Adobe After Effects CC (2015) Help 2015 En

User Manual: adobe After Effects - CC (2015) - Help Free User Guide for Adobe After Effects Software, Manual

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Adobe® Aer Eects®

CC

Help

Last updated 6/8/2015

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Contents

Chapter 1: What's new

New features summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1

Chapter 2: Workspace and workflow

Planning and setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6

Setup and installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

General user interface items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Workflows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Dynamic Link and After Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Keyboard shortcuts reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Working with After Effects and other applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

After Effects keyboard shortcuts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Workspaces, panels, and viewers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Sync Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

Modify keyboard shortcuts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

Chapter 3: Projects and compositions

Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

Precomposing, nesting, and pre-rendering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Composition basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

Timecode and time display units . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

Chapter 4: Importing footage

Importing and interpreting footage items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

Importing and interpreting video and audio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

Preparing and importing 3D image files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92

Working with footage items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

CINEMA 4D and Cineware . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

Importing from After Effects and Adobe Premiere Pro . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

Preparing and importing still images . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113

Chapter 5: Layers and properties

Creating layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122

Selecting and arranging layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127

Managing layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137

Layer properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142

Blending modes and layer styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154

3D layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

Cameras, lights, and points of interest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166

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Chapter 6: Views and previews

Previewing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178

Modifying and using views . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190

Video preview with Mercury Transmit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196

Chapter 7: Animation and Keyframes

Face Tracking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198

Animation basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207

Setting, selecting, and deleting keyframes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211

Editing, moving, and copying keyframes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215

Assorted animation tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220

Tracking and stabilizing motion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228

Speed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244

Animating with Puppet tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251

Tracking 3D camera movement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258

Time-stretching and time-remapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262

Keyframe interpolation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271

Chapter 8: Color

Creative Cloud Libraries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 278

Color basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280

Color management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291

Chapter 9: Drawing, painting, and paths

Paint tools: Brush, Clone Stamp, and Eraser . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303

Overview of shape layers, paths, and vector graphics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 312

Creating shapes and masks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 318

Managing and animating shape paths and masks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329

Shape attributes, paint operations, and path operations for shape layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340

Mask Tracking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347

Compositing Options and Mask Reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 349

Chapter 10: Text

Live Text Templates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 352

Creating and editing text layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353

Formatting characters and the Character panel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 359

Examples and resources for text animation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 365

Animating text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 371

Extruding text and shape layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 382

Formatting paragraphs and the Paragraph panel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387

Chapter 11: Transparency and compositing

Roto Brush, Refine Edge, and Refine Matte effects | CC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 390

Alpha channels, masks, and mattes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 401

Compositing and transparency overview and resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 412

Keying . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413

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Chapter 12: Effects and animation presets

Effects and animation presets overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 418

Detail-preserving Upscale effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 446

Effect list . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 446

Audio effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 455

Blur and Sharpen effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 458

Keying effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 465

Transition effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 477

Noise and Grain effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 483

Channel effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 504

Distort effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 510

Utility effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 527

Color Correction effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 531

Simulation effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 548

Obsolete effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 579

Generate effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 586

Matte effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 603

3D Channel effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 604

Stylize effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 610

Text effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 620

The Rolling Shutter Repair effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 622

Perspective effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 623

Chapter 13: Markers

Layer markers and composition markers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 628

XMP metadata . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 632

Chapter 14: Memory, storage, performance

Improve performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 638

GPU (CUDA, OpenGL) features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 641

Memory and storage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 643

Chapter 15: Expressions and automation

Plug-ins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 654

Automation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 656

Expression basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 656

Expression language reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 670

Expression examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 693

Scripts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 698

Chapter 16: Rendering and Exporting

Basics of rendering and exporting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 700

Supported GPUs for ray-traced 3D renderer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 717

Using the GoPro CineForm codec in After Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 719

Rendering and exporting still images and still-image sequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 722

Automated rendering and network rendering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 723

Export an After Effects project as an Adobe Premiere Pro project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 730

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Rendering and exporting for Flash Professional and Flash Player . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 731

Converting movies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 738

Chapter 17: System Requirements

System requirements for After Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 744

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Chapter 1: What's new

New features summary

Create dynamic, visually stunning motion graphics and visual effects wherever inspiration strikes. After Effects

connects with Creative Cloud mobile and desktop apps seamlessly, allowing your creativity to inspire you — wherever

you are.

Creative Cloud Libraries

New in After Effects CC 2015 | June

The inclusion of Creative Cloud Libraries in After Effects CC 2015 puts all your creative assets right at your finger tips.

All your favorite assets can now be accessed from within the Libraries panel in After Effects.

You can save, access, and reuse assets stored in Creative Cloud Libraries across Adobe's desktop (such as Photoshop,

Illustrator, and more) and mobile apps (such as Adobe Hue CC).

Library sharing makes it easy to collaborate with teams and maintain consistency across projects with common assets

like graphics, colors, Looks, or type styles.

Select Win dow > Libraries to open the Libraries panel in After Effects.

You can also choose assets from the Creative Cloud Market.

For more information about using Creative Cloud Libraries, see .

Integration with Adobe Stock

Adobe Stock is a new service that sells millions of high-quality, royalty-free photos, illustrations, and graphics.

You can search for Adobe Stock content directly from within After Effects, using the Libraries panel (Window >

Libraries) by clicking the Search Adobe Stock button in the panel. You can then purchase a license for an asset you want

to use and include it in your After Effects Library. Or, you can add an unlicensed preview (watermarked) copy to your

Library and purchase a license for it later.

For more information, see Add photos using Adobe Stock .

Changes to Preview workflow

Uninterrupted Preview

Enhanced in After Effects CC 2015 | June 2015

You can now make changes to a project while previewing within After Effects. View design iterations, adjust properties,

and even resize panels without stopping playback of your compositions.

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In previous versions of After Effects, after you started a preview in a composition, layer, or footage viewer, clicking

anywhere in the user interface would stop preview. Previews will now continue, until you stop the preview manually.

For more information, see Previewing.

Unified and Configurable Preview

Enhanced in After Effects CC 2015 | June 2015

You can now customize Preview behaviors using the updated Preview panel. If you're new to After Effects, you will find

the default Preview, started by pressing Spacebar, intuitive with real-time playback of audio and cached frames. For you,

the experienced After Effects user, Preview options are configurable to suit your working style.

Note that the these new changes have dissolved the differences between the old RAM preview and Standard preview

(spacebar) behaviors, and After Effects no longer uses those terms. Preview is now considered to be unified, with user-

configurable behaviors.

New controls in the Preview panel allow you to configure preview behaviors for each keyboard shortcut: audio, looping,

caching, range, and layer controls.

For more information, see Previewing.

Face Tracker

New in After Effects CC 2015 | June 2015

After Effects CC 2015 now includes face tracking capabilities. You can detect and track human faces with exceptional

accuracy by managing the level of detail you track.

Simple mask tracking lets you quickly apply effects only to a face, such as selective color correction or blurring a

person’s face, and more. However, with Face Tracking, you can also track specific points on the face such as pupils,

mouth, and nose, allowing you to isolate and work on these facial features with greater detail. For example, change

colors of the eyes or exaggerate mouth movements without frame-by-frame adjustments.

Face Tracking also lets you extract and copy facial measurements. Tracking of facial measurements tells you details such

as how open the mouth is and how open each eye is. You can also export detailed tracking data to Adobe Character

Animator for performance-based character animation.

For more information, see Face Tracking.

Integration with Adobe Character Animator (Preview)

New in After Effects CC 2015 | June 2015

Adobe Character Animator (Preview), a companion application, tracks your facial movements, records a voice over,

and even triggers bodily movement with simple keyboard actions and automated features that give life to characters

you create in Illustrator or Photoshop. When you talk, your character talks. When you feign surprise, so does your

character. When you’re grumpy, your character is too.

Adobe Character Animator is for two different types of artists: those who want to rig complex characters without

creating a confusing tangle of expressions, and those who just want to create simple characters easily. Either way, once

the character is set up in Photoshop or Illustrator, Adobe Character Animator brings it to life. It does this by users acting

out a performance in front of their webcam and talking into their microphone.

For more information, see Adobe Character Animator .

Note: For the After Effects CC 2015 release, Adobe Character Animator is only available as a technological preview.

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Interactive performance improvements

Enhanced in After Effects CC 2015 | June 2015

There are significant architectural code changes in After Effects CC 2015 release that allow the user interface and image

rendering to be processed separately by the CPU. The following improvements are a direct result of these changes:

•The user interface is now much more responsive as it no longer needs to wait for frames to finish rendering.

Conversely, frames can continue to render while you work with the user interface. This responsiveness makes for a

smoother interaction with the user interface at all times.

•Far fewer instances of delays or beach ball during a Preview.

•You can now interrupt or cancel frame renders by making a change to the composition.

•Fast scrubbing, even when the frames take a long time to render.

•Faster image caching.

•More efficient evaluation of expressions.

•Previews continue to play back while After Effects is in the background.

Changes to expression evaluation

Enhanced in After Effects 2015 | June 2015

Evaluation of expressions in After Effects has been significantly enhanced. Overall, you may find that expressions are

evaluated faster; the improvement will vary depending on the expression.

When an expression fails to evaluate, there are two major changes:

1Expression errors appear in a warning banner at the bottom of the Composition panel instead of in a dialog box.

The expression is not disabled.

2The expression will continue to evaluate and will display the warning banner until the problem with the expression

is fixed.

On the right side of the expression error warning banner are Left, Down, and Right arrow buttons:

1Click the Left or Right arrow buttons to display the previous or next expression error when multiple expressions fail

to evaluate.

2Click the Down arrow to display the property with the failing expression in the Timeline panel. The expression error

text is clipped to the width of the Composition panel. To see the full expression error in a dialog box, click on the

yellow error triangle icon for the expression in the Timeline panel.

User interface enhancements

Color icons for compositions and image sequences

Icons for compositions and image sequences in the Project and Timeline panels are now multicolored instead of

monochrome.

Preference for user interface highlight brightness

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In Preferences > Appearance there is a new Highlight Colors section wherein you can in which you can adjust the

brightness of interactive controls and focus indicators.

You can see the changes to the slider values reflected live in the user interface behind the Preferences dialog.

Panel group enhancements

Several changes have been made to how panel groups work

•No tab well for single panels - When there is only one panel in a panel group, the tab well does not appear. You can

still drag other panels into the tab row to dock them in that panel group.

•Menu instead of scroll bar - When there are more panel tabs than that will fit in the width of a panel group, a menu

( >>) appears on the right side of the tab well instead of a scroll bar. You can choose a tab from the tab well.

•Panel Group Settings sub-menu - In panel menus, panel group commands have been moved to the Panel Group

Settings sub-menu:

•Close Panel Group

•Undock Panel Group

•Maximize Panel Group

•Close Other Panels In Group: In panel menus, there is a new command to close other panels in the same group.

Maxon Cineware 2.0.15 plug-in

Enhanced in After Effects CC 2015 | June 2015

Cineware 2.0.15 for After Effects includes the following enhancements:

•CINEMA 4D Layers are no longer automatically synchronized - When adding multiple instances of a CINEMA 4D

scene layer in a composition, including adding Multi-Pass layers, Cineware no longer automatically synchronizes

CINEMA 4D Layers. You will see an on/offcheckbox at the top of the Effect Controls panel that has been relabeled

to Synchronize AE Layer. When this preference is enabled, the Render Settings and Camera options on all instances

of the layer will automatically synchronize as before, but CINEMA 4D layers can be set independently. If this

checkbox is disabled for a specific CINEMA 4D scene layer, then none of that layer's settings will synchronize with

the rest of the layers in the composition.

•Updated CINEMA 4D Layers dialog window - "Non-Layer Items" has been renamed "Items not on Layers". By

unchecking this setting, all objects that are not associated with any CINEMA 4D Layers will be turned off.

•Resizable dialog windows - The CINEMA 4D Layers and Cineware Settings dialogs have been updated so they can

be resized as needed.

Miscellaneous updates

Removal of Memory and Multiprocessing preference

The Multiprocessing preference has been removed due to the inclusion of new threading architecture in After Effects

CC 2015. The preference that was earlier named Memory and Multiprocessing is now named only Memory.

The Composition > Cache Work Area In Background command was dependent on the Multiprocessing feature. This

functionality has been removed.

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•Brainstorm has been removed in After Effects CC 2015. You can still use Brainstorm in After Effects CC 2014 and

earlier versions/releases. You can read about using Brainstorm in AFter Effects in the Use Brainstorm to experiment

and explore settingsarticle.

•RED camera raw (.r3d) file decoding has been updated with the newest RED SDK. New functionality includes

Dragon Enhanced Blacks, REDcolor4, and DRAGONcolor 2.

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Chapter 2: Workspace and workflow

Planning and setup

Planning your work

Correct project settings, preparation of footage, and initial composition settings can help you to avoid errors and

unexpected results when rendering your final output movie. Before you begin, think about what kind of work you’ll be

doing in After Effects and what kind of output you intend to create. After you have planned your project and made some

basic decisions about project settings, you’ll be ready to start importing footage and assembling compositions from

layers based on that footage.

The best way to ensure that your movie is suitable for a specific medium is to render a test movie and view it using the

same type of equipment that your audience will use to view it. It’s best to do such tests before you have completed the

difficult and time-consuming parts of your work, to uncover problems early.

Aharon Rabinowitz provides an article on the Creative COW website about planning your project with the final

delivery specifications in mind.

For more information about encoding and compression options, see this FAQ entry: “FAQ: What is the best format for

rendering and exporting from After Effects?”

Storyboards and scripts (screenplays)

Before you begin shooting footage or creating animations, it is often best to start by planning your movie with

storyboards and a script (screenplay).

You can use Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator to create storyboards. You can use Adobe Story to collaboratively

write and manage screenplays. Adobe Story also converts information from a screenplay into XMP metadata that can

automate the creation of shooting scripts, shot lists, and more.

Acquiring, choosing, and preparing footage

Before importing footage, first decide which media and formats you'll use for your finished movies, and then determine

the best settings for your source material. Often, it’s best to prepare footage before importing it into After Effects.

For example, if you want an image to fill your composition frame, configure the image in Adobe Photoshop so that the

image size and pixel aspect ratio match the composition size and pixel aspect ratio. If the image is too large when you

import it into After Effects, you’ll increase the memory and processor requirements of the compositions that use it. If

the image is too small, you’ll lose image quality when you scale it to the desired size. See Pixel aspect ratio and frame

aspect ratio.

If you can shoot footage with consistent lighting and colors—and otherwise prevent the need to do a lot of tedious

utility work in post-production—then you’ll have more time for creative work.

