creating a moving neon sign

[Aharon Rabinowitz]

That’s probably one of the better methods of doing that actually.

Create your sign in Photoshop as seperate layers fopr the letters. Then add the glow layer effect. For any letters you want to blink on and off, make sure you make aversion of that letter without a glow, and put it below the glow layer.

Then in AE just animated the glowing layer’s visibility.

There are other ways to do it, but this is probably the simplist way to do it, and in a case like this, there’s no reason to complicate things.

If you wanted to give it some extra kick (I haven’t tried this myself) make duplicates of every layer, so you have a glow version and a non glow version, and in AE, set the transfer/blending mode for the glow version to “add.” Only animate the opacity of the layer you want to blink on and off, but the glow with the add property will also effect anything that falls behind the glow, lending to reality.

The reason I said make a glow and non glow version for all is so that the blinking letter doesn’t look different than the rest. The add mode sort of lets you see through it a little, and you’ll be able to tell that there is a “special” layer in there – in the way that in hanna barberra cartoons you know which rocks are going to fall, becasue while the rest look nice, 3 of them are more drawn.

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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
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Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
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[Raine Parrish]

thanks for suggestion- gonna give it a try tomorrow and let you know how it goes!
thanks again
rp

[Ace Billet]

“…hanna barberra cartoons you know which rocks are going to fall, becasue while the rest look nice, 3 of them are more drawn.”

This is one of the best and well put cartoon notions I’ve heard in years.

cheers
ace

Intel Inside, the world’s most popular warning label.

[Mike Clasby]

Audiowaveform (without connecting to audio) makes a good neon effect as it has an inner and outer color, plus softness control. Throw on a glow and maybe a wiggle expression on the Opacity and its good.

wiggle (10, 50)

tweak to taste.