How To Use The Amazing Free New Preset “Cover Flow”

How To Use The Amazing Free New Preset “Cover Flow”

on Oct 23rd 2012 with 41 comments
Tutorial Details
  • Requirements: After Effects and Free Cover Flow Preset
  • Difficulty: Intermediate
  • Run Time: 19:06 min

Final Product What You'll Be Creating

Cover Flow is a preset for AE to create the classic flowing cover effect best known from iTunes. On top of that it has several options to change the result like adding randomness to the position of the layers, adding blur to fake a depth of field and so on. Today we’ll walk you through how to install and use this tool.

Download Cover Flow

Free Preset

If you’re using CS4, download this version instead.

Tutorial

Download Tutorial .mp4

File size: 247.8 MB

 
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I'm an After Effects and Cinema 4D hobbyist with the hope to find a job in the creative area as soon as my sabbatical will finish. I have a bachelor in electronics and an after degree in informatics. Before my sabbatical I was working as a broadcast engineer for a cable company.  

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  • http://www.facebook.com/BrewsterLync Brewster Lync

    Awesome

  • Jose

    Hi! Thanks a lot for this! god knows how hard it is to do this by hand because I had to do it more than once! I have a problem however… The rotation option doesn’t seem to work which is strange because I don’t see any errors, but I click it on and it does’t work…!

    • Michael Hofer
      Author

      Hi, glad you like it. Have you activated the 3D switch for your “foto” layer? If you open up the z rotation for your “foto” layer, is there an expression applied?

      • Jose

        Gahh went to try it again, and it worked… lol must have done something wrong the first time :S
        quick question… is it possible to offset a single photo in x? if the pics are different sizes so they don’t overlap!

      • Michael Hofer
        Author

        You can try and adjust the size under Slide Options other than that no there is no option for that. If you are familiar with expression you can go into the x position expression for that particular layer and add the value you need for that layer, that might work or not, I haven`t tested it yet!

      • Michael Hofer
        Author

        It works, so that might be an option.

      • Jose

        That’s what I was thinking, maybe adding the value to the expression :) Thanks!

  • Johnny K

    I’m on a Mac running CS6, but i don’t have the PresetEffects.xml file that you copy the text into, so I can’t get rid of the “Missing Plug-in” warning. I’ve done a search, but it’s not on my computer. How do I create it?

    • Michael Hofer
      Author

      Hi, I`m not a Mac expert but I think you have to apple click on the ae icon and thre should be an option something called “Show package content” and in there you should find the PresetEffects.xml. Again I`m not a Mac expert so maybe you have to ask google or bing to find a solution all I know is that there is an PresetEffects.xml on the mac somewhere.

      • Johnny K

        Thanks, Michael…that worked. After showing the package content, it’s in Contents > Resources. Great tutorial, BTW.

      • http://www.facebook.com/monamiali Ali Bouzidi

        How did you do that ?i can’t show the Package content! Im on mac osx 10.6.8. Double clic and open it with Pacific don’t work too. Thanks for answer.

      • http://www.facebook.com/monamiali Ali Bouzidi

        Find it! But didn’t work always the “Missing Plug-in” warning

      • Michael Hofer
        Author

        Does it work now or not?

      • http://www.facebook.com/monamiali Ali Bouzidi

        no it don’t work. I re-install all the package for 1000 times and always “missing plug-in” warning! Same probleme with CS5.5. Im on Macbook Pro OSX 10.6.8

      • surge

        Ali, in the After Effects CS6 folder (it should be the same in CS5.5) right click the AE CS6 application and select “Show package contents.” Now you go to Contents —> Resources and in the Resources folder, you will find the “PresetEffects.xml” file.

        You may need to modify the write permissions, so

        1) right click the XML file

        2) Select “Get Info”

        3) Scroll to the bottom

        4) Click the lock icon (and enter your password)

        5) Change the “Everyone” group to “Read & Write”

        I hope this helps.

  • http://www.facebook.com/kwaku.nyantekyi.1 Kwaku Nyantekyi

    Damn, is coming just a few days late!! This would have been perfect for a client last week. lol I’ll be sure to keep it in my archives though. Thanks a lot.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=603038231 Lele Colombo

    Only for windows?

    • Michael Hofer
      Author

      No, should work quite well with mac os and Linux in case you find a way to run AE on Linux ;-)

      • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=603038231 Lele Colombo

        I have copied the .ffx files in the presets folder but AE tells me that Coverflow is missing, I’ll try again later and let you know

      • Michael Hofer
        Author

        That`s the normal behavior as described in the tutorial at 2:58. You also have to copy the code from the txt file into the PresetEffects.xml file or just use the legacy version. The Preset should still work even with the missing effect warning.

  • http://twitter.com/lukewheldon Luke Wheldon

    Very useful preset, dude. Thanks!

  • http://www.facebook.com/hudsonryde Cameron Frank

    Slick!

    How did you use it with element or with the text as in the preview examples? Especially the text effect?

    • Michael Hofer
      Author

      Well I just created 3 nulls and used them as proxys for element. I pickwhipped the position and rotation values from element to these proxie nulls but because the proxie nulls are parented to the controll layer I had to use the “toComp” function to access the position values. Does that answer your question? If not please be more specific or have a look at the project file.

      • http://www.facebook.com/hudsonryde Cameron Frank

        ahh yes absolutely. Clever, thank you very much!

      • Hicham

        Can you please go into better detail about the text in the preview? Its a little complicated and could use any help you can offer. Thanks.

  • Michael Hofer
    Author

    For those of you, who are working with CS4, I`ve just created a version of “cover flow” that also works with CS4. You can download it from my dropbox for the next month. https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3401926/CoverFlow_CS4.zip

    • James Whiffin

      Thanks for that. AEtuts can you please host this file as anyone with CS5 or earlier will need this.

      • everettoptions

        done… thanks Michael!

    • http://www.facebook.com/marwa.shahbour Marwa Shahbour

      no i’m working with CS6, but i can’t handle the time of each photo/ layer.

      Thanks :)

  • msm

    how can i handle the time of each photo?
    thanks a lot

    • Michael Hofer
      Author

      I don`t understand the question. What do you mean by “time” for each photo?

  • josephsasa Chan

    hi! When I download the Cover Flow zip file, but inside don’t have the PresetEffect.txt. So where i can get it? thanks a lot.

  • http://www.facebook.com/vkashuba Volodymyr Kashuba

    If I have SC 5.5, which one I have to download and instal?

  • http://twitter.com/grreg_fr Grreg

    Great preset !
    But is there a way to run this script in an other language than english ? (I’m french and all the expressions are broken when I open this script).

  • http://www.facebook.com/dinaslilpinto Dina Theriac

    Thanks for sharing!

  • Ahmed Sodany

    please i need any one to write the expression for time remapping

  • http://twitter.com/nikefab Miles Fabishak

    How do I get rid of this error message?

    • http://www.facebook.com/glennonwright Glenn Wright

      I am having the same issue, did you figure out the issue?

  • http://www.facebook.com/kevin.maguire.5492 Kevin Maguire

    How do I render out the Coverflow effect. Everything looks great but when I make movie and render the Coverflow effect is not in the avi

  • http://www.facebook.com/jb.serrano.3 Jb Serrano

    hi mike its not working on cs4 what can i do ? help pls… thanks

  • http://www.facebook.com/jb.serrano.3 Jb Serrano

    cannot edit on on presettxt hml in cs4 32 bit pls.. help