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If possible, use uncompressed footage or footage encoded with lossless compression. Lossless compression means

better results for many operations, such as keying and motion tracking. Certain kinds of compression—such as the

compression used in DV encoding—are especially bad for color keying, because they discard the subtle differences in

color that you depend on for good bluescreen or greenscreen keying. It’s often best to wait until the final rendering

phase to use compression other than lossless compression. See Keying introduction and resources.

If possible, use footage with a frame rate that matches that of your output, so that After Effects doesn’t have to use frame

blending or similar methods to fill in missing frames. See Frame rate.

The kind of work that you’ll be doing in After Effects and the kind of output movie that you want to create can even

influence how you shoot and acquire your footage. For example, if you know that you want to animate using motion

tracking, consider shooting your scene in a manner that optimizes for motion tracking—for example, using tracking

markers. See Motion tracking workflow.

Also consider shooting at a larger frame size than what you need for final delivery if you want "head-room" for post-

production, whether for fake pans and zooms, or for stabilization.

Project settings

Project settings fall into three basic categories: how time is displayed in the project, how color data is treated in the

project, and what sampling rate to use for audio. Of these settings, the color settings are the ones that you need to think

about before you do much work in your project, because they determine how color data is interpreted as you import

footage files, how color calculations are performed as you work, and how color data is converted for final output. See

Color managementand Timecode and time display units .

If you enable color management for your project, the colors that you see are the same colors that your audience will see

when they view the movie that you create.

Note: Click the color depth indicator at the bottom of the Project panel to open the Project Settings dialog box. Alt-click

(Windows) or Option-click (Mac OS) to cycle through color bit depths: 8 bpc, 16 bpc, and 32 bpc. See Color depth and high

dynamic range color.

Composition settings

After you prepare and import footage items, you use these footage items to create layers in a composition, where you

animate and apply effects. When you create a composition, specify composition settings such as resolution, frame size,

and pixel aspect ratio for your final rendered output. Although you can change composition settings at any time, it’s

best to set them correctly as you create each new composition to avoid unexpected results in your final rendered output.

For example, the composition frame size should be the image size in the playback medium. See Composition settings.

If you’ll be rendering and exporting a composition to more than one media format, always match the pixel dimensions

for your composition to the largest pixel dimensions used for your output. Later, you can use output modules in the

Render Queue panel to encode and export a separate version of the composition for each format. See Output modules and

output module settings.

Performance, memory, and storage considerations

If you work with large compositions, make sure that you configure After Effects and your computer to maximize

performance. Complex compositions can require a large amount of memory to render, and the rendered movies can

take a large amount of disk space to store. Before you attempt to render a three-hour movie, make sure that you have

the disk space available to store it. See Storage requirements for output files .

If your source footage files are on a slow disk drive (or across a slow network connection), then performance will be

poor. When possible, keep the source footage files for your project on a fast local disk drive. Ideally, you’ll have three

drives: one for source footage files, one from which the application runs, and one for rendered output.

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For more information, see Improve performanceand Memory & Multiprocessing preferences .

Planning for playback on computer monitors and mobile devices

When you create a movie for playback on a personal computer—whether downloaded from the Web or played from a

CD-ROM—specify composition settings, render settings, and output module settings that keep file size low. Consider

that a movie with a high data rate may not play well from an older CD-ROM drive that cannot read data from the disc

fast enough. Similarly, a large movie may take a long time to download over a dial-up network connection.

When rendering your final movie, choose a file type and encoder appropriate for the final media. The corresponding

decoder must be available on the system used by your intended audience; otherwise they will not be able to play the

movie. Common codecs (encoders/decoders) include the codecs installed with media players such as Flash Player,

Windows Media Player, and QuickTime Player.

Aharon Rabinowitz provides an article on the Creative COW website about planning your project with the final

delivery specifications in mind.

Trish and Chris Meyer provide an article on the Artbeats website that describes some of the considerations for creating

video for the Web.

For more information about encoding and compression options for After Effects, see this FAQ entry: “FAQ: What is

the best format for rendering and exporting from After Effects?”

Mobile devices

Many of the considerations for creating movies for playback on mobile devices, such as mobile phones and the Apple

iPod, are similar to the considerations for creating movies for playback on personal computers—but the limitations are

even more extreme. Because the amount of storage (disk space) and processor power are less for mobile phones than

for personal computers, file size and data rate for movies must be even more tightly controlled.

Screen dimensions, video frame rates, and color gamuts vary greatly from one mobile device to another.

Use these tips when shooting video for mobile devices:

•Tight shots are better. It’s hard to see a face on a tiny screen unless it’s shot in relative close-up.

•Light your subjects well, and keep them separated from the background; the colors and brightness values between

background and subject should not be too similar.

•Avoid excessive zooming and rolling, which hinder temporal compression schemes.

•Because stable (non-shaky) video is easier to compress, shoot video with a tripod to minimize the shaking of the

camera.

•Avoid using auto-focus and auto-exposure features. When these features engage, they change the appearance of all

of the pixels in an image from one frame to the next, making compression using interframe encoding schemes less

efficient.

Use these tips when working in After Effects (for mobile devices):

•Use a lower frame rate (12-24 fps) for mobile devices.

•Use motion-stabilization tools and noise-reduction or blur effects before rendering to final output, to aid the

compressor in reducing file size.

•Match the color palette to the mobile devices that you are targeting. Mobile devices, in general, have a limited color

gamut.

•Consider using cuts and other fast transitions instead of zooming in and out or using fades and dissolves. Fast cuts

also make compression easier.

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Cross-platform project considerations

After Effects project files are compatible with Mac OS and Windows operating systems, but some factors—mostly

regarding the locations and naming of footage files and support files—can affect the ease of working with the same

project across platforms.

Project file paths

When you move a project file to a different computer and open it, After Effects attempts to locate the project’s footage

files as follows: After Effects first searches the folder in which the project file is located; second, it searches the file’s

original path or folder location; finally, it searches the root of the directory where the project is located.

If you are building cross-platform projects, it’s best if the full paths have the same names on Mac OS and Windows

systems. If the footage and the project are on different volumes, make sure that the appropriate volume is mounted

before opening the project and that network volume names are the same on both systems.

It’s best to store footage in the same folder as the project file or in another folder within that folder. Here’s a sample

hierarchy:

/newproject/project_file.aep

/newproject/source/footage1.psd

/newproject/source/footage2.avi

You can then copy the new project folder in its entirety across platforms, and After Effects will properly locate all of the

footage.

Use the Collect Files feature to gather copies of all the files in a project into a single folder. You can then move the folder

containing the copied project to the other platform. See Collect files in one location.

File-naming conventions

Name your footage and project files with the appropriate filename extensions, such as .mov for QuickTime movies and

.aep for After Effects projects. If files will be used on the Web, be sure that filenames adhere to applicable conventions

for extensions and paths.

Note: For After Effects CS6 and earlier versions, do not use high-ASCII or other extended characters in filenames that will

be used cross-platform.

Supported file types

Some file types are supported on one platform but not others. See Supported import formatsand Supported output

formats.

Resources

Ensure that all fonts, effects, codecs, and other resources are available on both systems. Such resources are often plug-

ins.

If you use a native After Effects effect in a project on one operating system, the effect will still work on the other

operating system to which you’ve transferred your project. However, some third-party effects and other third-party

plug-ins may not continue to operate, even if you have versions of these plug-ins on the target system. In such cases,

you may need to reapply some third-party effects.

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More Help topics

Adobe Story workflow

Composition settings

Output modules and output module settings

Render settings

Plug-ins

Fonts

Setup and installation

To submit a feature request or bug report about After Effects, choose Help > Send Feedback.

Installing the software

Before installing Adobe After Effects software, review the complete system requirements .

In addition to the full version of Adobe After Effects, you can also install additional copies on additional computers to

use as After Effects render engines to assist with network rendering. You install render engines in the same manner as

the full version of the application. You run the render engine using the Adobe After Effects Render Engine shortcut in

the Adobe After Effects folder.

Limitations of the trial version

The trial version of After Effects includes all of the codecs that are included with the full version of After Effects. This

means that you can import and export to all of the supported file formats using the trial version. The free trial version

of Adobe After Effects software does not include some features that depend upon software licensed from parties other

than Adobe. For example, Cycore (CC) effects, mocha-AE, mocha Shape, FreeForm, and Color Finesse are available

only with the full version of Adobe After Effects software. (Keylight is included, however.) If your installation of After

Effects is missing some third-party components, contact your system administrator to ensure that all licensed

components have been installed correctly.

Activate the software

Activation is a simple, anonymous process. After installation, your Adobe software attempts to contact Adobe to

complete the license activation process. No personal data is transmitted.

A single-user retail license activation supports two computers. For example, you can install the software on a desktop

computer at work and on a laptop computer at home.

For more information on product licensing and activation, see the Read Me file or go to the Adobe website.

More Help topics

Network rendering with watch folders and render engines

Plug-ins

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General user interface items

Activate a tool

The Tools panel can be displayed as a toolbar across the top of the application window or as a normal, dockable panel.

Note: Controls related to some tools appear only when the tool is selected in the Tools panel.

•Click the button for the tool. If the button has a small triangle at its lower-right corner, hold down the mouse button

to view the hidden tools. Then, click the tool you want to activate.

•Press the keyboard shortcut for the tool. (Placing the pointer over a tool button displays a tool tip with the name and

keyboard shortcut for the tool.)

•To cycle through hidden tools within a tool category, repeatedly press the keyboard shortcut for the tool category.

(For example, press the Q key repeatedly to cycle through the pen tools.)

•To momentarily activate a tool, hold down the key for the desired tool; release the key to return to the previously

active tool. (This technique does not work with all tools.)

•To momentarily activate the Hand tool, hold down the spacebar, the H key, or the middle mouse button. (The

middle mouse button does not activate the Hand tool under a few circumstances, including when the Unified

Camera tool is active.)

To pan around in the Composition, Layer, or Footage panel, drag with the Hand tool. Hold Shift, too, to pan faster.

To show or hide panels most relevant to the active tool, click the panel button if available. For example, clicking this

button when a paint tool is active opens or closes the Paint and Brushes panels. Select the Auto-Open Panels option in

the Tools panel to automatically open the relevant panels when certain tools are activated.

Open panel, viewer, and context menus

Panel menus provide commands relative to the active panel or frame. Viewer menus provide lists of compositions,

layers, or footage items that can be shown in the viewer, as well as commands for closing items and locking the viewer.

Context menus provide commands relative to the item that is context-clicked. Many items in the After Effects user

interface have associated context menus. Using context menus can make your work faster and easier.

•To open a p anel menu, click the button in the upper-right corner of the panel.

•To open a viewer menu, click the name of the active composition, layer, or footage item in the viewer tab.

•To open a context menu, right-click (Windows or Mac OS) or Control-click (Mac OS). This action is sometimes

referred to as context-clicking.

Columns

The Project, Timeline, and Render Queue panels contain columns.

•To show or hide columns, right-click (Windows) or Control-click (Mac OS) a column heading (or choose Columns

from the panel menu), and select the columns that you want to show or hide. A check mark indicates that the

column is shown.

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Note: In general, the search and filter functions in the Project and Timeline panels only operate on the content of columns

that are shown.

•To reorder columns, select a column name and drag it to a new location.

•To resize columns, drag the bar next to a column name. Some columns cannot be resized.

•To sort footage items in the Project panel, click the column heading. Click once more to sort them in reverse order.

Search and filter in the Timeline, Project, and Effects & Presets panels

The Project, Timeline, and Effects & Presets panels each contain search fields that you can use to filter items in the

panel.

•To place the insertion point in a search field, click in the search field.

•To place the insertion point in the search field for the active panel, choose File > Find or press Ctrl+F (Windows) or

Command+F (Mac OS).

•To clear the search field, click the button that appears to the right of the text in the search field.

When you type in the search field, the list of items in the panel is filtered, showing some items and hiding others. Only

items with entries that match the search query that you’ve typed are shown. The folders, layers, categories, or property

groups that contain the matched items are also shown, to provide context.

In general, only text in columns that are shown is searched for this filtering operation. For example, you may need to

show the Comments column to search and filter by the contents of comments. (See Columns.)

If one or more layers are selected in a composition, the filtering operation in the Timeline panel only affects selected

layers. In this case, unselected layers are not filtered out (hidden) if they don’t match the search query. However, if no

layers are selected in the composition, the filtering operation applies to all layers in the composition. This behavior

matches that for showing and hiding of layer properties by pressing their property shortcut keys. (See Show or hide

properties in the Timeline panel.)

Clearing the search field and ending the search causes expanded folders and property groups to collapse (close).

Therefore, it’s easier to work with the items that are found by the filter operation if you operate on them before you clear

the search field and end the search.

If the text that you type in the search field in the Project or Timeline panel contains spaces, the spaces are treated as

and-based operators. For example, typing dark solid matches footage items or layers named Dark Red Solid and Dark

Gray Solid. In the Effects & Presets panel, spaces are treated as space characters in the search field. For example, typing

change color matches the Change Color effect, but not the Change To Color effect.

Project, Timeline, and Effects & Presets panels accept or-based searching. In an or-based search, a comma denotes an

or, with and-based operators taking precedence over or-based ones. For example, sometimes the name of the property

that determines the amount for a blur effect is Amount, sometimes it is Blurriness, and sometimes it is Blur Radius. If

you search for Amount, Blurriness, Radius, then you will see the equivalent values for all of your blur effects.

When you type in a search field, recent search strings that match your input appear.

This search method also allows a way to save items you use often via a menu that opens when you click the search icon

in the search field. The search menu consists of two lists, separated by a divider. The top list contains the six most recent

searches, with the most recent one at the top. The bottom list contains saved search items. As you type, the top list filters

to show matching terms.

•To save a search item, Shift-click it in the top list of the search menu. Up to ten items may be saved.

•To delete a saved search item from either list, hover the mouse over the the item to highlight it, and then press Delete

or Backspace.

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See this video on the Video2Brain website to learn about the new features for searching and filtering in panels.

Examples of searches in the Project panel

•To show only footage items for which the name or comment contains a specific string, start typing the string.

•To show only footage items for which the source file is missing, type the entire word missing. (This search works

whether or not the File Path column is shown, which is an exception to the general rule that only shown columns

are searched.)

•To show only unused footage items, type the entire word unused.

•To show only used footage items, type the entire word used.

•To show only Cineon footage items, type Cineon with the Type column shown.

Examples of searches in the Timeline panel

•To show only layers and properties for which the name or comment contains a specific string, type the string. For

example, type starch to show pins created by the Puppet Starch tool.

•To show only properties that have an expression that uses a specific method, type the method name.

•To show only layers with a specific label, type the label name. (See Color labels for layers, compositions, and footage

items.)

Click the swatch for a label to see the context menu that lists the label names. Alternatively, drag the right edge of the

Label column heading to expand the column to read the label names.

Scroll or zoom with the mouse wheel

You can use the mouse wheel to zoom in the Timeline, Composition, Layer, and Footage panels. You can use the mouse

wheel to scroll in the Timeline, Project, Render Queue, Flowchart, Effect Controls, Metadata, and Effects & Presets

panels.

