2024 Release

Classroom in a Book®
The official training workbook from Adobe
Brie Gyncild & Lisa Fridsma
Adobe After Effects Classroom in a Book 2024 Release
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Cover Illustration: Pes Motion Studio, behance.net/peslab

ISBN-13: 978-0-13-831648-8
ISBN-10: 0-13-831648-1

$PrintCode
WHERE ARE THE LESSON FILES?
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ADOBE AFTER EFFECTS CLASSROOM IN A BOOK 2024 RELEASE iii

 CONTENTS
WHERE ARE THE LESSON FILES? iii

GETTING STARTED 1
About Classroom in a Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Prerequisites. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Installing After Effects, Bridge, and Media Encoder . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Activating fonts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Optimizing performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Restoring default preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Online content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
How to use these lessons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Additional resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Adobe Authorized Training Centers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

1 GETTING TO KNOW THE WORKFLOW 8

About the After Effects work area. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Creating a project and importing footage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Creating a composition and arranging layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
About layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Adding effects and modifying layer properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Animating the composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
About the Tools panel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
About timecode and duration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
About the Timeline panel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Previewing your work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Using the Properties panel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Optimizing performance in After Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Rendering and exporting your composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Customizing workspaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Controlling the brightness of the user interface . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Collaborating in After Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Finding resources for using After Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

iv CONTENTS
2 CREATING A BASIC ANIMATION USING EFFECTS AND PRESETS 38
Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Creating a new composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Working with imported Illustrator layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Applying effects to a layer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Applying and controlling effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Applying an animation preset . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Precomposing layers for a new animation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Previewing the effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Adding transparency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Rendering the composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

3 ANIMATING TEXT 56
Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
About text layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
Installing a font using Adobe Fonts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
Creating and formatting point text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Animating with scale keyframes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Using a text animation preset . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
About Adobe Bridge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Animating imported Photoshop text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
Animating type tracking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
Animating text opacity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Animating an image to replace text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Using a text animator group . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
About text animator groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Animating a layer’s position . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Adding motion blur . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

4 WORKING WITH SHAPE LAYERS 88

Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Creating the composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Adding a shape layer. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Creating a self-animating shape . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Duplicating a shape . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95

ADOBE AFTER EFFECTS CLASSROOM IN A BOOK 2024 RELEASE v

 Creating custom shapes with the Pen tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
Positioning layers with snapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
Animating a shape . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
Animating using parenting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
Using nulls to connect points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
About parent and child layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
Previewing the composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Animating layers to match audio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

5 ANIMATING A MULTIMEDIA PRESENTATION 116

Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
Using Creative Cloud Libraries in After Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
Adjusting anchor points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Parenting layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Precomposing layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Keyframing a motion path . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
Animating additional elements. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Applying an effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
About solid-color layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
Animating precomposed layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Animating the background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
Supported audio file formats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
Adding an audio track . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
Editing audio files in Adobe Audition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145

6 ANIMATING LAYERS 146

Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Preparing layered Photoshop files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
Simulating lighting changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Duplicating an animation using the pick whip . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
About Photoshop layer styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
Using a track matte to confine animation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
About expressions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
About track mattes and traveling mattes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

vi CONTENTS
 Animating using the Corner Pin effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Simulating a darkening sky. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
Viewing render times for layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Retiming the composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179

7 WORKING WITH MASKS 180

About masks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
Creating a mask with the Pen tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184
Tips for creating masks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184
Editing a mask . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
About mask modes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
Feathering the edges of a mask . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Replacing the content of the mask . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Creating a Bezier mask . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Zooming and panning by touch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
Adjusting the opacity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
Adding a shadow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
Creating a vignette . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196
Using the Rectangle and Ellipse tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199

8 DISTORTING OBJECTS WITH THE PUPPET TOOLS 200

Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202
About the Puppet tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
Adding Position pins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
Adding Advanced and Bend pins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210
Defining areas of overlap. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212
Stiffening an area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213
Squash and stretch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213
Animating pin positions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214
Using the Puppet tools to animate video . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
Recording animation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216
Extra credit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219

ADOBE AFTER EFFECTS CLASSROOM IN A BOOK 2024 RELEASE vii

 9 USING THE ROTO BRUSH TOOL 220
About rotoscoping. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222
Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222
Creating a segmentation boundary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
Editing Adobe Premiere Pro clips with After Effects . . . . . . . . 227
Fine-tuning the matte . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
Refine Soft Matte and Refine Hard Matte effects . . . . . . . . . . . 232
Freezing your Roto Brush tool results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
Changing the background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
Adding animated text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
Outputting your project. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
Extra credit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245

10 ADJUSTING COLOR AND MOOD 246

Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
Previewing your project on a video monitor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
Detecting scenes in a composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
Making color enhancements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
Adding a colorized effect. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
Replacing a background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
Color-correcting using Auto Contrast . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
Cloning an object in a scene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
Darkening a scene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
Freezing the action . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
Adding transitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277

11 CREATING MOTION GRAPHICS TEMPLATES 278

Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
Preparing a master composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
Setting up a template . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286
Adding properties to the Essential Graphics panel . . . . . . . . . 287
Protecting the timing of a section . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291
Exporting the template . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 292
Creating essential properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294
Extra credit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297

viii CONTENTS
12 USING 3D FEATURES 298
Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 300
Creating a 3D shape in After Effects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
Viewing the 3D ground plane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303
Using the 3D Transform Gizmo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304
Importing 3D objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305
About importing 3D objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306
Creating 3D text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307
Converting 2D objects to 3D . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 308
Using 3D views . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 309
Using the camera tools. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 310
Adding a background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 312
Lighting a scene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 312
Adding a camera. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 316
Using HDR images as lights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 316
Animating objects in a 3D scene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 318
Animating a camera . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 320
3D channel effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321
Working with Cinema 4D Lite . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 322
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 323

13 WORKING WITH THE 3D CAMERA TRACKER 324

About the 3D Camera Tracker effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 326
Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 326
Tracking the footage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 328
Repairing rolling shutter distortions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 328
Creating a ground plane, a camera, and the initial text . . . . . 329
Creating additional text elements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333
Locking an image to a plane with a solid layer . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336
Adjusting the camera’s depth of field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337
Tidying the composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339
Adding a final object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340
Creating realistic shadows. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
Adding ambient light . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343
Adding an effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343
Previewing the composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 344
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 345

