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Activity Forums Adobe After Effects puppet tool won’t work

  • Alan Wasem

    December 6, 2017 at 9:18 pm

    I have found that the cursor will change on when using puppet pin tool when you enable collapse transformations ( https://www.digitalsandwich.net/portfolio/ae-quicktip-collapse-transformations/ )on a precomp or an imported AI file. It also breaks scripts that use the pins such as RubberHose by BattleAxe because it changes the bounding box size of the layers.

  • Curt Needs

    March 22, 2018 at 6:16 pm

    I’m having the same issue. What I did was take one image and draw a mask on it. I copied that layer and inverted the mask on it. So, I had two layers that had the same mask on them, one normal and one inverted. I put pins within the mask on the normal layer. The inverted mask layer, however, would not allow me to put pins on the visible image because it was outside of the mask. So, even though I selected to invert the mask, After Effects registered that layer as only contained within the mask. It makes sense, but it shouldn’t work this way.

    So, I took that inverted mask layer and precomposed it. Then I tried to put pins on the visible image. And that’s when my current up-to-date version of After Effects crashed.

    Instead, I’m masking out every piece of the image that I’m applying puppets to and having them all on individual layers, and subtracting all of those masks onto another single layer, so my image appears seamless. This process requires more masks and layers than it should, but produces the results I was looking for.

  • Steve Bentley

    March 22, 2018 at 7:50 pm

    Hasve you tried locking the mask before applying the puppet tool? With out a locked mask the puppet tool thinks you want everything and may be trying to make a massive mesh. With the lock on the mask it will make the mesh only within the mask and ignore the alpha.

  • Steve Bentley

    March 23, 2018 at 10:34 pm

    Ok that’s not quite true – with the mask locked the puppet tool creates a hybrid mesh mask that incorporates the alpha (if there is one) and the mask you surround stuff with.

  • Jacob Giacometti

    July 29, 2018 at 8:28 pm

    Just lock the masks on the layer you’re trying to puppet, and you’ll be able to use the tool normally

  • Dale Bauer

    March 22, 2019 at 11:58 pm

    I just figured out that if you’ve moved the anchor point from it’s original place then you won’t be able to use the pin tool.

  • Jumin Park

    October 7, 2021 at 2:25 pm

    Thank you very much! Such a simple solution but worked with my case perfectly.

  • Jason Coleman

    October 11, 2024 at 12:43 am

    I had this same issue and realized that it is indeed an issue with how I was using a mask. Instead I did my animations first and THEN added the mask. Problem solved.

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