•To zoom into the center of the panel, or into the feature region when tracking, roll the mouse wheel forward.

•To zoom out of the center of the panel, or out of the feature region when tracking, roll the mouse wheel backward.

•To zoom into the area under the pointer, hold down Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS) as you roll the mouse wheel

forward. In the Timeline, Footage, and Layer panels, this action zooms in time when the pointer is over the time

navigator or time ruler.

•To zoom out of the area under the pointer, hold down Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS) as you roll the mouse

wheel backward. In the Timeline, Footage, and Layer panels, this action zooms in time when the pointer is over the

time navigator or time ruler.

•To scroll vertically, roll the mouse wheel forward or backward.

•To scroll horizontally, hold down Shift as you roll the mouse wheel backward or forward. In the Timeline, Footage,

and Layer panels, Shift-rolling backward moves forward in time and vice versa when the pointer is over the time

navigator or time ruler.

You can scroll or zoom with the mouse wheel in a panel even if it is not currently active, as long as the pointer is over it.

Undo changes

You can undo only those actions that alter the project data. For example, you can undo a change to a property value,

but you cannot undo the scrolling of a panel or the activation of a tool.

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You can sequentially undo as many as 99 of the most recent changes made to the project.

To avoid wasting time undoing accidental modifications, lock a layer when you want to see it but do not want to modify

it.

•To undo the most recent change, choose Edit > Undo [action] or Ctrl-Z

•To undo a change and all changes after it, choose Edit > History, and select the first change that you want to undo.

•To revert to the last saved version of the project, choose File > Revert. All changes made and footage items imported

since you last saved are lost. You cannot undo this action.

After Effects user interface tips

•Use ClearType text anti-aliasing on Windows. ClearType makes the outlines of system text, such as menus and

dialog boxes, easier to read. See Windows Help for information on how to enable ClearType text anti-aliasing.

•To show tool tips, select the Show Tool Tips preference (Edit > General > Preferences (Windows) or After Effects >

Preferences > General (Mac OS)).

•Use a workspace that contains the Info panel, and leave that panel in front of other panels in its panel group

whenever possible. The Info panel shows messages about what After Effects is doing, information about items under

the pointer, and much more.

•In Windows, disable the Aero compositing mode. Hardware acceleration of panels and OpenGL features perform

better in After Effects when Windows is operating in Basic mode. For information, see the Microsoft website.

•Use context menus.

•Use keyboard shortcuts.

More Help topics

Activating tools (keyboard shortcuts)

Effects and Presets panel

Organize, view, manage, and trim footage items

Select layers

Zoom an image for preview

Zoom in or out in time for a composition

Move or adjust a camera or working 3D view with the Camera tools

Lock or unlock a layer

Workflows

General workflow in After Effects

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Overview of general workflow in After Effects

Whether you use Adobe After Effects to animate a simple title, create complex motion graphics, or composite realistic

visual effects, you generally follow the same basic workflow, though you may repeat or skip some steps. For example,

you may repeat the cycle of modifying layer properties, animating, and previewing until everything looks right. You

may skip the step of importing footage if you intend to create graphical elements entirely in After Effects.

1. Import and organize footage

After you create a project, import your footage into the project in the Project panel. After Effects automatically

interprets many common media formats, but you can also specify how you want After Effects to interpret attributes

such as frame rate and pixel aspect ratio. You can view each item in a Footage panel and set its start and end times to

fit your composition. For more information, see Importing and interpreting footage items .

2. Create, arrange, and composite layers in a composition

Create one or more compositions. Any footage item can be the source for one or more layers in a composition. You can

arrange the layers spatially in the Composition panel or arrange them in time using the Timeline panel. You can stack

layers in two dimensions or arrange them in three dimensions. You can use masks, blending modes, and keying tools

to composite (combine), the images of multiple layers. You can even use shape layers, text layers, and paint tools to

create your own visual elements. For more information, see Composition basics, Creating layers, Compositing and

transparency overview and resources, Overview of shape layers, paths, and vector graphics , and Creating and editing

text layers .

3. Modify and animate layer properties

You can modify any property of a layer, such as size, position, and opacity. You can make any combination of layer

properties change over time, using keyframes and expressions. Use motion tracking to stabilize motion or to animate

one layer so that it follows the motion in another layer. For more information, see Animation basics, Expression basics,

and Tracking and stabilizing motion (CS5) .

4. Add effects and modify effect properties

You can add any combination of effects to alter the appearance or sound of a layer, and even generate visual elements

from scratch. You can apply any of the hundreds of effects, animation presets, and layer styles. You can even create and

save your own animation presets. You can animate effect properties, too, which are simply layer properties within an

effect property group. For more information, see Effects and animation presets overview .

5. Preview

Previewing compositions on your computer monitor or an external video monitor is fast and convenient, even for

complex projects. You can change the speed and quality of previews by specifying their resolution and frame rate, and

by limiting the area and duration of the composition that you preview. You can use color management features to

preview how your movie will look on another output device. For more information, see Previewingand Color

management.

6. Render and export

Add one or more compositions to the render queue to render them at the quality settings you choose and to create

movies in the formats that you specify. You can use File > Export or Composition > Add to Render Queue.

For more information, see Basics of rendering and exporting and the encoding quick start section in Adobe Media

Encoder.

Online resources for general workflow in After Effects

Read a basic step-by-step introduction to the general workflow in an excerpt from After Effects Classroom in a Book.

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Read Trish and Chris Meyer’s step-by-step introduction to creating a basic animation in a PDF excerpt from their book,

The After Effects Apprentice.

For an overview of After Effects project navigtion, see the video tutorial, “Walking Through A Mini Project,” by Jeff

Sengstack and Infinite Skills.

Basic workflow tutorial: Create a simple movie

This tutorial assumes that you have already started After Effects and have not modified the empty default project. This

example skips the step of importing footage and shows you instead how to create your own synthetic visual elements.

After you have rendered a final movie, you can import it into After Effects to view it and use it as you would any other

footage item.

Some people prefer to use the mouse and menus to interact with After Effects, whereas others prefer to use keyboard

shortcuts for common tasks. For several steps in this example, two alternative commands are shown that produce the

same result—the first demonstrating the discoverability of menu commands and the second demonstrating the speed

and convenience of keyboard shortcuts. You’ll likely find that you use some combination of keyboard shortcuts and

menu commands in your work.

1Create a new composition:

•Choose Composition > New Composition.

•Press Ctrl+N (Windows) or Command+N (Mac OS).

2Change the Duration value in the Composition Settings dialog box by entering 5.00 (5 seconds), choose Web Video

from the Preset menu, and click OK.

3Create a new text layer:

•Choose Layer > New > Text.

•Press Ctrl+Alt+Shift+T (Windows) or Command+Option+Shift+T (Mac OS).

4Type your name. Press Enter on the numeric keypad or press Ctrl+Enter (Windows) or Command+Return (Mac

OS) on the main keyboard to exit text-editing mode.

5Set an initial keyframe for the Position property:

•Click the triangle to the left of the layer name in the Timeline panel, click the triangle to the left of the Transform

group name, and then click the stopwatch button to the left of the Position property name.

•Press Alt+Shift+P (Windows) or Option+Shift+P (Mac OS).

6Activate the Selection tool:

•Click the Selection Tool button in the Tools panel.

•Press V.

7Using the Selection tool, drag your text to the bottom-left corner of the frame in the Composition panel.

8Move the current-time indicator to the last frame of the composition:

•Drag the current-time indicator in the Timeline panel to the far right of the timeline.

•Press End.

9Using the Selection tool, drag your text to the top-right corner of the frame in the Composition panel.

A new keyframe is created at this time for the Position property. Motion is interpolated between keyframe values.

10 Preview your animation using standard preview:

•Click the Play button in the Preview panel. Click Play again to stop the preview.

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•Press the spacebar. Press the spacebar again to stop the preview.

11 Apply the Glow effect:

•Choose Effect > Stylize > Glow.

•Type glow in the search field at the top of the Effects & Presets panel to find the Glow effect. Double-click the

effect name.

12 In the Render Queue panel, click the underlined text to the right of Output To. In the Output Movie To dialog box,

choose a name and location for the output movie file, and then click Save. For the location, choose something easy

to find, like your desktop.

13 Click the Render button to process all items in the render queue. The Render Queue panel shows the progress of the

rendering operation. A sound is generated when rendering is complete.

You’ve created, rendered, and exported a movie.

You can import the movie that you’ve created and preview it in After Effects, or you can navigate to the movie and play

it using a movie player such as QuickTime Player or Windows Media Player.

More Help topics

Activating tools (keyboard shortcuts)

Import footage items

Dynamic Link and After Effects

Dynamic Link features work only between applications of the same major version, such as the 2014 release of After

Effects CC with the 2014 release of Premiere Pro CC. Dynamic Link features do not work between applications that are

not of the same major version, such as After Effects CC and Premiere Pro CS6. For CS6 versions of the applications,

Dynamic Link features are only available with the Creative Suite Production Premium and Creative Suite Master

Collection editions; Dynamic Link features do not work between CS6 applications that have been installed and

activated as separate applications.

About Dynamic Link

In the past, sharing media assets among post-production applications required you to render and export your work

from one application before importing it into another. This workflow was inefficient and time-consuming. If you

wanted to change the original asset, you rendered and exported the asset again. Multiple rendered and exported

versions of an asset consume disk space, and they can lead to file-management challenges.

Dynamic Link offers an alternative to this workflow. You can create dynamic links between After Effects and Adobe

Premiere Pro. Creating a dynamic link is as simple as importing any other type of asset. Dynamically linked assets

appear with unique icons and label colors to help you identify them. Dynamic links are saved in projects generated by

these applications.

Create and link to After Effects compositions with Dynamic Link

You can create new After Effects compositions, and dynamically link to them from Adobe Premiere Pro. You can also

dynamically link to existing After Effects compositions from Adobe Premiere Pro.

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Create a composition from clips in Adobe Premiere Pro

You can replace selected clips in Adobe Premiere Pro with a dynamically linked After Effects composition based on

those clips. The new composition inherits the sequence settings from Adobe Premiere Pro.

1Open Premiere Pro and select the clips you want to replace.

2Right-click any of the selected clips.

3Select Replace With After Effects Composition.

After Effects opens (if it is not already open) and a new linked composition is created.

Create a dynamically linked composition from Adobe Premiere Pro

Creating a new dynamically linked composition from Adobe Premiere Pro launches After Effects. After Effects then

creates a project and composition with the dimensions, pixel aspect ratio, frame rate, and audio sample rate of the

originating project. (If After Effects is already running, it creates a composition in the current project.) The new

composition name is based on the Adobe Premiere Pro project name, followed by Linked Comp [x].

1In Adobe Premiere Pro, choose File > Adobe Dynamic Link > New After Effects Composition. In the 2014 version

of Premiere Pro, you can import compositions using Media Browser. See the following sections in Premiere Pro for

more information:

•Import files with Media Browser

•Adobe Dynamic Link

2If the After Effects Save As dialog box appears, enter a name and location for the After Effects project, and click Save.

When you create a dynamically linked After Effects composition, the composition duration is set to 30 seconds. To

change the duration, select the composition in After Effects, choose Composition > Composition Settings. Click the

Basic tab, and specify a new value for Duration.

Link to an existing composition

For best results, match composition settings (such as dimensions, pixel aspect ratio, and frame rate) to the settings in

the Adobe Premiere Pro.

❖Do one of the following:

•In Adobe Premiere Pro, choose File > Adobe Dynamic Link > ImportAfter Effects Composition. Choose an After

Effects project file (.aep), and then choose one or more compositions.

•In Adobe Premiere Pro, choose an After Effects project file and click Open. Then choose a composition in the

displayed dialog box and click OK.

•Drag one or more compositions from the After Effects Project panel to the Adobe Premiere Pro Project panel.

•Drag an After Effects project file into the Premiere Pro Project panel. If the After Effects project file contains

multiple compositions, the Import Composition dialog box opens.

Note: You can link to a single After Effects composition multiple times in a single Adobe Premiere Pro project.

Modify a dynamically linked composition in After Effects

Use the Edit Original command in Adobe Premiere Pro to modify a linked After Effects composition. Once the

composition is open in After Effects, you can change the composition without having to use the Edit Original

command again.

1Select the After Effects composition in Adobe Premiere Pro, or choose a linked clip in the Timeline, and choose Edit

> Edit Original.

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2Change the composition in After Effects. Then, switch back to Adobe Premiere Pro to view your changes.

The changes made in After Effects appear in Adobe Premiere Pro. Adobe Premiere Pro stops using any preview files

rendered for the clip before the changes.

Note: You can change the name of the composition in After Effects after creating a dynamic link to it from Adobe Premiere

Pro. Adobe Premiere Pro does not update the linked composition name in the Project panel. Adobe Premiere Pro does retain

the dynamic link, however.

Delete a dynamically linked composition or clip

You can delete a linked composition from an Adobe Premiere Pro project at any time, even if the composition is used

in a project.

You can delete linked clips from the timeline of an Adobe Premiere Pro sequence or timeline at any time.

❖In Adobe Premiere Pro, select the linked composition or clip and press the Delete key.

Create a linked sequence in Adobe Premiere Pro with Dynamic Link

Link to a new sequence

Creating an Adobe Premiere Pro sequence from After Effects launches Adobe Premiere Pro. Adobe Premiere Pro then

creates a project and sequence with the dimensions, pixel aspect ratio, frame rate, and audio sample rate of the

originating project. (If Adobe Premiere Pro is already running, it creates a sequence in the current project.)

❖In After Effects, choose File > Adobe Dynamic Link > New Premiere Pro Sequence.

Link to an existing sequence

For best results, match sequence settings and project settings in Adobe Premiere Pro (such as dimensions, pixel aspect

ratio, and frame rate) to those settings in the After Effects project.

Do one of the following:

•In After Effects, choose File > Adobe Dynamic Link > Import Premiere Pro Sequence. Choose an Adobe Premiere

Pro project, and then choose one or more sequences.

•Drag one or more sequences from the Adobe Premiere Pro Project panel to the After Effects Project panel.

Dynamic Link performance

A linked clip can refer to a complex source composition. Actions you perform on the complex source composition

require additional processing time. After Effects takes time to apply the actions and make the final data available to

Adobe Premiere Pro. In some cases, the additional processing time delays preview or playback.

To reduce playback delays, do one of the following:

•take the linked composition offline

•disable a linked clip to temporarily stop referencing a composition

•render the composition and replace the dynamically linked composition with the rendered file

If you commonly work with complex source compositions, try adding RAM or a faster processor.

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Note: A linked After Effects composition will not support Render Multiple Frames Simultaneously multiprocessing. See

Improve performance by optimizing memory, cache, and multiprocessing settings.