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 14 ADVANCED EDITING TECHNIQUES 346
Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 348
Stabilizing a shot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 348
Bicubic scaling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 349
Warp Stabilizer VFX settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 351
Removing motion blur . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353
Using single-point motion tracking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 356
Moving and resizing the track points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 359
Removing unwanted objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363
Checking for drift . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363
Creating a particle simulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 367
Mocha AE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 367
Understanding Particle Systems II properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 370
About high dynamic range (HDR) footage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 378
Retiming playback using the Timewarp effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 379
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 385

15 RENDERING AND OUTPUTTING 386

Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 388
About rendering and output . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 389
Exporting using the Render Queue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 389
Preparing movies for mobile devices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 392
Creating templates for the Render Queue. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 393
Rendering movies with Adobe Media Encoder . . . . . . . . . . . . . 394
About compression . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395
Preparing a movie for broadcast output . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 400
Review questions and answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 401

APPENDIX: TOOLS FOR TROUBLESHOOTING 402

INDEX 403

x CONTENTS
 9 USING THE ROTO BRUSH TOOL

Lesson overview
In this lesson, you’ll learn how to do the following:
• Extract a foreground object from the background using the
Roto Brush tool.
• Correct the segmentation boundary across a span of frames.
• Touch up a matte with the Refine Edge tool.
• Freeze a matte across a clip.
• Replace a background.
• Animate properties for creative effects.
• Track a face in footage.

This lesson will take about an hour to complete. If you haven’t already
done so, download the project files for this lesson from peachpit.com/
AfterEffectsCIB2024, following the instructions in the Getting Started
section under “Accessing the lesson files and Web Edition.”

220
PROJECT: WEB BANNER

With the Roto Brush tool, you can quickly separate

a foreground object from a background across many
frames. You can achieve professional results in a frac-
tion of the time you’d spend performing the same
task with traditional rotoscoping.

221
 About rotoscoping
When you draw or paint on the frames of a movie, you’re rotoscoping. For example, a
common use of rotoscoping is to trace an object, using the path as a mask to isolate
it from the background so you can work with it separately. You could draw masks, ani-
mate the mask paths, and then use the masks to define a matte. (A matte is a mask
used to hide part of an image so that another image can be superimposed.) While
effective, this is a time-intensive, tedious process, especially if the object moves a
great deal or the background is complex.
If a background or foreground object is a consistent, distinct color, you could use
color keying to separate the object from the background. If the subject was shot
against a green or blue background (green screen or blue screen), keying is usually
much easier than rotoscoping. However, keying is less efficient when you’re work-
ing with complex backgrounds.
The Roto Brush tool in After Effects, powered by an AI model, is much faster than
conventional rotoscoping. You use the Roto Brush tool to define the foreground
and background elements. Then After Effects creates a matte, and tracks the move-
ment of the matte over time. The Roto Brush tool does much of the work for you,
leaving only a little cleanup work to be done.

Getting started
In this lesson, you’ll use the Roto Brush tool to isolate a bird and rock pool so you can
replace the background. To finish up the project, you’ll add an animated title.
First, you’ll preview the final movie and set up your project.
1 Make sure the following files are in the Lessons/Lesson09 folder on your hard
disk, or download them from peachpit.com now:
• In the Assets folder: Chickadee.mov, Facetracking.mov, MillPond.mov
• In the Sample_Movie folder: Lesson09.mp4
2 Open and play the Lesson09.mp4 sample movie in Windows Movies & TV
or QuickTime Player to see what you will create in this lesson. When you are
done, close Windows Movies & TV or QuickTime Player. You may delete the
sample movie from your hard disk if you have limited storage space.
When you begin this lesson, restore the default application settings for After Effects.
See “Restoring default preferences” on page 3.
3 Start After Effects, and then immediately hold down Ctrl+Alt+Shift (Windows)
or Command+Option+Shift (macOS). In the Startup Repair Options dialog box,
click Reset Preferences.

222 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

4 Click New Project in the Home window.
After Effects opens to display an empty, untitled project.
5 Choose File > Save As > Save As.
6 In the Save As dialog box, navigate to the Lessons/Lesson09/
Finished_Project folder.
7 Name the project Lesson09_Finished.aep, and then click Save.

Creating the composition

You’ll import a footage file and create a composition from it.
1 Click New Composition From Footage in the Composition panel.

2 Navigate to the Lessons/Lesson09/Assets folder, select the Chickadee.mov file, and

then click Import or Open.
After Effects creates a composition
named Chickadee, based on the settings
in the Chickadee.mov file. The composi-
tion is two and one half seconds long,
with a frame size of 1920 x 1080. The
movie file was shot at a rate of 29.97
frames per second.
3 Choose File > Save to save the project
so far.

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 Creating a segmentation boundary
You use the Roto Brush tool to specify which parts of the clip are in the foreground
and which are in the background. You add strokes to distinguish the two, and then After
Effects creates a segmentation boundary between the foreground and background.

Creating a base frame

To use the Roto Brush tool to isolate a foreground object, you start by adding strokes
to a base frame to identify foreground and background areas. You can start on any
frame in the clip, but in this exercise, you’ll use the first frame as the base frame.
First, you’ll add the strokes that identify the bird and the rock pool as the fore-
ground objects.
1 Move the current-time indicator across the time ruler to preview the footage.
2 Press the Home key to move the current-time indicator to the beginning
of the time ruler.
3 Select the Roto Brush tool ( ) in the Tools panel.
You use the Roto Brush tool in the Layer panel, which you’ll open now.
4 Double-click the Chickadee.mov layer in the Timeline panel to open the clip in the
Layer panel.

224 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

5 Choose Fit from the Magnification Ratio pop-up menu at the bottom of the Layer
panel if you don’t see the entire image clearly.
By default, the Roto Brush tool creates green foreground strokes. You’ll start by adding
strokes to the foreground—the rock pool and the bird. Generally, it’s most efficient
to start with broad strokes and then use smaller brushes to refine the border.
6 Choose Window > Brushes to open the Brushes panel. Set up a hard round
100-pixel brush. (You may need to resize the Brushes panel to see the options.)
When you’re drawing strokes to define the foreground object, follow the skeletal
structure of the subject. Unlike traditional rotoscoping, you don’t need to define a
precise boundary around the object. Start with broad strokes, and work down to small
regions as After Effects determines where the boundary is supposed to be.
7 Draw a green stroke horizontally across the rock pool. ▶ Tip: You can quickly
zoom in and out of
the Layer panel using
the scroll wheel on your
mouse, if it has one.

