Basic AE Operating Techniques

[Beryl Stajich]

I’m just geeting started w/AE 6.5. I’ve had the program a long time, but the learning curve always seemed to steep to get into it. Recently I’ve tuned into the tutorials on Creative Cow and other sites (Video CoPilot) and have been following the bouncing ball(s).

But it’s tough to make any real headway when all the experts are using the 7.0 CS3/4 or higher interfaces and I have to stop and explore how to translate that into 6.5. Then, they use plug-ins and presets I don’t have. Very frustrating.

So far I have done a few projects with sphere and other plug-ins and am learning my way arouns the timeline and how to navigate the effects control panel. But I am clearly having problems figuring out how to make it all gel.

Here is an example:
.I took a world map and made an earth’s globe using the sphere plug-in.
.I added a starfield behind the earth.
.I transformed the earth by making it appear and grow in the composition.
.Then i made the earth rotate, but can not contol the speed or smoothness of the rotation.
.I then added text to the composition, and used the cylinder plug-in to wrap it around the earth. I used the outside render key and repositioned it behind the earth.
.Now I want to have it rotate out infront of the earth, but can not get the text to move at all.
.I’ve also used a precomp to add some highlights to the earth using expressions. But can not get the prcomp married back to the original comp. So I have a non-highlighted glove and a separte highlighted precomp. What a mess.

Does this give you some feel for where I am in terms of development time.

Beryl Stajich
bstajich@comcast.net

[Beryl Stajich]

OK, I’m more than willing to go back to basics. So, let’s try this:

On rotating text from the rear of a globe to the front, using the cylinder effect–
.I already have the text in the correct position & invisible behind the globe.
.Now I want to slowly rotate it out to the front.
.The end effect would be similar to the Universal Studios Logo
Now tell me how to just that much!

On rotating the earth created in sphere:
.I’m not talking about previewing the effect ram or otherwise. I’m talking about playing the effect as a rendered avi movie–the spin is not consistent and jerky. I am using the Y-rotation to animate it in the sphere control panel, but do not understand the contol settings. Here is where I need the help.

Beryl Stajich
bstajich@comcast.net