Adding the Command Line


The finished animation includes a blinking white cursor that appears in the lower-left area of the comp. The cursor moves from left to right to reveal a word as if the word is being typed onscreen. To create this component, you'll animate a solid to create the blinking cursor and animate another solid's scale to matte and reveal underlying words.

Your first task is to create the Text layers:

1.

Create a new Text layer for each line of text that follows (four text layers total), with Font Family set to Arial Black or Helvetica Neue, Text Size set to 26px, Fill Color set to white (RGB: 255, 255, 255), and Alignment set to Justify Last Left:

ad campaigns

posters

promotions

TRailers

2.

Select the four new text layers in the Timeline, press P to display their Position properties, and set all their Positions to 100, 440.

This puts all four words toward the lower-left corner of the composition. The words are unreadable at this point, since they're stacked on top of one another in a jumble of white characters.

Creating the blinking cursor

The blinking cursor is actually a Solid layer that continuously cycles from 100%, to 66%, to 33%, to 0% Opacity over time. You'll also make the cursor move across the screen so it looks like someone's typing the underlying words:

1.

Go to time 0;00, and create a Solid layer named "cursor" with Width 10 and Height 50, colored white (RGB: 255, 255, 255).

2.

Go to time 2;00, make sure the cursor layer is selected, and then press Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS) and the ] key to trim the layer's Out point to 2 seconds.

3.

Go to time 0;10, and add a Position keyframe with a value of 100, 430. This puts the cursor at the start of the four words.

4.

Go forward 1 second to time 1;10, and change the layer's Position to 430, 430.

5.

Press Home to go to time 0;00, and press T to display the cursor layer's Opacity property.

6.

Still at time 0;00, add a 100% Opacity keyframe to the cursor layer.

7.

Go forward three frames, and change the layer's Opacity to 0%.

8.

Go forward three frames, and change the layer's Opacity to 33%.

9.

Go forward three frames, and change the layer's Opacity to 66%.

10.

Click the Opacity property name to select all of its keyframes, and then copy them (Edit > Copy).

11.

Go forward three frames from the last Opacity keyframe in the layer, and paste the keyframes. Repeat this step until the cursor layer has Opacity keyframes spanning its entire length of time, as marked by its duration bar.

12.

Duplicate the cursor layer three times so you have four copies, one for each word.

13.

Place one cursor layer above each of the text layers (trailers, promotions, posters, ad campaigns) in the Timeline's layer stack.

The Main Timeline

Wiping the words

The final component of your virtual command line gradually reveals a word one character at a time after the blinking cursor has passed the character. You'll create this effect by animating the scale of a Solid layer and using the solid as a track matte for the word. Your first step is to set up and animate the solid:

1.

At time 0;00, create a new Solid layer named Wipe with Width 380 and Height 50, colored white (RGB: 255, 255, 255).

2.

Set the Wipe layer's Anchor Point to 0, 25 (the middle of the left edge of the Solid layer) and Position to 50, 430. The Solid layer now overlaps the four stacked words and the blinking cursor.

3.

Go to time 0;10, and add a Scale keyframe to the Wipe layer with a value of 4, 100. The Wipe layer is now just slightly wider than the blinking cursor.

4.

Go to time 1;10, and change the layer's Scale to 100, 100. Now the Wipe layer grows in length from left to right over time.

5.

Duplicate the Wipe layer three times so you have four copies, one for each word you need to reveal.

6.

Place one Wipe layer under each cursor layer in the Timeline's layer stack.

Your Timeline should have layers in the following order: cursor, Wipe, trailers, cursor, Wipe, promotions, cursor, Wipe, posters, cursor, Wipe, ad campaigns, Spinning Cube Pre-comp, Letters Background.

The Main Timeline

Animating the words

Your final tasks to complete the virtual command line are to assign each word a Wipe layer for the word's track matte and then stagger the words in time along with each word's associated cursor and solid layer. Follow these steps:

1.

Set the Track Matte of each text layer (trailers, promotions, posters, ad campaigns) to Alpha Matte "[Wipe]" in the Timeline's Modes column. Now the Wipe layer that's above each text layer serves as a matte to the word.

2.

Select all the layers except Letters Background and Spinning Cube Pre-comp in the Main Timeline.

3.

Go to time 2;00, and press Alt+] (Windows) or Option+] (Mac OS) to trim the selected layers' Out points to the current time.

Trimming the command line's layers

4.

Select the top three layers (cursor, Wipe, trailers) in the Main Timeline.

5.

Go to time 2;20, and press the [ key to move the selected layers so they start at the current time. The cube has already come together at this point, so you want each set of command-line layers to start at this point in time or later.

You'll move the remaining cursor/wipe/word groups in time next.

6.

Select the next three layers (cursor, Wipe, promotions) in the Timeline.

7.

Go to time 4;25, and press the [ key to move the selected layers in time.

8.

Select the next three layers (cursor, Wipe, posters) in the Timeline.

9.

Go to time 7;00, and press the [ key.

10.

Select the next three layers (cursor, Wipe, ad campaigns).

11.

Go to time 9;05, and press [.

Staggering the words and their associated cursor and wipe layers in the Main Timeline

12.

Select all the layers except Spinning Cube and Letters Background, and then choose Layer > Pre-Compose. Name the new composition what_we_do. Make sure the what_we_do comp layer is above the Spinning Cube Pre-comp layer in the Timeline.

At time 5;15, the blinking cursor reveals the word promotions.



    Adobe After Effects 6.5 Magic
    Adobe After Effects 6.5 Magic
    ISBN: 0321267230
    EAN: 2147483647
    Year: 2005
    Pages: 236

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