-
Does animating multiple masks for one shot require all the masks be on their own solid and then precomped?
Hi, there.
I’m sort of new to After Effects. I’m trying to animate several rectangles into frame to wipe on a single shot of a person’s face. It seems like you should be able to just add all the masks to the shot in their final positions and then move controls on the masks to animate their positions on and off. However, the only way to move a mask seems to be by having it connected to a solid and then animating each solid separately. This seems like a very tedious setup. Then, I have to precomp all the moving solids together and make the pre comp a track matte for the original layer. This makes interactively animating the masks quite difficult. I have to go into the precomp and move the masks around without really seeing what I’m doing and then come back out to see the results. Am I doing anything wrong here? Thanks for any help you can provide me.
-Scott
-
4 Replies
-
You can place all your masks on one layer. Just create your mask in it’s final position. Twirl open the “Mask 1” and set a keyframe from “Mask Path”. Now move the Current Time Indicator(CTI) to where you want your mask animation to start and move the “Mask 1” to it’s starting location. AE should automatically add a starting keyframe for your animation. Repeat for all the other masks.
Johnny Cuevas, Editor
Thinkck.com“I have not failed 700 times. I have succeeded in proving that those 700 ways will not work. When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.”
—THOMAS EDISON on inventing the light bulb. -
Johns way works and will be easier for you, but doing it the way you’re doing it you would just have to open a new comp viewer and drag the tab to the side of the other comp viewer (purple trapezoid denotes where) and you can have the 2 comps display at the same time. In each comp viewer lock the view to the desired comp and when you work in one you see the results!
This will help in future projects, trust me.
-Keith -
Thanks for the help, John!
Nuke Compositor, London UK
-
Thanks for the help, Keith!
Nuke Compositor, London UK
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up