Roto Brush tool properties appear in the Effect Controls panel. In the Layer panel,
a magenta outline identifies the boundaries After Effects created for the foreground
object. After Effects recognized only about half of the pool, because you initially
sampled only a small area of the subject. You’ll help After Effects find the boundary
by adding some more foreground strokes. First, you’ll make sure you’re using ver-
sion 3 of the Roto Brush tool.

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 8 In the Effect Controls panel, make sure 3.0 is selected for the Version.

9 Still using a large brush, continue to draw green strokes along the inside edges of
the pool. Do not include the branches directly behind the pool and the bird.

10 Zoom to 200% and use the Hand tool ( ) to pan to the bird.
11 Select the Roto Brush tool again. Then select a smaller brush, and draw a green
stroke across the bird’s body.

It can be tricky to get some areas without accidentally adding background as well.
It’s okay if you haven’t captured every detail in the foreground. You’ll use back-
ground strokes to remove any extraneous areas of the matte.
12 Press Alt (Windows) or Option
(macOS) to switch to the red
background stroke brush. Add red
strokes to background areas you
want to exclude from the matte.

226 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

13 Switch back and forth between the foreground and background brushes and brush
sizes to fine-tune the matte. Don’t forget to deselect the branches directly behind
the bird and the pool. In some cases, one click may be all it takes to exclude an
object or area from the matte.

14 When you’re happy with the bird’s matte, zoom back out and fine-tune any
remaining areas that need to be addressed with the rock pool.

Editing Adobe Premiere Pro

clips with After Effects
You can work with a clip in both Adobe Premiere Pro and After Effects, moving
easily between the two applications as you edit your project.
To edit an Adobe Premiere Pro clip in After Effects, do the following:
1 Right-click or Control-click the clip in Adobe Premiere Pro, and choose Replace
With After Effects Composition.
After Effects starts, and opens the Adobe Premiere Pro clip.
2 Save the project when you’re prompted by After Effects. Then, work in the
composition just as you’d work in any other After Effects project.
3 When you’re finished, save the project, and return to Adobe Premiere Pro.
Your changes are automatically reflected in the timeline.

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 Don’t worry about being exact about your brush strokes. Just make sure the matte
is within 1 to 2 pixels of the edge of the foreground object. You’ll have an opportunity
to refine the matte later. However, After Effects uses the information on the base
frame to adjust the matte for the rest of the span, so you want the matte to be accurate.
15 Click the Toggle Alpha button ( ) at the bottom
of the Layer panel. The selected area is white
against a black background, so you can see the
matte clearly.

16 Click the Toggle Alpha Overlay button ( ) at

the bottom of the Layer panel. The foreground
area appears in color, and the background has
a red overlay.

17 Click the Toggle Alpha Boundary button ( ) at

the bottom of the Layer panel to see the outline
around the bird and rock pool again.

As you use the Roto Brush tool, the Alpha Boundary is the best way to see how
accurate your boundary is, because you can see everything in the frame. However,
the Alpha and Alpha Overlay options let you see your matte without the distraction
of the background.

Refining the boundary across the span

You used the Roto Brush tool to create a base frame, which includes a segmentation
boundary that divides the foreground from the background. The Roto Brush span
appears below the time ruler at the bottom of the Layer panel. When After Effects
has propagated the current boundary for a frame, the bar beneath that frame on the
time ruler is green.
As you move forward and backward through the footage, the segmentation bound-
ary moves with the foreground object (in this case, the bird and the rock pool).
You’ll step through the frames in the span and make adjustments to the segmentation
boundary as necessary.
Because the rock pool is stationary, its track matte is consistent throughout the
span. Given that, we’ll focus on the bird, which moves around a lot.

228 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

1 Zoom in on the bird, and then make sure the Roto Brush tool is selected in the
Tools panel.
2 Press the 2 key on your main keyboard (not the numeric keypad) to move forward ▶ Tip: To move
one frame. forward one frame,
press the 2 key on your
keyboard; to move back
one frame, press the
1 key.

Working from the base frame, After Effects tracks the edge of the object and attempts
to follow its movement. Depending on how complex your foreground and back-
ground elements are, the boundary may or may not conform exactly to the area you
hoped it would.
3 Using the Roto Brush tool, paint foreground and background strokes to refine the
matte for this frame. If the matte is accurate, you don’t need to paint any strokes.
• Note: As it propa-
gates the segmentation
boundary for a frame,
After Effects caches that
frame. Cached frames
have a green bar in the
time ruler. If you jump
ahead to a frame
further along the span,
After Effects may take
longer to calculate
the boundary.

As you progress through this clip, you’ll notice changes to the segmentation bound-
ary with the bird’s beak. Likewise, you may need to refine the segmentation bound-
ary around the feet and legs.

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 4 Press the 2 key again to move forward to the next frame.
5 Use the Roto Brush tool to add to the foreground or subtract from the back-
ground as necessary to refine the boundary.
If you make a stroke you don’t like, you can always undo the stroke and try again.
As you move through the span, each change you make affects the frames after it.
The more you refine your selection, the better the overall results will be. You may
find it useful to move forward a few frames to see how changes affect the boundary.
When the bird is moving quickly (such as 0:14 –0:19), you’ll notice that the segmen-
tation boundary becomes more vague, but then “catches up” once the bird slows
down again. When a frame displays rapid movement, focus on removing areas that
should be excluded (such as the branch behind the bird), rather than adding blurry
areas of the bird.

6 Repeat steps 4 and 5 until you reach the end of the layer.

7 Once you’re satisfied with the bird, zoom out to fit the entire screen, and scroll
though the span, making any adjustments as needed.
8 When you have completed refining the segmentation boundary for the entire
layer, choose File > Save to save your work so far.

230 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

Fine-tuning the matte
Roto Brush does a pretty good job, but there may be stray bits of background in the
matte, or foreground areas that weren’t included. You’ll clean those up by refining
the edge.

Adjusting the Roto Brush & Refine Edge effect

When you use the Roto Brush tool, After Effects applies the Roto Brush & Refine
Edge effect to the layer. You can modify the effect using settings in the Effect
Controls panel. You’ll use those settings to further refine the edge of the matte.
1 Press the spacebar to play the clip in the Layer panel. Press the spacebar again
to end the preview when you’ve seen the whole clip.
As you preview the clip, you may notice that the segmentation boundary jumps
around a bit. You’ll adjust the Reduce Chatter and Contrast settings to make it
smoother.
2 In the Effect Controls panel, decrease the Contrast to 40% and increase Reduce
Chatter to 20%.

