Adobe After Effects

How get to acccess XML Elements in After Effects after importing data?

Posted by Brian Williams on September 21, 2020 at 10:55 pm

I posted something similar to this earlier today using JSon, but giving up on that I’ve switched to XML. Can someone show me what I am doing wrong here? I have an xml file that I am parsing through a script in After Effects, and I’m not sure how to get access to the XML elements.

My XML file is:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<root>
    <f>
        <accelX>0.4682</accelX>
        <accelY>-0.0352</accelY>
        <accelZ>-0.9247</accelZ>
        <gyroX>0.0555</gyroX>
        <gyroY>0.004</gyroY>
        <gyroZ>-0.0684</gyroZ>
    </f>
    <f>
        <accelX>-0.4682</accelX>
        <accelY>-0.0219</accelY>
        <accelZ>-0.9186</accelZ>
        <gyroX>0.0049</gyroX>
        <gyroY>0.0851</gyroY>
        <gyroZ>-0.046</gyroZ>
    </f>
</root>

And my jsx file is this:

var file = new File;
var check = 0;

var mainWindow = new Window("palette", "File Reader", undefined);
mainWindow.orientatizzaaq1on = "column";

var groupOne = mainWindow.add("group", undefined, "groupOne");
groupOne.orientation = "row";
var fileLocBox = groupOne.add("edittext", undefined, "Selected File Location");
fileLocBox.size = [150, 20];
var getFileButton = groupOne.add("button", undefined, "File...");
getFileButton.helpTip = "Select a .json file to change the comp";

var groupTwo = mainWindow.add("group", undefined, "groupTwo");
groupTwo.orientation = "row";
var applyButton = groupTwo.add("button", undefined, "Apply");

mainWindow.center();
mainWindow.show();

getFileButton.onClick = function() {
    file = file.openDlg("Open a file", "Acceptable Files:*.xml");
    fileLocBox.text = file.fsName;
    check = 1;
    }

applyButton.onClick = function() {
        if(check == 0) {
                alert("Please select a file");
                return false;
            } else {
                //app.beginUndoGroup("Comp Changes");
                var fileExtension = fileLocBox.text;
                var fileData;
                
                if(fileExtension.substring(fileExtension.length-4, fileExtension.length) == "json") {
                    fileData = readJson();
                    } else {
                        switch(fileExtension.substring(fileExtension.length-3, fileExtension.length)) {
                            case "txt":
                                //fileData = readTxt();
                            break;
                            case "xml":
                                fileData = readXml();
                            break;
                            }
                        }
                    changeComp(fileData);
                }
            alert("done");
   }

function readXml() {
    file.open("r");
    var xmlString = file.read();
    var myXml = new XML(xmlString);
    file.close();
    return myXml;
    }

function changeComp(data) {
    var nullz = app.project.activeItem.laayers.addNull();
    nullz.threeDLayer = true;
    nullz.name = "parent to me";
    for (i = 0; i < 20; i++) {
       var temp = data.f[i].accelX;
       var t =i/25;
      nullz.xRotation.setValueAtTime(t, temp);
      }
  }

This is the line, near the end, that isn’t working:

var temp = data.f[i].accelX;

Am I writing this incorrectly? After Effects will create one keyframe with a value of “0”, but doesn’t finish the for…loop and doesn’t complete the script. Am I accessing these elements incorrectly?

Filip Vandueren replied 6 years ago 2 Members · 1 Reply

1 Reply

Filip Vandueren
September 22, 2020 at 7:41 am

Maybe you need accelX[0] ?

Haven’t tested the code

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How get to acccess XML Elements in After Effects after importing data?

Filip Vandueren