After Effects

After effects is in DIRE need of an edge extend tool. When dealing with keys or roto that has haloing and edge contamination issues and/or transparency from motion blur. To the best of my knoledge, there is no way in AE to extend the color and luminance values from the core of the key and extend them outward. This is a vital tool for correcting edges. I have been looking for over a decade for a tool or technique that can reliably to this in AE, and there isn't one. I literally have to have a Nuke artist do this for me. Nuke has a myriad of tools for the the clean up of contaminated edges on roto or keys.This is an example of what edge extend does in Nuke. this isn't an averaging of the overall pixels, it just extends the values outward so things like motion blur can be rebuilt.Here's a video describing the process of using Color Smear with an actor very quickly crossing a bright monitor that needs screen replacement. this is something I do regularly, and it's a tota

I don't see a lot of discussion around this topic and most After Effects compositors either use sub par methods or simply aren't in need for high end solutions. But for us being stuck in the ecosystem it is tremendously hard to perform high quality composite work without any form of pixel spread to do clean ups, edge extends and creation of clean plates from green screens. These tools have been available in compositing packages like Flame, Fusion and Nuke for years already. The only thing we have is an immensly slow performing extend in Refine Hard Matte with tons of options we don't need and a range limit of about 1pixel. Their tools perform close to realtime and are able to smear the pixel information much much further. Please consider implementing a very fast performing high quality pixel spreader that is able to take RGB information and spread it with different methods/modes via it's own layer's alpha/mask or external via the mask layer selection. To understand what

Right now, when multiple compositions are queued but not yet rendered, each one requires its own manual “Output To” selection. This gets tedious fast when you have dozens of comps waiting. It would be a major time-saver to select multiple queued items and assign a single output destination to all of them at once. Currently, even if you select all the comps and set the output for one, it doesn’t propagate to the other selected comps. This would simplify batch-rendering workflows and eliminate a lot of repetitive clicking, especially on large projects with many deliverables.

It would be great if they activated the option again to change the color of the lines in the after effects - I would like to be able to customize it as I liked as before - combining the colors with my setup - it is a very simple option but personally it was very good ! I wish it were possible to do it again in this version "2026" > option.. 

The text editing panel in the After Effects Properties Panel (when text has been set up as an essential property) is a fixed height of about 2.5 lines tall. Premiere's Properties panel shows three full lines. (This appears to be the visible amount of text regardless of display settings, though I won't pretend I did exhaustive research here.)   These work ok in many cases, but for templates where longer text will be the norm, it makes it fiddly and annoying for the end user to work with text in this small space, and means they generally can't see all of it at once without copy/pasting from another app.  I'd love the ability to establish a specific height for the text editing area for the end user - perhaps a setting could be added in the existing Edit Properties pop-up? An editable height value / number of visible lines would allow for excellent customization, and could allow for a reduction in screen real estate for templates that would never use more than a single line!

In a lot of Adobe programs, you can hold "option" (on mac) and drag a shape or layer to duplicate it. Except for AE, this is however a very fast and interactive way to duplicate something that could even be applied to effects, keyframes, etc. Here is a demo video of how this would work: https://vimeo.com/137401276

The text in error messages is kind of 'dead'. When we need it to report an issue, its a pain. Please make this text selectable and copyable.

Windows has a surprisingly low file path character limit. When Collecting files, it's nice that the (Footage) folder mimics the Project Panel folder structure, but It'd be nice to have the option to place all assets in a single root folder.I'm often deep in a directory when unzipping a collected project. The depth of the heirirchy within the project file makes sense, but when mapped to a folder structure blows past the file size limit causing headaches. I don't often need the folder structure to mimic the project file, so it feels like paths are artifically long causing headaches for a seemingly niche benefit.When working with others or in a location with many projects, moving a project file extract location isn't feasible and would impact other user on the system. Considering it's unlikely microsoft will change this limit anytime soon, I am suggesting these fixes. An option to place all files in a single folder (easy) or sort by file type/extension (moderate) or compress the file

Yup. A search box will be good for the Prefs - quicker to get to the right settings as well as perhaps finding related settings - imagine finding a setting you never knew existed but would greatly enhance your user-experience. 

