[Brendan Mccullough]

Wow! This takes me back. I had an email setup to notify me of responses to this thread. Crazy.

I hardly use AE much anymore, as I’m primarily an editor, but if you copy and paste your code, I’ll take a look.

[Brendan Mccullough]

Thanks, Koby.

[Brendan Mccullough]

Perfect. Thank you for your help.

Like I said, there are some glaring errors with my code, as I was messing with various iterations right before I posted, so I definitely (at one point at least) had just time-inPoint in place of Math.sin(time).

In fact, I’m fairly certain at one point I had your code, almost exactly, except for placing value outside of the ease() at the end. I’m not exactly sure what is accomplished by placing value outside of the ease statement, but it is apparently the secret sauce. Can you elaborate on what you accomplish by placing it outside the function?

This is so simple I’m mad I couldn’t make it work 😉

[Brendan Mccullough]

I’ve got a fair handle on expressions, but you obviously have some experience with javascript, because I had to look up the if statement shorthand you used. For those that were confused by the conditional,

(time < delay) ? sin : sin/Math.exp(decay*(time-delay))

it is the same thing as writing

if(time < delay) { sin; } else { sin/Math.exp(decay*(time-delay)) }

Google gave me clarification at this link (blog.techsaints.com).

I learned something new today! I love new shortcuts. 🙂

[Brendan Mccullough]

Try modifying the expression used in the AE preset ‘buzz words’ (or ‘pop buzz words’, I don’t remember what it is). It parses a list of words separated by pipes (|), so you should be able to add words and specify how long they stay on screen.

[Brendan Mccullough]

Option 1: Create a spiral to your liking in Adobe Illustrator, copy the path, and paste it on the position property of a Null, and parent the position of particular (in the effect, not the layer) to the position of the Null.

Option 2: Use this expression for your particular position (this will require some experimenting):

freq = 10;
amp = 10;
multiplier = 1.5;
x = Math.sin(time*freq)*(amp*multiplier);
y = Math.cos(time*freq)*amp;
[x, y];

You could link the freq, amp, and multipler values to sliders with the pickwhip to experiment a little more easily.

I haven’t tried this myself because I’m in the middle of digitizing for an edit right now, but I think it should work.

Good luck! I hope you make your deadline.

[Brendan Mccullough]

Make a new solid in whatever color you want your shadow to be, double click the elliptical mask tool to create a new circular mask on it, feather it out (make to look shadowy, if that’s a word 😉 ), make this layer 3D, and orient it underneath your product layer to your liking.

Then, link the Y position of the product to the scale (and maybe even the opacity) of the shadow layer using the linear() (or ease()) function something like this:


productPos = pickwhip to your product layer's y-position;
bottom = y value of product at rest on the 'floor';
top = y value of product as high as you want to make it;
shadowSmall = whatever size the makes the shadow look correct when the product is at rest;
shadowLarge = whatever size makes it look correct when the product is in the air. Eyeball it;
linear(productPos, bottom, top, shadowSmall, shadowLarge);


Apply the same concept to opacity. Dig it?

[Brendan Mccullough]

I was playing with making the emitter do circles this morning, so maybe this will help you. I may be misunderstanding your problem.

I applied the following to the X/Y position property of particular:

width = <i>someValue</i>;
speed = <i>someOtherValue</i>;

value + Math.sin(time*speed)*width;

and then to the Z position property:

width = someValue;
speed = <i>someOtherValue</i>;

value + -Math.cos(time*speed)*width;

this is off the top of my head, so please forgive any errors.

Anyway, this will create a halo ring, then animate your null with the camera parented to it.

[Brendan Mccullough]

Check out this tutorial from Harry Frank. He uses an include statement at the start of an expression to reference a text file that contains variables which are called based on the comp name. It’s a super-ingenious alternative to scripting that probably fulfills 90% of most people’s needs.

[Brendan Mccullough]

Set your Y rotation equal to time, and then multiply it by your slider control. That way, when the slider control is set to 0, it’ll be time x 0 = 0, but anything higher will increase the rotation speed.