Creating and Animating Text

At the core of great motion graphics resides great text. Motion graphics inherits many of the traditional design elements found in graphic design and web design. In the world of animation, text allows the artist to directly communicate with the audience. When used correctly, text can be a powerful element in our design. The energy of our animation can steam from the movement of our on-screen text. Kinetic type, text that moves, generates a powerful connection between the words on the screen and the emotional reaction from our audience. In addition, text represents the great common denominator in our world. Most people know how to read and respond positively to the words we present. We can emphasis the meaning of our animation by pairing audio with on-screen text. Every watch an animation where the narrator is saying the exact same thing as the text on the screen? Doubling up on the content, in both text and audio, guarantees that our audience will hear the message. Text is a powerful medium in which we can communicate with out audience. Check out this great example of kinetic typography:

This week, we will explore the text creation tools inside of After Effects. Once we have a grasp on how to create text, we'll change gears and examine the animation pipeline for text layers in After Effects. Luckily for us, After Effects has a fantastic text creation toolset that is incredible powerful and easy to use. Let's jump and start exploring text in After Effects!

Project Due: Week 04

In this exercise, you learn how to create and animate text in After Effects. Working with text is a foundation level pillar that is crucial for motion design artists. Through this lesson, you'll learn about animation presets, applying different keyframe interpolations, adding motion blur and working with Photoshop documents inside of After Effects. Please follow the directions in Chapter 3 of the Adobe After Effects Classroom in a Book for specific instructions on completing this project. Please ensure your project includes the following required elements before you complete this assignment:

After you have saved the project file on your personal external storage device (like a thumb drive), please upload your After Effects Project File (.aep) and your rendered Quicktime Movie (.mov) to the Road Trip dropbox on D2L.

Before you upload your files to D2L, please ensure your files meet the following naming conventions:

Project Due: Week 04

As we discussed in class, text can be a powerful force in our designs. Using only text layers in After Effects, design and animate a personal business card. Use this animation to communicate yourself to the world, so make it specific to your interests and goals. Be creative and fun with this, but you can only use the text tools and animation presets found in After Effects. Use the sample animation found on this page as an example of what the final animation could look like. Please ensure your project includes the following required elements before you complete this assignment:

After you have saved the project file on your personal external storage device (like a thumb drive), please upload your After Effects Project File (.aep) and your rendered Quicktime Movie (.mov) to the "Business Card" dropbox on D2L.

Before you upload your files to D2L, please ensure your files meet the following naming conventions:

Check out these awesome learning resources! I've collected a number of assets that I think will help you conquer this week's homework and laboratory assignment. Please download the following materials to your local hard disk or flash storage device (AKA thumb drive).