The Reduce Chatter value determines how much influence the current frame has
when performing a weighted average across adjacent frames. Contrast affects how
tight the boundary is.
3 Preview the clip again.

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 Refine Soft Matte and
Refine Hard Matte effects
After Effects includes two related effects for refining mattes: Refine Soft Matte and
Refine Hard Matte. The Refine Soft Matte effect does the same thing as Refine Edge
Matte, except it applies the effect to the entire matte at a constant width. If you
need to capture subtle variations across an entire matte, use this effect.
The Refine Hard Matte effect performs the same edge refinements as the Roto Brush
when Fine-Tune Roto Brush Matte is turned on in the Roto Brush & Refine Edge
effect in the Effect Controls panel.

Using the Refine Edge tool

When an object isn’t smooth, the Roto Brush may not pick up the nuanced edge.
The Refine Edge tool lets you include fine details such as wisps of hair in designated
areas of the segmentation boundary.
Though it might be tempting to use the Refine Edge tool immediately after creat-
ing the base frame, it’s best to wait until you’ve refined the segmentation boundary
across the entire clip. Because of the way After Effects propagates the segmentation
boundary, using the Refine Edge tool too early results in a matte that is difficult to use.
1 Go to the base frame, which is the first frame of the clip, and then zoom in so
that you can see the edges of the bird’s tail clearly. Use the Hand tool if necessary
to move the layer so you can see the entire bird.
2 Select the Refine Edge tool ( ), hidden beneath the Roto Brush tool in the
Tools panel.
The tail is relatively soft, so a small brush size will work well. For a fuzzier object,
you might have better results with a much larger brush. The brush needs to overlap
the stray edges that emerge from the object.
3 Change the brush size to 5 pixels.
When you use the Refine Edge tool, draw strokes along the edges of the matte.
4 In the Layer panel, move the Refine Edge tool over the edge of the tail straddling
the segmentation boundary and including the variations in the feathers. You can
use multiple strokes if needed.

232 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

When you release the mouse, After Effects switches to the Refine Edge X-ray view
so that you can see how the Refine Edge tool changes the matte, capturing the detail
in the edges.
5 Move the current-time indicator across the time ruler to view the edge. At 0:15,
Refine Edge breaks away from the tail as the bird moves away rapidly.
6 Change the brush size to 19 pixels.
7 At 0:15, press Alt (Windows) or Option (macOS) and erase the artifact from the
Refine Edge tool, as it’s no longer useful going forward.
8 Continue to move forward and backward through the scene, applying the Refine
Edge tool wherever the matte’s edge doesn’t capture the fuzziness of the bird’s
feathers, and removing it wherever it strays from the tail.

• Note: Use the

Refine Edge tool only
after you have cleaned
9 Zoom out to see the entire scene, resize the Layer panel if you enlarged it, and then up the matte across the
choose File > Save to save your work. entire clip.

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 Freezing your Roto Brush tool results
You’ve put a fair amount of time and effort into creating the segmentation boundary
across the entire clip. After Effects has cached the segmentation boundary so it can
recall it without having to make the calculations again. To keep that data easily
accessible, you’ll freeze it. This reduces the processing demands on your system
so you can work faster in After Effects.
Once the segmentation is frozen, you cannot edit it unless you unfreeze it. Refreezing
the segmentation is time-consuming, so it’s best to refine the segmentation boundary
as much as possible before freezing.
1 Click the Freeze button in the lower right area of the Layer panel.
Depending
D

on your system,
this may take
a while.

After Effects displays a progress bar as it freezes the Roto Brush and Refine Edge tool
data. Freezing may take a few minutes, depending on your system. As After Effects
freezes the information for each frame, the cache line turns blue. When it has finished
freezing, a blue warning bar appears above the time ruler in the Layer panel, remind-
ing you that the segmentation is frozen.

234 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

2 Click the Toggle Alpha Boundary button ( ) in the Layer panel to see the matte.
Then click the Toggle Transparency Grid button ( ). Move the time marker across
the time ruler to see the subject without the distractions of the background.

3 Click the Toggle Alpha Boundary button again to see the boundary.
4 Choose File > Save.
After Effects saves the frozen segmentation information with the project.

Changing the background

There are many reasons to isolate a foreground image from a background. You
may want to replace the background entirely, moving the subject to a different
setting. Or you could simply want to change the foreground or background
without modifying the other. In this lesson, you’ll remove the fenced in area of the
background, and replace it with a different background, which you’ll enhance with
color correction tools.
1 Close the Layer panel to return to the Composition panel, and then move
the current-time indicator to the beginning of the timeline. Choose Fit from
the Magnification Ratio pop-up menu at the bottom of the Composition panel.
2 Hide the properties for the Chickadee.mov layer, if they’re visible.

The Composition panel displays the composition, which includes only the
Chickadee.mov layer, consisting only of the foreground you isolated from the clip.
3 Click the Project tab to display the Project panel, and double-click an empty area
in the Project panel. Navigate to the Lessons/Lesson09/Assets folder, select the
MillPond.mov file, and click Import or Open.

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 4 Drag the MillPond.mov clip from the Project panel to the Timeline panel, and
place it below the original Chickadee.mov layer.
5 Click the new layer, press Enter or Return, and rename the layer Mill Pond
Start. Then press Enter or Return again.

6 Select the Chickadee layer. Then, using the Selection tool ( ), drag the layer to
the lower half of the Composition panel. Your values should be similar to ours.

7 Select the Mill Pond Start layer, and choose Effect > Color Correction >
Hue/Saturation.
You’ll use the Hue/Saturation effect in two different ways, so you’ll create a duplicate
layer for the second effect.
8 With the Mill Pond Start layer selected, choose Edit > Duplicate. Rename the
bottom layer Mill Pond End. Then rename the top layer to remove the number 2
from the name (so that its name is Mill Pond Start).

236 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

9 Select the Mill Pond Start layer, and then, in the Effect Controls panel, do the
following:
• Select Colorize.
• Change Colorize Hue to 56 degrees.
• Change Colorize Saturation to 19.
• Change Colorize Lightness to −25.

10 In the Properties panel, click the stopwatch icon for the Opacity value to create
an initial keyframe at 100%.
11 Go to 1:10, and change the Opacity to 0.

