After Effects

My client has supplied multi-point gradient backdrops made in Illustrator (attached) that need to animate (position & colour) over time but the default 4-point gradient in AE wont cut it unfortunatley. Is it a massive deal to either add extra gradient 'points' to the default 4-way gradient tool in AE? But if there was a way of importing Illustrator gradients and converting to shape layers with a multi-point gradient (animatable) then that would be brilliant as well...

I find that the app usually has a lot of space available across the width of the screen. It would be great to be able to make the toolbar vertical, similar to Illustrator's and Photoshop's toolbar, or make it responsive/ reflow in a stacked version when the user resizes a panel. 

I use Lumetri Color all the time and find the Curves charts (Hue vs Saturation, Hue vs Hue, etc.) extremely useful, however I cannot find a way to stretch the curve charts verically to get enough precision. It's virtually impossible to make a setting as small as I need to sometimes. I can stretch the charts horiztally all I want, but that doesn't help much since the settings depend on vertical movements. Does anyone know of a way to do this? Thank you!

After Effects should remember the last render output path per project, not globally.Right now it defaults to the last-used path from any project, which frequently misplacesrenders and creates confusion.Please store the render and save destination per project to prevent lost files, mistakes, and wasted time. thx 

I have some suggestions for modifying the text animation presets known as "Slide and Pop In" and "Slide and Pop Out" in Adobe.Firstly, I recommend adding the option to animate "by line" in the dropdown menu of the preset's effect called "Slide & Pop In - Animate by," in addition to the existing choices of "by character" and "by word."Secondly, I propose that the "Slide & Pop Out - Y Position Offset" effect within the "Slide and Pop Out" preset should display a positive value of 94 instead of a negative value (-94), to move the letters downwards instead of upwards. In my opinion, this adjustment provides a more logical motion as it continues the animate-in movement of "Slide and Pop." To help illustrate my suggestions, I have created clear examples of animated text using the modifications: Link 1 : Slide and Pop InLink 2 : Slide and Pop Out I kindly request permission to share my own .ffx files as potential replacement files for the upcoming After Effects update.

Is almost ridiculous that premiere has the option to add a backgrounhd color to a text and After Effects, which should be more advanced, hasn't. Come on.... We have to invent all types of weird expressions to do that, and this way you can't even add corner radious to the background like in Premiere. Premiere has so many advances features for text that I wish could be brought into After Effects as well.

Request:  Would love to be able to parametrically adjust the corner radius of individual corners of rounded rectangles in AE. Similar to illustrator / figma.   I know this can be done through scripting / expressions, but would love to see native controls to create shapes like this. Would simplify things greatly.  Example from figma:    

I enter hex values in the color picker a fair amount, usually after copying it from somewhere else. Another common occurence is opening the color picker to get simple black #000000 or white #FFFFFF. For black, if I type a single '0' I get the desired result without the rest of all those pesky keyboard taps—hurray for seconds saved! But for white? Uff. I begrudingly have to type each and every last one like a frustrated hexidecimalistic novelist.... And are there bigger fish to fry in this vast world of ours? Yes. Sure. But would it also just make my day if I could have it both ways and enter a single 'F' in the color picker to get #FFFFFF? 🎨 You bet your bottom dollar!

I'm often using stroked shape paths for my 2D motion graphics and illustration work.  I like the idea of the Taper settings, but I feel they are very limiting.  Can we have something similar to the Feather tool to change the width of a stroke manually?And/Or, could you add some more settings under Taper, like:Middle WidthMiddle Offset (% of length of path, to move where you want this point to be, not locked to 50%)This might negate the "Start Length" and "End Length" properties, but not sure.Also, can we adjust how the Start and End Ease are calculated? Currently if you have your Start Length set to 50% and no easing, you get a sharp change of width in the middle (see 1st image).Increasing Start Ease to 100% makes this transition in the middle smoother, but also majorly fattens (and flattens) the start and gives it a weird 'elephant's foot' effect (see 2nd image).Maybe there's sort of an "Easy-Ease" option that eases the taper in and out?  I would like it to look li

I have mulitple templates setup for various work I do, rather than having to navigate to each project in the Finder it would be good to have the ability to have a Favourites list on the Home page that projects could be added to, there is plenty of space there on the left side!

Hello,I have several PCs I use solely for network rendering (3ds Max and After Effects). They do not meet the hardware requirements for Windows 11, but they still render just fine. Now that Windows 10 does not get updates from Microsoft anymore, I would like to use them offline, they do not need Internet for rendering. The only thing they need Internet for is to update After Effects now and then, which is impossible to do offline as far as I know. So please make an offline installer for After Effects updates.I know I can extend Windows 10 updates for another year in the ESU program, but this won't be a longterm solution.Thanks,Bob

Locked layers should be protected for change, not for peaking values. E.g.: the waveform of a locked layer can't be show - it has to be unlocked first.

Right now we can toggle a layer matte as either Alpha or Luma and a secondary option to invert.The feature requested is to keep these options, but be able to alt + click (or some form) to cycle through the alpha/luma channels themselves. For example, I have an RGB pass of a logo and need to create mattes out of it to isolate sections to then color correct. This requires shift channels (which will break masks) so then it'll need to be precomposed adding another layer of complexity. This would have to be done for multiple colors depending on needs. With this new change, you'd simply be able to link a layer to the RGB pass and toggle which RGB channel you'd like to use as a alpha/luma matte. Masks would still work, no precomps needed. It would by default cycle as alpha or luma by default, but adding in alt + click could give you the more refined matte options. Thank you.