When clearing the disk cache using app.executeCommand, After Effects should also display a confirmation warning.Specifically, when calling app.executeCommand(10200), the disk cache is cleared immediately without any warning, unlike when a user triggers the same action through the UI or a keyboard shortcut. This behavior can lead to accidental cache deletion and feels unfriendly to users.I would greatly appreciate it if a confirmation dialog could be added for this command as well.

It’s 2025. I open After Effects and… it feels like I’m still working in 2013.While Blender, Unreal Engine, Houdini, and even newer tools like Cavalry are evolving with bold updates, After Effects has barely moved. Every time a new version drops, it’s disappointing to see tiny improvements disguised as “major features.” It’s as if Adobe is keeping the program on life support without actually developing it.Let’s call it out: Graph Editor – still outdated, clunky, and untouched for over a decade. No real-time preview, no modular behavior, no intelligent UI. No modern easing tools – no built-in bounce, elastic, inertia, or overshoot. You still need to rely on Expression tricks or 3rd-party scripts for basic animation finesse. No native effectors or procedural animation tools – while tools like Cavalry, Cinema 4D, and Notch offer real-time procedural workflows and effectors, After Effects is stuck in manual keyframes and precomp hell. Still no native IK (inverse kinemati

Conclusion: ExtendScript needs an update, and Adobe should officially publish its type definitions. Why has ExtendScript not been updated?Right now, ExtendScript is still based on ES3, an extremely outdated JavaScript standard. Expressions, on the other hand, have been properly modernized and now support ES2020-level syntax. If Expressions can be updated, shouldn’t ExtendScript be modernized as well?Yes, updating ExtendScript may break backward compatibility and cause some existing scripts to stop working. However, ExtendScript also contains many long-standing bugs—such as issues with the conditional operator—that would be better off fixed even if it means some adjustments for script authors. In addition, why does Adobe still not publish official type information for ExtendScript (such as .d.ts files)?The community is collecting type information through steady efforts, but there is still a lot of missing type information.Types-for-Adobehttps://github.com/docsforadobe/Types-fo

You know how awesome Compound Blur is? I want that power everywhere.   That is, it would be extremely powerful to be able to switch a parameter to be "driven by" another layer.   You would set your minimum and maximum values and pick the layer it's pointed to. Just like how Compound Blur blurs more or less depending on the luminance, this would drive whatever the parameter was by the luminance of the referenced layer. (You could also include the ability to posterize it and soften it.) Oh, and the min and max values would be keyframeable too, of course.   Some use cases: Drive the complexity of a Fractal Noise layer by a depth map. So you have big fog up close and denser, more complex fog the further away it is. Some very cool, stylized effects by driving the size of the Venetian Blinds effect by footage. The size/density of CC Ball Action balls Mosiac sizes Glow size and intensity being driven by a different layer would be neat Stylized directional blurs where the blur

Most freelancers (most artists really) rarely check or change color space settings when exporting their renders.  Especially in a crunch when they have to quickly open somebody else's  file, make a small change and render.  This is particularly problematic when a project is in ACES.   This small check box in the project settings would eliminate that issue.  They might not even realize the project is in ACES and it wouldn't matter.  This small checkbox (see attached) would be very much appreciated.     

How about instead of making everything worse every year and breaking things for no reason, the Devs spend their time fixing the countless bugs and we can get back to doing our jobs without janky tools? Just a thought 

Something I find myself wishing for more and more is the ability to import compositions from other AE projects as components.   For example, I have a selection of end card animations that need to be adjustable for localisation, but also need to be kept consistent across multiple projects. When I make a change to the end card, that needs to be reflected in each of these projects.   I'd love to be able to have a single 'Endcards.aep' project and be able to import comps from that – then, when I place them into another composition, they would act as pre-comps with any essential properties exposed. The only difference is that they would not be openable or editable.   Later, if I make a change in 'Endcards.aep', and then re-open my other projects that refer to this, the end card comps would be automatically updated (in the way that other footage files are automatically updated).   Essentially – Mogrts inside After Effects. This would allow component libraries that are alw

i love the Layer Styles panel in photoshop , and i use the same effects in after effects in most projects . i just wish there was a bit more in depth options on some of the effects ; bevel and emboss contour options , gloss contour , etc . 

