• Adobe After Effects

  Motion blur on stroked masks

  Posted by Dave Baum on March 29, 2010 at 4:48 pm

  Hi all,

  I’m on a job that requires animating a series of Arabic letterforms.

  3d stroke almost does the job, but not quite, I can’t replicate the shapes well enough with it.

  I’ve decided to redraw everything in Illustrator, and am using an idea from the Meyer’s book, which is to draw a path along the centre line of each shape, stroke it with a line thick enough to cover the vector shape, set it to “reveal original image” and then animate the sart and end points. This method works great for allowing accurate shape reveals, but it’s so rough! I can;t add motion blur, it does nothing, the option to motion blur the mask is not available and CC force motion blur doesn’t work either.

  Would I be better of using my paths as a motion path for a second mask, and adding motion blur to that?

  Thanks in advance for any help, I’ve a few of these to do!

  cheers,
  Dave

  Dave Baum replied 16 years, 1 month ago 60,271 Members · 2 Replies
• 2 Replies

• 

  Dave Baum

  March 29, 2010 at 5:09 pm

  Hi Dave,

  Thanks for the info. If you have time to explain any more about track mattes I’d be mighty grateful, I’ve never used them. If it sounds as thought they would help, I’m all up for trying them out!

  As for masks, I understand all of what you say. However, in this instance, the mask is really just a single path line (as opposed to a completed shape) and is used for the stroke only. As the strokestart and end points animate, the shape below is revealed.

  The only feathering I can get into it is the hardness of the brush, but if I go less than 100% it becomes too narrow (even at full thickness of 50) to cover the vector I want it to reveal.

  I hope this makes sense, as I appreciate the advice!

  Thanks
  Dave
• 

  Dave Baum

  March 29, 2010 at 5:19 pm

  coolio, will give it a whirl.
  Thanks

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