link to value from layer above but hold it at 100%

[Lord Scales]

I don’t know this so much, but try this:

> find the time in which the Opacity of the last Layer go to 100. Let’s suppose it is in 6:21, so…

o = thisComp.layer(thisLayer, -1).opacity.valueAtTime (time -.4); //value of opacity
oMax = 100; //maximum value
t = 6.7; //time when it gets to 100

if(time < t) o else oMax I think there is an easier way like "when opacity gets to 100%, keep in until..." but I don't know exactly. Lord Scales

[Filip Vandueren]

Can’t you just keyframe that one layer ?

I’m not sure I understand:

Does every layer have just three keyframes 0-100-0, or are they looping/blinkg all the time ?
When exactly does the last layer need to stay at 100% ?
When the first layer has completed its cycle ?

BTW, here’s a different way to do it:

Draw a Path, use text on Path and fill it with periods …..
Now use a text animator to animate opacity. You can even add a little bit of scaling.

No expressions needed, and I think it’s the effect you need.
Much simpler to change the road by chaning the mask shape, and the spacing between the dots is figured out automatically.

[Saudi]

Hello again,

thanks for your replys.

@Lord Scales: I tried to play around with time calculations but ended up in a bigger mess :-). But I think that it is possible to do it this way.Aas u said, there must be an easier way to do it. Thanks for your reply.

@Filip: I think its to complicated to describe the whole thing. I am triing to animate a path/way on a map. Its a military map and I have the show the movement of the troops. The map was exported from cinema 4d with NULL objekts including position data for each dot. The dots are a bunch of 2D-Layers and just the first dot is animated(opacity) by keyframes. All the Layers under this mother- or masterlayer are connected with expressions like this:

thisComp.layer(thisLayer, -1).opacity.valueAtTime(time – .4);

to behave exactly like the first layer (or the layer above), just half a second later.

Now I want the last dot-layer to “read” just the first two keyframes from the animated masterlayer. (0% to 100%) like “do exactly what the layer above is doing but if opacity ==100 then stop and keep it”.

I hope u get what I want.

thank u so much

greeez martin