• Adobe After Effects Expressions

  Trying to make some even ultimater CCSphere expressions

  Posted by Matthew Woods on March 22, 2012 at 6:45 pm

  Hi cows,

  I am working with some ultimate CCSphere expressions found here:

  https://www.motion-graphics-exchange.com/after-effects/Ultimate-CC-Sphere-Light-Comp-Camera-linker/4b539a347c787

  These expressions are great, but I would also like to scale my CCSphere’s radius as I dolly in, and pan my CC sphere as I pan the camera.

  I managed to get the sphere radius scaling working pretty well with this expression:
  d = length(thisComp.activeCamera.pointOfInterest, thisComp.activeCamera.position);
  r = 100;
  a= 2*Math.acos(r/d);
  1000*r*Math.cos(a/2)

  I’m having major problems translating the camera’s POI to CCSphere’s 2d offset though.
  My CCSphere layer is a much higher resolution from my comp (so I can zoom way in)
  Comp is 1080p Sphere layer is 8192×4096

  The best I have gotten is inelegent expression:
  POI = from_comp(to_comp(thisComp.layer(“Camera 1”).transform.pointOfInterest));
  [8192-4.26667*POI[0],4096-3.7926*POI[1]]

  For reference, I placed a 3d text layer at the origin of my 3d scene, [960,540,0]. Ideally, I would like the sphere to center to appear married to that text layer when I pan the camera, but I can’t get it to work.

  Any suggestions?

  Thanks,

  -Matt

  Need a quick break from motion graphics?
  Try my game Constellation at:
  https://www.paperdragongames.com

  Matthew Woods replied 14 years, 5 months ago 2 Members · 2 Replies
• 2 Replies

• 

  Kevin Camp

  March 22, 2012 at 8:48 pm

  you might try making the sphere layer a 3d layer and then also setting that layer to auto orient towards camera (layer>transform>auto orient). the layer should then obey the 3d camera position and point of interest… depending on how you are controlling your camera it can work pretty well.

  Kevin Camp
  Senior Designer
  KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW
• 

  Matthew Woods

  March 23, 2012 at 5:04 pm

  Hi Kevin,

  I had tried that initially, and it seemed like it would work pretty well if I just had the sphere in the scene. The problem is, I also have 3d text layers. The auto oriented 3d sphere didn’t seem like it was moving in the same world as the text layers.

  -Matt

  Need a quick break from motion graphics?
  Try my game Constellation at:
  https://www.paperdragongames.com

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