start/stop expression at specific time

[David Chasterfield]

ohh ok ok , yeah its moving with it now , and the layer don’t really follow the anchor point of the null its following its top right corner ! but with a little adjustment made it perfect , and thanks to you of course , I’ve been searching the net for that for a quite a time now , couldn’t find it or maybe didn’t google the right words , but hey you the man ! thanks for your time and for making it work for me !! keep up 😉

[Christoph Müller]

I know that this is an old thread, still I am trying to get the parenting-expression to work and can’t figure out what I am doing wrong. The ‘child-layer’ follows the ‘Master-layer’ but before, it changes its position and at the end it goes back again to where it was…

This is what I use on the ‘child-layer’:

timeToStart = 2.5;
timeToEnd = 6 ;

if (time > timeToStart && time < timeToEnd)
{
thisComp.layer(“MASTER”).toComp([0,0,0])
}else{
value
}

It seems that the change in position is related to the ‘toComp([0,0,0])’-part. How can I make it work to stay at its place?

[Dan Ebberts]

I can’t tell exactly what you’re after, but maybe this will get you closer:


timeToStart = 2.5;
timeToEnd = 6 ;

if (time > timeToStart && time < timeToEnd){
thisComp.layer("MASTER").toComp([0,0,0]);
}else if (time >= timeToEnd){
thisComp.layer("MASTER").toComp([0,0,0],timeToEnd);
}else{
thisComp.layer("MASTER").toComp([0,0,0],timeToStart);
}


Dan

[Christoph Müller]

Thanks for your reply Dan. It definitely brings me closer but it’s not what I am looking for. What I actually want to achieve is the following:

A character plays frisbee. The frisbee flies towards the character and at a given time he grabs it, moves it around a bit and fires it again into some other direction. So, the frisbee should be able to move on its own but when the character grabs it, it should move along with the hand. Then when he fires the frisbee again, it should be able to move on its own again. Is this possible?

[Dan Ebberts]

I think there’s a piece missing. How do the frisbee and the character get to the same place at the same time?

[Christoph Müller]

The characters hand and the frisbee are two seperate layers. Each one would be individually animated with keyframes. The frisbee comes in from point A to point B which is very close to the grabbing hand. At this point it follows the hand movement and its keyframes (position, rotation) till it is thrown away again. and goes from C to D.

Does that make sense?

[Dan Ebberts]

I must be missing something, because I think that’s exactly what your original expression does. The layer does its own thing before 2.5 seconds and after 6 seconds. In between, it rides along with MASTER.

Dan

[Christoph Müller]

The problem I have is that the frisbee does not stay at the positioned keyframe (B) but moves to another place in the comp when the parenting starts. And at the end of the parenting it goes back again to the original position instead of staying where it went with the parenting.

[Dan Ebberts]

>The problem I have is that the frisbee does not stay at the positioned keyframe (B) but moves to another place in the comp when the parenting starts.

You want it to stay at B when the parenting starts? Sorry, I’m lost…

Maybe someone else can figure it out.

Dan

[Christoph Müller]

lol. I made an AE file to show you what I meant and you know what, you are right (of course you are). Now everything is working as it should… Embarrassing. Sorry to have you bothered with a problem that actually didn’t exist and thanks for your time.