More Help topics

Working with Adobe Premiere Pro and After Effects

Importing from After Effects and Adobe Premiere Pro

Keyboard shortcuts reference

General (keyboard shortcuts)

Result Windows Mac OS

Select all Ctrl+A Command+A

Deselect all F2 or Ctrl+Shift+A F2 or Command+Shift+A

Rename selected layer, composition, folder,

effect, group, or mask

Enter on main keyboard Return

Open selected layer, composition, or footage

item

Enter on numeric keypad Enter on numeric keypad

Move selected layers, masks, effects, or render

items down (back) or up (forward) in stacking

order

Ctrl+Alt+Down Arrow or Ctrl+Alt+Up Arrow Command+Option+Down Arrow or

Command+Option+Up Arrow

Move selected layers, masks, effects, or render

items to bottom (back) or top (front) of

stacking order

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Down Arrow or

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Up Arrow

Command+Option+Shift+Down Arrow or

Command+Option+Shift+Up Arrow

Extend selection to next item in Project panel,

Render Queue panel, or Effect Controls panel

Shift+Down Arrow Shift+Down Arrow

Extend selection to previous item in Project

panel, Render Queue panel, or Effect Controls

panel

Shift+Up Arrow Shift+Up Arrow

Duplicate selected layers, masks, effects, text

selectors, animators, puppet meshes, shapes,

render items, output modules, or

compositions

Ctrl+D Command+D

Quit Ctrl+Q Command+Q

Undo Ctrl+Z Command+Z

Redo Ctrl+Shift+Z Command+Shift+Z

Purge All Memory Ctrl+Alt+/ (on numeric keypad) Command+Option+/ (on numeric keypad)

Interrupt running a script Esc Esc

Display filename corresponding to the frame

at the current time in the Info panel

Ctrl+Alt+E Command+Option+E

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Projects (keyboard shortcuts)

Preferences (keyboard shortcuts)

Panels, viewers, workspaces, and windows (keyboard shortcuts)

Note: (Mac OS) Shortcuts involving function keys F9-F12 may conflict with shortcuts used by the operating system. See

Mac OS Help for instructions to reassign Dashboard & Expose shortcuts.

Result Windows Mac OS

New project Ctrl+Alt+N Command+Option+N

Open project Ctrl+O Command+O

Open most recent project Ctrl+Alt+Shift+P Command+Option+Shift+P

New folder in Project panel Ctrl+Alt+Shift+N Command+Option+Shift+N

Open Project Settings dialog box Ctrl+Alt+Shift+K Command+Option+Shift+K

Find in Project panel Ctrl+F Command+F

Cycle through color bit depths for project Alt-click bit-depth button at bottom of Project

panel

Option-click bit-depth button at bottom of

Project panel

Open Project Settings dialog box Click bit-depth button at bottom of Project

panel

Click bit-depth button at bottom of Project

panel

Result Windows Mac OS

Open Preferences dialog box Ctrl+Alt+; (semicolon) Command+Option+; (semicolon)

Restore default preferences settings Hold down Ctrl+Alt+Shift while starting After

Effects

Hold down Command+Option+Shift while

starting After Effects

Result Windows Mac OS

Open or close Project panel Ctrl+0 Command+0

Open or close Render Queue panel Ctrl+Alt+0 Command+Option+0

Open or close Tools panel Ctrl+1 Command+1

Open or close Info panel Ctrl+2 Command+2

Open or close Preview panel Ctrl+3 Command+3

Open or close Audio panel Ctrl+4 Command+4

Open or close Effects & Presets panel Ctrl+5 Command+5

Open or close Character panel Ctrl+6 Command+6

Open or close Paragraph panel Ctrl+7 Command+7

Open or close Paint panel Ctrl+8 Command+8

Open or close Brushes panel Ctrl+9 Command+9

Open or close Effect Controls panel for

selected layer

F3 or Ctrl+Shift+T F3 or Command+Shift+T

Open Flowchart panel for project flowchart Ctrl+F11 Command+F11

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Activating tools (keyboard shortcuts)

Note: You can activate some tools only under certain circumstances. For example, you can activate a camera tool only when

the active composition contains a camera layer.

To momentarily activate a tool with a single-letter keyboard shortcut, hold down the key; release the key to return to

the previously active tool. To activate a tool and keep it active, press the key and immediately release it.

Switch to workspace Shift+F10, Shift+F11, or Shift+F12 Shift+F10, Shift+F11, or Shift+F12

Close active viewer or panel (closes content

first)

Ctrl+W Command+W

Close active panel or all viewers of type of

active viewer (closes content first). For

example, if a Timeline panel is active, this

command closes all Timeline panels.

Ctrl+Shift+W Command+Shift+W

Split the frame containing the active viewer

and create a new viewer with opposite

locked/unlocked state

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+N Command+Option+Shift+N

Maximize or restore panel under pointer ` (accent grave) ` (accent grave)

Resize application window or floating window

to fit screen. (Press again to resize window so

that contents fill the screen.)

Ctrl+\ (backslash) Command+\ (backslash)

Move application window or floating window

to main monitor; resize window to fit screen.

(Press again to resize window so that contents

fill the screen.)

Ctrl+Alt+\ (backslash) Command+Option+\ (backslash)

Toggle activation between Composition

panel and Timeline panel for current

composition

\ (backslash) \ (backslash)

Cycle to previous or next item in active viewer

(for example, cycle through open

compositions)

Shift+, (comma) or Shift+. (period) Shift+, (comma) or Shift+. (period)

Cycle to previous or next panel in active frame

(for example, cycle through open Timeline

panels)

Alt+Shift+, (comma) or Alt+Shift+. (period) Option+Shift+, (comma) or Option+Shift+.

(period)

Activate a view in a multi-view layout in the

Composition panel without affecting layer

selection

click with middle mouse button click with middle mouse button

Result Windows Mac OS

Cycle through tools Alt-click tool button in Tools panel Option-click tool button in Tools panel

Activate Selection tool V V

Activate Hand tool H H

Temporarily activate Hand tool Hold down spacebar or the middle mouse

button.

Hold down spacebar or the middle mouse

button.

Activate Zoom In tool Z Z

Activate Zoom Out tool Alt (when Zoom In tool is active) Option (when Zoom In tool is active)

Result Windows Mac OS

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Compositions and the work area (keyboard shortcuts)

Activate Rotation tool W W

Activate Roto Brush tool Alt+W Option+W

Activate and cycle through Camera tools

(Unified Camera, Orbit Camera, Track XY

Camera, and Track Z Camera)

C C

Activate Pan Behind tool Y Y

Activate and cycle through mask and shape

tools (Rectangle, Rounded Rectangle, Ellipse,

Polygon, Star)

Q Q

Activate and cycle through Type tools

(Horizontal and Vertical)

Ctrl+T Command+T

Activate and cycle between the Pen and Mask

Feather tools. Note - You can turn off this

setting in the Preferences dialog box.

G G

Temporarily activate Selection tool when a

pen tool is selected

Ctrl Command

Temporarily activate pen tool when the

Selection tool is selected and pointer is over a

path (Add Vertex tool when pointer is over a

segment; Convert Vertex tool when pointer is

over a vertex)

Ctrl+Alt Command+Option

Activate and cycle through Brush, Clone

Stamp, and Eraser tools

Ctrl+B Command+B

Activate and cycle through Puppet tools Ctrl+P Command+P

Temporarily convert Selection tool to Shape

Duplication tool

Alt (in shape layer) Option (in shape layer)

Temporarily convert Selection tool to Direct

Selection tool

Ctrl (in shape layer) Command (in shape layer)

Result Windows Mac OS

New composition Ctrl+N Command+N

Open Composition Settings dialog box for

selected composition

Ctrl+K Command+K

Set beginning or end of work area to current

time

B or N B or N

Set work area to duration of selected layers or,

if no layers are selected, set work area to

composition duration

Ctrl+Alt+B Command+Option+B

Open Composition Mini-Flowchart for active

composition

Tab Tab

Activate the most recently active composition

that is in the same composition hierarchy

(network of nested compositions) as the

currently active composition

Shift+Esc Shift+Esc

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Time navigation (keyboard shortcuts)

Previews (keyboard shortcuts)

Result Windows Mac OS

Go to specific time Alt+Shift+J Option+Shift+J

Go to beginning or end of work area Shift+Home or Shift+End Shift+Home or Shift+End

Go to previous or next visible item in time

ruler (keyframe, layer marker, work area

beginning or end)

note: Also goes to beginning, end, or base frame

of Roto Brush span if viewing Roto Brush in Layer

panel.

J or K J or K

Go to beginning of composition, layer, or

footage item

Home or Ctrl+Alt+Left Arrow Home or Command+Option+Left Arrow

Go to end of composition, layer, or footage

item

End or Ctrl+Alt+Right Arrow End or Command+Option+Right Arrow

Go forward 1 frame Page Down or Ctrl+Right Arrow Page Down or Command+Right Arrow

Go forward 10 frames Shift+Page Down or Ctrl+Shift+Right Arrow Shift+Page Down or Command+Shift+Right

Arrow

Go backward 1 frame Page Up or Ctrl+Left Arrow Page Up or Command+Left Arrow

Go backward 10 frames Shift+Page Up or Ctrl+Shift+Left Arrow Shift+Page Up or Command+Shift+Left Arrow

Go to layer In point I I

Go to layer Out point O O

Go to previous In point or Out point Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Left Arrow Command+Option+Shift+Left Arrow

Go to next In point or Out point Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Right Arrow Command+Option+Shift+Right Arrow

Scroll to current time in Timeline panel D D

Result Windows Mac OS

Start or stop preview spacebar, 0 on numeric keypad, Shift+0 on

numeric keypad

spacebar, 0 on numeric keypad, Shift+0 on

numeric keypad

Reset preview settings to replicate RAM

Preview and Standard Preview behaviors

Alt + click Reset on Preview panel Option + click Reset on Preview panel

Preview only audio, from current time . (decimal point) on numeric keypad* . (decimal point) on numeric keypad* or

Control+. (period) on main keyboard

Preview only audio, in work area Alt+. (decimal point) on numeric keypad* Option+. (decimal point) on numeric keypad*

or Control+Option+. (period) on main

keyboard

Manually preview (scrub) video Drag or Alt-drag current-time indicator,

depending on Live Update setting

Drag or Option-drag current-time indicator,

depending on Live Update setting

Manually preview (scrub) audio Ctrl-drag current-time indicator Command-drag current-time indicator

Preview number of frames specified by

Alternate Preview preference (defaults to 5)

Alt+0 on numeric keypad* Option+0 on numeric keypad* or

Control+Option+0 (zero) on main keyboard

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Note: Some shortcuts are marked with an asterisk (*) to remind you to make sure that Num Lock is on when you use the

numeric keypad.

Views (keyboard shortcuts)

Toggle Mercury Transmit video preview / (on numeric keypad) / (on numeric keypad), Control+/ on main

keyboard

Take snapshot Shift+F5, Shift+F6, Shift+F7, or Shift+F8 Shift+F5, Shift+F6, Shift+F7, or Shift+F8

Display snapshot in active viewer F5, F6, F7, or F8 F5, F6, F7, or F8

Purge snapshot Ctrl+Shift+F5, Ctrl+Shift+F6, Ctrl+Shift+F7, or

Ctrl+Shift+F8

Command+Shift+F5, Command+Shift+F6,

Command+Shift+F7, or Command+Shift+F8

Fast Previews > Off Ctrl+Alt+1 Command+Option+1

Fast Previews > Adaptive Resolution Ctrl+Alt+2 Command+Option+2

Fast Previews > Draft Ctrl+Alt+3 Command+Option+3

Fast Previews > Fast Draft Ctrl+Alt+4 Command+Option+4

Fast Previews > Wireframe Ctrl+Alt+5 Command+Option+5

Result Windows Mac OS

Turn display color management on or off for

active view

Shift+/ (on numeric keypad) Shift+/ (on numeric keypad)

Show red, green, blue, or alpha channel as

grayscale

Alt+1, Alt+2, Alt+3, Alt+4 Option+1, Option+2, Option+3, Option+4

Show colorized red, green, or blue channel Alt+Shift+1, Alt+Shift+2, Alt+Shift+3 Option+Shift+1, Option+Shift+2,

Option+Shift+3

Toggle showing straight RGB color Alt+Shift+4 Option+Shift+4

Show alpha boundary (outline between

transparent and opaque regions) in Layer

panel

Alt+5 Option+5

Show alpha overlay (colored overlay on

transparent regions) in Layer panel

Alt+6 Option+6

Show Refine Edge X-ray (After Effects CC 12.0

and later)

Alt+X Option+X

Center composition in the panel Double-click Hand tool Double-click Hand tool

Zoom in in Composition, Layer, or Footage

panel

. (period) on main keyboard . (period) on main keyboard

Zoom out in Composition, Layer, or Footage

panel

, (comma) , (comma)

Zoom to 100% in Composition, Layer, or

Footage panel

/ (on main keyboard) / (on main keyboard)

Zoom to fit in Composition, Layer, or Footage

panel

Shift+/ (on main keyboard) Shift+/ (on main keyboard)

Zoom up to 100% to fit in Composition, Layer,

or Footage panel

Alt+/ (on main keyboard) Option+/ (on main keyboard)

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Footage (keyboard shortcuts)

Set resolution to Full, Half, or Custom in

Composition panel

Ctrl+J, Ctrl+Shift+J, Ctrl+Alt+J Command+J, Command+Shift+J,

Command+Option+J

Open View Options dialog box for active

Composition panel

Ctrl+Alt+U Command+Option+U

Zoom in time = (equal sign) on main keyboard = (equal sign) on main keyboard

Zoom out time - (hyphen) on main keyboard - (hyphen) on main keyboard

Zoom in Timeline panel to single-frame units

(Press again to zoom out to show entire

composition duration.)

; (semicolon) ; (semicolon)

Zoom out in Timeline panel to show the entire

composition duration (Press again to zoom

back in to the duration specified by the Time

Navigator.)

Shift+; (semicolon) Shift+; (semicolon)

Prevent images from being rendered for

previews in viewer panels

Caps Lock Caps Lock

Show or hide safe zones ' (apostrophe) ' (apostrophe)

Show or hide grid Ctrl+' (apostrophe) Command+' (apostrophe)

Show or hide proportional grid Alt+' (apostrophe) Option+' (apostrophe)

Show or hide rulers Ctrl+R Command+R

Show or hide guides Ctrl+; (semicolon) Command+; (semicolon)

Turn snapping to grid on or off Ctrl+Shift+' (apostrophe) Command+Shift+' (apostrophe)

Turn snapping to guides on or off Ctrl+Shift+; (semicolon) Command+Shift+; (semicolon)

Lock or unlock guides Ctrl+Alt+Shift+; (semicolon) Command+Option+Shift+; (semicolon)

Show or hide layer controls (masks, motion

paths, light and camera wireframes, effect

control points, and layer handles)

Ctrl+Shift+H Command+Shift+H

Result Windows Mac OS

Import one file or image sequence Ctrl+I Command+I

Import multiple files or image sequences Ctrl+Alt+I Command+Option+I

Open movie in an After Effects Footage panel Double-click the footage item in the Project

panel

Double-click the footage item in the Project

panel

Add selected items to most recently activated

composition

Ctrl+/ (on main keyboard) Command+/ (on main keyboard)

Replace selected source footage for selected

layers with footage item selected in Project

panel

Ctrl+Alt+/ (on main keyboard) Command+Option+/ (on main keyboard)

Replace source for a selected layer Alt-drag footage item from Project panel onto

selected layer

Option-drag footage item from Project panel

onto selected layer

Delete a footage item without a warning Ctrl+Backspace Command+Delete

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Effects and animation presets (keyboard shortcuts)

Layers (keyboard shortcuts)

Note: Some operations do not affect shy layers.

