Flower Animation

I watched chapter 8, this chapter is all about animating the three layers together and timing them the way you want. It is a difficult one but I made it through. You have to animate something from each layer and put them together at the end to have the perfect flower . Please let me know if you have any questions.

Tips :
Be patient.
The stem is hard to do, just use the pen and make three points up without anything showing , then put a stroke.
Do not waste much time on drawing skills
Good Luck !!

                                                   Here is my final result

Repeater

I'm at chapter 7 now.  In this chapter you will learn  ways to make a flower, using a repeater and without a repeater.  I followed what he did step by step. Be careful to follow exactly what he is doing and put the same values he is putting if you are a beginner and you will have the same results.  This will make you discover more what you can do with a shape layer.  I did create the stem , feel free to create it as well.  Plus you can try to animate the flower if you like. This will be extra work .

Transform button

Now I began Chapter 6 and it also explains more about the shape layers and what is the function of the transform button. It is a really easy chapter so I hope you will understand it ! It gives you a detailed explanation of how to manipulate shape layers and animate them either individually or together. Take notes , if you have any questions I'm here

Congratulations , you have made it so far!!

If you managed to keep up with me and finish all the tutorials so far I can tell you that you are on your way to success ! Now I will give you a little exercise to practice what you have learned.

Instruction : make a see saw out of shape layers , a rectangle go down on the wood and the ball go up as soon as the rectangle hit the wood . I will put you a picture to have an idea about what I'm talking about

Tips : use all shape layers so you can animate them

     If you are facing any problem I'm always available for you questions

Shape layer Vs Solid layer

After watching these 6 minutes of shape layers video you can start with this video. I have 42 chapters of tutorials on my pc.  Each chapter have their own exercises. Anyway Chapter 1 2 4 are nothing so I will started with Chapter 3 and 5 and this will be your forth projects. file project 4. You don't need assets for this one. I will the 2 chapters for you. Every time I finish a chapter i will upload it. I sometimes don't finish the whole tutorial but I will get back to it later on.  Chapter 3 explain 6 major terms used in after effects :  Composition, Layers , Animation , Effects , 3D, Randoring. Take notes ! Chapter 5 explains the difference between solid and layer and explain further how shape layers work.

PS : if you don't understand a word : Just search for it!

Shape Layers

After you finish the step of animating an orange and throwing it from the table, I watched a youtube video about shape layers. I haven't finished the whole video yet but I have watched only 6 minutes of it because believe me you will need it for later.  Please do watch 6 minutes of it and remember to take notes and work on the software at the same time. Save your project as usual and this will be your project 3 file and save it in ae composition file. I think no assets are required for this tutorial.  Now you have 3 tutorial videos to save in a file called tutorials: tutorial 1 :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tR3fpv4Aco      Tutorial 2:  Jeff Foster animating the orange         

Tutorial 3 : Shape layers : here is the link:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U29Mj9d_rL0&index=5&list=PL9rnDcgHTOxiLPjJRbzO5GOzcahqZW19-

 ( with this video - shape layers- you will learn how to create a shape layer, change its color , you will know what a stroke is and how to animate it)

Animating the orange

The video of jeff foster is one hour and a half. You need 10 minutes from it to work on  animating the orange. Since the video is on my pc not online , I had to upload each minute alone ! Sorry . Watch it and take notes and if you have any questions , I'm always available 24/7. Everything I'm learning I will be posting here. 

 You can join me step by step in the learning process. I will upload all the parts I will be watching from this video later on. 

What I did Next

Next thing I watched is jeff foster video , now this video is one hour long but fortunetly , I only watched about 10 minutes of it and I will tell you why.  I only wanted to learn to do one thing from this video  and it is how to animate an orange. Of course I will get back to the video but not right now. As usual, take notes, watch carefully and try to understand the steps. The video I will upload down below.  You have to select 2 images from google for this tutorial , a table and  half an orange. You might have trouble selecting these images but I will make it easy on you. You have to put on google wood table. Select a table that is close to the on his using in the video. Write  : wood table . png. and download it from the website when you choose the picture. Why . png? because it transparent , no white in the backgroung. Select an image that has grey squares behind it, it means that the background is transparent. Do the same for half orange, also. png image with no background. Once you choose them save them directly in a asset file of project 2 . Project2 file > assets > save images. Don't forget the a-e compistion file as well.  Remember, auto save files will show up and they are importnt , leave them.  Save the project like I told you in my first post. Import these images to the after effect and start working ! Good Luck . just finish the part where you make the prange drop frothe table. 

If you have any questions feel free to ask !

What I have done so far

I have been working on After Effects for a few days now and I will guide through each step I took in order to learn the software. First I started with this Video , After Effects for beginners  and I recommend would start with this video here is the link to it :   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tR3fpv4Aco  This will get you started on the basics , I strongly recommend that you get a notebook and get started on taking notes. Watch the entire 20 minutes and take notes as much as you can. Your notes can be pictures, sentences, whatever suits you, but it is important that you will understand once you refer back to them. For me, I just filled the pages with notes and on the back of my notebook, I wrote all the key controls and abeviations I needed to learn so I don't forget them.  In this vieo you wil learn about scale, position , oppacity, masking, vignettes, solids, texts what a layer and compostion is and believe me these are very important to get started. I suggest that if you find difficult terms to search them on their own and really understand what they mean. Here is a picture of the tutorial so you are sure that it is the one I used. 

When you finish , save the link of the video in a file called tutorials , and you can name the sub file tutorial one and then save the link in microsoft and save microsoft file in the tutorial 1 folder. 

There is also something very important and it is to organise your saved after effects files.  For example, in this tutorial you will use a downloaded picture and a footage ( video) of some kind and you learn to work with them. These pictures you used must be saved. It is easy , name a file Project1 and inside it create 2 other file, one called assets and the second one call it " a-e composition ". In the assets file save all the pictures and videos you used in your tutorial for after effect, for example , in the first tuturial you will save the video and the image you imported in the after effect soyou don't lose them. Of course  when you save your work on after effects, save the file in th a-e composition, and name the after effect file you saved  something you will not forget and something you learned in this tutorial. For example, name the after effect file : masking , solids, text, basics , whatever.. 

Introducing Myself

Dear readers, 

My name is Carole , I'm 24 years old from Lebanon Middle East. I have recently started working on a software called After Effects CC 2015 so I can learn animation. My brother is really good in this field. His major is Computer Graphic Animation ( CGA).  He finished his major and with the help of his friends , he now has a stable job at a company and is working on a movie too. As for me , I have a BA in educational psychology. I couldn't find a job in my field but the thing is, my brother decided to help me learn everything about animation. Now I decided to share with you my experience in learning after effects on your own. Please if you are reading this I really would like to hear from you and know what you actually think. If you are ready to keep up with me let me know , believe me I have a great mentor. Plus , I will be posting every step of the learning process so install after effects cc 2015 and let's begin! If you feel you don't know anything about the filed don't worry ! I will guide you