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 12 Still at 1:10, select the Mill Pond End layer.
13 In the Effect Controls panel, click the stopwatch icon for the Channel Range
property to create an initial keyframe.
14 Go to the end of the footage (2:25), and change the Master Hue to -30.

15 Press the spacebar to preview the project. Press the spacebar again when you’ve
finished.

The background transitions from a monochromatic dusk to a full summer day and
then again to the beginning of fall as the leaves change.
16 Choose File > Increment And Save.
If you save incrementally, you can return to earlier versions of your project to make
adjustments later. This can be very useful if you’re experimenting or want to try
alternative effects. The Increment And Save feature preserves the previously saved
version of the project and creates a new project with the same name, with an
increasing number added to the filename.

Adding animated text

You’re nearly done. All you need to do is to add the animated title between the bird
and the background.
1 Deselect all layers, and then move the current-time indicator to the beginning
of the time ruler.
2 Select the Type tool ( ), and then type Reflections in the Composition panel.

238 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

A new text layer named Reflections appears in the Timeline panel at the top
of the layer stack.
3 Select the Reflections layer, and then do the following in the Text section
of the Properties panel:
• Choose Courier New for the font.
• Choose Bold for the font style.
• Type 300 px for the font size.
• Choose Optical from the Kerning menu.
• Select white for the Fill color.
• Deselect the Stroke checkbox.
4 Click the More button, and then type 140% for the vertical scale.

5 Use the Selection tool ( ) to reposition the text to rest along the top edge of
the rock pool, and then move the Reflections layer below the Chickadee layer.

You’ll animate the text so that it appears on the screen in a liquid motion.

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 6 Make sure you’re at the beginning of the timeline and the Reflections layer is
selected. In the Effects & Presets panel, type blur in the search box. Under Text,
double-click the Blur And Fade In preset.

7 Deselect all layers in the Timeline panel, and move the current-time indicator
to the beginning of the time ruler. Press the spacebar to preview the clip.

8 Choose File > Save to save your work.

240 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

Outputting your project
You’ll render your movie to complete the project.
1 Choose File > Export > Add To Render Queue.
2 In the Render Queue panel, click the blue words Best Settings.
3 In the Render Settings dialog box, choose Half from the Resolution menu, and
make sure Use Comp’s Frame Rate is selected in the Frame Rate area. Then
click OK.

4 Click the blue text next to Output Module. Then, at the bottom of the Output
Module Settings dialog box, choose Audio Output Off, and click OK.

5 Click the blue text next to Output To. In the Output Movie To dialog box,
navigate to the Lessons/Lesson09/Finished_Project folder, and click Save.

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 6 Click Render in the top right corner of the Render Queue panel.

7 When the project has rendered, save and close it.

Congratulations! You’ve separated a foreground object from the background,
replaced and modified the background, and animated some text to complete the
movie. You’re ready to use the Roto Brush tool on your own projects.

242 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

Extra credit
Tracking faces
The face-tracking feature in After Effects makes it easier to track a face or specific facial features, such
as lips or eyes. Previously, tracking a face required roto brushing or complex keying.

• Note: If you open the Lesson09_extra_credit.aep file, you may need to relink the Facetracking.mov asset.

1 Choose File > New > New Project.

2 Click the New Composition From Footage button in the Composition panel, and then navigate
to the Lessons/Lesson09/Assets folder. Select the Facetracking.mov file, and click Import or Open.
3 Select the Facetracking.mov layer in the Timeline panel. Then, select the Ellipse tool, hidden by the
Rectangle tool in the Tools panel.
4 Drag an elliptical mask roughly covering the face.

5 Right-click the Mask 1 layer, and choose Track Mask.

6 In the Tracker panel, choose Face Tracking (Outline Only) from the Method menu.

The Face Tracking (Outline Only) option tracks the entire face. The Face Tracking (Detailed Features)
option tracks the outline plus the lips, eyes, and other distinctive facial features. You can export
detailed facial data for use in Character Animator, or you can use it in After Effects to apply effects
or to match it with another layer, such as an eye patch or a hat.

(continued on next page)

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 Sidebar
Extra credit
head(continued)

7 ClickText
Sidebar the Track Forward button in the Tracker panel.

The Tracker tracks the face, changing the mask’s shape and position as the face moves.
8 Press the Home key to return to the beginning of the timeline, and then move the current-time
indicator across the time ruler to see how the mask moves with the face.
9 In the Effects & Presets panel, search for Bright. Then drag the Brightness & Contrast effect onto
the Facetracking.mov layer in the Timeline panel.
10 Expand Effects > Brightness & Contrast > Compositing Options in the Timeline panel.
11 Click the + icon next to Compositing Options. Choose Mask 1 from the Mask Reference 1 menu,
and increase Brightness to 50.
The masked area of the face brightens, but nothing else does. This setting is too bright, and the edge
of the mask is too abrupt. You’ll make it more subtle.
12 Reduce the Brightness to 20.
13 Expand the Mask 1 properties. Change the Mask Feather property to 70, 70 pixels.

14 Save the project to the Lessons/Lesson09/Finished_Project folder. Then close the file.
You can use the face tracker to blur a face, brighten it, or add any other effect. You can also invert
the mask to affect everything but the face.

244 LESSON 9 Using the Roto Brush Tool

Review questions
Questions
1 When
Reviewshould
uses Number
you useList
the Roto Brush tool?
2 What is the segmentation boundary?
3 When should you use the Refine Edge tool?

Review answers
1 Use the Roto Brush tool any time you would have used traditional rotoscoping.
It’s particularly useful for removing a foreground element from the background.
2 The segmentation boundary is the boundary between the foreground and background.
The Roto Brush tool adjusts the segmentation boundary as you progress through the
frames in the Roto Brush span.
3 Use the Refine Edge tool when you need to rotoscope objects with fuzzy or wispy edges.
The Refine Edge tool creates partial transparency for areas of fine detail, such as hair.
Use the Refine Edge tool only after you’ve adjusted the segmentation boundary across
the entire clip.

