[Ryan Hannebaum]

Hmm, I’m having a problem controlling the speed of the pre-rendered spinning cog using time-remapping. I need to be able to slow the rotation down to a new constant speed, then speed it up and have it continuously rotate at that faster speed, and so on.

Time-remapping seems more suited for point-in-time calculations, and not continuous animation from one point on into the future. Thoughts?

[Ryan Hannebaum]

Oh my god, why didn’t I think of that? Elegant! And that would be by far the quickest rendering option too, right? Thank you!

[Ryan Hannebaum]

I spoke too soon, and have one problem that should be easy to rectify.

When I lower the value of the Slider for that expression in the Rotation attribute, the spinning actually reverses while between keyframes.

So I have two keyframes on the Slider. The first is set to “1,” and the second is set to “0.1.”

Before the comp gets to the first keyframe, the cog rotates 1 time per second. Perfect. After it reaches the second keyframe, it rotates 0.1 times per second. Also perfect.

But between those two keyframes, as the value drops gradually from 1 to 0.1, the rotation actually goes backward!

I came across this solution, but I didn’t know if maybe there was an easier way, because I don’t fully understand the solution myself…

slider = effect("Slider Control")("Slider");
f1 = timeToFrames(inPoint);
f2 = timeToFrames(time);
accum = 0;
for (f = f1; f < f2; f++){ t = framesToTime(f); accum += slider.valueAtTime(t); } accum*thisComp.frameDuration

Thoughts on keeping the rotation the correct direction while simply slowing down its rate?

[Ryan Hannebaum]

Thanks, that seems to be much much better than using loopOut()! Exactly what I was hoping.

[Ryan Hannebaum]

Thanks. Unfortunate that it’s so complex, but then again, we’re fortunate extrusion is so simple and nice in CS6 I suppose.

Because I’m strained for time on this current project, I just gave up the extrusion and let the layers in question be flat, so that I could apply effects to them while still being able to move them in z-space. But I’ll definitely keep your suggestion in mind when I start new projects in the future!

[Ryan Hannebaum]

Hmm, well I need to be able to move the pre-comp in z-space, so I don’t think making the layer 2D will work for me.

In other words, my pre-comp layer DOES have both Collapse Transformations and 3D checked.

Is there another way to be able to add effects to it?

[Ryan Hannebaum]

Thanks again Philip. So it sounds like when you check the Collapse Transformation box on a pre-comp layer, it essentially makes the layer like a “folder” to group other layers, rather than a fully editable layer unto itself. Is that a fair summary?

[Ryan Hannebaum]

Thanks Philip. The layers inside the pre-comp are extruded. Would the extrusion still show if I made the pre-comp layer itself 2D?

[Ryan Hannebaum]

That worked! I’m not exactly sure why that worked though …. ?

At any rate, thanks again Philip. I don’t suppose you could explain why that was what did the trick? I’m not real savvy with that sunshine icon and its functions.

[Ryan Hannebaum]

The little sunshine icon is there for all the shape layers, but it’s sort of dimmed, and I’m unable to toggle it.