After Effects Software Workshop 1

Learning all the basics today.

Photoshop for video.

The active panel is always highlighted with yellow.

Top left is the project window - this is where compositions live, any imported documents.
To the right of this is the visual of what working with.
Bottom right has a timeline.
Bottom left is where the layers go.
The top right window is different workspaces. This should be reset to standard.

By default there is an info window which also includes an audio window.
Just below this is a preview options.
Under this is the effects menu. This gives different things that can be used in this software.

New composition
Rename the composition. The actual window of Aftereffects is a project which can have multiple compositions within it.
Next option down gives us presets. Today we're working with PAL D1/DV Widescreen Square Pixel

PAL is what we use in the UK. This is working at a frame rate of 25 per second.
Once this is selected it automatically selects the width and height.

Always start at 0 seconds for start time. The duration is important. Hours:Minutes:Seconds:Frames

Working to 10 seconds for today. This can be changed at any time.

The colour mode that we are using is RGB. There is also HSB but we wont use this for now. Having RGB set to 0 is nothing, meaning no light is coming through, 255 is the highest value.

Once we click ok, this now changed the look of the window.

Selecting the composition on the left then going to composition at the top will allow us to go back to the previous window and change anything if need be.

To create a layer to work with go to layer at the top. This gives multiple options to choose from. Here we are working with solid.

Anything in yellow for numbers in terms of size can either be clicked on to change or click and drag them and this will also change it.

When click ok, this places it in the center of the screen.

The toggles on the bottom left will be revealed at a later date. In the time line is had put the bar on for the full 10 seconds, so this means that this square will appear for the full 10 seconds on the screen.

To scroll between the time frame, click and drag on the little yellow icon above the red line. The rest line is what frame of the composition is being shown.

Moving the length of the red bar within the timeline window changed how long that layer is on screen and when within the composition.

Move the layer by clicking and dragging it about.

A layer can only contain one thing at a time. To add more layers just do the same process.

They each have their own bar on the time line.

There are more ways to play stuff back than clicking and dragging the red line. This is the quickest way to see if something works, and testing things out.
Another way to play things back is to press the space bar. This is useful for simple things. It can only deal with small bits at a time.
The other way to preview if something works is the menu bar on the right. This buffers up first and loads it into its ram memory and plays the project back in real time.

The 'full' option can be edited to have a lower quality which may help the real time playback. It only effects the viewing on screen whilst working on it, it doesn't change the final export of it.

The bottomlayer in the pallet is the bottom of the stack and and places on top of it will cover it in the screen also, similar to Photoshop.

To zoom in and out can either use the scroll ball on the mouse, also either the option in the bottom left of the screen, or press cmd and + or -

To zoom in on the timeline, on the grey bar at the top there is little yellow tabs (top ones). Moving these allows us to zoom in to look closer at a specific time frame within the composition. Clicking and dragging the middle then allows you to scroll between the whole composition at that zoom.

The tool key is another cool function. It is the key between shift and z. This pushes the window to the maximum I can go. The window that is selected.