how can I merge two layers into one?

[Simon Bonner]

Hi Idan,

Unfortunately you can’t place more than one footage item in each layer in AE. That frustrated me too when I first moved over from Premiere, but you get used to it. If you want to neaten up your timeline panel, you can precompose the two different layers and that will put them in a single comp of their own that will be on a single layer (select both and hit cntl+alt+c)

Simon Bonner

youtube.com/simonsaysFX

[Idan Goldstein]

Thanks for your quick replay.
but will it work if I try to take from the same footage two different ins and outs?

[Simon Bonner]

If you mean, “Can I put two piece of footage on the same layer if they are both ‘made from’ the same video asset?” that’s a no I’m afraid. If you’re asking about what can be precomposed, anything can. Any number of layers: doesn’t matter that they are. This answer your question?

Simon Bonner

youtube.com/simonsaysFX

[Mike Clasby]

“but will it work if I try to take from the same footage two different ins and outs?”

If I’m understanding you correctly, you can. Just drop the footage into the comp, then duplicate it (Ctrl D) as many time as you want “different ins and outs”. Then trim those layers in and out points (Alt [, Alt ]). Now if you select all the duplicate layers with different in and out points you can precompose those. You will now have that original footage with gaps, which I’m assuming is what you want. You might get an overlapping sound if some layers overlap, but I don’t know why you’d want them to overlap.

Is that what you want?

[Adam Bowers]

i know this is really old but in case anyone else comes on here looking for an answer (like i did), the solution is precomposing: https://helpx.adobe.com/after-effects/using/precomposing-nesting-pre-rendering.html