[Walter Soyka]

What exact version of Unmult have you installed (there are a number of them, maybe you can provide a link to the one you’re using)?

What exact error message do you get?

[Walter Soyka]

Do you have any third-party codec packs installed?

What are the preview errors you’re seeing?

[Walter Soyka]

Yes, and it’s pretty straightforward if you’re familiar with scripting. Here’s some commented code:

// create an undo group so we can Control+Z this all away
app.beginUndoGroup("Create new comp with first selected footage");
// assume the first selected item in the project panel is our audio footage.
// in real life, you'd already have an object for this.
// note that I'm not doing any error checking here, so things will go wrong if you don't have a valid selection
var audioTrack = app.project.selection[0];
// create a new comp named after our audio track, 1920px wide, 1080px high, square pixels, at the length of the audio track, and at 29.97fps
var newComp = app.project.items.addComp("Comp " + audioTrack.name, 1920, 1080, 1, audioTrack.duration, 30000/1001);
// add the audio footage as a layer in the new comp
var newAudioLayer = newComp.layers.add(audioTrack);
// close the undo group, that's all, folks!
app.endUndoGroup();

[Walter Soyka]

On your Trim Paths End property, you could use something like:

<pre class=””>linear(time, 0, thisComp.duration, 0, 100);

Here’s a sample project [link] that shows how it works. For bonus points, this project lays out the progress bar proportionately in any size comp.

[Walter Soyka]

I think I would approach this with Trapcode Tao, to make some path-based shapes and fractal distortions.

Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive   |   RenderBreak [blog]   |   Profile [LinkedIn]

[Walter Soyka]

Cavalry is really cool, but it’s not a plugin — it’s a whole separate application. They’re trying to be a really smooth, fast, flexible tool for 2D animation. If you’re familiar with Ae and C4D, you’ll already be familiar with a lot of the concepts in Cavalry.

It’s a brand new product. It’s still got a way to go, but the premise and the architecture show a lot of promise.

Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive   |   RenderBreak [blog]   |   Profile [LinkedIn]

[Walter Soyka]

All the “CC” effects were developed by the third-party developer CycoreFX. They were bundled into the “Pro” versions of Ae way back when (which cost more than the standard edition), and moved into the main release back in the early 2000s.

Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive   |   RenderBreak [blog]   |   Profile [LinkedIn]

[Walter Soyka]

Can you post a screenshot so that we can see what you are seeing?

Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive   |   RenderBreak [blog]   |   Profile [LinkedIn]

[Walter Soyka]

Try clearing your cache.

Edit > Purge All > Memory and disk cache…

Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive   |   RenderBreak [blog]   |   Profile [LinkedIn]

[Walter Soyka]

Ae is not going to work well with 1920 layers.

Trapcode Form is probably the best tool for this — you can use layer maps to manipulate the transparency and color of dots based on their position, it will be much faster than trying to manipulate them all individually:
https://www.redgiant.com/user-guide/form/layer-maps-group/

Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive   |   RenderBreak [blog]   |   Profile [LinkedIn]