Open Interpret Footage dialog box for

selected footage item

Ctrl+Alt+G Command+Option+G

Remember footage interpretation Ctrl+Alt+C Command+Option+C

Edit selected footage item in application with

which it’s associated (Edit Original)

Ctrl+E Command+E

Replace selected footage item Ctrl+H Command+H

Reload selected footage items Ctrl+Alt+L Command+Option+L

Set proxy for selected footage item Ctrl+Alt+P Command+Option+P

Result Windows Mac OS

Delete all effects from selected layers Ctrl+Shift+E Command+Shift+E

Apply most recently applied effect to selected

layers

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+E Command+Option+Shift+E

Apply most recently applied animation preset

to selected layers

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+F Command+Option+Shift+F

Result Windows Mac OS

New solid layer Ctrl+Y Command+Y

New null layer Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Y Command+Option+Shift+Y

New adjustment layer Ctrl+Alt+Y Command+Option+Y

Select layer (1-999) by its number (enter digits

rapidly for two-digit and three-digit numbers)

0-9 on numeric keypad* 0-9 on numeric keypad*

Toggle selection of layer (1-999) by its number

(enter digits rapidly for two-digit and three-

digit numbers)

Shift+0-9 on numeric keypad* Shift+0-9 on numeric keypad*

Select next layer in stacking order Ctrl+Down Arrow Command+Down Arrow

Select previous layer in stacking order Ctrl+Up Arrow Command+Up Arrow

Extend selection to next layer in stacking

order

Ctrl+Shift+Down Arrow Command+Shift+Down Arrow

Extend selection to previous layer in stacking

order

Ctrl+Shift+Up Arrow Command+Shift+Up Arrow

Deselect all layers Ctrl+Shift+A Command+Shift+A

Scroll topmost selected layer to top of

Timeline panel

X X

Show or hide Parent column Shift+F4 Shift+F4

Show or hide Layer Switches and Modes

columns

F4 F4

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Setting the sampling method for selected

layers (Best/Bilinear)

Alt+B Option+B

Setting the sampling method for selected

layers (Best/Bicubic)

Alt+Shift+B Option+Shift+B

Turn off all other solo switches Alt-click solo switch Option-click solo switch

Turn Video (eyeball) switch on or off for

selected layers

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+V Command+Option+Shift+V

Turn off Video switch for all video layers other

than selected layers

Ctrl+Shift+V Command+Shift+V

Open settings dialog box for selected solid,

light, camera, null, or adjustment layer

Ctrl+Shift+Y Command+Shift+Y

Paste layers at current time Ctrl+Alt+V Command+Option+V

Split selected layers (If no layers are selected,

split all layers.)

Ctrl+Shift+D Command+Shift+D

Precompose selected layers Ctrl+Shift+C Command+Shift+C

Open Effect Controls panel for selected layers Ctrl+Shift+T Command+Shift+T

Open layer in Layer panel (opens source

composition for precomposition layer in

Composition panel)

Double-click a layer Double-click a layer

Open source of a layer in Footage panel

(opens precomposition layer in Layer panel)

Alt-double-click a layer Option-double-click a layer

Reverse selected layers in time Ctrl+Alt+R Command+Option+R

Enable time remapping for selected layers Ctrl+Alt+T Command+Option+T

Move selected layers so that their In point or

Out point is at the current time

[ (left bracket) or ] (right bracket) [ (left bracket) or ] (right bracket)

Trim In point or Out point of selected layers to

current time

Alt+[ (left bracket) or Alt+] (right bracket) Option+[ (left bracket) or Option+] (right

bracket)

Add or remove expression for a property Alt-click stopwatch Option-click stopwatch

Add an effect (or multiple selected effects) to

selected layers

Double-click effect selection in Effects &

Presets panel

Double-click effect selection in Effects &

Presets panel

Set In point or Out point by time-stretching Ctrl+Shift+, (comma) or Ctrl+Alt+, (comma) Command+Shift+, (comma) or

Command+Option+, (comma)

Move selected layers so that their In Point is at

beginning of composition

Alt+Home Option+Home

Move selected layers so that their Out point is

at end of composition

Alt+End Option+End

Lock selected layers Ctrl+L Command+L

Unlock all layers Ctrl+Shift+L Command+Shift+L

Set Quality to Best, Draft, or Wireframe for

selected layers

Ctrl+U, Ctrl+Shift+U, or Ctrl+Alt+Shift+U Command+U, Command+Shift+U,

Command+Option+Shift+U

Cycle forward or backward through blending

modes for selected layers

Shift+ - (hyphen) or Shift+= (equal sign) on

the main keyboard

Shift+ - (hyphen) or Shift+= (equal sign) on

the main keyboard

Find in Timeline panel Ctrl+F Command+F

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Note: Some shortcuts are marked with an asterisk (*) to remind you to make sure that Num Lock is on when you use the

numeric keypad.

Showing properties and groups in the Timeline panel (keyboard shortcuts)

Note: This table contains double-letter shortcuts (for example, LL). To use these shortcuts, press the letters in quick

succession.

Result Windows Mac OS

Find in Timeline panel Ctrl+F Command+F

Toggle expansion of selected layers to show

all properties

Ctrl+` (accent grave) Command+` (accent grave)

Toggle expansion of property group and all

child property groups to show all properties

Ctrl-click triangle to the left of the property

group name

Command-click triangle to the left of the

property group name

Show only Anchor Point property (for lights

and cameras, Point Of Interest)

A A

Show only Audio Levels property L L

Show only Mask Feather property F F

Show only Mask Path property M M

Show only Mask Opacity property TT TT

Show only Opacity property (for lights,

Intensity)

T T

Show only Position property P P

Show only Rotation and Orientation

properties

R R

Show only Scale property S S

Show only Time Remap property RR RR

Show only instances of missing effects FF FF

Show only Effects property group E E

Show only mask property groups MM MM

Show only Material Options property group AA AA

Show only expressions EE EE

Show only modified properties UU UU

Show only paint strokes, Roto Brush strokes,

and Puppet pins

PP PP

Show only audio waveform LL LL

Show only properties with keyframes or

expressions

U U

Show only selected properties and groups SS SS

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Showing properties in the Effect Controls panel (keyboard shortcuts)

Modifying layer properties (keyboard shortcuts)

Hide property or group Alt+Shift-click property or group name Option+Shift-click property or group name

Add or remove property or group from set

that is shown

Shift+property or group shortcut Shift+property or group shortcut

Add or remove keyframe at current time Alt+Shift+property shortcut Option+property shortcut

Result Windows Mac OS

Toggle expansion of selected effects to show

all properties

Ctrl+` (accent grave) Command+` (accent grave)

Toggle expansion of property group and all

child property groups to show all properties

Ctrl-click triangle to the left of the property

group name

Command-click triangle to the left of the

property group name

Result Windows Mac OS

Modify property value by default increments Drag property value Drag property value

Modify property value by 10x default

increments

Shift-drag property value Shift-drag property value

Modify property value by 1/10 default

increments

Ctrl-drag property value Command-drag property value

Open Auto-Orientation dialog box for

selected layers

Ctrl+Alt+O Command+Alt+O

Open Opacity dialog box for selected layers Ctrl+Shift+O Command+Shift+O

Open Rotation dialog box for selected layers Ctrl+Shift+R Command+Shift+R

Open Position dialog box for selected layers Ctrl+Shift+P Command+Shift+P

Center selected layers in view (modifies

Position property to place anchor points of

selected layers in center of current view)

Ctrl+Home Command+Home

Move selected layers 1 pixel at current

magnification (Position)

arrow key arrow key

Move selected layers 10 pixels at current

magnification (Position)

Shift+arrow key Shift+arrow key

Move selected layers 1 frame earlier or later Alt+Page Up or Alt+Page Down Option+Page Up or Option+Page Down

Move selected layers 10 frames earlier or later Alt+Shift+Page Up or Alt+Shift+Page Down Option+Shift+Page Up or Option+Shift+Page

Down

Increase or decrease Rotation (Z Rotation) of

selected layers by 1°

+ (plus) or - (minus) on numeric keypad + (plus) or - (minus) on numeric keypad

Increase or decrease Rotation (Z Rotation) of

selected layers by 10°

Shift++ (plus) or Shift+- (minus) on numeric

keypad

Shift++ (plus) or Shift+- (minus) on numeric

keypad

Increase or decrease Opacity (or Intensity for

light layers) of selected layers by 1%

Ctrl+Alt++ (plus) or Ctrl+Alt+- (minus) on

numeric keypad

Control+Option++ (plus) or

Control+Option+- (minus) on numeric keypad

Result Windows Mac OS

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3D layers (keyboard shortcuts)

Note: (Mac OS) Shortcuts involving function keys F9-F12 may conflict with shortcuts used by the operating system. See

Mac OS Help for instructions to reassign Dashboard & Expose shortcuts.

Increase or decrease Opacity (or Intensity for

light layers) of selected layers by 10%

Ctrl+Alt+Shift++ (plus) or Ctrl+Alt+Shift+-

(minus) on numeric keypad

Control+Option+Shift++ (plus) or

Control+Option+Shift+- (minus) on numeric

keypad

Increase Scale of selected layers by 1% Ctrl++ (plus) or Alt++ (plus) on numeric

keypad

Command++ (plus) or Option++ (plus) on

numeric keypad

Decrease Scale of selected layers by 1% Ctrl+- (minus) or Alt+- (minus) on numeric

keypad

Command+- (minus) or Option+- (minus) on

numeric keypad

Increase Scale of selected layers by 10% Ctrl+Shift++ (plus) or Alt+Shift++ (plus) on

numeric keypad

Command+Shift++ (plus) or Option+Shift++

(plus) on numeric keypad

Decrease Scale of selected layers by 10% Ctrl+Shift+- (minus) or Alt+Shift+- (minus) on

numeric keypad

Command+Shift+- (minus) or Option+Shift+-

(minus) on numeric keypad

Modify Rotation or Orientation in 45°

increments

Shift-drag with Rotation tool Shift-drag with Rotation tool

Modify Scale, constrained to footage frame

aspect ratio

Shift-drag layer handle with Selection tool Shift-drag layer handle with Selection tool

Reset Rotation to 0° Double-click Rotation tool Double-click Rotation tool

Reset Scale to 100% Double-click Selection tool Double-click Selection tool

Scale and reposition selected layers to fit

composition

Ctrl+Alt+F Command+Option+F

Scale and reposition selected layers to fit

composition width, preserving image aspect

ratio for each layer

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+H Command+Option+Shift+H

Scale and reposition selected layers to fit

composition height, preserving image aspect

ratio for each layer

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+G Command+Option+Shift+G

Result Windows Mac OS

Switch to 3D view 1 (defaults to Front) F10 F10

Switch to 3D view 2 (defaults to Custom View

1)

F11 F11

Switch to 3D view 3 (defaults to Active

Camera)

F12 F12

Return to previous view Esc Esc

New light Ctrl+Alt+Shift+L Command+Option+Shift+L

New camera Ctrl+Alt+Shift+C Command+Option+Shift+C

Move the camera and its point of interest to

look at selected 3D layers

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+\ Command+Option+Shift+\

Result Windows Mac OS

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Keyframes and the Graph Editor (keyboard shortcuts)

Note: (Mac OS) Shortcuts involving function keys F9-F12 may conflict with shortcuts used by the operating system. See

Mac OS Help for instructions to reassign Dashboard & Expose shortcuts.

With a camera tool selected, move the camera

and its point of interest to look at selected 3D

layers

F F

With a camera tool selected, move the camera

and its point of interest to look at all 3D layers

Ctrl+Shift+F Command+Shift+F

Turn Casts Shadows property on or off for

selected 3D layers

Alt+Shift+C Option+Shift+C

Result Windows Mac OS

Toggle between Graph Editor and layer bar

modes

Shift+F3 Shift+F3

Select all keyframes for a property Click property name Click property name

Select all visible keyframes and properties Ctrl+Alt+A Command+Option+A

Deselect all keyframes, properties, and

property groups

Shift+F2 or Ctrl+Alt+Shift+A Shift+F2 or Command+Option+Shift+A

Move keyframe 1 frame later or earlier Alt+Right Arrow or Alt+Left Arrow Option+Right Arrow or Option+Left Arrow

Move keyframe 10 frames later or earlier Alt+Shift+Right Arrow or Alt+Shift+Left

Arrow

Option+Shift+Right Arrow or

Option+Shift+Left Arrow

Set interpolation for selected keyframes (layer

bar mode)

Ctrl+Alt+K Command+Option+K

Set keyframe interpolation method to hold or

Auto Bezier

Ctrl+Alt+H Command+Option+H

Set keyframe interpolation method to linear

or Auto Bezier

Ctrl-click in layer bar mode Command-click in layer bar mode

Set keyframe interpolation method to linear

or hold

Ctrl+Alt-click in layer bar mode Command+Option-click in layer bar mode

Easy ease selected keyframes F9 F9

Easy ease selected keyframes in Shift+F9 Shift+F9

Easy ease selected keyframes out Ctrl+Shift+F9 Command+Shift+F9

Set velocity for selected keyframes Ctrl+Shift+K Command+Shift+K

Add or remove keyframe at current time. For

property shortcuts, see Showing properties

and groups in the Timeline panel (keyboard

shortcuts).

