AE WinSK 2017-1 How to draw graphics' object on Effect Control panel

Forum|Forum|5 years ago
January 15, 2021
2 replies
449 views

Hello All.

I know that AE SDK (in my case SDK 2017.1 for AE) provide a lot of macros for put to Effect Control Panel some objects for plugin control, such: sliders, buttons, check-boxes, popups, color, etc. Could you please tell me is possible to draw on this panel custom graphics' object? For example - draw image histogram betwen my 2 sliders in real time. I'm know how to draw histogram but completely don't understood how to "glue" the histogram to the Plugin' Control Panel. Is this generally possible? Is Adobe provide any API/sites for perform this or provide examples show the functionality? Is special SDK and GUI lib required? I did see that very popular plugins for AE and PR, such Magic Bullet, Saphire, etc... drawing on this panel very fine stuffs. Is this "drawing" possible by regular Adob'e SDK?

This topic has been closed for replies.

S

shachar carmi

Community Expert

To expand on Nat's answer:
the graphics buffer of AE's ECW and comp window are only accessible via the "Drawbot" suite, which is part of the standard AE SDK.

you can use other libraries to draw whatever you want, but you eventually need to copy your result into a drawbot buffer using the dawbot suite. (possible via creating a Drawbot image from an exisintg mem address cintaining poxel data of the correct format, and then drawing that image into the drawbot buffer)
cairo is a popular choice, as well as QT.

i personally just use the darwbot tools to do what i need.

marks81797503Author

Known Participant

Understood, tahnk you Nat and Shachar.

Shachar, could you please explain in short - what you means "drawbot tools"?

Thank you again

S

shachar carmi

Community Expert

the drawbot suite has some drawing tools, such as polygon fill, stroke, text draw ect.

since CC2015, AE's ui buffers have become opaque and can only be drawn onto using drawbot.

so for most uses, you can use drawbot's callbacks and free yourself of the need to handle a 3rd party drawing API or the os drawing tools that are not cross platform.

should you decide the tool made avaiable by drawbot are not sufficient for your needs, emply whatever API you want, and copy it's result onto AE's buffer using drawbot as a final stage.

N

Nat Ashdown

Participating Frequently

Hello,

Yes you can. Search for Custom UI in the docs, and take a look at the Custom_ECW sample in the Examples/UI of the SDK. There's a built in drawing library called Drawbot, but I think you can use others if you want to.

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