Create and save your own presets
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Corporate video is about making money, not about making art. It's about making the budget and making the deadline.
So, how can you do both? Presets! Make it fast, make it consistent.
I'll help you ramp up and put together your game plan and make some presets for your next corporate project. The bottom line is that you need to learn how to make your own presets.
If you don't work in corporate video, presets are still extremely useful.
Also, let me add that this effect isn't that amazing, but the objective is to teach you how to create and save presets! ;-)
Note: Some of the terminology of presets has changed in After Effects 6.5. In AE 6.0, Presets were called Favorites. I will be using AE 6.5 terminology.
Create your effect
I'll go through how I created a simple effect. If you'd like to create your own, skip to the next section.
- Create a new comp that's720x540, duration 5 seconds.
- Add text to a layer by selecting the Text tool and clicking down on the middle of the composition window. The text says "Increase Productivity 10-Fold". The text should be large and bold with no serifs. I chose Arial Black at 62 point. My text is royal blue and I did not animate the text.
- Apply the Grid filter. Effects > Render > Grid.
- Change the following settings:
Size from: Width slider
Width: 84.3 (set keyframe at 0:00)
Border: 0 (set keyframe at 0:00)
Blending mode: Stencil Alpha - Jump ahead in the timeline to 1:00. Set Width to 14.1 and Border to 34.
- Apply Find Edges to your text layer. Effect > Stylize > Find Edges.
- Apply Drop Shadow. Effect > Perspective > Drop Shadow. Change the following settings:
Opacity: 44%
Distance: 37
Softness: 36
Save your preset
- Open the Effect Controls window. An easy way to do this is to select the layer in your timeline with the effects, hit the 'E' key to bring up the effects, and then double click on any of the effects. The Effect Controls window will pop up.
- Select all of the effects in the Effect Controls window. It may be easier if you twirl them shut by clicking on the arrow on the left side. To select multiple effects, shift+click them.
- Choose 'Save Animation Preset..." under the Animation menu.
- A pop up window will ask you where you would like to save your preset. Navigate to your After Effects application folder. Within that folder, there is a folder called 'Presets'. You may want to create a new folder inside Presets... named for your project or for the type of preset. I'll create a folder called 'Buzzwords' and save the preset as 'Buzzword-text.ffx'.
Applying your preset to new layers
- In After Effects, open the Effects & Presets palette. Twirl down *Animation Presets. You should see a folder called ‘Buzzwords’.
- You can open the sub folders and drag the preset to your solid or text layer.
- If ‘Buzzwords’ folder does not show up in the Effects & Presets palette, select ‘Refresh List’ from the flyout menu on the palette.
- Make sure that you are at the first frame or In Point of your layer. Select your layer and hit the 'I' key to jump to the In Point quickly. If you are not at the In Point, the keyframes will be set at whatever point you are located.
- Drag the preset to your text or layer to apply it. Alternately, you can select the layer and go to Animation > Apply Animation Preset. It should also show up under Animation > Recent Animation Presets. Find your preset and apply.
Preset Tips
- Make a copy of your presets that you create for a project and back them up with your project.
- To save animations that use the Advanced Text Engine, you'll need to select the Animators in the timeline before you save the preset.
- To save your transformations (position, rotate, etc.), select the keyframes that you've set before saving. If you're also saving effects, shift-click to select them all.
- Keep your presets neat and tidy by creating sub folders.
- Share your cool presets with us and get some free publicity for you or your company!