OUGD202 - Software Workshop - After Effects [4]

This After Effects workshop covers the application of text within After Effects and any transformations you can apply. The text tool allows you create more complex animations as opposed to importing text from Illustrator or Photoshop.


Using the type tool in After Effects

You can alter standard format options in the character window. I have set up a standard composition and used the text tool to create the following:

Aswell as having our normal transform properties, we also have another set of properties specific to text. When adding text to an After Effects composition, the anchor point is located in the lower left (above) as opposed to the centre (when importing text from Illustrator / Photoshop).

When altering the anchor point, however, the text layer moves rather than the anchor point itself. The 'Pan Behind Tool' (Shortcut: Y) allows you to reposition the anchor point.

Text Properties

The Source Text tool allows us to change the content and formatting of the text over time. Here I have removed some of the characters and added a keyframe under the 'Source Text' option. I repeated this for each, individual word. As these are 'hold' keyframes, After Effects does not fill in the blanks; instead it shows each word one after another. (Image 2 - hold keyframes)

'Animate'

The Animate tool allows you to apply specific transformations to your text layer. When an option is selected, an 'Animator' drop down menu appears. Here I have chosen 'Position'.

Range Selector

Simply by changing the 'Start' number, we can immediately see what will happen in the composition window. The Start and the End tool are similar to paragraph indents.

Here I have altered the start position to 40% and the end to 60%. Using the offset tool, you can alter where this selection of text occurs, as shown below.

Under the 'Advanced' drop down menu, I changed the units from percentages to 'index' (in terms of characters) which provided much more control as you can select individual characters to animate with. You can also alter whether After Effects animates specific characters, characters without spaces, words or lines. 

Scale

When importing content from Illustrator or Photoshop, there are various options which change the way in which layered objects can be animated. When scaling text, for example, each character scales individually as opposed to the entire word. 

To change this, go to 'Text > More Options > Anchor Point Grouping' and change the option from 'Character' to 'Word', for example. Each word now has a common anchor point. Under the 'Animator 1' menu, you can additional changes.

The text remains editable at all times.

Offset: -100 to 0

40% scale

Start: 0 and End: 100

Path options

In the previous workshop, we looked at using masks in the form of Illustrator artwork to determine which part of a layer was transparent or opaque.