[Kevin Camp]

Correction to my reply…

You would adjust the Tile Width and Height properties (not the Output Wd & Ht)

[Kevin Camp]

the motion tile effect will do it, you’ll need to adjust the output width and height together, but then it will scale and replicate at the same time.

[Kevin Camp]

Assuming you want the wings to flap, I’d start by using one of the flatter butterflies to make it easier to animate the wings. If the butterfly parts (wings and body) have not been separated into separate layers, I’d probably do that for one of the flatter butterflies in Photoshop and then bring that PSD into AE as a comp. You can make things a little easier if you turn the butterfly so that it points to the right edge of the PSD and then crop the file to the edges of the wings before you importing it into AE.

Import the layered butterfly into AE as a comp with layer size retained, open the comp and make all of the layers 3D. For the wings, move the move the anchor points to the edge nearest the body. Then keyframe the y-rotation to go from 0 to about 90 upwards over a few frames, make those two keyframes easy-ease and then add this expression to make them flap:

loopOut('pingpong')

The wing should now flap up and down in a loop. Adjust the timing to the desired flap speed. and do the process to the other wing and enable motion blur for all of the layers.

Bring that flapping butterfly comp into the main comp where it will form the logo/shape. Make it 3D and enable the Collapse Transformations switch. We’ll use a wiggle() expression to create the random movement, but to control the movement add a Slider expression control to the butterfly and then add this expression to the butterfly’s position:

amp = effect("Slider Control")("Slider") ;
wiggle(1, amp)

Now keyframe the slider value to go from a high value (like 500) to a very low value, like 0 or 1. And enable the orientation to follow the motion by selecting the butterfly and choosing Layer > Transform > Auto Orient and click ‘Orient Along Path’

The butterfly should now start off fluttering around the screen and then come to a landing in the original position. Adjust the slider values and timings as needed.

Now you can duplicate that butterfly and position the duplicates to make the logo/shape when they come to the final position (when the slide is 0 or 1).

To add a bit of randomness to the flapping (so they don’t all flap at the same time), select a butterfly and enable time-remapping and try this expression:

flapDur = 5 ; // this is the number of frames that the wings flap, set as needed
seedRandom( index, true ) ;
value + random( flapDur * thisComp.frameDuration )

Right-click the time-remap property and choose ‘copy expression only’, then choose the other butterflies and paste.

All the butterflies should now flutter around and land at their original positions.

You can vary the slider timings so they don’t all land at the same time. You can also keyframe the positions as needed, so you can have them start off-screen, then move on-screen and they wil still keep the random wiggle movement.

[Kevin Camp]

You might also submit a bug report to Adobe if you haven’t already:

https://www.adobe.com/products/wishform.html

[Kevin Camp]

Here’s what I think they did:

Add a null layer and parent the layer with the motion path that needs to be scaled to the null.

Scale the null layer to match the layer that has the mask that was copy/pasted as a motion path.

Then, if needed, scale the layer with the motion path (not the null) to get it back to the original size before the null was scaled. You could also try an expression to recalculate the scale to match what it was originally, before null was scaled:

xScale = 100 * scale[0] / parent.scale[0] ;
yScale = 100 * scale[1] / parent.scale[1] ;
[xScale, yScale ]

[Kevin Camp]

since you need control over 3 components, you’ll need 3 animators.

add the first animator for opacity, this will be for the first letter. set the animator’s opacity to zero and then add an expression selector and paste this expression into the expression selector’s amount expression:

if ( textIndex == 1 ) { a = 0 } else { a = 100 }
[ a, a, a ]

to get the first letter of the second word, you can duplicate that animator, set the opacity to 100 (since the first animator set it to 0, this one will set it back to 100) and then use this expression in the expression selector:

txt = text.sourceText ;
wrd = txt.split(' ') ;
if ( textIndex == wrd[0].length + 2 ) { a = 100 } else { a = 0 }
[ a, a, a ]

now both first letters should be visible. To animate those, simply animate the opacity property of the those animators.

to get the rest of the letters to reveal, create another animator for opacity, set the opacity to 100, animate the offset property to reveal letters and set the Mode to Subtract.

[Kevin Camp]

I usually parent the layer that needs to move to the other layer to make the expression a little easier, so in this case parent the 11:30et to the 8:30pt, then add this expression to the ET layer:

rect = parent.sourceRectAtTime() ;
x = rect.width ;
value - [ x, 0 ]

Then adjust the x position value of the ET layer for the proper spacing.

After that the x-position of the ET should follow the width of the PT layer.

[Kevin Camp]

It looks like your Channel/Color setting is set to “RGB Straight”. Just bellow the preview window there is an option that is a Red-Blue-Green icon, click on that and set it to “RGB”

[Kevin Camp]

You might also checkout some of Dan Ebberts’ expressions on Motionscript.com. Here is a link to a page that covers a lot of uses for random:

http://motionscript.com/mastering-expressions/random-3.html

If you scroll down to ‘Only a Matter of Time’ there are 3 example s of expressions for time remapping clips — the previews are broken since Flash is dead, but if you simply copy/paste the expression onto a clip, you’ll see the result quickly.

[Kevin Camp]

If you just want random frames, this might work for you.

Drag a clip from the project window onto the new comp icon (this will make a comp that matched the clips specs (size, frame rate, duration, etc), the choose layer > time > enable time remapping and add this expression:

random( outPoint )

then add the comp to the render queue.