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Build an Hour Glass
Hey all, I’m working on building an hour glass in AE.
I’d like the sand in the hour glass to fall and move down as the hour glass flips.
I’ve been playing with particles for the sand, but am looking for a better plugin that would allow the sand particles to respond to the “walls” of the hour glass and bounce around naturally as the sand particles fall.
Any recommendations on how to better achieve this effect?
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7 Replies
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Hey that sounds great. It reminds me of a sequence on the opening title of the series AMAZING STORIES that Steven Spielberg produced in the 80s. And although I don’t know exactly how to remedy that technical problem, I suggest checking out Video CoPilot dot net.
https://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/
Plug-ins
https://www.redgiant.com/products/trapcode-suite/
Hope these help and Happy Holidays! Happy Thanksgiving!
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You might look into a 2D physics simulation tool like Newton:
Or a physics-aware 3D particle system like Stardust:
https://aescripts.com/stardust/
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Thank you! I’ve used a couple videocopilot plugins in the past. I’ll check this out
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Thanks! I was looking at Newton but did not know of stardust
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No way – I’ve just created my profile on here to look EXACTLY for this! I’ve been animating an hourglass for the past week now, and failing badly. I managed to get it to fill up, but the particles look pretty naive. Have you had any luck?
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It’s a trap!!
Kidding aside, many moons I’ve done similar simulations in AW Power Animator and Maya then last AE.
Honestly, don’t expect dynamic solutions to do it all for you.
You will need to create secondary animations to push the envelope on realism.
Basically, do what Lucas Films does…fake it 🙂
And if you don’t believe me, Google the BTS of the Naboo waterfall scenes 🙂
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Particle Playground in AE can do some of this, but it’s a bit wonky to set up.
There’s also some 2d physics stuff in Adobe Character Animator (which, by the way, is the most fun piece of software Adobe makes).
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