Alt+Shift+property shortcut Option+property shortcut

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Text (keyboard shortcuts)

Result Windows Mac OS

New text layer Ctrl+Alt+Shift+T Command+Option+Shift+T

Align selected horizontal text left, center, or

right

Ctrl+Shift+L, Ctrl+Shift+C, or Ctrl+Shift+R Command+Shift+L, Command+Shift+C, or

Command+Shift+R

Align selected vertical text top, center, or

bottom

Ctrl+Shift+L, Ctrl+Shift+C, or Ctrl+Shift+R Command+Shift+L, Command+Shift+C, or

Command+Shift+R

Extend or reduce selection by one character

to right or left in horizontal text

Shift+Right Arrow or Shift+Left Arrow Shift+Right Arrow or Shift+Left Arrow

Extend or reduce selection by one word to

right or left in horizontal text

Ctrl+Shift+Right Arrow or Ctrl+Shift+Left

Arrow

Command+Shift+Right Arrow or

Command+Shift+Left Arrow

Extend or reduce selection by one line up or

down in horizontal text

Shift+Up Arrow or Shift+Down Arrow Shift+Up Arrow or Shift+Down Arrow

Extend or reduce selection by one line to right

or left in vertical text

Shift+Right Arrow or Shift+Left Arrow Shift+Right Arrow or Shift+Left Arrow

Extend or reduce selection one word up or

down in vertical text

Ctrl+Shift+Up Arrow or Ctrl+Shift+Down

Arrow

Command+Shift+Up Arrow or

Command+Shift+Down Arrow

Extend or reduce selection by one character

up or down in vertical text

Shift+Up Arrow or Shift+Down Arrow Shift+Up Arrow or Shift+Down Arrow

Select text from insertion point to beginning

or end of line

Shift+Home or Shift+End Shift+Home or Shift+End

Move insertion point to beginning or end of

line

Home or End Home or End

Select all text on a layer Double-click text layer Double-click text layer

Select text from insertion point to beginning

or end of text frame

Ctrl+Shift+Home or Ctrl+Shift+End Command+Shift+Home or

Command+Shift+End

Select text from insertion point to mouse click

point

Shift-click Shift-click

In horizontal text, move insertion point one

character left or right; one line up or down;

one word left or right; or one paragraph up or

down

Left Arrow or Right Arrow; Up Arrow or Down

Arrow; Ctrl+Left Arrow or Ctrl+Right Arrow; or

Ctrl+Up Arrow or Ctrl+Down Arrow

Left Arrow or Right Arrow; Up Arrow or Down

Arrow; Command+Left Arrow or

Command+Right Arrow; or Command+Up

Arrow or Command+Down Arrow

In vertical text, move insertion point one

character up or down; one left or right; one

word up or down; or one paragraph left or

right

Up Arrow or Down Arrow; Left Arrow or Right

Arrow; Ctrl+Up Arrow or Ctrl+Down Arrow; or

Ctrl+Left Arrow or Ctrl+Right Arrow

Up Arrow or Down Arrow; Left Arrow or Right

Arrow; Command+Up Arrow or

Command+Down Arrow; or Command+Left

Arrow or Command+Right Arrow

Select word, line, paragraph, or entire text

frame

Double-click, triple-click, quadruple-click, or

quintuple-click with Type tool

Double-click, triple-click, quadruple-click, or

quintuple-click with Type tool

Turn All Caps on or off for selected text Ctrl+Shift+K Command+Shift+K

Turn Small Caps on or off for selected text Ctrl+Alt+Shift+K Command+Option+Shift+K

Turn Superscript on or off for selected text Ctrl+Shift+= (equals) Command+Shift+= (equals)

Turn Subscript on or off for selected text Ctrl+Alt+Shift+= (equals) Command+Option+Shift+= (equals)

Set horizontal scale to 100% for selected text Ctrl+Shift+X Command+Shift+X

Set vertical scale to 100% for selected text Ctrl+Alt+Shift+X Command+Option+Shift+X

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Masks (keyboard shortcuts)

Auto leading for selected text Ctrl+Alt+Shift+A Command+Option+Shift+A

Reset tracking to 0 for selected text Ctrl+Shift+Q Command+Shift+Control+Q

Justify paragraph; left align last line Ctrl+Shift+J Command+Shift+J

Justify paragraph; right align last line Ctrl+Alt+Shift+J Command+Option+Shift+J

Justify paragraph; force last line Ctrl+Shift+F Command+Shift+F

Decrease or increase font size of selected text

by 2 units

Ctrl+Shift+, (comma) or Ctrl+Shift+. (period) Command+Shift+, (comma) or

Command+Shift+. (period)

Decrease or increase font size of selected text

by 10 units

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+, (comma) or Ctrl+Alt+Shift+.

(period)

Command+Option+Shift+, (comma) or

Command+Option+Shift+. (period)

Increase or decrease leading by 2 units Alt+Down Arrow or Alt+Up Arrow Option+Down Arrow or Option+Up Arrow

Increase or decrease leading by 10 units Ctrl+Alt+Down Arrow or Ctrl+Alt+Up Arrow Command+Option+Down Arrow or

Command+Option+Up Arrow

Decrease or increase baseline shift by 2 units Alt+Shift+Down Arrow or Alt+Shift+Up Arrow Option+Shift+Down Arrow or

Option+Shift+Up Arrow

Decrease or increase baseline shift by 10 units Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Down Arrow or

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Up Arrow

Command+Option+Shift+Down Arrow or

Command+Option+Shift+Up Arrow

Decrease or increase kerning or tracking 20

units (20/1000 ems)

Alt+Left Arrow or Alt+Right Arrow Option+Left Arrow or Option+Right Arrow

Decrease or increase kerning or tracking 100

units (100/1000 ems)

Ctrl+Alt+Left Arrow or Ctrl+Alt+Right Arrow Command+Option+Left Arrow or

Command+Option+Right Arrow

Toggle paragraph composer Ctrl+Alt+Shift+T Command+Option+Shift+T

Result Windows Mac OS

New mask Ctrl+Shift+N Command+Shift+N

Select all points in a mask Alt-click mask Option-click mask

Select next or previous mask Alt+` (accent grave) or Alt+Shift+` (accent

grave)

Option+` (accent grave) or Option+Shift+`

(accent grave)

Enter free-transform mask editing mode Double-click mask with Selection tool or

select mask in Timeline panel and press Ctrl+T

Double-click mask with Selection tool or

select mask in Timeline panel and press

Command+T

Exit free-transform mask editing mode Esc Esc

Scale around center point in Free Transform

mode

Ctrl-drag Command-drag

Move selected path points 1 pixel at current

magnification

arrow key arrow key

Move selected path points 10 pixels at current

magnification

Shift+arrow key Shift+arrow key

Toggle between smooth and corner points Ctrl+Alt-click vertex Command+Option-click vertex

Redraw Bezier handles Ctrl+Alt-drag vertex Command+Option-drag vertex

Result Windows Mac OS

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Paint tools (keyboard shortcuts)

Note: Some shortcuts are marked with an asterisk (*) to remind you to make sure that Num Lock is on when you use the

numeric keypad.

Invert selected mask Ctrl+Shift+I Command+Shift+I

Open Mask Feather dialog box for selected

mask

Ctrl+Shift+F Command+Shift+F

Open Mask Shape dialog box for selected

mask

Ctrl+Shift+M Command+Shift+M

Result Windows Mac OS

Swap paint background color and foreground

colors

X X

Set paint foreground color to black and

background color to white

D D

Set foreground color to the color currently

under any paint tool pointer

Alt-click Option-click

Set foreground color to the average color of a

4-pixel x 4-pixel area under any paint tool

pointer

Ctrl+Alt-click Command+Option-click

Set brush size for a paint tool Ctrl-drag Command-drag

Set brush hardness for a paint tool Ctrl-drag, then release Ctrl while dragging Command-drag, then release Command

while dragging

Join current paint stroke to the previous

stroke

Hold Shift while beginning stroke Hold Shift while beginning stroke

Set starting sample point to point currently

under Clone Stamp tool pointer

Alt-click Option-click

Momentarily activate Eraser tool with Last

Stroke Only option

Ctrl+Shift Command+Shift

Show and move overlay (change Offset value

of aligned Clone Stamp tool or change Source

Position value of unaligned Clone Stamp tool)

Alt+Shift-drag with Clone Stamp tool Option+Shift-drag with Clone Stamp tool

Activate a specific Clone Stamp tool preset 3, 4, 5, 6, or 7 on the main keyboard 3, 4, 5, 6, or 7 on the main keyboard

Duplicate a Clone Stamp tool preset in Paint

panel

Alt-click the button for the preset Option-click the button for the preset

Set opacity for a paint tool Digit on numeric keypad (for example,

9=90%, 1=10%)*

Digit on numeric keypad (for example,

9=90%, 1=10%)*

Set opacity for a paint tool to 100% . (decimal) on numeric keypad* . (decimal) on numeric keypad*

Set flow for a paint tool Shift+a digit on numeric keypad (for example,

9=90%, 1=10%)*

Shift+a digit on numeric keypad (for example,

9=90%, 1=10%)*

Set flow for a paint tool to 100% Shift+. (decimal) on numeric keypad* Shift+. (decimal) on numeric keypad*

Move earlier or later by number of frames

specified for stroke Duration

Ctrl+Page Up or Ctrl+Page Down (or 1 or 2 on

the main keyboard)

Command+Page Up or Command+Page

Down (or 1 or 2 on the main keyboard)

Result Windows Mac OS

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Shape layers (keyboard shortcuts)

Markers (keyboard shortcuts)

Result Windows Mac OS

Group selected shapes Ctrl+G Command+G

Ungroup selected shapes Ctrl+Shift+G Command+Shift+G

Enter free-transform path editing mode Select Path property in Timeline panel and

press Ctrl+T

Select Path property in Timeline panel and

press Command+T

Increase star inner roundness Page Up when dragging to create shape Page Up when dragging to create shape

Decrease star inner roundness Page Down when dragging to create shape Page Down when dragging to create shape

Increase number of points for star or polygon;

increase roundness for rounded rectangle

Up Arrow when dragging to create shape Up Arrow when dragging to create shape

Decrease number of points for star or

polygon; decrease roundness for rounded

rectangle

Down Arrow when dragging to create shape Down Arrow when dragging to create shape

Reposition shape during creation Hold spacebar when dragging to create shape Hold spacebar when dragging to create shape

Set rounded rectangle roundness to 0 (sharp

corners); decrease polygon and star outer

roundness

Left Arrow when dragging to create shape Left Arrow when dragging to create shape

Set rounded rectangle roundness to

maximum; increase polygon and star outer

roundness

Right Arrow when dragging to create shape Right Arrow when dragging to create shape

Constrain rectangles to squares; constrain

ellipses to circles; constrain polygons and

stars to zero rotation

Shift when dragging to create shape Shift when dragging to create shape

Change outer radius of star Ctrl when dragging to create shape Command when dragging to create shape

Result Windows Mac OS

Set marker at current time (works during

preview and audio-only preview)

* (multiply) on numeric keypad * (multiply) on numeric keypad or Control+8

on main keyboard

Set marker at current time and open marker

dialog box

Alt+* (multiply) on numeric keypad Option+* (multiply) on numeric keypad or

Control+Option+8 on main keyboard

Set and number a composition marker (0-9) at

the current time

Shift+0-9 on main keyboard Shift+0-9 on main keyboard

Go to a composition marker (0-9) 0-9 on main keyboard 0-9 on main keyboard

Display the duration between two layer

markers or keyframes in the Info panel

Alt-click the markers or keyframes Option-click the markers or keyframes

Remove marker Ctrl-click marker Command-click marker

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Motion tracking (keyboard shortcuts)

Saving, exporting, and rendering (keyboard shortcuts)

Note: On Mac OS, some keyboard commands used to interact with the operating system conflict with keyboard commands

for interacting with After Effects. Select Use System Shortcut Keys in the General preferences to override the After Effects

keyboard command in some cases in which there’s a conflict with the Mac OS keyboard command.

Keyboard shortcuts graphic

Click the link below to download a pdf of about 50 of the more commonly used and pouplar keyboard shortcuts.

AE_KeyboardShortcuts.pdf

Working with After Effects and other applications

Working with Adobe Bridge and After Effects

Adobe Bridge is the control center for Adobe Creative Suite software. Use Adobe Bridge to browse for project templates

and animation presets; run cross-product workflow automation scripts; view and manage files and folders; organize

your files by assigning keywords, labels, and ratings to them; search for files and folders; and view, edit, and add

metadata.

•To open Adobe Bridge from After Effects, choose File > Browse In Bridge.

Result Windows Mac OS

Move feature region, search region, and

attach point 1 pixel at current magnification

arrow key arrow key

Move feature region, search region, and

attach point 10 pixels at current magnification

Shift+arrow key Shift+arrow key

Move feature region and search region 1 pixel

at current magnification

Alt+arrow key Option+arrow key

Move feature region and search region 10

pixels at current magnification

Alt+Shift+arrow key Option+Shift+arrow key

Result Windows Mac OS

Save project Ctrl+S Command+S

Increment and save project Ctrl+Alt+Shift+S Command+Option+Shift+S

Save As Ctrl+Shift+S Command+Shift+S

Add active composition or selected items to

render queue

Ctrl+Shift+/ (on main keyboard) Command+Shift+/ (on main keyboard)

Add current frame to render queue Ctrl+Alt+S Command+Option+S

Duplicate render item with same output

filename as original

Ctrl+Shift+D Command+Shift+D

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•To reveal a file in Adobe Bridge, select a file in the Project panel and choose File > Reveal In Bridge.

•To use Adobe Bridge to browse for animation presets, choose Animation > Browse Presets.

Adobe Bridge is part of the Creative Cloud suite of applications and can be downloaded and installed through Creative

Cloud. See the help documentation and the Adobe Bridge CC product page for more information.

See this video to get an overview of Adobe Bridge CC.

After Effects includes template projects that include entire DVD menus for you to use as a basis for your own DVD

menus. To use Adobe Bridge to browse and import these template projects, choose File > Browse Template Projects. (See

Template projects and example projects.)

Working with Photoshop and After Effects

If you use Photoshop to create still images, you can use After Effects to bring those still images together and make them

move and change. In After Effects, you can animate an entire Photoshop image or any of its layers. You can even

animate individual properties of Photoshop images, such as the properties of a layer style. If you use After Effects to

create movies, you can use Photoshop to refine the individual frames of those movies.

Comparative advantages for specific tasks

The strengths of After Effects are in its animation and automation features. This means that After Effects excels at tasks

that can be automated from one frame to another. For example, you can use the motion tracking features of After Effects

to track the motion of a microphone boom, and then automatically apply that same motion to a stroke made with the

Clone Stamp tool. In this manner, you can remove the microphone from every frame of a shot, without having to paint

the microphone out by hand on each frame.

In contrast, Photoshop has excellent tools for painting and drawing.

Deciding which application to use for painting depends on the task. Paint strokes in Photoshop directly affect the pixels

of the layer. Paint strokes in After Effects are elements of an effect, each of which can be turned on or off or modified

at any time. If you want to have complete control of each paint stroke after you’ve applied it, or if you want to animate

the paint strokes themselves, use the After Effects paint tools. If the purpose of applying a paint stroke is to permanently

modify a still image, use the Photoshop paint tools. If you are applying several paint strokes by hand to get rid of dust,

consider using the Photoshop paint tools.

The animation and video features in Photoshop Extended include simple keyframe-based animation. After Effects uses

a similar interface, though the breadth and flexibility of its animation features are far greater.

After Effects can also automatically create 3D layers to mimic the planes created by the Photoshop Vanishing Point

feature.

Exchanging still images

After Effects can import and export still images in many formats, but you will usually want to use the native Photoshop

PSD format when transferring individual frames or still image sequences between After Effects and Photoshop.

