February 1997 Issue, copyright 1997, Canada Computer Paper Inc.
Adobe After Effects 3.1
FX program provides professional results
By Graeme Bennett
After Effects
From: Adobe
For: Macintosh
Price: US$995; US$1,995 (production bundle)
Pros: Powerful animation and post-production processing. A few years
ago, these effects required an expensive FX generator. Good tutorials.
Cons: Fairly complicated, number-oriented interface.
After Effects is one of those software programs that produces effects that
look like they've been done in a gazillion-dollar "Harry Suite"
digital-effects studio. And, if your Mac is studly enough (After Effects
will run on a 68030 or better, but seriously wants to run on a big, bad
PowerMac), you can create truly professional effects that amply prove why
the Mac can more than hold its own in a PC-centric world.
Adobe After Effects was a fairly tough product to review. I have pity on
those users who, for whatever reason, are struggling along without the benefit
of the excellent tutorials in the After Effects manual. Don't bother! After
Effects is full of obscure keyboard shortcuts and things you just have to
read about in the manual to understand. Once I'd read the manual (it took
more than one reading to sink in, in my case) and had done the tutorials,
I was well on my way to "F/Xstacy."
Here's the basic principle:
1) First, you create a project, into which you will place one or more compositions.
Compositions can be nested, so that, for example, a clock can have moving
hands (part of a "clock composition"), but the entire clock can
be resized, rotated, or otherwise manipulated as one object.
2) Animated effects are set up on a timeline that runs from left to right,
much as it is in Adobe Premiere and many other video editors. By setting
two or more "keyframes," you can set when an effect starts and
stops. When third-party plug-ins, or After Effects' own filters, are used,
the filter becomes an item in the list of layers. Setting keyframes on any
item, setting an effect or position, and then moving to another position
on the timeline easily creates an animated effect.
Like Adobe Photoshop, After Effects relies heavily on the concepts of filters,
layers, and masks for many of its effects. As you might expect, you can
import files from Photoshop, Premiere, Illustrator, QuickTime, MIDI, and
several other common formats.
Although I'm grateful for the excellent tutorials and am quite astonished
at the fantastic effects possible, I can't escape the nagging feeling that
After Effects is a little clumsy and overly complex here and there-a situation
not helped by the total lack of online Help in the program. (Why is it that
so few Mac programs have help systems? When was the last time you saw a
Windows program that didn't include a Help menu? It's as if Mac developers
are stubbornly clinging to the pompous belief that Macs are so easy they
don't need to provide help.) At any rate, rather than having to manually
set keyframes and press (not to mention "remember!") Command-this
and Command-that, I'd like to see the program support more drag-and-drop
selections and automated procedures-or at least a good hypertext help system!
As it is, you can do a lot, but the program's complexity and hundreds of
menu items tend to overshadow the power in many cases.
However, these are minor quibbles. The program proved to be 100 percent
stable in my tests (it was awfully slow on my "minimum configuration"
68030 test system, but performed well on an AV PowerMac with 80 MB of RAM)
and serves to show another good reason why many video professionals continue
to prefer the Mac platform.
Metatools Studio Effects
Pros: Powerful plug-ins add particle animation and many other sophisticated
effects that look like they were produced on an ultra-expensive special
effects system.
Cons: Numerical interfaces, lean documentation.
If one were to categorize these tools with a single word, Studio Effects
might best be described as "extreme."
Studio Effects plug-ins are, at times, frighteningly complex-adding huge
panels of numerical controls and math-oriented functions via a range of
special effects plug-ins to the already complex Adobe After Effects program
(reviewed above). The good news is that Studio Effects produces an amazing
array of effects that are stunningly sophisticated. Animated logos rise
as if emerging from vacuum-formed plastic (anybody remember the Mattel Vacu-form?);
images melt as if made from liquid mercury, and a particle-animation system
that creates everything from smoke to Star Trek-like star fields.
If you've seen the "ripple" distortion effects on such shows as
Babylon 5 (when a weapon is fired) or Sliders, you can create
those effects, too, with the program's Ripple Pulse effect.
You can make an image look as though it is turning into glass or viewed
through running water. These are but a few of the 18 effects in the package,
each of which is nearly infinitely customizable.
Conclusion
At least for me, the best software tools are those that cloak sophistication
and power in a convenient and intuitive interface. Studio Effects succeeds
on the first two accounts, but fails somewhat on the last, although it is
likely that those who are familiar with the keyframe-oriented nature of
Adobe After Effects will grasp the essentials of these plug-ins quite easily.
How could Studio Effects be improved? This product really needs a preview
function, and the manual needs to have more comprehensive tutorials than
the one simple example cited for each effect. These complaints notwithstanding,
these are compellingly cool effects very much in the "Kai" style
that I would highly recommend to anyone working with After Effects.
If you are a Mac-based animator or videographer, these optical effects are
the next best things to having your very own Industrial Light and Magic
dept. For a complete feature list, visit q
Contact: Metatools,
Web site: http://www.metatools.com
Back to Table of
Contents...
Return to
TCP Home Page
TCP Online February 1997 Issue