• Adobe After Effects

  Floating letters

  Posted by Lova Rehle on December 13, 2022 at 10:48 pm

  Hi AfterEffects community,

  I am still a newbie when it comes to after effects, but have a solid foundation in my skills. I am looking for ideas on how to make a particular project work. I have text that i want to break up into letters and float about the screen. Does anyone know of an effect or expression that could attain this? Or what’s the least time consuming approach?

   

  https://vod-progressive.akamaized.net/exp=1670985245~acl=%2Fvimeo-prod-skyfire-std-us%2F01%2F214%2F18%2F451071988%2F1983609297.mp4~hmac=e1652930086def45ef31fbb2842db578206bb40531712e272530113a14155b11/vimeo-prod-skyfire-std-us/01/214/18/451071988/1983609297.mp4

   

  

  

  

  Graham Quince replied 3 years, 8 months ago 3 Members · 2 Replies
• 2 Replies

• 

  Dan Ebberts

  December 14, 2022 at 8:59 pm

  That looks like a fairly complex physical simulation. It looks like something you might be able to pull of with Newton or Pastiche (or a combination of both) from aescripts. I don’t have those tools, so I’m not sure, but you might want to check them out.
• 

  Graham Quince

  December 15, 2022 at 9:22 am

  Your video link won’t open for me, but from your description I think CC Card Dance could possibly get you there. If you can arrange your letters in a grid, you can then use a gradient on another layer to drive the animation. That would be quite a bit of work just lining up the letters.

  Alternatively, I think you could use a “proximity detection” expression on a layer’s position, something like:

  var targetPos = thisComp.layer("Shape Layer 1").transform.position;
  var thisLayerPos = value;
  var distance = length(targetPos, thisLayerPos);
  value+(thisLayerPos*100/distance);

  This means the L layer actively stays away from the displacing object. That expression might need a little work, but if you make one letter, get that responding correctly then duplicate and reposition the new layer, you should be able to fill a grid relatively quickly.

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