[Kevin Camp]

What would be perfect is a Beam effect where you can parent the start and end points to objects, control thickness, spacing and key frame the shape.

Qucik, someone code this and become rich…

use the beam effect then add the venetian blinds effect and add this expression to the direction property:

p = effect(“Beam”)(“Starting Point”)-effect(“Beam”)(“Ending Point”);
radiansToDegrees(Math.atan2(p[1],p[0]))

then just set the transition completion and width values as needed to create the dashes.

i’m not sure i’ll become rich on this though…

Kevin Camp
Art Director
KCPQ, KZJO & KRCW

[Kevin Camp]

here’s an expression by colin braley for repelling layers:

https://colinbraley.com/repel_expressions_tutorial.html

although i haven’t tried it, it looks like the expression should work for 3d layers.

Kevin Camp
Art Director
KCPQ, KZJO & KRCW

[Kevin Camp]

i agree with john, i think you found your font. it’s possible that they used a variation of din, that modified/replaced a few characters to avoid copyright issues (i think the period/decimal is different too).

you can use a font creation tool like type tool to hack the font and either replace certain characters with characters from another font, or modify existing characters with a vector editing tool like illustrator and replace the original character. it’s really not that hard to do, but the software isn’t free (though you might be able to find a similar free tool).

if the 7 is the only issue, and you may be able to get clever with a track matte and an expression to have the trackmatte turn on when you type a ‘7’ and off for any other character.

you can try this:

• type ‘7.00’ (without quotes) on a text layer and make it the size you need.
• create a new, small solid and position it over the tab on the ‘7’ (you can use a mask to refine the matte if needed).
• set the text layer with the 7 to use the small solid as a trackmatte (alpha inverted) (you can adjust the matte layer position if needed).
• then parent the matte to the text layer, so if you need to move the text layer the matte stays with it.
• then add this expression to the opacity of the track matte layer:

txt = parent.text.sourceText;
num = txt.split('.');
if (num[0] == '7') 100 else 0

the expression looks at the characters before the decimal, so if you change the text to 8.00 the matte should turn off, if you change the text to 7.30 the matte will turn back on and hide the tab on the seven

Kevin Camp
Art Director
KCPQ, KZJO & KRCW

[Kevin Camp]

yep, i think particle world would be a better way to go. it won’t give you depth of field, but being a 3d particle system will give you 3d depth, and will be easier to use and faster to render….

try something like this to get the particles to look like they are falling and moving towards the frame of view:

set grid to off

particle:
particle type = faded sphere
birthsize = 0.01
death size = 0.1
birth color and death color = white

physics settings:
animation = direction axis
gravity = -0.1

producer settings:
position y = -0.25
radius z = 0.5

camera settings:
rot x = 20
rot y = 90

i think that would get you close. again, no depth of field, but much more realistic than particle playground.

you can also enable motion blur (on both the layer and preview)

Kevin Camp
Art Director
KCPQ, KZJO & KRCW

[Kevin Camp]

i should have looked at your sample first… since the camera is moving, the snow movement is likely more towards the camera and slightly falling, so 3 layers really doesn’t make for this.

let me think about this for a bit… i’m thinking you might be able to create a system to use as a depth matte for lens blur….

Kevin Camp
Art Director
KCPQ, KZJO & KRCW

[Kevin Camp]

i should also add that you may be able to accomplish the faux dof method more easily with the snow effect on three layers and blur accordingly, but you’ll learn more using particle playground…. even if all you learn is how hard particle playground is to use…

Kevin Camp
Art Director
KCPQ, KZJO & KRCW

[Kevin Camp]

particle playground wouldn’t be my first choice for realistic snow… being a 2d system limits it (as you are finding).

you should be able to use property mappers to affect both the size and speed of the particles, which would help to create the illusion of depth, but i can’t think of a way to add blur to that (there’s no blur in the effect settings).

to fake dof, i think you’ll need to create snow on different layers (i’d plan on three layers, foreground, middle ground and background), varying the size and speed of the particles. then add a blur effect to the layers that need to be blurred due to dof.

there are particle systems like trapcode particular that are 3d systems and have dof built into the effect (you might try the trial version). after effects is bundled with particle world, wichi is 3d, but doesn’t support dof (at least not in my ancient version of ae).

Kevin Camp
Art Director
KCPQ, KZJO & KRCW

[Kevin Camp]

You might see if you can manipulate the Vegas effect. It seems like it would get you close…

Kevin Camp
Art Director
KCPQ, KZJO & KRCW

[Kevin Camp]

if you have the bounce workiing the way you need it, can you just convert that expression to keyframes and then use a loopOut() expression to loop through those keyframes?

you’d need to remove a lot of the redundant keyframes produced by converting the expression to keyframes, but it may work for you…

Kevin Camp
Art Director
KCPQ, KZJO & KRCW

[Kevin Camp]

make sure quicktime is installed

Kevin Camp
Art Director
KCPQ, KZJO & KRCW