When importing or exporting a PSD file, After Effects can preserve individual layers, masks, layer styles, and most

other attributes. When you import a PSD file into After Effects, you can choose whether to import it as a flattened image

or as a composition with its layers separate and intact.

It is often a good idea to prepare a still image in Photoshop before importing it into After Effects. Examples of such

preparation include correcting color, scaling, and cropping. It is often better for you to do something once to the source

image in Photoshop than to have After Effects perform the same operation many times per second as it renders each

frame for previews or final output.

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By creating your new PSD document from the Photoshop New File dialog box with a Film & Video preset, you can start

with a document that is set up correctly for a specific video output type. If you are already working in After Effects, you

can create a new PSD document that matches your composition and project settings by choosing File > New > Adobe

Photoshop File.

Exchanging movies

You can also exchange video files, such as QuickTime movies, between Photoshop and After Effects. When you open a

movie in Photoshop, a video layer is created that refers to the source footage file. Video layers allow you to paint

nondestructively on the movie’s frames, much as After Effects works with layers with movies as their sources. When

you save a PSD file with a video layer, you save the edits that you made to the video layer, not edits to the source footage

itself.

You can also render a movie directly from Photoshop. For example, you can create a QuickTime movie from Photoshop

that can then be imported into After Effects.

Color

After Effects works internally with colors in an RGB (red, green, blue) color space. Though After Effects can convert

CMYK images to RGB, you should do video and animation work in Photoshop in RGB.

If relevant for your final output, it is better to ensure that the colors in your image are broadcast-safe in Photoshop

before you import the image into After Effects. A good way to do this is to assign the appropriate destination color

space—for example, SDTV (Rec. 601)—to the document in Photoshop. After Effects performs color management

according to color profiles embedded in documents, including imported PSD files.

Working with Flash and After Effects

If you use Adobe® Flash® to create video or animation, you can use After Effects to edit and refine the video. For

example, from Flash you can export animations and applications as QuickTime movies or Flash Video (FLV) files. You

can then use After Effects to edit and refine the video.

If you use After Effects to edit and composite video, you can then use Flash to publish that video.

Flash and After Effects use separate terms for some concepts that they share in common. The following table lists the

differences between the terms used in the two applications:

Additional resources

The following articles provide additional information about using Flash and After Effects together:

•Richard Harrington and Marcus Geduld provide an excerpt, "Flash Essentials for After Effects Users", of their book

After Effects for Flash | Flash for After Effects on the Peachpit website. In this chapter, Richard and Marcus explain

Flash in terms that an After Effects user can understand. http://www.peachpit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1350895

After Effects Flash Professional

Composition Movie Clip

Composition frame (Composition panel) Stage

Project panel Library panel

Project files FLA files

Render and export a movie Publish SWF file

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•Richard Harrington and Marcus Geduld also provide "After Effects Essentials for Flash Users", another excerpt from

their book After Effects for Flash | Flash for After Effects. In this chapter, Richard and Marcus explain After Effects

in terms that a Flash user can understand. http://www.peachpit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1350894

•Robert Powers provides a video tutorial on the Slippery Rock NYC website that shows the basics of using After

Effects from the perspective of someone who is familiar with Flash Professional.

Exporting QuickTime video from Flash

If you create animations or applications with Flash, you can export them as QuickTime movies using the File > Export

> Export Movie command in Flash. For a Flash animation, you can optimize the video output for animation. For a Flash

application, Flash renders video of the application as it runs, allowing the user to manipulate it. This lets you capture

the branches or states of your application that you want to include in the video file.

Importing and publishing video in Flash

When you import a movie file into Flash, you can use various techniques, such as scripting or Flash components, to

control the visual interface that surrounds your video. For example, you might include playback controls or other

graphics. You can also add graphic layers on top of the movie for composite results.

Composite graphics, animation, and video

Flash and After Effects each include many capabilities that allow you to perform complex compositing of video and

graphics. Which application you choose to use will depend on your personal preferences and the type of final output

you want to create.

Flash is the more web-oriented of the two applications, with its small final file size. Flash also allows for run-time

control of animation. After Effects is oriented toward video and film production, provides a wide range of visual effects,

and is generally used to create video files as final output.

Both applications can be used to create original graphics and animation. Both use a timeline and offer scripting

capabilities for controlling animation programmatically. After Effects includes a larger set of effects.

Both applications allow you to place graphics on separate layers for compositing. These layers can be turned on and off

as needed. Both also allow you to apply effects to the contents of individual layers.

In Flash, composites do not affect the video content directly; they affect only the appearance of the video during

playback in Flash Player. In contrast, when you composite with imported video in After Effects, the video file you

export actually incorporates the composited graphics and effects.

Because all drawing and painting in After Effects is done on layers separate from any imported video, it is always non-

destructive. Flash has both destructive and nondestructive drawing modes.

Importing Flash SWF files into After Effects

Flash has a unique set of vector art tools that make it useful for a variety of drawing tasks not possible in After Effects

or Adobe® Illustrator®. You can import SWF files into After Effects to composite them with other video or render them

as video with additional creative effects. Interactive content and scripted animation are not retained. Animation

defined by keyframes is retained.

Each SWF file imported into After Effects is flattened into a single continuously rasterized layer, with its alpha channel

preserved. Continuous rasterization means that graphics stay sharp as they are scaled up. This import method allows

you to use the root layer or object of your SWF files as a smoothly rendered element in After Effects, allowing the best

capabilities of each tool to work together.

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Working with Adobe Premiere Pro and After Effects

Adobe Premiere Pro is designed to capture, import, and edit movies. After Effects is designed to create motion graphics,

apply visual effects, composite visual elements, perform color correction, and perform other post-production tasks for

movies.

You can easily exchange projects, compositions, sequences, tracks, and layers between After Effects and Adobe

Premiere Pro:

•You can import an Adobe Premiere Pro project into After Effects. See Import an Adobe Premiere Pro project.

•You can export an After Effects project as an Adobe Premiere Pro project. See Export an After Effects project as an

Adobe Premiere Pro project .

•You can copy and paste layers and tracks between After Effects and Adobe Premiere Pro. See Copy between After

Effects and Adobe Premiere Pro.

•You can render and replace After Effects compositions in Premiere Pro to speed up VFX-heavy sequences. See

Render and Replace After Effects compositions in Adobe Premiere Pro .)

If you have Adobe Premiere Pro, you can do the following:

•Use Adobe Dynamic Link to work with After Effects compositions in Adobe Premiere Pro. A dynamically linked

composition appears as a clip in Adobe Premiere Pro.

•Use Adobe Dynamic Link to work with Adobe Premiere Pro sequences in After Effects. A dynamically linked

sequence appears as a footage item in After Effects.

•Start After Effects from within Premiere Pro and create a new composition with settings that match the settings of

your Premiere Pro project.

•Select a set of clips in Adobe Premiere Pro and convert them to a composition in After Effects.

For information on using Dynamic Link with After Effects and Premiere Pro, see Dynamic Link and After Effects and

Dynamic Link sections in Adobe Premiere Pro Help.

Working with Adobe Media Encoder and After Effects

You can use Adobe Media Encoder to export video from After Effects. Use Adobe Media Encoder to encode formats

like H.264, MPEG-2, and WMV. Formats such as these are encoded at a higher quality than the Render Queue. Other

formats, are available in Adobe Media Encoder, but not in After Effects. For example, the DNxHD format is available

in Adobe Media Encoder CC, but not in After Effects CC.

You can add After Effects project files to a watch folder in Adobe Media encoder, and the project is automatically added

to the encoding queue Adobe Media Encoder. See the Import files with Watch folder section in Adobe Media Encoder

for detailed information.

For details about using Adobe Media Encoder with After Effects, see Render and export with Adobe Media Encoder.

See this tutorial to learn how to export After Effects compositions using Adobe Media Encoder.

Edit in Adobe Audition

While working in After Effects, you can use the more comprehensive audio-editing capabilities of Adobe Audition to

fine-tune your audio. You can use the Edit in Adobe Audition command to start Adobe Audition from within After

Effects.

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If you edit an audio-only file (for example, a WAV file) in Adobe Audition, you change the original file. If you edit a

layer that contains both audio and video (for example, an AVI file), you edit a copy of the source audio file.

1Select the layer that contains the audio that you want to edit. The item must be of a type that is editable in Adobe

Audition.

2Choose Edit > Edit In Adobe Audition to open the clip in Edit view in Adobe Audition.

3Edit the file, and then do one of the following:

•If you’re editing an audio-only layer, choose File > Save to apply your edits to the original audio file. You can also

choose File > Save As to apply your edits to a copy of the audio file. If you choose File > Save As, import the copy

of the file into After Effects.

•If you’re editing a layer that contains both audio and video, choose File > Save As. After you save the file, import

it into After Effects. Then, add it to the composition, and mute the original audio in the audio-video clip by

deselecting the Audio switch in the Timeline panel.

Note: Any effects applied to audio in After Effects aren’t included in the copy that is sent to Adobe Audition.

Tutorials and resources about using Adobe Audition to modify audio from After Effects can be found on this post from

the After Effects Region of Interest blog.

More Help topics

Adobe Bridge

Template projects and example projects

Animation presets overview and resources

Preparing and importing Photoshop files

3D object layers from Photoshop

Video and animation overview

3D

Vanishing Point

Web links, chapter links, cue points, and markers

Importing from Adobe After Effects

After Effects keyboard shortcuts

Keyboard shortcuts are a great way to speed up your tasks and also work more efficiently. Here is a downloadable

shortcuts graphic of about 50 of the more commonly used and popular After Effects shortcuts.

AfterEffects_KeyboardShortcuts.pdf

The complete list of After Effects keyboard shortcuts is available here .

Workspaces, panels, and viewers

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Workspaces and panels

Adobe video and audio applications provide a consistent, customizable user interface. Although each application has

its own set of panels, you move and group panels in the same way in each application.

The main window of a program is the application window. Panels are organized in this window in an arrangement

called a workspace.

Each application includes several predefined workspaces that optimize the layout of panels for specific tasks. You can

also create and customize your own workspaces by arranging panels in the layout that best suits your working style for

specific tasks.

You can drag panels to new locations, move panels into or out of a group, place panels alongside each other, and undock

a panel so that it floats in a new window above the application window. As you rearrange panels, the other panels resize

automatically to fit the window.

A Application window B Grouped panels C Individual panel

To increase the available screen space, use multiple monitors. When you work with multiple monitors, the application

window appears on the main monitor, and you place floating windows on the second monitor. Monitor configurations

are stored in the workspace.

Workspaces are stored in XML files in the preferences folder. With some caveats regarding monitor size and layout,

these workspaces can be moved to another computer and used there.

•(Windows) [drive]:\Users\[user_name]\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\After Effects\13.0\ModifiedWorkspaces

•(Mac OS) [drive]/Users/[user_name]/Library/Preferences/Adobe/After Effects/13.0/ModifiedWorkspaces

See this video tutorial about workspaces by Andrew Devis on the Creative Cow website for more details.

Choose a workspace

•Choose Window > Workspace, and select the desired workspace.

•Choose a workspace from the Workspace menu in the Tools panel.

•If the workspace has a keyboard shortcut assigned, press Shift+F10, Shift+F11, or Shift+F12.

To assign a keyboard shortcut to the current workspace, choose Window > Assign Shortcut To [Workspace Name]

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Save, reset, or delete workspaces

Save a custom workspace

As you customize a workspace, the application tracks your changes, storing the most recent layout. To store a specific

layout more permanently, save a custom workspace. Saved custom workspaces appear in the Workspace menu, where

you can return to and reset them.

❖Arrange the frames and panels as desired, and then choose Window > Workspace > New Workspace. Type a name

for the workspace, and click OK.

Note: (After Effects, Premiere Pro) If a project saved with a custom workspace is opened on another system, the application

looks for a workspace with a matching name. If the application cannot find a match (or the monitor configuration doesn’t

match), it uses the current local workspace.

Reset a workspace

Reset the current workspace to return to its original, saved layout of panels.

❖Choose Window > Workspace > Reset workspace name.

Delete a workspace

1Choose Window > Workspace >Delete Workspace.

2Choose the workspace you want to delete, and then click OK.

Note: You cannot delete the currently active workspace.

Dock, group, or float panels

You can dock panels together, move them into or out of groups, and undock them so they float above the application

window. As you drag a panel, drop zones—areas onto which you can move the panel—become highlighted. The drop

zone you choose determines where the panel is inserted, and whether it docks or groups with other panels.

Docking zones

Docking zones exist along the edges of a panel, group, or window. Docking a panel places it adjacent to the existing

group, resizing all groups to accommodate the new panel.

Grouping zones

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Grouping zones exist in the middle of a panel or group, and along the tab area of panels. Dropping a panel on a grouping

zone stacks it with other panels.

Dock or group panels

1If the panel you want to dock or group is not visible, choose it from the Window menu.

2Do one of the following:

•To move an individual panel, drag the gripper area in the upper-left corner of a panel’s tab onto the desired drop

zone.

•To move an entire group, drag the group gripper in the upper-right corner onto the desired drop zone.

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The application docks or groups the panel, according to the type of drop zone.

Undock a panel in a floating window

When you undock a panel in a floating window, you can add panels to the window and modify it similarly to the

application window. You can use floating windows to use a secondary monitor, or to create workspaces like the

workspaces in earlier versions of Adobe applications.

❖Select the panel you want to undock (if it’s not visible, choose it from the Window menu), and then do one of the

following:

•Choose Undock Panel or Undock Frame from the panel menu. Undock Frame undocks the panel group.

•Hold down Ctrl (Windows®) or Command (Mac OS®), and drag the panel or group from its current location.

When you release the mouse button, the panel or group appears in a new floating window.

•Drag the panel or group outside the application window. (If the application window is maximized, drag the panel

to the Windows taskbar.)

Resize panel groups

To quickly maximize a panel beneath the pointer, press the ` (accent grave) key. (The accent grave is the unshifted

character under the tilde, ~, on standard US keyboards.) Press the key again to return the panel to its original size.

When you drag the divider between panel groups, all groups that share the divider are resized.

1Do either of the following:

•To resize either horizontally or vertically, position the pointer between two panel groups. The pointer becomes

a double arrow .

•To resize in both directions at once, position the pointer at the intersection between three or more panel groups.

The pointer becomes a four-way arrow .

2Hold down the mouse button, and drag to resize the panel groups.

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A Original group with resize pointer B Resized groups

Open, close, and show panels and windows

Even if a panel is open, it may be out of sight, beneath other panels. Choosing a panel from the Window menu opens it

and brings it to the front of its group.

When you close a panel group in the application window, the other groups resize to use the newly available space. When

you close a floating window, the panels within it close, too.

•To open or close a panel, choose the panel from the Window menu.

•To close a panel or window, click its Close button . If you accidentally close a panel, choose the panel from the

Window menu, and the panel will be displayed again.

•To open or close a panel, use its keyboard shortcut.

•If a frame contains multiple panels, place the pointer over a tab and roll the mouse scroll wheel forward or backward

to change which panel is active.

