November « 2008 « After Effects region of interest

Archive for November, 2008

November 26, 2008

new features in Camera Raw 5.2 plus the seed of a new workflow section in Help

“Hey, wait a second. What’s the After Effects guy doing blogging about Camera Raw?”

You did know that the Camera Raw plug-in comes with After Effects, too, right?

I’d say that 80% of the still images that I import into After Effects for my personal projects come through the Camera Raw plug-in. (I like my Leica D-LUX 3 very much.)

Anyway, I just wanted to let everyone know that there are a couple of new features in the Camera Raw 5.2 update that was just released. Of course, John Nack and Tom Hogarty have more information on their blogs. Here are a couple of direct links to the sections about the new features in After Effects CS4 Help on the Web.

“Save image states as snapshots in Camera Raw”

“Adjust color or tone using the Targeted Adjustment Tool (TAT) in Camera Raw”

You can check for updates by choosing Help > Updates in After Effects or almost any of the other Adobe applications.

While I was updating Help on the Web for the Camera Raw 5.2 update, I went ahead and made a few fixes and enhancements to the document. One thing that I’m starting to do is collect links to online resources that describe how to accomplish certain large goals in After Effects. Here’s a summary excerpt from the new “Specific workflows in After Effects” section of After Effects Help on the Web:

Most sections of this document are organized according to general tasks that you can perform with After Effects. However, many questions are more focused on a specific end result rather than a specific task. For example, rather than wanting to know how to apply an effect to a layer and blend that layer with other layers, you may want to know how to make fire, smoke, clouds, or a tornado. This section is intended as a repository for links to resources that answer those specific, goal-focused questions.

If you add comments to this section that point to additional resources of this kind, the section will grow to be more useful and more complete.

This section will grow over time… hopefully quickly. Thanks to Rich Young, Steve Muratore, and several others for convincing me to try this.

6:36 PM Comments (0) Permalink

After Effects CS3 scripting guide for enhancement requests and bug reporting

I’m working on updating the After Effects scripting guide for CS4. In addition to documenting the new features, I’m fixing long-standing errors, adding examples, and otherwise trying to make the document better.

So, what do you want to see added, fixed, or changed?

I’ve posted a copy of the After Effects CS3 scripting guide on the Adobe Share (Acrobat.com) site. If you download that document, you can see the errata for the CS3 document. Then—and this is the important part for me—you can make your own comments and send them to me. I’d like to get FDF files (files that just contain Acrobat comments and other markup), but I’ll accept emailed PDF documents, comments on this blog post, comments on the After Effects scripting user-to-user forum, or any other way that you want to send me feedback.

You can email me at kopriva (at> adobe [dot} com.

12:34 PM Comments (0) Permalink

November 19, 2008

things you had trouble finding last month

Every once in a while, I read through the results of the surveys that we have on various parts of the Community Help portions of the website. Though some of you say good things (and that can really turn a crap day into a good one), others point out problems. The most common problem is of the “I couldn’t find…” variety. I take that feedback into account when updating After Effects Help, of course.

Here is a partial list of things that some of you couldn’t find this month.

documentation for mocha for After Effects

Imagineer Systems provides documentation for mocha for After Effects. When you start mocha for After Effects, there’s a Guide item in the splash screen that opens the mocha for After Effects documentation. Choosing Help > Manual in mocha for After Effects does the same.

There are also lots of tutorials on the Imagineer website. The “Tracking and stabilizing motion” section of After Effects CS4 Help on the Web has links. Be sure to read the comments on that page; several folks have posted new links to additional resources.

Another area of confusion is about mocha for After Effects and the trial version of After Effects CS4. As described in the “Installation, activation, and registration” section of After Effects Help on the Web, the trial version doesn’t included several pieces of software that Adobe licenses from other companies. This includes mocha for After Effects.

Help

Several of you said that you couldn’t find After Effects Help. Ouch. That’s not good. Please read my blog post about the new Help system for CS4. And, yes, we’re aware of the irony of having to explain how to use Help. We’re working on it. Please do try out the new Community Help search and let us know what you think.

the very basics

Some people said that they were looking for “the very basics”.

Check out the three items under the “Getting started” section on the After Effects Help and Support page. There are some introductory video tutorials there, plus a link to a very basic explanation of the After Effects workflow.

You can also take just a few minutes to follow the click-by-click instructions in the “Example workflow: Create a simple movie” section of After Effects Help on the Web.

keyboard shortcuts

Occasionally, someone says that they want all of the keyboard shortcuts listed in After Effects Help. Then I say that they are. Really. All of them. Then, after some more conversation, what we find is that the person just wasn’t using the same terminology as that used in the “Keyboard shortcuts” section of After Effects Help.

For example, a little piece of internal Adobe jargon, ‘nudge’, has crept into the lexicon of the After Effects power users. This is in part because that’s the word that’s used in one of the somewhat hidden preferences files that some people occasionally pry open. But, because most people don’t use the word ‘nudge’ but instead use more sensible, common words like ‘move’, we use the word ‘move’ in the documentation.

So, if you can’t find a keyboard shortcut, try searching using different, synonymous words. If you have trouble, feel free to leave a comment at the bottom of a page of Help to let us know what you’re looking for. (Or you could do the same thing in the After Effects user-to-user forum.)

inspiration and example projects

We have some gallery items on the After Effects Help and Support page that are meant to inspire. But, really, if I want to be inspired and get new ideas for motion graphics, I tend to go to Motionographer.

For example projects, I’d check out the “Template projects and example projects” section of After Effects Help and some of the sites listed in the “Community sites” section in the right sidebar of the After Effects Help and Support page, such as Dean Velez’s Motion Graphics Lab.

general color correction information

“About color correction and adjustment”

details about all of the little new features

an unordered, approximately comprehensive list of new features in After Effects CS4

11:19 AM Comments (0) Permalink

November 14, 2008

a little more explanation about Community Help

Community Help comprises the following:

• Complete, up-to-date online Adobe documentation, including After Effects Help on the Web

• Live commenting, moderated by experts (as described in a previous blog post)

• A custom search engine, with which you can search the most relevant online resources for you, Adobe’s customers

This custom search engine includes our own Help documents, Technical Support documents, and tutorials, as well as content created by the larger community (like you). The goal of the custom search engine is to help you to find focused answers faster than with a standard Web search.

You can search Community Help in one of three ways:

• Enter a search query in the After Effects application, using the search box in the upper-right corner of the application window.

• On any page of After Effects Help on the Web, use the search box in the upper-left corner of the page. To search only that document, check the “This Help system only” box.

• On the After Effects Community Help and Support page, use the main search field. To filter a search to only Adobe content, click “All Adobe Help And Support” on the results page.

If you’re offline, pressing F1 or choosing Help > After Effects Help in After Effects takes you to a paltry, out-of-date subset of Help that shipped with the product. Never use this. Use After Effects Help on the Web or the PDF version of Help. If you think that you will ever need Help when you are offline, take a moment to download the PDF version of Help now. You can download the PDF version of Help by clicking the icon at the top right of any page of After Effects Help on the Web. The PDF contains the same up-to-date Help available online (without the comments and other online features, though).

This is a new system. We hope that you’ll explore it and let us know what you think. We are listening to customers’ feedback and are always looking for ways to improve the experience.

Please tell us what you think.

12:49 PM Comments (0) Permalink

November 2, 2008