[Topher Welsh]

I would take the layers, and precomp them, and then go into the precomp and apply the mask there.

Topher Welsh
Head Editor & Motion Graphics
http://www.scout.com

[Topher Welsh]

Okay, now I get it… I thought that since Realtime Update was checked, if i dragged the radius up or down, it would show me, but the book didn’t tell me that I needed to hit the apply button…

Thanks so much Adam… I’m sure your gonna be getting a lot more of these ridiculous questions from me… hahaha

Topher Welsh
Head Editor & Motion Graphics
http://www.scout.com

[Topher Welsh]

First off, whats your system look like… and also what is the font that you are using for the text? I know when I was tring to create some text using the BleedingCowboys text, (you should google that to see what I am talking about) there were so many artifacts going along with that font (dust, lines, things that make it look cool) that it slowed down the PA interface when opened as a plugin in After Effects to the point that it was taking forever for it to render one frame just for a preview.

IF this is your problem I suggest that you make sure you are in DRAFT 3D mode… also if you just got PA and you are trying to do text with lots of extra stuff on the font, that slows down and eats ram up because it has to render all of those individual peices.

I would say you could go two ways, find an easier font to work with… or bring it into illustrator, and do the make outlines function, delete the unneeded artifacts, save it as an .ai WITH COMPRESSION TURNED OFF, import as an illustrator file into PA.

Remember these are all situations with me assuming your situation.

Good luck and get back to me!

Topher Welsh
Head Editor & Motion Graphics
http://www.scout.com

[Topher Welsh]

Check your render settings and make sure in the VIDEO OUTPUT that CHANNELS are set to RGB+Alpha

Topher Welsh
Head Editor & Motion Graphics
http://www.scout.com

[Topher Welsh]

Well make sure that it is the SOLID draft 3D line instead of the dotted one… kind of confusing…

If that doesnt work… check out JD’s tutorial on layer mapping… maybe there is something that I am forgetting

https://www.motionworks.com.au/tutorials/tutorials_download/invig_layermap.mov

Topher Welsh
Head Editor & Motion Graphics
http://www.scout.com

[Topher Welsh]

If you mean where in the effects panel… its Effects>Simulation>CC Mr Mercury

Topher Welsh
Head Editor & Motion Graphics
http://www.scout.com

[Topher Welsh]

Here is a picture of where the transparency switch is.

https://img169.imageshack.us/img169/2046/tswitchqu9.jpg

once you click that off, your default background will be gone, and then you can stick a picture or more footage behind your keyed out footage.

I think what you are trying to do with the whole flash video idea is you just want to make it a flash video once you have a finished product.

I would just focus mainly on creating the keyed out footage the way that you want it in After Effects, and then export that to a file such as quicktime or .avi and then find a free converter somewhere like download.com

Unless AE has a flash export setting that I can’t find for the life of me.

Topher Welsh
Head Editor & Motion Graphics
http://www.scout.com

[Topher Welsh]

You need to make sure you have DRAFT 3D turned off in the switches panel.

Topher Welsh
Head Editor & Motion Graphics
http://www.scout.com

[Topher Welsh]

Ohhhhhh okay… now I understand… looks like I’m hittin the old PS then.. damn I was really hoping there might be a way to make it in PA!

Thanks for the response though, I really appreciate it…. now I can quit racking my brain.

Toph.

Topher Welsh
Head Editor & Motion Graphics
http://www.scout.com

[Topher Welsh]

[Hamid Rohi-Bilverdy] “I tried a couple of times now, but i only get a black screen in the back :-(“

Your footage does have the background transparent, just by default you screen has a black background. There is a switch at the bottom of you preview window that has a white/grey checkerboard, hit that, and you should see that the background is transparent.

Or you could just find a background jpeg and drag it into your comp underneath your footage so your layers would look like this:

FOOTAGE
BACKGROUND_Picture.jpg

Topher Welsh
Head Editor & Motion Graphics
http://www.scout.com