Smoke_Turbulence. Select Turbulence layer and drag it inside Modifiers box.
Play the animation and see how particles move.

In this case, Smoke_Turbulence can affect our other layers so no further changes are necessary there.
Save.

Step 12

Last thing we need to do is assigning of materials. For snow, create a new material and double-click on it to reveal its properties. Disable both Color and Specular. Enable Luminance and Transparency. Select Transparency and set its Texture to Fresnel. Open its Gradient by double-clicking on gradient icon. Drag the mid-point handle to the right a bit to soften the edges of our material.

Step 13

To apply PyroCluster shader we need to do two things. First, on the Materials panel go to File>Shader>PyroCluster and File>Shader>PyroCluster - Volume Tracer. Double-click on PyroCluster material and change Volume to 10 and Density to 0,2.
For Volume Tracer, no changes are necessary but it’s possible to change the resolution of smoke there.
The second thing you need to do is to add Environment object (Objects>Scene>Environment). Apply Volume Tracer material to it. It serves as PyroCluster renderer.
Now you can add the materials for corresponding layers. See the screenshot.
Switch the view to Camera.
Save. We’re ready to render.

Step 14

Open Render Settings. Select Output and specify your settings. I set the size to 1280×720, Frame Rate to 25 and Frame Range to 10F – 150F.
Under Save select output path and Format (I set it Quick Time Movie, Animation with 25 Fps and Million of Colors+).
Tick the Alpha Channel box.
First, you’ll render out the Smoke layer. Make sure, it’s the only one enabled as you can see in screenshot.
Star Render by selecting Render>Render to Picture Viewer (or Shift+R)

Step 15

At this point I did some test renders with snow and found that there’s something that I didn’t like so I moved moved Turbulence layer to X: -100m, Z: 220m and Camera to X: 150m, Y: 7m and Z: 245m. You don’t need to do this necessarily but I just wanted to remind that you should do your own changes if something doesn’t satisfy you.

For snow renders, we’ll have to enable Scene Motion Blur which you can enable under Effect…

Disable Smoke layer and enable Front. You’ll be rendering all three snow layers separately so after each render you’ll have to disable one and enable next one.
For Scene Motion Blur there are 2 properties that you’ll have to change for each render pass:
Samples – this means how many frames will be put in between our chosen length of motion blur (the more the better looking blur)
Strength – this is the length of motion blur

For Front layer these settings should be: Samples – 36 Times, Strength – 30%
For Mid layer: Samples – 25 Times, Strength – 25%,
For Back layer: Samples – 16 Times, Strength – 15%,

Render and you’re done with Cinema 4d.

Step 16

Switch over to After Effects and import the animations you just rendered. Set all of them to Premultiplied – Matted With Color: Black.
Create a new composition (Main_Comp) with desired settings. Bring in all the elements and put them into the right order. Change Smoke layer’s opacity to 30%.
Also, we need a background so create a new solid and apply Ramp effect. Call it BG. I used these colors: #021A23 and #000D07
Save.

Step 17

Bring in the logo and place it beneath Snow_Front and Snow_Mid layer. Precompose it (with "Leave all attributes in ‘Main_Comp’" enabled so that the new composition had the size of logo) and call the composition Main Logo.
Open Main Logo. Here you can add the texture for a logo. Bring in the picture you want to use for texture, position it on top of the logo and set Logo’s TrkMat to Luma Matte.
Place a black solid in background so the logo wouldn’t be transparent.
Apply Levels on texture picture to bring up the contrast if neccesarry.
Save.

Step 18

Switch back to Main_Comp. You can see that logo has lost its sharpness. That’s because we precomposed it and now its seen as raster rather than vector. To fix it, simply enable Collapse Transformations (the little sun icon).
Highlight Main_Logo and precompse it again as same as previous. Call it Texture Transition. Open it.
Save.

