Learn The Basics Of Adobe AfterEffects To Create a Moving Portrait

In this class, I’ll teach you the basics of navigating and working in AfterEffects. We’ll re-create a moving portrait and while doing that learn about the AfterEffects interface and some of its basic tools. This class will be great for anyone who has a firm understanding of applications that deal with layers like Photoshop, Illustrator, and Fresco. This will also be a good introduction for intermediate-level video editors who have worked in Premiere Pro and want to begin experimenting with AfterEffects. That being said, I’ll try to explain things as easily and succinctly as possible for those of you with no experience in these types of applications. 

We’ll cover the following skills:

• Creating a new project
• Creating a new composition
• Importing media and organizing your project
• A brief overview of the AfterEffects Interface
• Creating and nesting compositions and layers
• Different layer types and their uses
• Keyboard shortcuts for easier navigation
• The basics of keyframing and understanding position/scale/placement in a 2D space
• The basics of keying and masking

This class will be useful for anyone who’s curious to get their feet wet in AfterEffects but finds the program to be overall confusing and frustrating. Again, I won't teach you everything because AfterEffects is VAST but hopefully I’ll give you the vocabulary and skills to begin to utilize some of its basic functions.

For this class, you’ll need access to the latest version of Adobe AfterEffects, preferably through a Creative Cloud membership. You’ll also need an internet connection and a few gigs of space on your computer to download the footage and follow along with me as I build out the project.

DOWNLOAD THE FOOTAGE HERE TO FOLLOW ALONG

• Class Introduction
• Class Project
• The Interface
• Layers and Masking
• Keying and Pre Comps
• Keyframing & Rotoscoping
• Switches, Modes, & Pick Whips
• Render & Export