• Adobe After Effects

  pixel sperm with tail that moves; pixel swarm

  Posted by Tim Bowen on June 20, 2006 at 7:39 pm

  Hi folks,

  New to the forum and have a question.
  I’m working on a project that is using individual square pixels to mimic sperm moving on the screen. That’s easy…. but they want to add a tail to the square pixel and have it move just like real sperm tails would. Any suggestions or ways to help me think this through?

  Also I need to create a “swarm” of square pixels that would follow the lead sperm/square pixel. I know there’s an expression tutorial in the Meyer’s advanced book, but do you have any other suggestions?

  Thanks for your help

  Graham Quince replied 20 years, 2 months ago 2 Members · 1 Reply
• 1 Reply

• 

  Graham Quince

  June 22, 2006 at 4:47 pm

  I’m guessing you’ve duplicated your square to get individual animations??

  If that’s the case, then it should be pretty easy to create a second small size compostion, with one static sqaure in it. Add a new solid, slightly larger than your square. Draw in a tail shape using the path tool. You can set keyframes to animate it by hitting the M key and clicking on the shape setting. Then apply Stroke to make it visible.

  Now then easy bit. In your original comp, highlight one of your sqaures and hold down the ALT key. Now drag the square-tail comp on top of that layer. The sqaure is replaced by your tail comp and retains all the movement keyframes.

  For a swarm, think about trying Particle Playground, or Foam.

  Hope that helps

  Graham

  https://www.quinceweb.com – web design
  ——–
  https://www.shiveringcactus.bravehost.com – Free FX for amateur films

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