Step 19

Here, create a new solid and apply Fractal Noise to it. Change its Contrast to 1180 and Brightness to -50. Under Transform uncheck Uniform Scaling. Change Scale Width to 600 and Scale Height to 300.
Add this expression to Offset Turbulence – [time*260,0]
Now you’ll be seeing at very bad looking Fractal Noise because of the scale. To make it more sharp and get detail, change Complexity to 9.
Tick Perspective Offset and we’ll get a nice, growth-like movement.

Scrub through timeline and see how it works.
Now you should work on your own a bit. Goal is to find a state where left side of the screen is almost empty and over a period of time it roughly fills it.
To make it easier you can use Evolution and Sub Offset properties – move them around until satisfied.

See the screenshot for my settings.
Save.

Step 20

Next, we need to mask out unnecessary parts because we’ll use this as a track matte. Make a white Solid and call it Mask_In. On top of it, make another Solid but black, call it Mask_Out.
The idea is to cut down everything we don’t need so that only growing part remain.
Also, to get a fade in, animate Brightness of Fractal Noise from -165 to -50 over 45 frames (01:20)
Change keyframe types as in screenshot.
Save.

Step 21

Select Mask_In, Mask_Out and Fractal Noise layer’s and precompose them into Transition_Matte.
Now bring in the texture you want logo to turn into.
Put it under Transition_Matte and set its TrkMat to Luma.

Step 22

You have a transition but it only goes one direction. We need it to dissolve too.
Select all layers and precompose them into Forward_Transition.
Bring in Transition_Matte on top. Right click on it and select Time>Time Reverse-Layer. Then go to its Rotation and change it to 180 degrees.
Change Forward_Transition TrkMat to Luma. Position Transition_Matte layer to get a nice dissolve.
Save.

Step 23

Now, to get those particles emitting nicely, we need another matte – this time only middle part itself. In Project panel duplicate Texture_Transition comp and rename the copy to Emitter_Matte. Open it.
Replace Forward_Transition with Transition_Matte. Set its TrkMat to Luma.Select both layer’s and precompose them to Emitter_Transition. Again, bring in Transition_Matte comp and place it under. Set its TrkMat to Luma.
Save.

Step 24

Okay, the hardest part is over. Switch to Main_Comp. Bring in Emitter_Matte comp. This will be an emitter map for Particular. Disable layer’s visibility and turn it into a 3d layer (Particular will warn you if you don’t).
Create a new Solid and call it Particles. Place it on top of Texture Transition. Apply Particular to it.

Step 25

Under Emitter set Emitter Type to Layer. Then, under Layer Emitter change Layer to Emitter_Matte.
Now set Particles/sec to 10000 to see what’s happening without long loading times. Change their Size to 1.5.
Open Turbulence Field under Physics>Air. Change Affect Size to 10 and Affect Position to 1000. Now particles will start moving around randomly.

Step 26

Add wind by setting Wind X to 300. You can see that particles are moving too randomly. Change Air Resistance to 20. It makes particles fly slower over time.
Set Complexity under Turbulence Field to 10.
Save.

Step 27

Scroll up to Emitter and change Emitter Size Z to 200, Velocity Random to 100, Velocity Distribution and Motion to 0.
Then, under Particle, set Life to 2 seconds, Size Random to 50%. Draw Curves as you see in screenshot.
Save.

Step 28

Another important thing you should change is Lightness – Size under Layer Emitter. It’ll give particles size depending on luminance of emitter pixels.
Also change Layer Sampling to Particle Birth Time.
Now particle size is a bit too big – lower it to 1.2.

Step 29

Still, there’s a problem – particles start to move almost at once they’re generated. We want them to drift with the wind for a while.
Under Turbulence Field, change Fade-in Time to 1,3. This will tell both Affect Size and Position to wait a while before taking effect.
Lastly, change Particles/sec to 50000 and enable Motion Blur.
Save.

Step 30

Now, the color correction.
Apply Hue/Saturation to Texture Transition. Tick Colorize and set Colorize Hue to 195 and Colorize Saturation to 20.
Create a new Adjustment Layer, put it on top and call it CC. Apply Curves and Noise, change their values as desired.
You’re done.