I've set up a comp with a light behind a large number of grey solids aranged in a grid. The light shines through the grid and onto a perpendicular solid ground-plane.
The thing is, the grid solids aren't casting any shadows. Now, they're in a precomp which is set as a 3D layer, but all the materials options are set correctly. All of the solids AND the precomp are set to cast shadows, and the ground-plane is set to accept shadows. The light casts shadows (and it works with other objects in the scene), but no joy on the solids grid.
Here's an image showing two views of the scene along with the corresponding overhead view to show the camera and light placement. The horizontal line in the overhead view is the solids grid. Also, Trapcode Lux is on to visualize the light cone, but it's not to blame, since there are still no shadows with it off and removed from the comp.
I've been trowling through th interwebs for an answer and it appears a lot of people have come accross similar issues yet I am still to solve my little hiccup.
I have a bunch of 3D layers sitting on a 3D plane. Everything was going swimmingly until I animated these layers in individual pre-compositions, when all the shadows disappeared. All shadow settings are set correctly, lights are in the right places, layers are separeted on Z axis and there are no effects on anything.
I'll include some images so you get the gist:For some reason, 1 shadow is working. i've checked all the settings and nothing seems to be different between them.
Here's a shot of the stats on the working comp:
And one of a non-working comp:
Now the pre-comps are no longer interacting with the ground at all. You can see the working one in the background is hanging out half way through the floor where as the front characters should be doing the same but aren't.
And finally, for some reason, at the 7second mark, it suddenly works again!?
Now, nothing changes at the 7 second mark, the camera and lights are in exactly he same place.
I have a shape with a 4 colour gradient on it but it wont accept shadows unless i turn off the gradient. Is there a way to have shadows on this shape and keep the gradient as well?
3D layers work fine but when I cast shadows from 3D layers after effects quickly crashes with an error ... After Effects Error:bad tracked memory ID (23:35).
I have tested very simple projects to determine if it was shadows creating the problem...simply two 3D layers with on casting shadows onto the other and this seems to be the culprit.
I have tried lowering the advanced composition settings for the shadow mapping down to their lowest settings as well to see if that is a solution but even at 250 the project will still crash. I've also tried ENABLING openGL just to see if my video card played nicer in openGL than not...again crash.
Basics of my system are
AMD PhenomII 3.2ghz quad 16 gig Gskill ram NvidiaGTX285 video card 700watt power supply gigabyte motherboard...if necessary I can give model number but it escapes me at the moment. Vista Home Premium 64bit
I am going to check video card drivers next...but they have been recently updated.
I cannot say if this is a new development as for some time with CS5 I was not working with 3D layers but now on recent projects this is occuring. I am also going to try the same project recreated in CS4 and see what happens.
I have 2 layers, a background image and a round button with a shadow effect.
How can I only export the button, including his shadow, to png ?
I used Photo Impact, and in Photo Impact, I clicked on the layer, I selected "Export object" and the layer (object) was saved to a desired filename (in my case, I want png or tga, with transparency) .
Also, if I have a background layer, a button layer and a text over the button. If I select the button and the text, how can I export them to png (merge them and export them) directly ? Exactly like the case above, but with multiple players.
Why takes the rendering of only 1 layer with 3 letters (incl shadows) over 37 days on a pc with a 3770K, 16gb ddr3 1600, 550/550 SSD and GTX670 2GB....this can't be right....
and when I want to render multiple layers, will it be possible to render them at once instead of layer by layer? If I merge them somehow the shadows are screwed up....
I have PSE11 and purchased Paint the Moon effects. How can I view both the Layers panel and the Effects panel at the same time? Was this an option in older versions of PSE that are used in the Paint the Moon tutorials?
These will be family table parts and assemblies but just to keep it simple for now lets look at non family table parts and assemblies.The attachment is a drawing of a casting, a machine part that is made from the casting and an assembly that uses the machine part.
The casting will have a drawing that has no BOM.The machine part will have a drawing that has a BOM that calls out the casting.The assembly will have a drawing that has a BOM that calls out the machine part.
In the models:
I would like to have an assembly and a machine part the is linked to the casting part so if the casting part changes the machine part and the assembly changes.
In the drawings:
I would like to be able to use existing iproperties or user defined ones and use one parts list style so I can create a drawing of the casting, create a drawing of the machine part where the bom calls out the casting description and part number and a drawing of the assembly that calls out the machine description and part number.
I assume the curb box is included (or not) depending on the casting number? How is something like 3067 handled, which comes with and without a curb box?
Is there any way to seperate a layer from its effects, so that the effects become actual layers that filters can be applied to?
Like if I had an inner shadow, is it possible to remove that shadow effect from the layer itself and make it a seperate layer, so it is still an inner shadow but is its own raster layer, so that it is possible apply a Lighting effects filter to it?
After I am done making a picture I want to add more things to spice it up. You know like adding layers with lower opacity with other effects like text and whatnot. My problem is finding things that go well with the pictures.
I am creating a typographic advertisement and I created the text layers in AI. I imported these files as raster layers and they appear clear within the pre-compositions of AE. The problem that I run into is when I exit the pre-comp and view the final composition the nested layers become pixelated. The layers are vector layers and I have tried everything that I can to correct the problem.
I'm having an issue with the Layers panel, which is docked to my Comp panel, freezing my system whenever I try to click into any other panel. I can open a project, click on a layer to do some painting and then if I try to go back to the Comp panel...it freezes. My only solution is to open the Task Manager and shut down AE. If I save everything before I try to get out of the Layers panel then I am okay but that getting old fast.
