Best Way to Switch Between 2 Versions

[Sabri Liefert]

No sorry, i mean two versions of the same animation.
Like one is in german and one is in english.
The animation is the same.
During development of the animation i have to render daily a german and english version.
So it would be very annoying to replace all text every day.
A automatic or semi-automatic solution would be great.

[Michael Szalapski]

You could make a null object as a controller layer in your main comp. Apply an expression controls Checkbox Control to it.

Create a precomp for each instance of text. Have the opacity for the German layers set to be 100% when the checkbox is marked and have it be 0% when the checkbox is blank. And vice versa for the English layers.

Once you have one comp set up like that, simply create a duplicate of it for each new instance of text you need.

– The Great Szalam
(The ‘Great’ stands for ‘Not So Great, in fact, Extremely Humble’)

No trees were harmed in the creation of this message, but several thousand electrons were mildly inconvenienced.

[Sabri Liefert]

Thank you for the idea!

I inserted the following expression to the Opacity of the Text Layer:

if (comp(“Control”).layer(“Null 1”).effect(“Checkbox Control”)(“Checkbox”)==1) 0 else 100

And did the inverse to the other language text layer.

Works good!

Its only a little bit fiddling to have two comp. windows open to see both, the control and the actual composition simultaneously open. Or is there a better workaround to switch controls (in different “master” comp.) and see the affected composition at once.
I plan to link a lot of controls to the “master control” composition for presentation.

kind regards

[Michael Szalapski]

In the same way that you open 2 composition windows, it should be possible to have two effect panels open – one locked to the control layer’s effects. My AE machine is in the middle of a render or I’d check to make sure that works.

– The Great Szalam
(The ‘Great’ stands for ‘Not So Great, in fact, Extremely Humble’)

No trees were harmed in the creation of this message, but several thousand electrons were mildly inconvenienced.

[Sabri Liefert]

Thank you again,

i just have to lock the window to prevent it from jumping to display the “Control Comp”.

Is it possible to distribute the layer expression to multiple text layer at once?

[Michael Szalapski]

Edit>Copy Expression I think.
Or maybe it’s Edit>Copy then Edit>Paste Expression.

Either way, there’s an option to just copy an expression onto another layer.

– The Great Szalam
(The ‘Great’ stands for ‘Not So Great, in fact, Extremely Humble’)

No trees were harmed in the creation of this message, but several thousand electrons were mildly inconvenienced.