[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

There’s a few ways to go about this- John described a good one- here’s a couple more:

you can animate masks with feathered edges on semitransparent white solids.

OR

Use AE lights with Trapcode Lux to make the light cone volumetric.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

The easiest way is to render your Mir animation, track the point where you want the lens flare to be and apply the track info to the lens flare. Animate the intensity and rotation as well- that works 90% of the times.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

Another way would be to do this 3D using Zaxwerks 3D Serpentine:

https://zaxwerks.com/3dserpentine/

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

Mathew already mentioned the way to move the anchor point at the bottom. I would suggest that for the very last step. First animate the stem and branches/leafs forming (use masks on textured shapes created in PSD while also animating the scale for each individual element with the anchor point moved at the bottom of each one – where it connects with the previous piece). Then pre-comp and apply a Mesh Warp to create some movement as it grows – leaves start up and then rotate sideways a bit as they grow and become heavier… . After that precomp again and set anchor point at the very bottom and make the whole plant “grow” by scaling up. You would need of course to play with the timing of the animation for all elements to give it a more organic feel.
Here’s an example of a tree (mid spot) that I made grow using this technique:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCHFw6ocSG8

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

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[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

Like Darby I have a hard time giving specific input without some stills for reference. You definitely need to add blur to your sign and also try matching the grain with your footage – that will do wonders to blend stuff in. Use the footage itself ( a few still frames ) to create the textures for the sign in PSD. A quick way to match the perspective and light in AE directly while giving volume to your sign would be to use FreeForm Pro or ShapeShifter AE to create, extrude and light the sign.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

Try expanding your mesh for Puppet Tool- that may help.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

It could be a combination of AE 3d layers and Zaxwerks Serpentine:

https://zaxwerks.com/3dserpentine/

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

You only need to buy the more complex rig if you don’t want to replicate yourself what the tutorial teaches. If you just follow along and replicate the instructions you’ll get a simple camera rig that can then be improved. The trick to avoid creating a “arm” with the Null is to position the camera at the center ( 0 on all axis for Position) before you link it’s properties to various Nulls.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

I don’t quite get what you’re after, but if I am at least close these can help:

https://www.redgiant.com/products/all/planespace/

https://aescripts.com/layers2grid/

https://www.motion-graphics-exchange.com/after-effects/AlignLayers-Nabscripts/4c39ce9303a03

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

I would suggest a sequence of stills as well which can be altered using expressions. Here’s a link you may find useful:

https://forums.adobe.com/thread/1039818

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist