[Marc Nibor]

Ok, I guess my description was just bad.
Let me try again…

In short: I want type to act as a lightsource. Is there a way to do this in AE?

In my scene all layers are 3D. The scene is lit by a 20% Ambient light, so it’s quite dark. What I called “background” in my previous post is actually a “brickwall” image. Infront of the brickwall is some moving text flowing in midair. I want the text to act like it was a neonsign and emit some light onto the wall.
I have already tried to attach a pointlight and a spot to the text, but it looked horrible because of it’s shape. It just did not look like the light was coming from the text.

Right now I just had an idea how I probably could fake it. Maybe I could just put a copy of the type layer right in front of the wall, then size it up, blur it or add a glow effect and set it to be fullbright. But I’d still prefer to use a “real” lightsource if possible.

[Marc Nibor]

Thank you Alex,
the Markers did not really work for me in this case, since I wanted the notes to be visible at all time.

While trying to find a solution I tested titles. While I didn’t have the chance to test it extensively it seems like this will do for now.
I made a template with a pretty small font for a still title and no background. I copied it over each item in the timeline and switch the track with the titles on and off when needed. It’s also very fast to edit them just by double clicking on the title item.

Thank you for the help : )

[Marc Nibor]

Thank you Dave.

[Marc Nibor]

Walter and Raja… thank you VERY much! 🙂

[Marc Nibor]

Thanks Walter, that was very valuable Info!

One more question. Each of the comps (the screens inside my main comp) has already some effects applied, is animated and placed individually.

Is this work lost or is there a way how I can replace these comps inside the main comp with the ones that I will create in the project? something like “replace footage” but in this case for the comps.

[Marc Nibor]

Thanks Ted,
almost there.

I use Optical Flares… but there a re still a few minor problems.
I used a pointlight and adjusted the z value just so that it’s right “above” the photo which I turned into a 3D layer as you said.
obviously the light now effects how the photo looks. but if I switch it off, the lensflare disappears too.

I had problems in the beginning with understanding what you meant by “link the flare to the light”. I guess you mean switching the positioning mode inside the optical flares properties to track lights? once I do that the flare is attached to the light and moves with it. but again… if I turn off the light, the flare is off too.

What am I doing wrong?

EDIT:
It works now!
I must have done something wrong before… just went through the whole procedure again and now I can switch off the light and the flare is still there.

THANKS!

[Marc Nibor]

Thanks for all the suggestions.

It helped alot!

[Marc Nibor]

sorry to interrupt.

Thanks, I got both messages!
DNxHD sounds very promising especially because it also supports alpha – although the HD only “limitation” is a bit of a showstopper since I don’t work in HD exclusively.

so one more try… I probably should have been a bit mores specific in the first post.
a “semiprofessional” alternative will do. I use lossless for important stuff. But often I render several versions in different colors etc. This fills up even a 1-2 TB disk rather quickly.

I’m not doing broadcast quality stuff. If a “normal” person can’t tell the difference immediately when viewing it’s ok.

Under those circumstances – is there anything else you can recommend ?

[Marc Nibor]

Thanks, that worked ; )

[Marc Nibor]

Thank you very much Emily for this detailed answer.

I came close with the artifacts… but just resaving was not enough. I actually ended up to size down (transform) and size up the fruits over and over until the quality was matching.

As for the levels… changing the levels alone was not enough. after trying out alot of other things I found that changing the vibrance worked best.

I did not get any satisfying results with the lightangles yet, so I will try out all your suggestions asap –

again…. thank you very much for your effort.

Marc