It's true - no upgrade to AE would be complete without a smorgasbord of new effect offerings and CS4 is no exception. Now if only Adobe had a 3D program of its own, it would be a one-stop shop for all your post needs. psd file with the 3D layer into After Effects, and further process and animate the objects without having to go back to a 3D application and re-render the result. This feature alone creates a game-changing new 3D workflow in which artists, instead of rendering a 3D scene from within a dedicated 3D application and treating it as finished footage inside After Effects, can import and paint objects in Photoshop, import the. Ready to get your 3D on? Wanna animate Photoshop 3D layers in your composition where they can be viewed as 3D objects using cameras in After Effects? Well in CS4 you can! You can also apply effects to change the layers' appearance over time, composite 3D layers with other objects and render the result as you would any other project element. I found this to be a far better way to visualize and navigate the structure of my meatier projects: you just have to click on a comp's name in the Mini-Flowchart to instantly switch to it. These compositions can be opened to access the Mini-Flowchart, which reveals the nesting organization of related comps. To make these composition hierarchies easier to navigate, this new version sports a nifty composition navigator along the top of each Composition panel. This allows both the creation of elaborate animation chains and also the ability to make quick updates to a project where a change in one composition may be immediately rippled out through other comps. Search results are Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah-speedy and appear as soon as you start typing.Īnother great way to keep things organized is by using nested comps inside After Effects as a way to break down complex projects into smaller, more manageable elements. You can also search projects for specific footage items or footage properties, such as scanning by file type to find all the. Don't get me wrong, I like to twirl as much as the next guy, but why not save more time for the actual creative stuff.
This ability to directly target properties saves a bunch of time scrolling around and twirling open layers. Now you can quickly conjure up project elements, keyframe-able properties, effects and more. In CS4, Adobe came up with the brilliant idea of including live search functions directly inside the Timeline and Project panels. I know my comps quickly become a pile of layers on top of another pile of layers, and it can be a trick to find a specific layer or other asset - especially on deadline or when you're working on a project that was handed off to you. Working in After Effects can be intensely creative, while at the same time being massively tedious as you try and wrangle all your layers. This is the mother app of all apps, and I couldn't complete a single project without it. After Effects CS4 is stacked and packed to the rim with new features that can supercharge your productivity and break down creative barriers. No matter what the medium, from 60-foot motion picture screens to two-inch cell phone and PDA displays, from television to Websites.
Integrated workflow for mobile device authoringĪdobe After Effects is still the industry standard for visual effects and motion graphics work. WEBSITE: PRICE: After Effects CS4, $999 upgrade, $299