Cinematic Opening Title Redux – Day 1

on Jan 26th 2009 with 177 comments
Tutorial Details
  • Program: After Effects, Various scripts & plugins
  • Difficulty: Advanced
  • Run Time: 45:58 min

Final Product What You'll Be Creating

This entry is part 25 of 33 in the Logo Reveals Session
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In this 2 part tutorial we revisit the Cinematic Opening concept with an homage to all of you, our readers, by enshrining all of the comments left on the site in a “ready for Hollywood” delivery. It features a clever use of freely available scripts and expressions to create what would normally be a very complicated and time-consuming animation. The tutorial will be split into 2 days with a total of over 80 minutes of training.

In day 1 we cover cunning techniques to harness a large amount of text and quickly format and animate it in a cinematic style. This tutorial has tricks and techniques that should appeal to all users from beginners all the way to the most seasoned and advanced users of After Effects.

And best of all, it is all created by only using built it After Effects tools!

You can watch Day 2 of this tutorial here

Tutorial

Download Tutorial .flv

File size MB

Scripts used in this tutorial


First watch this tutorial on how to install and run scripts in After Effects

Then download and install these scripts:
1. 3D Text Creator Script (download 3D_text_creator_from_file.jsx)
2. 3D Layer Distributor Script (download 3D_text_creator_from_file.jsx)
3. Random Layer Shifter Script (download LayerRandomShifter 1.1)
4. Shift Selected Layers Script (download pt_ShiftLayers_v2.0.zip)
5. rd_KindaSorta Script (download rd_KindaSorta_v1.2.zip)
6. rd_Slicer Script (download rd_Slicer_v2.0.zip)

Music and Images used in the final piece


Extraterrestrial from AUDIO JUNGLE
Reflection Nebulas in Orion from NASA
In the Center of Reflection Nebula NGC 1333 from NASA

 
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I run AESCRIPTS.com which provides useful scripts for Adobe After Effects. You can follow me on Twitter @aescripts  

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  • yatrik2004

    Can someone please send me a copy of the staggering Layers script?

  • http://myspace.com/1886tm tommy

    does it matter that I have textwrangler 2.1, because when it scans my document it comes up as only 1 entry total and there is like 400 entries, just curious… I really like this effect, and I am stoked to try it out if possible.

    • http://aescripts.com Lloyd Alvarez
      Author

      The version should not matter, make sure you watch any typos and follow the examples closely as small differences matter.

  • KB24

    Hey Lloyd, incredible tutorial. You have mad skills.

  • CYB3RGH05T

    Great tutorial! I was wondering tho when you go to animate text and go to expressions under offsets, What is that in CS4 because expressions dont show up. Thanks

  • Tommy

    I love this tutorial but, when I put in the code it still only brings up one sentence and it does not note the other statements in the text wrangler file. I am 100% certain that I have followed all of the steps closely and that all the steps I took were verbatim and everything checks out. Could I possibly need after effects CS4 vs. CS3? I thank you in advance, I really dig this effect. :-)

    • http://aescripts.com Lloyd Alvarez
      Author

      The tutorial works the same in CS3 and CS4

  • http://feldman.cl Amit

    Can you upload the project file?, i cant watch the video anymore and i got stuck in the middle. I want to do this for my grandparents 60th aniversary.
    Thank you!

    I need to finish this before april 5th. :D

  • Sal

    Lloyd,

    Your tutorials are great. I really want to thank you for taking the time to share your expertise.

    I’ve run into a glitch. The text is unreadable when it pops up on the screen. It almost seems like there are two lines of text on the same layer.

    If that makes any sense to you, would you know what I might be doing wrong?

    • http://aescripts.com Lloyd Alvarez
      Author

      @Sal – Make sure your line separator is set properly. You can try changing it to something more visible like a comma (,). Of course you will need to modify your text document appropriately.

  • Sal

    Lloyd,

    I don’t know what happened but it works now. I simply re-entered the “\n” what-you-may-call-it.

    Thanks. BTW, did I mention your tutorials are great. You’ve got great imagination and technical skills.

  • Anthony

    Great tutorial! I was just curious about what the time your markers were placed at. Thanks.

  • Anglo Esam

    thank you
    thank you
    thank you
    thank you
    thank you
    thank you
    thank you
    thank you

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  • http://tuts.cgbaran.com/ CgBaran Tuts

    Great tutorial thanks

  • Mark

    Great tutorial.

    I’ve come across a slight problem relating to the KindaSorta Script. Basically i’m importing the lyrics of a song. But when i run the script it re-sorts the actual layers randomly. So the layers are in the right order in the composition (i.e. they’ve been sorted), but the source layers in the timeline have been given a new order so the end result is wrong? Any ideas?

  • Clayton Light

    I’m having trouble viewing. It stalls about 15 seconds in.
    Advice?
    Looks beautiful though, I’d really like to watch it.

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  • Valeria

    just watching it right now, love the expressions explanations!! thx!!

