Rotate 2d object in After Effects

[Anthony Giola]

Hi Shaun,

I like Dave’s Idea but there is another way which may be harder but could potentially make a better quality Cylinder. Use a 3D program. I would have to recommend Cinema 4D just because it would be easiest. If you dont have it just download the demo, it will render in 640×400 as max resolution but if you know how to mess with it you should make it look like its a much higher resolution.

[Joey Foreman]

Well yea, that would make a helluva better cylinder, as far as cylinders go. But that’s a lot of dough to shell out ($995.00) to make a can.
Because no, there’s not really a way to “mess” with a 640 x 480 image to scale it up to full frame HD.
Not to mention the time investment needed to get up to speed in a 3d app, even C4D.
But if time’s no object he’d be just as well off learning Blender for free.
A happy compromise, I suggest, would be Zaxwerks 3d Invigorator for AE.

Easy to use, and a fourth the price of C4D.

https://zaxwerks.com/invigorator_classic/index.shtml

Just a note, it’s generally considered bad forum form to advocate using non-commercial versions of software for commercial work by circumventing the license agreement. About a notch below advocating cracked software, so take care;)

[Michael Szalapski]

I agree with Joey on all counts but especially on Zaxwerks 3d Invigorator. It is a great choice for working with “actual” 3d items in AE.

– The Great Szalam
(The ‘Great’ stands for ‘Not So Great, in fact, Extremely Humble’)

No trees were harmed in the creation of this message, but several thousand electrons were mildly inconvenienced.

[Shaun Kurian]

Thanks everyone for sharing your expertise- I am trying to accomplish this task with CC Cylinder and also with 3D Invigorator. I am able to get the cylinder object shape and able to rotate in “3d” with both plugins, but the challenge is making the cylinder look similar to the psd I uploaded in my initial question. With CC Cylinder, I need to apply the effect to a metallic and glossy texture that, as Dave LaRonde mentioned, I need to build. And I presume with 3D Invigorator, I need to use the Layer Map function of the plugin. But here’s my question- how can I go about creating a metallic texture that looks like the psd cylinder object’s surface? Many thanks for your suggestions.

[Anthony Giola]

As far as I saw I never read anything about his work being commercial. I may be mistaken but on my first read through of his post i did not see any mention of commercial gain.