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INDEX

SYMBOLS .mogrt files

opening in After Effects 292
3D opening in Premiere Pro 295–296
adjusting depth of field 337
cameras 316–317, 329–330 A
camera tools 310
channel effects 321 action-safe zones 24

features 298–323 activating fonts in

ground plane 303 Adobe Fonts 2, 60–62

layers 300, 302 adjustment layers 47, 140, 285

light layers 312
Adobe After Effects application
point of interest 318
installing 2
Real-time Draft 3D preview
optimizing performance in 3
mode 303
workspace 10
Rotation properties 302
using HDR images as lights 316 Adobe After Effects Classroom
in a Book 2024 Release
views 308–309
downloading lesson files 4
3D Camera Tracker effect 326–344
prerequisites 2
3D models, importing 305–306
Adobe After Effects Help 36
3D shapes
Adobe Audition 144
creating 301–302
Adobe Bridge
extruding 303
about 69
3D text
browsing animation presets in 68
creating 307
importing files with 69
extruding 308
installing 2
3D Transform Gizmo 302, 304
Adobe Character Animator 218

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 Adobe Fonts 2, 60–86 Analyze Forward button 361 Raining Characters In 73

Adobe Illustrator files, anchor points Ripple 68

importing 43 adjusting 121 Slow Fade On 206

centering in shape layers 92 text 67

Adobe Media Encoder
Typewriter 284
creating presets animating
for 397–400 animations
cameras 320
encoding presets in 396 about 22
facial expressions 218
installing 2 creating with Character
fill color 105
rendering output Animator 218
with 394–399 layers 146–179
duplicating using pick
layers to match audio 114 whips 153
Adobe Photoshop files
lighting 151–152, 163–167 easing 67
importing 14, 150
on a path 129 linking through
importing layer styles
opacity 77 expressions 156
from 155
position 83–85, 103 repeating 133
importing text from 71
layered 149 precomposed layers 139 animator properties in text
Puppet tool pins 216 animator groups 81
Adobe Premiere Pro
scale 65, 103 application window 10
Motion Graphics
templates in 295 text 58–87, 71, 81, 238
assets, importing 13
using with video with Puppet
After Effects 227 tools 215–216 audio

animation presets adding tracks 143

Adobe Stock 119
applying 25–26, 48, 50 animating layers
Advanced 3D renderer 302 to match 114
Bad TV 3 - weak 286
editing files in Adobe
Advanced pins browsing in Audition 144
about 208 Adobe Bridge 68
file formats supported 142
animating 214 customizing 70
placing 210 Explosion 2 284 Audio/Video Switches in the
Timeline panel 27
using to animate Fade Out By Character 79
video 215–216 Fade Up Words 25 Audition. See Adobe Audition

alpha track mattes. Fly in with a Twist 205 Auto Contrast effect 19–20,
See track mattes Increase Tracking 75 254–255, 261

ambient lights, adding 343

404 INDEX
B brightness, changing color
in the user interface 35 animating 105
background, changing for a shape 92
Browse Presets command 68
replacing 235, 257–260
correcting 248–276
Bullet Train animation
background strokes, correcting using Auto
preset 48
creating with the Contrast 261
Roto Brush tool 226–227
C grading 248
Bad TV 3 - weak animation keying 222
preset 286 cached frames, using previewing accurately 250
base frames, creating with the Roto Brush tool 229
Roto Brush tool 224–225 Color Emboss effect 47
Cache Frames When Idle 32
Bend pins Colorizing an image 255–257
cameras
about 208 adding to a 3D scene Composition Navigator bar 23
animating 214 316–317
Composition panel
placing 210 animating 320
about 15
Bezier curves CC Light Sweep effect 21–22 typing in 63
in a motion path 130
CC Particle Systems II Composition Profiler 167
in masks 186 effect 367–378
compositions
Bezier masks, creating 188 Center Anchor Point In New
about 15
Shape Layers 92
bicubic scaling 349 adding footage to 16, 42
Channel Blur effect 28–29
bilinear sampling 349 creating 15, 40–41, 59, 281
Character Animator 218 creating from footage 90
Black Clip 261
Character panel 25, 44, 63 defined 12
blending modes duration of 41
about 196 child layers 110
fitting layers to 42
applying 196 Cinema 4D Lite 322 importing 13
for masks 185, 258 nesting 16
circles, drawing 197
blur, adding. rendering 52
cloning objects 261–265
See motion blur, adding retiming 168–177
codecs 395
Bridge. See Adobe Bridge Composition Settings
collaboration tools 36 dialog box 16–17, 41
Brightness and Contrast
effect 268–269

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 compression 395 dependencies, finding E
missing 14
Content-Aware Fill 363–367
Easy Ease
depth of field,
contrast, adjusting 254–255 adjusting 337–338 adding 67
Convert To Editable Text in the Graph Editor 383
Directional Blur effect 137
command 24, 72, 205
editing
Dissolve-Ripple effect 343
Convert Vertex tool 187–188 masks 185
distortions, rolling
copying. See duplicating Premiere Pro clips in After
shutter 328
Effects 227
Corner Pin effect 161–162 docking panels 10 segmentation
boundaries 228–231
Create Nulls From Paths panel Dolly controls 310
110–111 text 25, 44–45, 72
downloading lesson files 4
Create Text And Camera Effect Controls panel
command 330 drawing about 46
Creative Cloud Libraries circles 373 hiding properties in 22
about 119 custom shapes 98
effects
sharing Motion Graphics ellipses 197
about 18
templates in 292–293 rounded rectangles 100
applying 47, 136
shapes 91
current-time indicator 27 Auto Contrast 19–20, 261
stars 92
customizing Brightness and
with the Pen tool 106 Contrast 268–269
brightness of the user
interface 35 drift, in motion tracking 363 CC Light Sweep 21–22
workspaces 34 CC Particle
Drop Shadow effect 46
Systems II 367–378
custom shapes, drop zone 10 Channel Blur 28–29
drawing 98–100
duotones, creating 255–257 Color Emboss 47
Custom View 1, controlling 47
in 3D views 310 duplicating
Corner Pin 161–162
animations 133
Directional Blur 137
D animations using pick
whips 153 disabling third-party 402
default preferences 3, 11 Dissolve-Ripple 343
shape layers 95
deforming video with Puppet videos 135 Dissolve - Vapor animation
tools 215–216 preset 50–51
duration Drop Shadow 46
Deform pins. See Puppet tools
about 26 Fade Up Words 26
Density value for Puppet setting for composition 41 finding 20
tools 212

