Adobe After Effects CC Cource

Course overview:

After Effects is designed to allow those new to video animation techniques or who are self-taught, to get the most from immensely powerful software. Learn to create rich compositions with video, Photoshop, Illustrator and other files. Create advanced test effects, video blending, keying effects and track mattes. Learn basic through advanced animation techniques that make After Effects an unrivaled motion graphics toolset. This course introduces you to the newest techniques and tools used in Adobe after Effects CC 2017.

Prerequisites

Good working knowledge of Mac or Windows.

Job profile

Graphic designers, motion designers

Course Outline

1. GETTING TO KNOW THE WORKFLOW
About the After Effects work area
Getting started
Creating a project and importing footage
Creating a composition and arranging layers
About layers
Adding effects and modifying layer properties
Animating the composition
About the Tools panel
About timecode and duration
About the Timeline panel
Previewing your work
Optimizing performance in After Effects
Rendering and exporting your composition
Customizing workspaces
Controlling the brightness of the user interface
Finding resources for using After Effects
Review questions and answers


2. CREATING A BASIC ANIMATION USING EFFECTS AND PRESETS
Getting started
Importing footage using Adobe Bridge
Creating a new composition
Working with imported Illustrator layers
Applying effects to a layer
Applying and controlling effects
Applying an animation preset
Previewing the effects
Adding transparency
Rendering the composition
Review questions and answers


3. ANIMATING TEXT
Getting started
About text layers
Installing a font using Typekit
Creating and formatting point text
Using a text animation preset
Animating with scale keyframes
Animating using parenting
About parent and child layers
Animating imported Photoshop text
Animating type tracking
Animating text opacity
Using a text animator group
About text animator groups
Animating a layer’s position
Timing layer animations
Adding motion blur
Review questions and answers


4. WORKING WITH SHAPE LAYERS
Getting started
Adding a shape layer
Creating custom shapes
Duplicating shapes
Duplicating and modifying a composition
Positioning layers with snapping
Adding compositions to a 3D project
Adding the finishing touches
Extra credit
Review questions and answers


5. ANIMATING A MULTIMEDIA PRESENTATION
Getting started
Using Creative Cloud Libraries in After Effects
Adjusting anchor points
Parenting layers
Precomposing layers
Keyframing a motion path
Animating additional elements
Applying an effect
About solid-color layers
Animating precomposed layers
Animating the background
Adding an audio track
Supported audio file formats
Editing audio files in Adobe Audition
Review questions and answers


6. ANIMATING LAYERS
Getting started
Preparing layered Photoshop files
About Photoshop layer styles
Simulating lighting changes
Duplicating an animation using the pick whip
About expressions
Animating movement in the scenery
Adjusting the layers and creating a track matte
About track mattes and traveling mattes
Animating the shadows
Adding a lens flare effect
Adding a video animation
Rendering the animation
Retiming the composition
Review questions and answers


7. WORKING WITH MASKS
About masks
Getting started
Creating a mask with the Pen tool
Editing a mask
About mask modes
Creating a Bezier mask
Feathering the edges of a mask
Replacing the content of the mask
Zooming and panning by touch
Adding a reflection
Creating a vignette
Using the Rectangle and Ellipse tools
Adjusting the timing
Tips for creating masks
Trimming the work area
Review questions and answers


8. DISTORTING OBJECTS WITH THE PUPPET TOOLS
Getting started
About the Puppet tools
Adding Deform pins
Defining areas of overlap
Stiffening an area
Animating pin positions
Squash and stretch
Recording animation
Act it out with Adobe Character Animator
Review questions and answers


9. USING THE ROTO BRUSH TOOL
About rotoscoping
Getting started
Creating a segmentation boundary
Using Adobe Premiere Pro with After Effects
Fine-tuning the matte
Refine Soft Matte and Refine Hard Matte effects
Freezing your Roto Brush tool results
Changing the background
Adding animated text
Outputting your project
Extra credit
Review questions and answers


10. PERFORMING COLOR CORRECTION
Getting started
Previewing your project on a video monitor
Adjusting color balance with levels
Adjusting color balance with Color Finesse
Replacing the background
Color-correcting using Auto Levels
Motion tracking the clouds
Replacing the sky in the second clip
Color grading
Extra Credit
Review questions and answers


11. USING 3D FEATURES
Getting started
Creating 3D text
Using 3D views
Importing a background
Adding 3D lights
Adding a camera
Extruding text in After Effects
Working with Cinema 4D Lite
Integrating the C4D layer in After Effects
Finishing the project
Review questions and answers


12. WORKING WITH THE 3D CAMERA TRACKER
About the 3D Camera Tracker effect
Getting started
Repairing rolling shutter distortions
Tracking the footage
Creating a ground plane, a camera, and the initial text
Creating realistic shadows
Adding ambient light
Creating additional text elements
Locking a layer to a plane with a null object
Animating the text
Adjusting the camera’s depth of field
Rendering the composition
Review questions and answers


13. ADVANCED EDITING TECHNIQUES
Getting started
Using Warp Stabilizer VFX
Bicubic scaling
Warp Stabilizer VFX settings
Using single-point motion tracking
Checking for drift
Moving and resizing the track points
Using multipoint tracking
mocha for After Effects
Creating a particle simulation
Understanding Particle Systems II properties
About high dynamic range (HDR) footage
Review questions and answers


14. RENDERING AND OUTPUTTING
Getting started
Creating templates for the Render Queue
About compression
Exporting using the Render Queue
Preparing movies for mobile devices
Rendering movies with Adobe Media Encoder
Preparing a movie for broadcast output
Review questions and answers