I'm working on an hp Z420 Workstation. This system is entirely new as of December 2013 and there haven't been any major issues but this has popped up and it's getting in the way of production.
Is it possible applying those photoshop filters into After effects layers? I thought the filter worked like layers, so when I import the photoshop files to AE I could drag the filter and apply it on a movie layer! I didn't work! Is it possible?
I am using this function for the first time and I am wondering about a dialog that pops up and says:"Some aspects of Effects cannot be reproduced with layers".
I'm trying to create a lower thirds that will include some motion, otherwise I might try Photoshop for this. But basically, I'm trying to create a gradient using ramp in AE so that the lower thrids I've created fades away on the sides. Similar to the image I've attached. I don't know how to make the layer that I put the ramp effect on affect the other layers.
The template has 8 compositions and I'm trying to arrange the compositions to play in the order I'd like them to play.
I tried copying/pasting the layers into a pre-existing composition but the text overlaps with the other text layers.
I also tried to pre compose the layers and then copy/paste that into a composition but it also overlaps. Then I tried to drag it to the bottom and/or move the bar on the sequence but it won't appear when i play.
when I import files from Illustrator, and import them as footage to preserve the layers, I get an object for every layer. However, when I move those layers into my comp, they are either moved by default into the center or wherever I drop them. How would I move them into the comp while preserving the position of the layers in my actual ai file?
when I transform my edit into an after effects composition from the premier timeline the text layers all come over as black solids and the text content is lost.
I don't give two hoots as to your no doubt legitimate technical reasons for this, but the bottom line is that it sucks, it's a waste of my time and effort and it just seems like a simple thing that you should have implemented from the ground up when building the dynamic linking between AE and PR.
Is there an expected timeframe for the issue to be addressed?
Just to explain my typical workflow a little, I'm an editor/motion artist, so it's very frequent I'll lay out all my picture assets and text objects on a video edit timeline alongside vo and music, and once I'm happy with the flow I move the timeline over to Ae to commence animation for tv commercials, political spots, advocacy work, whatever.
I've created a grid of around 80 individual text layers (each layer is a single letter) and first, I want to animate their opacity as a group, then INDIVIDUALLY animate their opacity (again) and color. How do I do this?
Also, while I'm asking, I have two simpler questions:
- is there a way to animate the color of multiple layers at once so I don't have to click on each individual layer and do it manually? - how do I achieve a "swipe" opacity effect? If this is not clear I can explain but I won't bother for now.
I'm working on an image, and I need it to say "The Wedding of Jane Smith."
I have 4 different text layers showing up, and they're all visible. (a real small "the," a much larger "Wedding," a small "of," and a large "Jane Smith.") I like to have the different words on separate text layers so I can move them around and lay them out the way I like.
I got to the point where I wanted to apply blending effects to the text (drop shadow, bevel, whatever). Now, since I have 4 different text layers, what I'd normally do is merge them into one rasterized layer and then do my effects. But I'm wondering if there is a better, more non-destructive way.
I do video graphic design at my job, working with a video editor, and it would be extremely convenient if I could apply effects to multiple text layers without first rasterizing and merging the layers. i.e. when my boss or the client is looking over my shoulder, and I can show him what the text looks like with the blending FX without having to commit to the text placement/size by rasterizing/merging.
all of a sudden, the display in PSE11 is so big on my Mac that I can't see the right-hand screen components, including the layers or effects. I looked all through the preferences and can't figure out how to re-size the display back to the default. I can't even minimize the display enough to grab the corner and pull the window in a little. Is there any way to re-set the display to the default so I can see the layers and effects, without reinstalling the program?
I'm makeing a demo video for an iPhone app and I have a really good PSD template for an iPhone but I'm not seeing a way to move any of the layers around. The reason I need to make adjustments is because it has a nice relfection on the screen and I need to gett the footage from the video underneath the reflection.
I'm matching 3D layers in AE to footage shot with camera. When I try to work with this I seem to work with sizes that AE can't cope with. In real life a layer should be 20 meters away from the camera. When I try to set these settings it jumps back to about 12 meters. ALso the camera can't be offset more than about -12000 mm (12 meters). That's no good. After Effects seems to work with tiny sizes. (you can't use meters or even cm as units, just mm). When I look in top view in my windows everything is out of reach. can't find the camera, can't find the layers. So...of course it's me doing something wrong and AE should be set differently, but how?
I have an old man whose eyes are slitty and so I have created a white with a layer and feathered it round his wrinkles and it looks ok. I can add mask track to this in ae and also track it in mocha. I have an iris import clip that I then need to add to the white. It is in .png.
I cannot make a mask path appear on the layer information to the left of the screen so the iris dances about and can't be tracked.
How do I blend the white mask layer and the iris layer so they move as one? Do I put them together then track them togethr in mocha?
I have spent a day on this trying to figure it. On top of that I would also like to clone an eyelid half open so that I can put this on top of white layer, iris layer and then eyelid and track all together. But if possible the white and iris moving together would be enough.
In the instructions on youtube I have also found that when I hit 3d little cube icon I get a black background on the iris and not the old mans face how do I get rid of that?
This is for a man who gets wolf eyes in the film. Would it be easier to get some wolf eyes in photoshop and stick those on? the clip is just 4 secs long.
I am trying to make extrusions to an image. I am new to Illustrator and have read that .ai files are the only ones that you can extrude in AE. However when I bring in an .ai file and select create shape from vector layer, a grey square covers the shape. I am assuming that it is a transparancy issue and it is just filling in the size of the .ai project. I could be wrong though.
