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Filed under: 3D •CS4 •Motion Graphics •Tips •Training •

Review: After Effects Camera Training

Missing in the action

For a series that is all about the camera, I felt that there were a few opportunities missed to show some useful shortcuts or preferences. For instance, I always set the Composition panel’s View Options so that the camera wireframes always remain visible, even when the camera is not selected. Also, in the art gallery scene, the motion path gets oddly cropped off, which would have been the perfect time to mention that this is easily fixed by setting a preference to always show the entire motion path, no matter the duration (Preferences > Display > Motion Path > All Keyframes).

When setting up your 3D space, Rob omits what is probably the first trick I show students when they are setting up their 3D space: The Camera X, Y and Z tools can be used in ortho views to bring all the layers into view over the background color. At least, that’s the slow way: One of my favorite features (introduced in CS3) is View > Look at All Layers. This shortcut makes all layers instantly snap to fit in the 3D view while maintaining the largest magnification value possible. You can then zoom in further with the camera tools if necessary. This may not seem significant at first, but check out the figures below. If you’ve ever struggled to select an itsy-bitsy camera or light icon at 25% magnification (like Rob does on occasion), you need this feature. (There’s also a sister shortcut, View > Look at Selected Layers.)

The default layout for the art gallery scene. Notice how small the icon is for the camera. Magnification is set to Fit up to 100% but can only manage 50%.

After using the camera tools to adjust the display, the camera icon is larger because the magnification is now at 76%. This is a tricky thing to explain, so just try it! In top view, select View > Look at All Layers then use the Camera Z tool to zoom in some more.

It would also have been nice to slip in another shortcut new to CS4: To center a layer in the Active Camera’s view, select Layer > Transform > Center in View.

I was surprised not to see a discussion about the difference between Orientation and Rotation, as these properties are used when animating the camera - especially when using the one-point camera model.

And there was no discussion of using Roving Keyframes for a camera move. Roving keyframes can be very useful when you have a large number of keyframes along a motion path but yet you want a simple speed graph controls, and might have been put to good use in the art gallery animation.

Conclusions

If you are completely new to using the camera in After Effects, you’ll find some tried and tested techniques here that will give you a good grounding in controlling AE’s camera. The first four modules start slow, giving more of a guided tour than tips and tricks, but it picks up pace at section five and gets progressively more interesting.


While animating in 3D in AE is not very intuitive at first, it’s also not a very deep implementation and there are a limited number of actual techniques. So if you’ve already had some experience with parenting the camera to a null, and the different auto-orient options, you may not find much new here. This is not meant as a slight; it’s just that there are simply a limited number of known techniques you need to learn to move the camera. So if you were hoping that Rob has invented a magical new method of controlling the camera that will save you gobs of time, sorry. The AE camera is still fiddly to use, and the prescription you need may be just more practice.

Also be aware that this series is solely focused on controlling the 3D camera, which is just one ingredient in creating a complex 3D scene - beyond just controlling the camera, you also eventually need to learn about lights and shadows, mixing 2D and 3D layers, the 3D render order, using 3D effects, and importing cameras from 3D applications.

But if it’s help with animating the camera you’re looking for, the After Effects Camera Training tutorials wrap up all the most useful tricks in one training package with some nice eye candy to boot. I feel that the price (at $50 for 37 minutes) is a tad high compared to other commercially available training modules or subscriptions (for example, both Total Training and Lynda.com offer comprehensive After Effects courses as but a small part of what you can access for their $25/month subscription fee), but everyone will have a different opinion on that one depending on their budget.

UPDATE: Shortly after this review went to press, the list price of the Camera Training series was reduced to $42. It’s on sale for $29 thru November 20, 2009. Please check the Toolfarm Store for the latest info.

Other Sources for AE Camera Training

If your budget is tight, there are numerous free camera tutorials available online. Here’s a few we found to be particularly useful:

• We have a video here on PVC which demonstrates the basics of using the camera tools, including using those tools to manipulate the alternate 3D views (the “first trick” discussed above). If you’re completely new to manipulating 3D layers, watch this video first.
• This tutorial specifically covers how to use a null object to animate a 3D camera. Written for After Effect 7 but still accurate for CS4.
• To read more on building a camera rig, we also wrote a couple of articles (originally published in 2006 in DV Magazine but now online here at PVC): Camera Control - Part 1 and Camera Control - Part 2.
• Andrew Kramer of Video Co-Pilot also covers parenting a null object, as well as the Separate XYZ animation preset. He also uses the wiggle expression on the camera in his Advanced Camera Tips.
• Meanwhile, John Dickinson uses a null to animate a light in his latest video tutorial using ProAnimator with After Effects.

None of these in isolation are anywhere near as complete as Rob’s camera training and don’t replace it; we consider them to be good starters for or extensions to his training.

 

FTC Disclosure: As we all wrestle with the new FTC guidelines regarding bloggers and disclosure, you’re going to see a lot of awkward sidebars like this in reviews on PVC. In this case, we know Rob, and received a copy of his video training for free to review. We personally make money from video training through Lynda.com, and previously sold videos through Toolfarm (Rob’s distributor). Plus we sell books that do contain training on AE’s 3D camera. However, we do not view Rob as competition; indeed, we encouraged him to also join the training-for-sale market, as we respect him as a user.

The content contained in our books, videos, blogs, and articles for other sites are all copyright Crish Design, except where otherwise attributed.

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I checked out the link you provide, which was Crowd Control from All Bets Are Off, and it looked awesome. I have obviously heard of this before, but didn’t realize how easy it was to purchase or setup. The explain everything pretty thoroughly on their site and that always helps. Thanks for sharing this much needed information, it will definitely help out.

Posted by dsphotographers  on  03/30  at  10:41 AM

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