… for Visual Effects

Tip #938: 10 Essential After Effects Tricks

Larry Jordan – LarryJordan.com

After Effects is filled with many different ways to work more efficiently.

This article first appeared in RocketStock.com. This is an excerpt.

These 10 quick and easy After Effects tricks are essential for any motion designer!

1. Quick Pan. Hold down the space bar and drag.
2. Build a RAM Preview. Control + O.
3. Duplicate layers. Command + D.
4. Adjust Render Quality. Select the dropdown menu at the bottom of the composition panel.
5. Export Alpha Channels. Include both RGB + Alpha in the Output Module.
6. The “Wiggle” Expression. Add the expression wiggle(10,10) into your expression editor.
7. Save Frames. Composition > Save Frame As > File.
8. See All Keyframes. U.
9. Keyframe Scaling. Hold down option and drag a selection of keyframes.
10. The Graph Editor. With keyframes selected, hit the small graph icon in the timeline.

The article link at the top includes detailed descriptions, illustration of each shortcut and links to more After Effects tips and tutorials.