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Animated camera following stroke doesn’t reveal full image
I’m animating an arrow that goes around my company’s logo – the arrow starts at the top right of the logo, goes counter-clockwise and ends at the bottom right of the logo where there is the pointer end of the arrow. I’ve put a mask on the arrow and then stroked it, so it looks like it is being drawn onto the screen.
Everything looks great with the “Front” view, but when I add the camera to get close up on the animating line/arrow, when I get to the pointy end, the entire arrowhead doesn’t show up – the line just continues to the end, and doesn’t reveal the entire arrowhead.
But when I pull the camera back to show the entire logo, the head of the arrow reveals gradually as the camera pulls back, so that when the camera is in it’s final place, the image looks perfect.
any idea why this is happening? The stroke brush size is 50 over the course of the entire timeline, so that’s not it. I can’t seem to find anything that makes the arrowhead show up when the camera is zoomed in.
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9 Replies
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Nels
Try changing the Front View to Camera 1(New camera Name) and see what happens.
Don’t know whats exactly the problem is but if you are using a new camera then change the view to that camera instead of Front and see what happens.
Vishesh Arora
3D and Motion Graphics Artist
Films RajendraBlog:
https://digieffects.wordpress.comDemo Reel(3D):
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Sorry if I wasn’t clear before, but that’s the problem – when I look at the comp with Camera 1, the arrowhead doesn’t show up until the camera pulls back to it’s full screen position. When I get to where the arrowhead should be using Camera 1, it looks like the first picture above, but when I pull the camera back, it gradually reveals to show the whole arrowhead (the second image). The full arrowhead shows up perfectly when using the Front View, but the final render will be using Camera 1.
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What kind of asset is the arrow? Is the arrow head following the stroke all the way around or does it only appear at the end? Is it being continuously rasterized?
Darby Edelen
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the arrowhead is part of the image (an EPS), and thus, only appears at the end. And yes, it is being continuously rasterized. However, I’ve found that when I uncheck that box to make it continually rasterized, the arrowhead appears when it should, but since it’s not rasterized, the arrow and arrowhead are quite pixellated and thus no good.
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When you apply the Stroke effect to a continuously rasterized layer the radius of the stroke is no longer relative to the layer’s transforms. That is to say that a radius of 50 pixels is now 50 pixels large in the composition no matter how much you scale or move the layer.
Try applying the stroke effect to a non-continuously rasterized solid layer above the continuously rasterized layer and using that as a track matte. You may need to do some work to align the stroke properly.
Darby Edelen
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I will give that a shot and report back with my results. Thanks for the help!
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Darby –
After working with what you had suggested, I was able to figure out the solution. After applying the stroke to a non-continuously rasterized layer (like you said), copying that to a layer beneath it which had no stroke and was continuously rasterized and making that a track matte, I was nearly there. The edges of the arrow were a little ragged, but duplicating the two layers made it so you could only tell the layers were a little ragged if you were zoomed in to 800%. And since this is going to be seen almost exclusively online, it was good to go.
Thanks for your help, Darby!
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Are you using Stroke on a non-continuously rasterized copy of the arrow layer or a solid? I’d recommend using it on a solid, that should help avoid the ragged edge look.
Darby Edelen
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I had been using a copy of the arrow, which led to the ragged edges. I just used a solid of the same color, and it’s exactly what I was looking for. And you’re right, I did have to mess with the stroke a little, but it was the way to go.
Thanks!
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