  • atif qureshi

    i have same problem man the inpoint tell me to my mail add plz plz plz

    thanks plz

  • atif qureshi

    hi sir i have a problem

    whan i do time*20 ok and hilight 20

    “time*thisComp.layer(”control”).effect(”Speed”)(”Slider”)”

    it works but like you said i should subtract the inpoint of the layer to make sure it works correctly, but when i do

    (time – inpoint)*thisComp.layer(”control”).effect(”Speed”)(”Slider”)

    it bumps me back with the error

    “After Effects warning: Class ‘global’ has no property or method named
    ‘inpoint’

    Expression disabled”

    plz help me and tell to my email plz

    • http://aescripts.com Lloyd
      Author

      Javascript is case sensitive. It is inPoint with a capital P

  • atif qureshi

    someone send me the link
    of this pt express edit scripts

    plz plz plz

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  • atifqureshi

    but don’t download

    plz helps me

    and i want to study more about scripts after effect

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  • Irina Tietje

    Hi, I have AE 6.5. how can i change the scripts that actually function with AE CS. So that they can function with Ae 6.5. Thanks a lot for the tutorial. Irina

    • http://aescripts.com Lloyd
      Author

      Unfortunately you can’t do that as the script rely on features that were introduced in CS3. Some scripts will work in 6.5, you should give them a try.

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  • Bruce

    Hi Lloyd,

    This is really a great tutorial. I was messing around with it and thought that rather than having the text continue off screen it would be nice to have them fade. I tried to do this by adding another couple of sliders in the control layer and duplicating the linear expression in opacity. Then I substituted my control names, but it didn’t work. Is my logic flawed?

    thanks – Bruce

  • http://www.thedigitalexplorer.tv Stephen

    Hey Lloyd, great tutorial!

    Quick question for you : When I import my text wrangler file some of the longer sentences that I am using get cut off. I seem to only be able to import 30 characters (spaces included). Anything over that gets cut short.

    Any idea on what may be causing that since in the tutorial you use comments that are well over 30 characters long.

    Thanks in advance and keep up the great work!

    • http://www.thedigitalexplorer.tv Stephen

      Hey Lloyd,

      I just realized that all the all my text was imported (not just the first 30 characters as mentioned above).

      It wasn’t displayed in the actual layer but it was in the comp. AE must have a limit to the amount of characters it can display on each layer.

      Cheers,

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  • umer

    we will have to buy the 3d layer distributer script?????

  • http://www.youtube.com.br/ianhpiratao IANH – BR

    anyone have this file 3d_text_creator_from_file.jsx to make a upload ?
    im from brazil, and now need to pay to make a download..

    i realllyy want to do this tut, i need the script,
    anyone con help me ?

    thanks

  • http://www.youtube.com.br/ianhpiratao IANH – BR

    anyone have this file 3d_text_creator_from_file.jsx to make a upload ?
    im from brazil, and now need to pay to make a download..

    i realllyy want to do this tut, i need the script,
    anyone con help me ?

    thankss!

  • http://poerlomlaxlep@mytop-in.net ReksChekCok

    Hey men I love your tutorial but why do we have to pay for the scripts? its unfair men

  • Cheryl

    Great tutorial! Thank you! It would be good to see the expressions in case of errors while making this project. Are they listed anywhere?

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  • hamidrezamasoudi

    this video is perfect .
    I like this effect .
    thanks a lot.

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  • 0583257

    Definitely one among the best AE tutorials I’ve ever seen on the net!!!
    Many thanks and keep them coming!

  • Onealtron

    very good tutorial but it’s must pay the script, i want a tutorial, with a free add-on, pfff after 3 yaers on after effect, this give me to surrender aef 7.0, pfff.
    But i know the hard work of the graphic designer, it’s so hard, thanks for this good tutorial it’s very easy to use aef with these tutorial thanks !

    P.S : Sorry for my english I’am french…

  • COl

    flat out awesome….trying really hard to do this but you have set the bar!!

    1 problem im having is at 19:30, when i click the stop watch it does not open an expression for me to alter the time….any ideas?

    thanks again for an awesome tutorial!!

    • http://aescripts.com Lloyd
      Author

      You need to option-click the stop watch (alt-click on windows) to set an expression.

      • wscott

        Amen, and thank you!

  • http://www.jonathanv.com Jonathan V.

    Lloyd,

    I’m using this tutorial to create a video clip for my sister’s wedding. In this tutorial you use a reduced number of text layers.

    Could you let us know how many layers you used in the “final” version?

    Thank you in advance!

  • AliH2106

    how did you edit the music together its been bugging me for some time can you post a tutorial on it please thx

  • Hussain

    wow….awsome!!! thanks give me mre>>>>>>>>>>

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  • murat

    perfect………

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  • Ninerian

    Where did the Video gone?

  • Jacuz

    Please upload Part-1 again coz its not available anymore

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