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Need help with compositing leaves falling from a tree
Hi, I have this project in which I have to composite leaves falling from a tree. First I drew the tree trunk and its leaves in Illustrator, then moved them to Photoshop and organized the leaves the way I want them to be positioned, using more than 200 layers of leaves. After importing the PSD into AE I started figuring out a way to simulate,in a realistic manner, the leaves falling from the tree. The leaves need to move on the y axis from their original position on the tree to a certain y value under the tree, in order to give a sense of them falling to the ground. They also need to rotate slightly while falling like real leaves do when affected by the wind. I tried using expressions and nulls instead of keyframing each layer, which will take hours. I have yet to master expressions, actually far from it, and I hope some of the experts here could give a hand and help me make this happen. If needed, later today I’ll be able to post a snapshot of the comp and the expressions I used, so far without success.
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6 Replies
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So you need all of the 200 leaves to fall down ?
Should they all fall in a certain timeframe ? Is it like an impact causes them all to fall down at the same time ?
The hard part would be for a layer to know where to ‘land’ At which Y-value is the ground ? Should the leaves all stop at the same value or randomly etc…
There’s a lot of variables to think of, so please post an example of your scene.
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Hi, thanks for your quick reply.
All 200 leaves need to fall down. They fall not because of an impact, but slowly fall off the tree like autumn leaves, symbolizing grief and loss. It shouldn’t be that complicated. Each leaf has to fall from its original position on the tree to a certain Y value at the bottom of the trunk. The leaves should fall off sequentially, one after the other, with a gap of a second or two between.
I’m posting some example screenshots of the composition to make things clearer.
This is the tree with the leaves at their starting position.
This is the tree after some leaves have fallen and landed on the ground.
This is the expression I tried to use. It didn’t work good and every new leaf I copied it to got thrown off from its original starting position.
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OK, I see,
you have a 2 layers set up, and you want all leaves to drop the same way, after a certain delay.
The easiest way to do this in a way that resembles yours, is to animate the anchorPoint, not the position of your guide layer, and apply the expression to the anchorPoint of your leaves.
Because the anchorPoint’s value results in a relative movement, you won’ have the leafs jumping after you apply the expression.
Other solutions are also possible, though they are more comples: Writing a sort of particle systme for the leaves that adds randomness or wind to each leaf.
Let me know which roue you prefer, and if this is an urgent thing ?
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I think using the expression on the anchor point is probably the answer. Don’t know why I didn’t think of it. And yes, this is quite urgent, if I won’t have a simple solution by tomorrow I’m gonna have to start animating each leaf seperately. Would you show me how exactly to write the expression? What expression would you use for the delay to take place?
Any help or comments on the expression I’ve written could help me in future projects, so feel free doing so.
And thanks again, Ynon
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hi…
i have virtually exactly the same problem except i want the leaves to grow on the tree first and then to fall off.
i have an intermediate level of knowlegde in AE… but any help would be REALLY REALLY helpful! (i’ve got a few weeks to do this so i can spend sometime on it)
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Sorry bout the delay Ynon,
the expression you used can be retained with the anchorPoint approach: just animate the anchorPoint of the guide layer, and change “position” to “anchorPoint” where needed in the expression.
It should work out perfectly.
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