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Filed under: 3D •Motion Graphics •Post Production •Visual Effects •

Camera Control, Part 2: Graph Editor & Dolly Rigs

After Effects 7.0

One of the reasons we’re so loyal to After Effects is the way its team keeps adding user-oriented production refinements in each update. Along these lines, After Effects 7.0 has an Animation Preset that helps build a dolly camera rig for you.

You still need to start by creating a null object and one node camera, arrange the two together, and parent the camera to the null as we outlined above. Then with the null selected, turn your attention to the Effects & Presets panel (use Command+5 on Mac or Ctrl+5 on Windows to open it), twirl open the folder named * Animation Presets, and then twirl open the subfolder named Transform. In it is a preset named Separate XYZ Position (seen at right): Double-click it to apply it to your selected null object.

This will automatically add a custom expression control to the null with values for X, Y, and Z Position, plus the expression we detailed earlier (with the added feature - or nuisance, if you aren’t aware of it - of adding the null’s original position to the controller values; you can enter 0,0,0 for the null’s Position if you find this annoying). You now keyframe the effect’s X, Y, and Z Position values to move the camera. To rotate it, as before, animate the Rotation values for either the null or the camera.

Hand in hand with this is a major new feature in After Effects 7.0: the Graph Editor. Some users - especially those comfortable working in advanced 3D animation packages - have long wished that After Effects offered a more sophisticated way to edit value and velocity curves, including the ability to view multiple properties (even from multiple layers) overlaid in the same space.

To view how keyframed properties vary over time, select the layer or layers you want to view, and then click on the Graph Editor button along the top of the Timeline panel (the rightmost icon, just to the left of the time ruler). The area of the Timeline panel which normally displays the layer bars will be replaced by the Graph Editor (shown below). By default, all animated properties of the selected layer or layers will be displayed. To reduce clutter, properties which are not enabled for keyframing are not displayed unless you select their name.

A significant addition introduced in After Effects 7.0 was the Graph Editor, which allows you to view and edit multiple parameters as a set in the Timeline panel.

The graph lines are color-coded; in the case of position-oriented properties, X, Y, and Z values are correspondingly colored red, green, and blue (RGB). Multiple keyframes may be selected and manipulated as a group. Hovering your cursor over a graph line shows that property’s value at that point in time. There are numerous ways to customize the Graph Editor’s display; for example, if you enable the Graph Editor Set button for a property to the right of the Keyframe enable/disable button, that property will always be displayed even if the layer is not selected.

There will undoubtedly be a learning curve for many users as they adjust to the new Graph Editor. We’ll be using After Effects 7.0 in the next few columns, hopefully helping you become more familiar with its new interface and features.

Click here to download a small .zip archive of our AE 6.5 (and later) project demonstrating a dolly camera rig.

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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