The Disk Cache settings recommend that a separate drive is selected as the location to store cache files. It might be helpful to be able to set a primary location and maximum cache size for an external/secondary drive, and a backup location/size for when the primary drive is not available.   This way, if you forget your external drive when working out of home, for instance, the cache is still handled in a predictable manner.

First off, I’m liking the keyframe colors way more than I expected, especially in my more complex projects with lots of controllers. But using it can feel like a chore. Specifically, when using the Select Keyframe Label Group, it reveals far more properties than expected. I attached a screen recording. I start with a mostly collapsed timeline, then pick the context menu to select the matching keyframe colors and suddenly a huge chunk of my timeline is twirled open; I then go on to hide the additional properties so I can focus on just the keys I wanted. I would love it if this only revealed the matching color, so I could see all/more of them on screen at once. While I don’t exactly think this is a bug, it’s certianly not what I expected to happen. Thanks!

The Clone brush in AE should automatically reveal only the clone brush strokes in the comp window when Paint on Transparent is active but still have the layer source visible in teh layer window. Currently it completely disappears in the both windows and you need to manually select another duplicated layer as the clone source for EVERY single clone brush stroke.  While you can set the source in the Paint panel, you can't paint with the Paint on transparent active as the Layer window is fully black.  The current method is cumbersome and completely counter-intuitive. 

I am adamant about keeping my compflow in my projects going left to right so my Flowchart and Mini-Flowchart views match my open Timeline Panels and I would love to borrow Chrome's "Close other tabs to the right" option in After Effects. I included a screenshot of the option from Chrome and where I'd love to see it be added in After Effects. Bonus points if it could be mapped to a keyboard shortcut?

Is there a script or way to automatically or bulk freeze all rotobrush work? I have a file from another designer with a xrazy amount of unneeded roto work, but instead of rebuilding from scratch properly I need to freeze all this roto work but would like to do a "click here to freeze all roto work" instead of doing layer by layer throughout the entire project.

Parenting has got better but I wish I didn't have to press 'X' to jump to the layer number when parenting.Please expose the layer number of the object clicked on in the timeline. I have a ton of layers.I want to pair the 'eye' with the 'head controller'.I've just drawn an 'eye' and it's layer 12 I click the controller in the composition panel.I then need to click the controller, then press 'X' to jump to it in the timeline (if it's shy then you can't see it)Remember the layer number of the controllerThen click the 'eye' again, press 'X' to jump back to that layer and parent it to the layer number I just remembered.

As a long-time user and motion designer, I’m writing to request the addition of a native Duplicator system in After Effects—comparable to the powerful one available in Cavalry. While After Effects is excellent for compositing and animation, its current duplication and instancing workflow is extremely manual and outdated compared to modern tools.The ProblemCurrently, duplicating objects and managing variations in AE requires a combination of precomps, parenting, expressions, or third-party tools. This process is slow, lacks flexibility, and is not visually intuitive—especially when working with large numbers of repeated elements in motion graphics, UI, or pattern-based animation.Proposed Feature: After Effects DuplicatorHere’s what the new Duplicator panel/system should offer, inspired by Cavalry:Core FeaturesInstance-Based DuplicationLike shape layers or nulls, duplications should be instances (linked copies), not flattened clones. Editing one updates all.Grid / Radial / Linear / Point

Would be great to be able to select a folder in my Project tab and send all comps in that folder to ME. For example, I have a FINAL COMPS folder in which are several more subfolders, all organized and containing several comps each. Currently, I need to open ALL folders and then select ALL comps, while unselecting the folders... 

When a single designer is creating many boards for a video, they often utilize the Artboards feature in either Illustrator or Photoshop. As an animator receiving designs in this fashion, there exists no simple way to import them into After Effects in a useful way. Both Illustrator and Photoshop have "Artboards to Files" workflows, but that's not ideal because it creates redundant versions of the artwork. This can complicate folder structures, take up filespace, and cause the opportunity for conflicting versions as changes are made. In essense, this workflow goes against what artboards are for in the first place! The proposed solution is an additional option in the dialog that appears when importing Ps/Ai files to select which artboard should be imported. This should include:[Each Artboard by Name and Index] - Imports a layer or composition the exact size of the selected artboard.All Artboards - All artboards are imported in as a single large layer or composition. In cont

I really need better ways to set the color space of footage. The color panel is annoying to get to for every file.  Here's what I want:- In the Import File Window, I wasn ta Colorspace pulldown next to the sequence options so I can set the colorspace of the file on import. Don't forget a checkbox for Preserve RGB.- In the Project panel, when you click on a file, the colorspace profile of that file is dispalyed in the file info at the top of the window. let us click on the colorspace and change it directly there. - Be able to easily change the default color space for footage as it's brought in.  

I want to use dlig, but there's no way to enable them directly in After Effects.You can't just copy and paste text from Illustrator like you can with stylistic sets, because it won't work. The only option is to outline the text in Illustrator and import it into AE, which makes it uneditable and adds a lot of extra work. AE doesn't usually let you use most of the OpenType features, which is quite annoying.I often want to use dlig in my projects, so it would be great if AE at least supported this feature.

When working with multiple text boxes in After Effects, it can be frustrating that the layer stays selected after editing. You always have to click outside the box (or press ESC) to deselect it. Would it be possible to add an option for auto-deselecting or auto-selecting the next text box? That would be a huge timesaver for those of us who work heavily with text. Another text-related issue: when linking two fields together, or when using Essential Graphics, please add support for uppercase symbols (like the *). At the moment, they don’t display correctly and will appear in lowercase when used dynamically.