It would be extremely helpful to have a dropdown in the Pre-compose dialog that lets you assign a label colour to the new precomp as you create it.  

When versioning up a precomp the current workflow is something like this. 1 - Find precomp in project (right click -> reveal in project) 2 - Duplicate precomp3 - Alt drag precomp back on top of layer to replace. Sometimes (too often) I'll duplicate a pre-comp and then forget to replace it. Also this is a lot of clicks when it would be great to have a context menu option that was esentially "duplicate and replace with new copy / version" Proposed feature "Replace with New Copy Shortcut": 1 -  click on comp in timeline 2 - cmd+alt+shift+D - comp is replaced with a new copy -- unlinking it from wherever else it was used. 3. profit  This would eliminante some annoying mistakes and also speed up a common task.  While we are at it can we make "true comp duplicator" a feature of the app instead of a script I always have to install. 

Could we have an updated version of Content-Aware Fill, please?The new one would utilize more than one reference frame. It would also be more precise even at the cost of calculation speed.The current version is rarely useful due to poor content generation.Thanks.

It's a minor thing, but often I have longer filenames and have been using comments to keep track of some things as well. However, if the text is too long, the source / file name gets an ellipsis at some point in the middle of the text, and comments are simply truncated (and sometimes it is not even obvious that this is happening). Making the columns wider helps, but then takes up valuable screen real estate.  Would be great to show a tooltip with the full text when the mouse hovers over these. It honestly is a feature that seems standard in many UIs, and I was expecting one to appear initially when I first started messing with After Effects. (I had initially posted this to the beta forum but this seems like a better place for it!)

It’d be amazing if After Effects could save my workspaces to my Adobe account. I’ve spent years perfecting my panel layout and custom script UIs and every time I change computers or reinstall AE, I have to rebuild everything from scratch. Ideally, my workspace would live in my Creative Cloud profile, so when I log in on a new machine, everything’s back exactly how I left it. Panels, extensions, scripts, all in place. Bonus idea: if AE detects that a panel or script UI used in my workspace isn’t installed yet, it could just notify me instead of leaving an empty space. That’d save a ton of time and confusion.In short:Save/sync workspaces in the cloudRestore automatically when signing inAlert me if a panel or script is missing This would make switching machines or reinstalling After Effects so much smoother like how keyboard shortcuts or prefs used to sync.

I wrote an expression that gets After Effects on its knees directly after opening or importing the project. It would be great when Safe Mode had an option to disable expressions, so the user can correct or remove the culprits.

Desarrollar un botón,  similar a la opción de capa tímida, que defina un rango de capas sobre las cuales haya un desplazamiento vertical específico, es decir: Por ejemplo: Tengo un proyecto con 50 capas de las cuales requiero un desplazamiento constante entre un grupo continuo de 20 de ellas para la selección de fotogramas clave o definición de otras propiedades. Entonces arrastro desde la primera capa hasta la ultima con clic sostenido y la selección de capas se sigue hasta más allá de la última capa deseada. Con este botón pued oponer el rango de que al hacer este tipo de movimientos ocurra entre las 20 capas que necesito. ¿Por qué es útil? 1.- Porque no siempre se desea precomponer un grupo de capas que se seguiran modificando en una composición principal.  2.- Porque La tecla shift funciona para la selección de capas pero no para la selección de los fotogramas en sus propiedades, mucho menos cuando se requiere seleccionar múltiples propiedades como esc

Right now in After Effects, if you select a bunch of comps in the render queue and try to change their output path, only the first one updates and the rest keep their previous paths. It’d make way more sense if selecting multiple items in the render queue and setting a new output path applied to all of them. My current workaround is clunky: I set a path for the first comp, then go back to the project panel, select the rest, and add them again so they inherit the new path. But that shouldn’t be necessary. This would save a ton of time when batch rendering. Especially for people exporting dozens of comps at once.