Week 1 (14th October 2013)
During the first tutorial we were able to look into basically navigating around the interface and making sure that we knew what each area did, as After Effects is split into different sections. We then started to look at drawing out shapes and adding in key framing so we were able to create a mini 10 second animation that showed clearly the shapes blinking in and out, or moving across the screen into a different location. This is a good skill to have I guess but will probably not end up helping us in the long run as we want our videos to look realistic and not have random shapes flying around the screen.
Week 2 (21st October 2013)
Today we started looking at Photoshop and how to set up an image to import into After Effects. On Photoshop there is a Film and Video preset already so we don't need to set up the size of the image; and the size of this preset is also the same as the preset on After Effects that we used last week. We then created a simple shape on Photoshop, which had a translucent background to be able to import into After Effects. We created a new composition in After Effects and then changed the background colour, to something other than white, so we could see the translucent effect. We created 2 different versions of the picture from Photoshop; one that had been cropped and one that hadn't. The one that wasn't cropped fit to the composition, but then the one that wasn't cropped could be moved around and didn't fit exactly, which would eventually be a disadvantage. We then quickly went over key framing again but this time we used realistic images and got them to move, which did look very effective once it was rendered out.
Week 3 (28th October 2013)
During todays sessions we learned about Interpolation, which is where After Effects chooses how a motion works between two key frames. Each key frame has two anchor points which we can use to changes the angle of the motion path to create curves. We started with four squares simply moving from left to right across the screen at a constant speed, but we wanted to make it more realistic by adding in acceleration and deceleration, as this is how thing move in the real world. I then changed the type of key frame to one which would allow me to change the various aspects of the key frame like the opacity, position, scale and rotation. We then used the graph editor to be able to change the speeds of the squares so that they would move at different times. After this produced a small animation in which a ball rolls down a hill, accelerating, and then rolls gradually back up the hill at the other side, deceleration. At this point we also added rotation into it so that it added more realism into it and would create the illusion that the ball was actually rolling.
Week 4 (4th November 2013)
Today we started by creating new solid same size as composition, which was the same size as the previous weeks. We started today's session by looking at masks and how we can use them to alter the transparency of a solid shape or an area of the comp. Masks on After Effects works in the same way as they do in Photoshop but here they are used on different layers using a vector shape and using the pen and shape tools on the top toolbar. We started by using the rectangle tool to test this quickly and we created a smaller rectangle on the background which has a yellow outline in which all things outside of the yellow mask are now transparent; this can be used to also create outlines for text or if some areas of the composition need to be transparent, like with green screen. We can then use the different tools to feather the edges, change the opacity and then change the mask size so that it overlaps the edge of the mask itself.
We then took the scene from last week, but this time created a small car that was going to roll down the hill instead. We then used a parent-child relationship to attach the body of the car together to the wheels so that we could get it to roll across the screen. We used the rotate tool to rotate the wheels over the seven seconds of footage and then parented this to the body of the car so that as the car moved across the screen the wheels would rotate but still stay attached to the body whilst staying together wherever it was moved to.
We then created a small animation of a car that blew out a buff of smoke that went up the chimney of the car and then got bigger as it floated out the car before disappearing. We then looked at expressions in After Effects so that we could change the way in which we copied keyframes so that the animation could be repeated over and over while still having the ability to change aspects of it later; this is a really good technique when you are creating something that repeats over and over again.
Final Composition
To round up our After Effects induction we created a final composition that incorporated everything that we had looked at to date, we used the background and animation from the 3rd lesson and then added in the animation we had done in today's, 4th, lesson. We used the footage from last week and imported in the car animation, and replaced the ball rolling with the car instead so that it followed the motion path we already created. Once the car was in we changed the size so it was the correct scale and then made the change to make it orient along the motion path we had already put in so that it moved correctly. We then had a few things to change around like the wheels moving before the car does and other things like that, but I am really happy with my final piece which is shown below, the only thing I'm not too happy with is the smoke.
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