• Adobe After Effects Expressions

  Create a reference layer for an expression

  Posted by Rens Wegerif on June 22, 2015 at 12:00 pm

  Hello everybody,

  Here is a problem that occurs with my projects quite often. I am working on a project on wihich I have over hundred layers. I have written some expression for the opacity value for the layers, and copied it to all other layers. It’s kinda tedious work. Now I want to change the code, but I have to go through all the layers once again 🙁 Is there a way to get the expression from one layer, like reference to that layer in the expression box? I tried linking to a marker comment, linking to a text layer’s source text, but both don’t seem to work….

  Thanks in advance 🙂

  thisComp.layer("wiggle(.5,12)").text.sourceText

  and this one:

  n = 0;
  if (thisComp.layer("markers").marker.numKeys > 0){
    n = thisComp.layer("markers").marker.nearestKey(time).index;
    if (thisComp.layer("markers").marker.key(n).time > time){
      n--;
    }
  }

  if (n == 0){
 "";
}else{
opacity=thisComp.layer("markers").marker.key(n).comment;
}


  Rens Wegerif replied 10 years, 10 months ago 1 Member · 1 Reply
• 1 Reply

• 

  Rens Wegerif

  June 22, 2015 at 2:08 pm

  Found it!

  Create an extra comp called “// Controller” with a Text layer called // Expression.
  For the source text of this text layer, apply your expression.

  Ad the following expression to all the layers that need that same expression:

  eval(comp("// Controller").layer("// Expression").text.sourceText.toString())

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