• Adobe After Effects Expressions

  Precomp source text based on main comp time

  Posted by Kristine Jones on July 28, 2022 at 5:28 pm

  I’ve created a one hour countdown timer. At the start of each minute I’d like to transition to a different background for 5 seconds then transition out. This new background requires a change in the timer’s text color.

  To achieve this I’ve created a precomp with the new background and a duplicate of the timer text layers with text recolored. Ideally I’d like to reuse this single comp multiple times on top of the main timer, instead of creating a new precomp for each minute’s change.

  Within the precomp I’ve changed the source text expression to: comp(“countdown”).layer(“00”).text.sourceText;

  This gives me the text I want to see, but from the beginning of the main countdown comp. If my precomp is located at X min on the main comp’s timeline, what code would I add to display the text at that point in time?

  Kristine Jones replied 4 years, 1 month ago 2 Members · 2 Replies
• 2 Replies

• 

  Dan Ebberts

  July 28, 2022 at 5:51 pm

  Try this:

  c = comp("countdown");
  c.layer("00").text.sourceText.valueAtTime(time + c.layer(thisComp.name).startTime)
• 

  Kristine Jones

  July 28, 2022 at 6:00 pm

  Perfect. Thank you, Dan!

Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up