After Effects

[slushparlor1]

Hi everyone,

I must have been a good girl this year because Santa left me After Effects and Premiere Pro under the tree!!!!! I think my family has more confidence than me in my video ability . However, I am very excited to start looking at some of these programs. I think Beth has said there was a pretty steep learning curve with After Effects. I know that both Beth and Cheryl have been using this product and I'm wondering if they (or anyone else) can direct me to some sites that were helpful to them in getting started. I'm just looking to create a few new effects and bring them into Elements to start.

Does anyone have any ideas?

Thanks!!!!!

Theresa

[momoffduty]

CONGRATS Theresa!!! Did your programs come with a free 30 day trial for Lynda.com? That would be the first place to start. Congrats again!

[slushparlor1]

Thanks so much Cheryl. I'm overwhelmed!!!!!

[Steve Grisetti]

If you've got a good understanding of keyframing, you'll already have a head start on how After Effects creates its effects.

Meantime, there are lots of great free tutorials for beginners. Like this one.
http://ae.tutsplus.com/tutorials/basix/ ... g-started/

And the Classroom in a Book really got me up and running to a certain degree!

[Chuck Engels]

I did a simple getting started tutorial, take a look and maybe you won't be quite so intimidated

http://muvipix.com/products.php?searchp ... =0&btn.y=0

It is mainly to show the similarities between After Effects and Premiere Elements.
videocopilot.com and creativecow.com are two great resources for free tutorials.
But like Cheryl says, if you have a free Lynda.com trial then be sure to use it

[Bob]

Congratulations, Theresa! You are going to love it when you get up to speed.

When you register After Effects with Adobe, you'll get a choice of a bonus. One of those is a month subscription to Lynda.com. That's a good place to start. And, like Chuck, I like the Video Copilot site and the Creative Cow site for tutorials and ideas.

We've got a growing community of After Effects users now.

[momoffduty]

Theresa, after you watch the tuts at Lynda, I recommend the book "After Effects Apprentice" by Trish & Chris Meyer. It has step by step learning and a DVD rom with project content so you follow along with the book. There are completed projects to look at when you get stumped and questions at the end of the chapter to try things on your own. I really wanted to just jump right into AE so it was frustrating at first to go thru the book at my snail's pace. But, it paid off in learning by doing the exercises. At each step there are keyboard shortcuts. Be sure to use these and you will have them memorized in no time.

Bob & Dick & others recommended this book to me, thanks! Great tip.

[slushparlor1]

Thank you everyone for all the great tips.

Cheryl, I just ordered that book from Amazon. Prepare yourself, I might be coming to you for some advice in 2010 . ha ha. You hit the nail right on the head - I want to jump in with both feet - but I have to take the time to get to learn it. Now UPS just needs to come and deliver my book!!!

Thanks again

Theresa

[Maxine370]

Congrats on the AE...Lynda is a good first step then you can also check out Creative Cow and Video Co-Pilot for some addtl tutorials.

One basic trick is to to copy your CC Cycore plug-ins into the Premiere Pro plug-in folder. You can use a lot of them right in Premiere which in itself is a nice bonus. (light wipe, radial scale wipe, grid wipe, cc spotlight, cc kaledia work and so many more - some don't and will freeze up the system so be careful) Copy the plug-ins from AE to Premeire Pro Plug-ins folder. SAVE OFTEN as I said some do not work and can freeze up the program but usually not until rendering.

I love light wipe (check off color from original) especially to add text to
a screen.

Play with Grid Wipe transitions for some funky effects.

[Bill Hunt]

Sounds like a wonderful Christmas present.

This is aimed at another program in the group - Encore, the authoring app that comes with and installs with PrPro. When you get around to using it, I strongly recommend Jeff Bellune's book, The Focal Easy Guide to Adobe EncoreDVD 2.0, Focal Press. Do not let the name fool you. The book is 100% good for Encore CS4. The only things missing from it are BD production (mostly the same as DVD, but with different Assets and size), and Adobe Dynamic Link between Encore and PrPro, which was heavily strengthened in CS4. Still, Jeff will give you the necessary details on authoring, plus all sorts of great tricks for getting around the limitations of the DVD-spec. You will not be disappointment.

Good luck and enjoy,

Hunt

[Clayton]

Hunt do you know where it is available? I looked at Amazon and only the Kindle version was available.
Edit: Didn't find it at Barnes and Noble either. Will look in local stores

[karri]

Congratulations Theresa! Santa was as good to me last Christmas, but I haven't spent a lot of time in After Effects unfortunately, although I did buy the book Cheryl recommended. Your post generated so many great tips in this thread ... Hunt thanks for the heads up on the Encore book. (Clayton, I found it on Amazon, I think, is this it?
http://www.amazon.com/Focal-Easy-Guide-Adobe-Encore/dp/0240520041/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1262614916&sr=1-1)

Beth I am going to try copying the effects folder, thx!

[Clayton]

Hunt thanks for the heads up on the Encore book. (Clayton, I found it on Amazon, I think, is this it?
http://www.amazon.com/Focal-Easy-Guide-Adobe-Encore/dp/0240520041/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1262614916&sr=1-1)

Thanks, Karri, I guess they get stock in quickly. Last Thursday it wasn't available. I guess I need to order quickly as it says on 5 left now.

[SteveG]

Congrats Theresa.

What's this I hear about some recession? I don't believe it.