406 INDEX
 Fractal Noise 137 essential properties 294 footage
Gaussian Blur 372 exporting about 13
Hue/Saturation 236, 252– Motion Graphics finding missing 14, 402
254, 255–257 templates 292–293 importing 12, 14, 148
Lens Flare 376 movies with Adobe Media tracking 328
missing 14 Encoder 394–400
foreground strokes,
motion blur 85 creating with the Roto
expressions 156, 264
Ramp 375 Brush tool 225–226
extruding
Refine Hard Matte 232
3D shapes 303 formatting text 63–64
Refine Soft Matte 232
text 308 Fractal Noise effect 137
Timewarp 379
Wave Warp 140 freezing
F
frames 270, 273–274
Effects & Presets panel 20
face tracking 243 Roto Brush tool results 234
Ellipse tool
creating a vignette with 197 Fade Out By Character
animation preset 79
G
using to create
a mask 197, 373 Fade Up Words animation Gaussian Blur effect 372
preset 26
encoding presets in gradient fills 92
Adobe Media Encoder 396 files, importing 11
Graph Editor
Essential Graphics panel fills 92 about 172
about 280, 286
filtering in Adobe Fonts 61 using to remap
adding properties time 173–177, 383
to 287–292 finding missing footage, fonts,
or effects 14 grids
editing source text in 287
displaying and hiding 45, 65
exporting templates Fit To Comp command 42
from 292–293 snapping to 65
Fit To Comp Width
grouping properties in 289 command 64 ground plane
in Premiere Pro 295 creating with 3D Camera
Fly in with a Twist animation
organizing 289 Tracker effect 329
preset 205
viewing supported viewing in 3D projects 303
properties 288 fonts
grouping properties in the
finding missing 14
Essential Graphics Essential Graphics panel 289
workspace 287 installing from Adobe
Fonts 2, 60–62 guides, showing 45
selecting 63

ADOBE AFTER EFFECTS CLASSROOM IN A BOOK 2024 RELEASE 407

 H Increment And Save fitting to compositions 42
command 238 importing in Photoshop
HDR (high dynamic range) files 149
In points, setting 27, 141
footage 378 isolating 161
installing
HDR images as lights 316 locking 204
After Effects 2
making visible in the
hiding properties 22 fonts 60–62 Timeline panel 30
Home key 25 interpolation between naming in Photoshop 150
Home window 11, 36 keyframes 28 naming text 44
nesting 49
Horizontal Type J
tool 25, 44, 75 parenting 109, 110, 123
precomposing
Hue/Saturation effect JavaScript in expressions 156
49, 98, 125, 270–271
236, 252–254, 255–257
rearranging in the
K Timeline panel 18
I renaming 73
keyframes
Illustrator files, scaling 206
about 28, 29
importing 42–43 setting In points for 141
adding 127
images shape 88–115, 91
labels 132
adding to 3D scenes with shortening 141
keying 222
3D Camera Tracker 336 snapping 100
replacing in motion solid 136, 165
graphics templates 290 L
soloing 161
importing labeling keyframes 132 splitting with Scene Edit
3D objects 305 Detection 251–252
layers
footage 12, 13, 14, 148 text 60
about 15, 17
layered Illustrator Transform properties 18–19
adjustment 140
files 42–43 trimming 141, 285
animating 146–179, 149
layered Photoshop files as layer styles 155
compositions 13, 23, animating to match
148–150 audio 114 Layer switches in the Timeline
multiple files 13 child 110, 123 panel 27
Photoshop files 13, 71, 150 converting to 3D 302 learning resources for Adobe
text 71–72 copying 127 After Effects 6
expanding in the Timeline Learn panel 36
Increase Tracking animation
panel 19
preset 75

408 INDEX
length of composition 41 properties, displaying 185 modes, mask 185

Lens Flare effect 376 replacing content of 188 motion blur, adding 85, 160
segments 182
lesson files, downloading 4 Motion Graphics templates
tips for creating 184
Libraries panel 119 about 280
tracking 257
creating 278–297
lighting, simulating changes tracking faces 243
exporting 292–293
in 151–152, 163–167 vertices 182
grouping properties in 289
lights working with 180
making source text
adding 3D 312 mask tracker 257–259 editable in 287
using HDR images as 316 opening in After Effects 292
Material Options
Light Settings dialog box 313 properties 315 replacing images in 290

mattes sharing 280

linked assets 14
about 222 specifying master
linking animations through compositions for 286
expressions 156 adjusting with the Refine
Edge tool 232–233 using in Premiere Pro 295
locking layers 204 track 156–159, 159 motion paths, customizing 129
traveling 159 Motion Source 360
M viewing against black 228
Motion Target 360
Mask Feather tool 194 viewing with red
overlay 228 motion tracking
masks
Maxon Cinema 4D analyzing and applying 361
about 182 Lite 322–323 managing drift when 363
Bezier 186, 188
Media Encoder. single-point 356–362
creating 364–365 See Adobe Media Encoder
creating with the Pen N
tool 163–164, 184 meshes
curved 186 adjusting the Density nesting compositions 16, 49
value 212
drawing with shape
changing the color of 211 New Composition button 281
tools 197
editing 185 used with Puppet tools 208 New Composition from
Footage button 90
feathering 194 missing fonts, effects,
inverting 185 or footage 14, 402 NTSC D1 preset 41
modes 165, 185, 258–259 mobile devices, preparing null objects 110–111
modifying with the compositions for 392
Convert Vertex tool 187
Mocha AE plug-in 367

ADOBE AFTER EFFECTS CLASSROOM IN A BOOK 2024 RELEASE 409

 O particle systems, restoring defaults 3, 402
creating 367–378 restoring defaults
Offset Paths in shape layers 97 in Windows 11
path operations
opacity about 102 Premiere Pro.
animating 77, 191 Pucker & Bloat 102 See Adobe Premiere Pro

modifying 51 Wiggle Paths 93 presets

optimizing performance Pen tool 98, 106, 184 browsing in

in After Effects 3, 33 Adobe Bridge 68
performance, optimizing 3, 33 creating for Adobe Media
Orbit tools 310 Encoder 397–400
Photoshop.
Out point 27 See Adobe Photoshop files finding 20

output modules in the pick whip 153 previewing

Render Queue panel 53 compositions 30
pixel aspect ratio 400
outputting projects 386–401 in real time 32
point of interest 318 manually 48
overlap, defining areas of 212
point text 63 Preview panel 30
Overlap pins 208
position, animating 83, 103 Project panel
overscan 24
positioning objects using ruler about 14
guides 45 opening 53
P
Position pins projects
Pan Behind tool 122 adding 208–210 about 12
panels animating 214 saving 15
docking and arranging 10 Position property 19 properties
maximizing 12
Pre-compose grouping in the Essential
menus 27 dialog box 49, 125 Graphics panel 289
panning with touch hiding in the Timeline
precomposed layers,
gestures 189 panel 22
animating 139
Pan tools 310 Properties panel
precomposing layers 49, 98,
125, 169–170, 270–271 about 30
paragraph text 60
essential properties in 294
preferences
parenting formatting text in 63
Center Anchor Point In
about 110 shape settings in 99
New Shape Layers 92
layers 109, 123
location of files 3 Pucker & Bloat 102–103
layers to null
objects 110–111

