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Mask Modes Unintentionally Changing With the Click of a Mouse!
Here’s an issue I’ve been having for way too long now, and my long searches for an answer have been futile.
Let’s say I draw a mask on a layer. If I need to move around the vertices of that mask for either tuning or keyframing, sometimes when I simply click the vertex, the mask mode will change. If I want that mask mode set to “Subtract,” for instance, and I click the vertex, suddenly the mask mode switches to “Lighten” or “Intersect” or any other mask mode rather than staying put.
I’ve tried restarting AE, restarting my computer, uninstall/reinstall, cleaning caches – I’ve run the whole gamut and nothing has permanently solved this horrendously frustrating issue. If anyone else out there has come across this issue and solved it, I will be forever in your debt!!
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5 Replies
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Try resetting your preferences. Close After Effects, then hold Ctrl+Alt+Shift (Windows) or Cmd+Opt+Shift (macOS) while starting Ae.
Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive | RenderBreak [blog] | Profile [LinkedIn] -
No dice, unfortunately. The only difference I had on this current layer I’m working on, is that instead of my intended mode of Add constantly switching to None, now it’s switching to Intersect…. ????
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Any solve on this? It’s been happening on AE on several machines for me over a number of versions for years and it’s getting a little old!
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Could there be a chance that your keyboard keys have been pressed? While drawing the mask using the pen tool, if the key “n” is pressed, the blending mode will be changed to none. If other keys are pressed, the mode will cycle through any modes that start with that letter. You can try pressing “a” to get it back to add.
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What throws me is that you see this across multiple versions and machines. Since most people do not encounter this, I hypothesize that there is another tool/plugin that you install in your systems that is causing this. The plugin may be a ‘system plugin’ that gets loaded as the OS boots or a plugin that is loaded with AE.
For the system plugins, try booting to a base environment and see if the problem persists. If it does not, then try disabling your startup programs (Task Manager if Windows), especially ones that are common across your systems and are tied to input devices, and keep booting different combinations until the problem reappears.
If not a startup app, then do a similar clean launch test with AE (i.e. no AE plugins) and then partial enablement of the plugins until the problem appears and you identify the misbehaving tool. I found this link describes how to disable AE plugins. https://www.toolfarm.com/tutorial/in_depth_troubleshooting_after_effects/
If this is happening with a clean boot and a clean launch, then I am out of ideas…
Pauley
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