[Patrick Hearn]

Best off googling scripting in After Effects and having a look at some resources. Read the adobe documentation probably and make a start on it then post here if you’re stuck on any particular part.

[Patrick Hearn]

EDIT:
IGNORE ALL THIS – IT’S UTTER RUBBISH.
(I’ll be interested to see how(if) someone does do it)

OK, just working off the top of my head here.

You’ve got a null for each side of the book (BookL, BookR) and a null for controlling the shutting which BookL is parented to which is on the spine(BookC). Book C rotates to shut the book (actual structrula elemnts of the books I’ll leave to you).

Anyway, even if ther’s a better apporach to that, in the end you’re going to have a null on each side of the book, one of which will move in an arc to the other.

You have a photo you want to pop up. It’s split into 2 layers, left and right side (PhotoL, PhotoR). The anchor point is at the bottom left and right of the images respectively. They’re parented to BookL And BookR respectively.

As the book shuts now the photos will intersect with the book – bad.

OK so we just keyframe (or expression if you want to be able to change speds and stuff easily later) the photos to rotate down to flat.

Probably going to run into some issues keeping the esdges together i guess.

Actually you’ve probably already tried this and that’s what you’re asking about.

Never mind, I might give the a go and post again when I’ve a betteer idea

[Patrick Hearn]

Parent the camera to the null and rotate the null object, make sure it’s in 3d.

[Patrick Hearn]

x=thisLayer.position[0];
y=thisLayer.position[1];
Ax=thisLayer.anchor[0];
Ay=thisLayer.anchor[1];

[x+Ax-(width/2), y+Ay-(height/2)]

That should be better, assuming that previously all your anchor points were in the centre of the layers.

[Patrick Hearn]

Create an expression on the property: position. (Alt + Click on the stopwatch)
Enter this:

x=thisLayer.position[0];
y=thisLayer.position[1];
Ax=thisLayer.anchor[0];
Ay=thisLayer.anchor[1];

[x+Ax, y+Ay]

This will at first mess up your comp, you will prob have to rearrange some things, but it will mean you’re able to move anchor point without affecting position.

(There’s a better way of doing this, I’m sure. So I’m well prepared to be shamed into submission by Dan Ebberts. This was just my first thought, I’ll have another look and post again I I get a better solution)

[Patrick Hearn]

Double click on the layer name in the timeline, type your text.

Alternatively, select the text tool and click on the layer.

[Patrick Hearn]

As a note. You may have to tweak the levels just a little for screen towrk, in case your black isn’t completely black.

[Patrick Hearn]

OK. I’m going to assume your setup is this:
·image of earth as a globe
·paths for lines
·stroke effect animated to draw onto paths

Now you say the earth is scaling down… I’m guessing you start in close and then move out. Perhaps precomp the earth and masks and scale that.

Better yet, if you want a better looking move away (if indeed that is what you’re doing) make the precomp a 3d layer and create a camera. Now snimate the camera away from the layer. The rate of size change is much more natural this way.

[Patrick Hearn]

Thanks fro the reply.

I think I’ve got an idea of what I’ll get from doing this, I’ll give it shot.

I did have a thought today about it. I tihnk i’ll try to crash zoom out. Often I see effects to move between a very close up shot and a wide shot when it’s clearly impossible to have acheived with real camerawork.

Not entirly clear in my head exactly how i’m going to acheive it, but I’ve got a few ideas. I’ll post again when I’ve had a go, for posterity.

[Patrick Hearn]

Using a batch renamer on the resultant files from Mazaika or simply naming them numerically would mean you could just import as an image sequence rather than each image individually.