410 INDEX
Puppet tools Refine Hard Matte effect 232 resources for using
about 207 After Effects 36
Refine Soft Matte effect 232
distorting objects Responsive Design -
with 200–219 reflections, adding 191 Time 291–292
Puppet Advanced Pin remap-time marker in the restoring default
tool 208, 210–211 Source Time ruler 171 preferences 3, 11
Puppet Bend Pin
tool 208, 210 removing objects from retiming compositions
footage 363–367 168–177, 379
Puppet Overlap Pin
tool 208, 212 rendering Ripple animation preset 68
Puppet Position Pin compositions 52–54
tool 208 rolling shutter distortions,
default settings for 53 repairing 328
Puppet Sketch
for mobile devices 392
tool 216–217 Roto Brush & Refine Edge
movies 386–401 effect 231
Puppet Starch Pin
tool 208, 213–217 templates 393
Roto Brush tool
recording animation using compression in 395
creating background
with 216 using the Render Queue strokes 226–227
using the mesh 208 panel 242, 389–395
creating foreground
with Adobe Media strokes 224–225
Q Encoder 394–399
freezing results 234
Render Queue refining a segmentation
QuickTime 2 panel 241, 393–400 boundary 228–231
adding compositions to 53 using 220–245
R
Render Settings options 53 rotoscoping 222
Raining Characters render-settings
In animation preset 73 Rounded Rectangle tool 100
templates 393–397
Ramp effect 375 rulers, showing 45
render times, by layer 167, 402
recording puppet pin replacing S
animation 216
backgrounds 257–260
Rectangle tool 197 Safe Mode 402
content using a mask 188
red overlay in matte content with content- safe zones 25
preview 228 aware fill 363–367
sample text, using
Reduce Chatter value 231 resetting preferences 402 in Adobe Fonts 61

Refine Edge tool 232–233 resizing layers 206 sampling algorithms 349

ADOBE AFTER EFFECTS CLASSROOM IN A BOOK 2024 RELEASE 411

 saturation, adjusting 252–254 shapes stacked panels 10

saving projects 15 custom 98–100 Starch pins

drawing 91, 98 about 208
scale
self-animating 93 adding 213
animating 65, 103
modifying 206 shared projects 36 Star tool 92

Scene Edit Detection 251–252 Shutter Angle 160 Startup Repair Options
Shutter Phase 160 dialog box 402
segmentation boundary
224–227 Slow Fade On animation Stock images in Libraries
preset 206 panel 119
segments in a mask 182
snapping layers 100–104 strokes 93
selectors in text animator
groups 81 tapering 107
Snap to Grid command 65
Select View Layout pop-up Sync Selected Fonts 62
solid layers
menu 309
creating 136, 165
T
separating background from using to create particle
foreground 222–245 systems 369 team projects 36
Sequence Layers using with 3D Camera
Tracker 336–337 templates
command 275
for rendering 393–397
shadow catcher 343 soloing layers 161
Motion Graphics 286–287
shadows Solo Supported Properties
in the Essential Graphics text
adding to a 3D scene 315
panel 288 3D 307–308
creating with the
adding 60–65, 282
3D Camera Tracker soundtrack, adding 143
effect 341 animating 58–87, 71, 81,
Source Text property 287 238–240, 282–284
simulating 191
Source Time ruler in time animating tracking in 75
shape layers remapping 171 animation presets
3D 301–302 for 25–26, 67
Specular Intensity 315
about 88, 90 converting to
applying fills and Specular Shininess 315 editable 23–24, 72, 205
strokes to 92 creating 44
split layers by scene 251
centering anchor editing 44, 72
points in 92 squares, drawing 197
editing imported 205
creating 91
squash and stretch entering in the
duplicating 95 animation 213 Composition panel 63
settings in Properties formatting 63–64, 282
stabilizing video 348–355
panel 99

412 INDEX
 imported from Toggle Alpha button 228 training, Adobe product 7
Photoshop 71
Toggle Alpha Overlay Transform properties 19
layers 60 button 228
making editable in Motion transitions between
Graphics templates 287 Toggle Transparency Grid scenes 274–275
button 235
naming layers 44 transparency 51.
point 63 tools See also opacity
positioning 64 about 24 traveling mattes 159
settings in the Properties Clone Stamp 262–264
panel 63, 307 trimming layers 141, 285
drawing 91
text animator groups 80 Ellipse 197 tutorials, accessing 6, 36

time. See Timewarp effect Pan Behind 122 type. See text
current-time field 27 Puppet 207
Typewriter animation
current-time indicator 27 Rectangle 197 preset 284
duration 26 Tools panel 24
freezing frames 273–274 U
touch gestures 189
protecting
duration 291–292 Track Camera command 329 U key 74
remapping 170–174 undocking panels 10
Tracker panel 259
ruler 27
tracking in type, animating 75 Use Dimensions From
timecode 26 menu 16
tracking motion
time graph 27 user interface
faces 243
about 10
time-lapse simulation, single-point 356–362
creating 168 customizing brightness 35
using Mocha AE 367
Timeline panel using the 3D Camera
Tracker 328–329
V
about 27
expanding layers in 19 with masks 364–365 vertices
renaming layers in 73 tracking presets 76 converting 187
in a mask 182
Time Remap keyframes 173 track mattes 156–159
Video switch 30, 50
Timewarp effect 379–384 track points
for 3D Camera Tracker 329 views, 3D 308
title-safe zones 24
moving and resizing 359 vignettes, adding 196, 267
Toggle Alpha Boundary
button 228 positioning 358–360

ADOBE AFTER EFFECTS CLASSROOM IN A BOOK 2024 RELEASE 413

 W workflow 11 Y
workspaces
Warp Stabilizer VFX 348–355 y axis in the 3D Transform
about 10 Gizmo 302
Wave Warp effect 140 customizing 10, 34
Web Edition 4 Essential Graphics 287 Z
Learn 36
White Clip 261 z axis in the 3D Transform
predefined 34
Wiggle Paths 93 Gizmo 302

work area X zooming with touch gestures

189
brackets 27
x axis in the 3D Transform
introduction to 10 Gizmo 302

414 INDEX