•If a frame contains more grouped panels than can be shown at once, drag the scroll bar that appears above the tabs.

Viewers

A viewer is a panel that can contain multiple compositions, layers, or footage items, or multiple views of one such item.

The Composition, Layer, Footage, Flowchart, and Effect Controls panels are viewers.

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Locking a viewer prevents the currently displayed item from being replaced when you open or select a new item.

Instead, when a viewer is locked and a new item is opened or selected, After Effects creates a new viewer panel for that

item. If you select the item from the viewer menu of a locked viewer, a new viewer isn't created; the existing viewer is

used.

Instead of housing multiple items in a single viewer and using the viewer menu to switch between them, you can choose

to open a separate viewer for each open composition, layer, or footage item. When you have multiple viewers open, you

can arrange them by docking or grouping them, like any other panels.

For example, you can create one Composition viewer each for different 3D views (Top, Bottom, Back, Front, custom

views) so that you can maximize each of the views with the ` (accent grave) keyboard shortcut, which maximizes or

restores the panel under the pointer.

To create a custom workspace with multiple viewers, ensure that all viewers are unlocked before you save the workspace.

Locked viewers are associated with a specific project context and are therefore not saved in the preferences file.

•To create a new viewer, choose New from the viewer menu. (See Open panel, viewer, and context menus.)

•To lock or unlock a viewer, choose Locked from the viewer menu, or click the Toggle Viewer Lock button.

•To lock the current viewer, split the current frame, and create a new viewer of the same type in the new frame, press

Ctrl+Alt+Shift+N (Windows) or Command+Option+Shift+N (Mac OS).

•To cycle forward or backward through the items in the viewer menu list for the active viewer, press Shift+period (.)

or Shift+comma (,).

Edit this, look at that (ETLAT) and locked Composition viewers

If a Composition viewer is locked, the Timeline panel for another composition is active, and the Composition viewer

for the active composition is not shown, then most commands that affect views and previews operate on the

composition for which the viewer is shown.

For example, pressing the spacebar can start a standard preview for the composition visible in a locked Composition

viewer rather than the composition associated with the active Timeline panel.

This behavior facilitates a working setup sometimes referred to as edit-this-look-at-that (ETLAT). The most common

scenario in which this behavior is useful is the scenario in which you make a change in the Timeline panel for a nested

(upstream) composition and want to preview the result of the change in a containing (downstream) composition.

Note: ETLAT behavior works for keyboard shortcuts for zooming, fitting, previewing, taking and viewing snapshots,

showing channels, showing and hiding grids and guides, and showing the current frame on a video preview device.

To prevent this behavior, unlock the Composition viewer or show the Composition viewer for the composition that you

want to view or preview.

See this video on the Video2Brain website to learn about the improvements in ETLAT (edit-this-look-at-that) workflow

in After Effects CS5.5 and later.

More Help topics

Panels, viewers, workspaces, and windows (keyboard shortcuts)

Choose a viewer to always preview

Previews (keyboard shortcuts)

Views (keyboard shortcuts)

About precomposing and nesting

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Preferences

The following sections describe the Preferences menu and and the various tasks that can be performed using this menu.

The Preferences menu

To open the Preferences menu, go to:

•Edit > Preferences > [category name] (Windows)

•After Effects > Preferences > [category name] (Mac OS)

Use the following keyboard shortcuts to open the Preferences > General menu:

•Ctrl+Alt+; (semicolon) (Windows)

•Command+Option+; (semicolon) (Mac OS)

Reset preferences

To restore the default preference settings, press and hold the following keys while the application is starting.

•Ctrl+Alt+Shift (Windows)

•Command+Option+Shift (Mac OS)

To restore default keyboard shortcuts, Alt-click (Windows) or Option-click (Mac OS) the OK button.

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Reveal preferences

Preferences, including keyboard shortcuts and workspaces, are stored as files in the following locations:

•(Windows) \Users\\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\After Effects\13.0

•(Mac OS) /Users//Library/Preferences/Adobe/After Effects/13.0

To reveal the preferences in After Effects without searching on your hard drive, go to:

•Edit > Preferences > General and click Reveal Preferences in Explorer button (Windows)

•After Effects > Preferences > General and click Reveal Preferences in Finder button (Mac OS)

It is recommended that you do not modify the files in this directory manually; use the Preferences dialog box to modify

the preferences. For information on modifying keyboard shortcuts, see Modify keyboard shortcuts. For information

on managing workspaces, see Workspaces and Panels.

Note: The Library folder in Mac OS X is hidden. See the following article to learn how to access hidden user files on Mac

OS:http://helpx.adobe.com/x-productkb/global/access-hidden-user-library-files.html

The following list briefly describes the different options listed under the Edit > Preferences menu, especially those

options that are not self-explanatory.

General preferences

•Levels Of Undo: Undo changes

•Path Point Size: Specifies size of Bezier direction handles and vertices for masks and shapes, direction handles for

motion paths, and other similar controls.

•Show Tool Tips: After Effects user interface tips

•Create Layers At Composition Start Time: Layers overview

•Switches Affect Nested Comps: About precomposing and nesting

•Default Spatial Interpolation To Linear: About spatial and temporal keyframe interpolation

•Preserve Constant Vertex Count When Editing Masks: Designate the first vertex for a Bezier path

Pen Tool Shortcut Toggles B etween Pen and MaskFeather Tools: Variable-widt h mask fe ather

•Synchronize Time Of All Related Items: Preferences and composition settings that affect nested compositions

•Expression Pick Whip Writes Compact English: Edit an expression with the pick whip

•Create Split Layers Above Original Layer: Split a layer

•Allow Scripts To Write Files And Access Network: Loading and running scripts

•Enable JavaScript Debugger: After Effects scripting guide at the Adobe After Effects Developer Center on the Adobe

website

•Use System Color Picker: Choose a color picker

•Create New Layers At Best Quality: Layer image quality and subpixel positioning

•Use System Shortcut Keys (Mac OS only): Keyboard shortcuts reference

•Dynamic Link with After Effects Uses Project File Name with Highest Number: About Dynamic Link (Production

Premium or Master Collection only)

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Previews preferences

•Adaptive Resolution Limit: Preview modes and Fast Previews preferences

Also, see Fast Previews (CS6).

The GPU Information dialog box is available to check the texture memory for your GPU, and to set the ray-tracing

preference to the GPU, if it is available. The OptiX version number is available, as well as the Copy button to copy

the general information at the top of the dialog box to the system clipboard.

•Viewer Quality (Zoom Quality and Color Management Quality): Viewer Quality preferences

•Audio Preview Duration: Preview video and audio

Display preferences

•Motion Path: Motion paths

•Disable Thumbnails In Project Panel: Composition thumbnail images

•Show Rendering Progress In Info Panel And Flowchart: Preview video and audio

•Hardware Accelerate Composition, Layer, And Footage Panels: Improve performance

Import preferences

•Still Footage: Create layers from footage items or change layer source

•Sequence Footage: Import a single still image or a still-image sequence

•Interpret Unlabeled Alpha As: Alpha channel interpretation: premultiplied or straight

•Drag Import Multiple Items As: Import footage items by dragging

•There is a dropdown menu to choose drop-frame or non-drop-frame timecode for Indeterminate Media NTSC,

which applies to imports like still image sequences in which timecode values are not present or are unknown.

Output preferences

•Segment Sequences At, Segment Movie Files At, and Audio Block Duration: Segment settings

•Use Default File Name And Folder: Name output files automatically

Grids & Guides preferences

•Safe zones, grids, guides, and rulers

Labels preferences

•Color labels for layers, compositions, and footage items

Media & Disk Cache preferences

•Enable Disk Cache and Maximum Disk Cache Size: Caches: RAM cache, disk cache, and media cache

•Conformed Media Cache and Clean Database & Cache: Media cache

•Create Layer Markers From Footage XMP Metadata and Write XMP IDs To Files On Import: XMP metadata in

After Effects

Video Preview preferences

•Preview on an external video monitor

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Appearance preferences

•Use Label Color For Layer Handles And Paths and Use Label Color For Related Tabs: Color labels for layers,

compositions, and footage items

•Cycle Mask Colors: Cycle through colors for mask paths

•Use Gradients: Use gradients in user interface.

•Brightness: Brightens or darkens user interface (UI) colors.

Auto-Save preferences

Project links embedded in QuickTime, Video for Windows files

Memory & Multiprocessing preferences

Memory & Multiprocessing preferences

Audio Hardware and Audio Output Mapping preferences

Preview video and audio

Sync Settings

The Sync Settings feature enables you to synchronize preferences and settings through the Creative Cloud. For detailed

information, see the Sync Settings article.

Migrate settings from previous versions

After Effects will prompt you to migrate settings from a previous version if it finds a preference folder from a previous

version and no preference folder for the current version. This occurs when you start After Effects for the first time and

when you delete the entire preferences folder.

If you want to migrate settings from your previous version of After Effects, see the Migrating your settings from a

previous minor version of After Effects section.

Sync Settings

When you work on multiple computers, managing and syncing preferences among the computers can be time-

consuming, complex, and error prone.

The new Sync Settings feature in After Effects enables you to sync preferences and settings via Creative Cloud. For

example, if you use two computers, the Sync Settings feature makes it easy for you to keep those settings synchronized

across these two computers.

The synchronization takes place via your Adobe Creative Cloud account. Settings are uploaded to your Creative Cloud

account and then are downloaded and applied on the other computer. You can also synchronize settings from another

Creative Cloud account. After Effects creates a user profile on your computer and uses it to synchronize settings to and

from the associated Creative Cloud account.

You can initiate the synchronization manually; it does not happen automatically and it cannot be scheduled.

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Synchronize your settings

To initiate the synchronization, choose Edit > [your Adobe ID] > Sync Settings Now (Windows) or After Effects > [your

Adobe ID] > Sync Settings Now.

•Download Settings: Synchronize Settings from Creative Cloud to your computer; overwrite the local version with

the Creative Cloud version of settings.

•Upload Settings: Synchronize settings from this local computer to Creative Cloud.

Progress and details about the synchronization is displayed in the Info panel (Window > Info).

Restart After Effects to apply downloaded preferences after using Sync Settings .

Synchronize settings from a different account

By default, the Adobe ID associated with the license for the product is used to synchronize the preferences. To use a

different Adobe ID to synchronize the settings, from the Edit menu (Windows) or After Effects menu (Mac OS), choose

[your Adobe ID] > Use Settings From a Different Account. Enter the Adobe ID and password.

Managing synchronization

Clear Settings

Select Edit > [your Adobe ID] > Clear Settings (Windows) or After Effects [your Adobe ID] > Clear Settings (Mac OS),

to clear all settings and reset them to the default state. Clear Settings also resets the token that is used to indicate the

user's settings that was used to sync the settings.

Click Quit to clear the current preferences, and close After Effects. When the application is launched again, default

preferences are set.

Manage Sync Settings

To change the settings for the Sync Settings feature (Windows):

•Click Edit > [your Adobe ID] > Manage Sync Settings

•Click Edit > Preferences > Sync Settings

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To change the settings for the Sync Settings feature (Mac OS):

•Click After Effects > [your Adobe ID] > Manage Sync Settings

•Click After Effects > Preferences > Sync Settings

You can change the following settings in the settings dialog:

Automatically clear user profile on application quit Enable this option to clear the user profile when you quit After

Effects. On next launch, preferences are fetched from the default Adobe ID used to license the product.

Select the preferences to synchronize.

1Synchronizable Preferences

2Keyboard Shortcuts

3Composition Settings Presets

4Interpretation Rules

5Render Settings Templates

6Output Module Settings Templates

Note: Synchronizable preferences refer to preferences that are not dependent on computer or hardware settings.

Note: Keyboard shortcuts created for Windows synchronize only with Windows and Mac OS keyboard shortcuts

synchronize only with Mac OS.

Choose one of the following options from the drop-down menu to instruct After Effects when to synchronize the

settings :

•Ask my preference

•Always Upload Settings

•Always Download Settings

Note: The Sync Settings feature does not synchronize files that are manually placed in the preferences folder location.

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Modify keyboard shortcuts

To modify keyboard shortcuts in After Effects, do the following:

1In After Effects, depending on your operating system, select:

•Edit > Preferences > General (Windows)

•After Effects > Preferences > General (Mac OS)

2On the Preferences dialog, click the Reveal Preferences in Explorer (Windows) or Reveal Preferences in Finder

(MAC OS) button.

3The Install Directory is opened, with the Preferences file selected. Depending on your operating system, open either

of the following files:

•Adobe After Effects <version> Win en_US Shortcuts.txt OR

•Adobe After Effects <version> Mac en_US Shortcuts.txt

You can modify keyboard shortcuts in this text file.

Note: If you modify a keyboard shortcut to a combination that already exists, it results in a conflict. Ensure that the new

combination you enter has not been used already.

Note: On Mac OS, some keyboard commands for interacting with the operating system conflict with keyboard commands

for interacting with After Effects. Select Use System Shortcut Keys in the General preferences to override the After Effects

keyboard command in some cases in which there’s a conflict with the Mac OS keyboard command.

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Chapter 3: Projects and compositions

Projects

About projects

An After Effects project is a single file that stores compositions and references to all of the source files used by footage

items in that project. Compositions are collections of layers. Many layers use footage items (such as movies or still

images) as a source, though some layers—such as shape layers and text layers—contain graphics that you create within

After Effects.

A project file has the filename extension .aep or .aepx. A project file with the .aep filename extension is a binary project

file. A project file with the .aepx filename extension is a text-based XML project file.

The name of the current project appears at the top of the application window.

A template project file has the filename extension .aet. (See Template projects and example projects.)

XML project files

Text-based XML project files contain some project information as hexadecimal-encoded binary data, but much of the

information is exposed as human-readable text in string elements. You can open an XML project file in a text editor

and edit some details of the project without opening the project in After Effects. You can even write scripts that modify

project information in XML project files as part of an automated workflow.

Elements of a project that you can modify in an XML project file:

•Marker attributes, including comments, chapter point parameters, and cue point parameters

•File paths of source footage items, including proxies

•Composition, footage item, layer, and folder names and comments

Note: Footage item names are exposed in string elements in XML project files only if the names have been customized.

Footage item names derived automatically from the names of source files and solid color names are not exposed in string

elements

Some strings, such as workspace and view names, are exposed as human-readable strings, but modifications made to

these strings are not respected when After Effects opens the project file.

Note: Do not use the XML project file format as your primary file format. The primary project file format for After Effects

is the binary project file (.aep) format. Use the XML project file format to save a copy of a project and as an intermediate

format for automation workflows.

To save an XML project (.aepx) file as a binary project (.aep) file, choose File > Save As and enter a file name ending

with .aep, without the x. (See Save and back up projects in After Effects CS5 .)

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Project links embedded in QuickTime, Video for Windows files

When you render a movie and export it to a container format, you can embed a link to the After Effects project in the