how to make a realistic neon sign? (tutorial?)

[Steve Morris]

Andrew Kramer has a tutorial on light streaks which uses a glow. He may having something in there that can help you.

[Nate Vander plas]

Not sure why the glow doesn’t do it for you. I would think it’d be perfect for a neon sign. What kind of image are you starting with?

[Kevin Camp]

i have created neon signs using just 3d stroke and glow on vector art that i created in illustrator and then pasted in to solids as masks. it worked really well… using 3d stroke did allow me to feather the edges before adding the glow, but you could try blurring the sign before adding glow if needed.

also you can add another glow effect over your other glow eefect if you just need to pump up your glow.

Kevin Camp
Designer – KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW

[David Bogie]

The term “realistic” could be a problem. Real neon signs do not produce volumetric glow by themselves. Only if there’s smoke or fog does the glowing tube produce a halo or atmospheric glow.

Try these threads for some pedantic ranting and links to some interesting neon signs examples:

https://www.adobeforums.com/cgi-bin/webx/.3bc32cd0/2

https://www.adobeforums.com/cgi-bin/webx?14@@.3bc30cfd/0

bogiesan

This is my standard sigfile so do not take it personally: “For crying out loud, read the freakin’ manual.”

[Peter O’connell]

Hi Buijon, if you work in 32 bit you will be able to get excellent photoreal glows by playing arond with blurs and the add blending mode. Make sure the brightness value of the thing you are blurring is at least 2.
Good Luck

Pete O’Connell

http://www.barxseven.com

[Mike Clasby]

For neon, I like drawing a mask on a solid layer (or import an AI path), then:

Render>Audio waveform
Audio Layer: Solid mask is on (no audio layer referenced)
Path: your mask
Displayed Samples: Crank it up until you get it smooth
Thickness: to taste
Softness and Inside/Outside colors to taste.

Glow: optional

A wiggle on the opacity of the layer can give you a flicker:

wiggle (30,10)

[Nathan Quattrini]

How do i import a path? You see the guy in the art department made the neon AI just as an open path that has several layers of stroke on it (for web still image use only). So how do I get that path into AE to try what you said? If I paste it on a solid it doesn`t mask because its not a closed path. So how can I put the path on a transparent background so the Neon sign can eventually be a motion design element in the corner of a video?

[Nathan Quattrini]

“Render>Audio waveform”

i also don`t have a “render” option on my effects menu…

[Chris Zwar]

I thought it was worth emphasising Peter’s post, because he makes a very poignant point:

If you have AE 7, you can use the 32-bit mode to generate “true” lighting effects, so you can use text or strokes as your source to create neon effects with no 3rd-party plug-ins. I simply don’t have time to google and search for you, but when AE7 came out there was a tutorial on exactly that.

If you don’t want to use AE 7’s 32-bit mode (for whatever reason), then you are looking at plug-ins like Trapcodes’ Starglow or Tinderbox’s T_Starburst (Sapphire and Boris probably have their equivalents too). Again, if you do some googling of your own you will find out more about these products- don’t be fooled, they’re not just useful for making stars.

Finally, you can just stack up your layers with increasing levels of blur and make their transfer mode “add”. It’s surprisingly effective (and the basis for most light-saber tutorials) – and again, no 3rd party costs.

-Chris

[Mike Clasby]

The AI path, you copy in AI, then paste into AE, doesn’t need to be a closed path, Audio waveform works fine on open paths. Details on copy/paste here, sometimes you need to have preferences in AI set right:

https://www.creativecow.net/articles/rabinowitz_aharon/import_path/index.html

I’m on AE6.5 so Audio Waveform is under Render, there, but in AE& just type in Audio Waveform in the Effects and Presets Palette (Ctrl 2) and it will tell you where it is.

Good luck.