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inserting clips and automatically moving layers forwards in time
Hi there, I’m fairly new to After Effects, and working on quite a complex animation on multiple layers, and I’m having problems shunting existing layers and stills/video forwards & backwards based on the change to “one layer”.
E.g. I suddenly realise that a still image on layer 3 needs to play for longer, currently I keep having to select all the other layers and drag them right, then go in and tweak keyframe fades accordingly.
There must be an easier “assisted” way to do this, as theoretically what I’m trying to do in Adobe Premier jargon is a “ripple edit” or “insert edit” on the timeline. I can’t see any way of doing this in After Effects and of course googling “ripple” shows an effect, not a way of editing your clips and layers in the tool itself.
Most tutorials never show complex layouts, so I’ve had no luck on that front, its always one layer being shown at a time.
Can anyone help, is there a hidden “insert” button somewhere that shuffles everything on the other layers further along the timeline after it as you extend the duration of a clip?
Hope this makes sense to someone!
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16 Replies
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I’m starting to realise that AE is a “different beast”, but this kind of shuffling of timeline data seems pretty fundamental to me – thanks for the advice though Dave.
If anyone else is wanting a similar solution – the best solution, well that I’ve found is to seperate your file into several seperate AE sequences to make them more manageable when making timing adjustments, then use another AE file to comp the renderings from the others together, then each complex sequence can just be a simple piece on one layer.
That said, this is early days for me with the app, so I’m sure there’s probably a better option for a better workflow for updating nested content like this that someone else can suggest.
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I agree with you. Sometimes when I’m working on complex timing particularly with lots of keyframes, it’s very frustrating to have to shift bits along, and if you forget something then you can have a very nasty time trying to get everything rearranged. I usually have my layers in roughly timed order (so that all the stuff from near the start of the shot are together) so at least if i need to move everything after a certain point, most of the layers are nearby.
I think what you’re suggesting is also what I might suggest as a workaround – precomping a whole bunch of stuff so you can crop and shuffle it. But even that can be a bit clunky. I think it’s just part of the AE experience.
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Hi Derek – I’ve been trying to locate the same solution for AE. I’ve been working in Timeline based applications for some time, and over the past 10 years it has largely been in Flash. Flash has a very nice “Insert Frame” command, and I used it ALL the time to simply shift everything out, using the Timeline marker as a starting point. Have yet to find something that is similar to this in AE, and it’s driving me nuts.
I’ve had to re-think the way I build compositions, and watching some of the more complicated tutorials out there, it looks like people make their comps and layers span the entire length of the clip. So in the vent you need to shift things out or back, you just select all the layers, press “U”, select all your keyframes and drag them out. This works fine, as long as you don’t have complicated animations in the compositions. Since composition timelines mirror the main timeline (assuming they share a common starting point), you will have to update those as well. That can become a mini nightmare, just because the client wanted some text 10 seconds in, to stay on the screen longer.
I’ve also been scouring the Web for Scripts or Extensions that might do this as well. If I find anything – you’ll all be the first to know.
Cheers,
Stephen -
Thanks Stephen, yeah I have the same kind of background too with Flash so I was expecting this to be similar in AE, you’re right clients often expect it to be easy to add a few seconds here and there during a sequence.
Thanks for the tips, I’ll try them out. In the end my solution was to break the whole sequence into seperate projects then re-compile the final sequences together at the end, which made trimming and adjusting throughout a 10 minute sequence easier without needing much timeline work on shunting the rest around to make room.
If you do find anything better technique/plugin wise, do let me know thanks!
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Sorry Dave but you’re absolutely wrong! Of course there is no real good solution that I know of, but Adobe has really dropped the ball for many years on this.
Using the excuse “After effects is a compositor, not a NLE” is an excuse that was really only acceptable 10 years ago. Today, the technology is quite simple for Adobe to add to the software. Why don’t they do it?
Of course people will never use After Effects as an editor. But why limit the program so it is impossible to assemble a lengthy composition? If I want to assemble a two minute intro, with each slide interacting with each other consisting of multiple layers, I know it’s going to be a huge pain to shift every thing if the timing changes. Saying to a client in session “sorry, this will take a while to make that minor change because this is a compositor not a NLE” isn’t a valid excuse.
It’s issues with software like this that make us look bad in front of clients. BS excuses will not change that.
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Dave, I can check the weather, get instant directions, edit photos, watch movies, play high graphic video games on my phone. If a $1000 piece of software can’t make a simple upgrade after all of the technological advances over the past ten years, then they have no excuse. I’ll admit, yeah it is a cheaper piece of software than the flame. But is that an excuse for such an obvious flaw? Heck, even Motion allows multiple clips on one layer (not that Motion is very good either).
So your business advice is to spend $250,000 on a suite instead of complaining to a company because of an easy fix? Many software complaints have been solved with online petitions. 15 years ago, spending $50,00 on an edit suite was considered cheaping out, but today the times have changed considerably.
Call me old fashioned, but I think that when a program has a flaw, it should be fixed. If you bought a hyundai and it broke down the first day, would you accept the dealer telling you “too bad, you should have bought a BMW.” Obviously we know to accept the shortcomings of products when they have a lower price tag, but it doesn’t excuse them from keeping obvious flaws in the product.
So my solution? I guess to complain to the folks at Adobe. Will it go anywhere? Probably not, but it’s all I can do. Trying to get a company to spend an extra quarter million on an additional suite for me to be a bit quicker would probably be a waste of time.
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Fair enough point. The condescension is not necessary though.
Kapiche?
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There is in fact a Ripple and Overlay options in AE. Though not extremely useful. If you open a Layer window (the layer’s window where you could motion track or paint the footage) look at the bottom of the Layer window frame. You have an in time marker button, in timecode, an out time marker button, out timecode, duration of the selected clip, and drum roll please……. Ripple Insert Edit Button and Overlay Edit Button. These are NOT new. They have been available as long as I’ve been using AE. And I can’t think of a single time I’ve used them. They are clunky and involved. But just read this and thought I’d clear the matter up.
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Looked at this really quick and I have a revision. The above option is only available in Layer windows originated from the project window. If they are generated from the timeline the Ripple and Overlay button are not available.
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This tip REALLY helps me out.
I cannot but help creating account to appreciate you.
A thousand times thank you.
Have a good day!
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