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bertugk40855429
Participant
March 29, 2017
Question

How to run AEGP?

  • March 29, 2017
  • 2 replies
  • 1175 views

I am very new to After Effects SDK and I did some reading on the structure of the SDK and examples. Now I was trying to build the examples, and it works fine for Effect plugins. I am on Mac and for making the effect examples, all I need to do is changing the Build Settings in xCode. Then copy the built file under `Library/Application Support/Adobe/Common/Plug-ins/7.0/MediaCore/personal/paramarama.plugin`. Then I restart After Effects and it gets shown in the effects list.

However, when I try the same thing for AEGP examples, it doesn't work. I noticed that both extensions are .plugin but paramarama says 'Effect' on its file and ProjDumper says 'General'. So this doesn't get shown on the effects.

I got pretty confused. What am I missing here?

How can I run/test AEGP plugin? I think I couldn't really connect the dots between effect plugins and aegp. I'd be grateful for any help.

*Edit: As far as I understand, AEGPs run on the start of After Effects. If so how do I test them?

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2 replies

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bertugk40855429Author
Participant
March 30, 2017

Hi shachar, thanks for your info Can you please suggest me a start point for learning about AEGP. I couldn't figure out about the gap between effect plugins and AEGPs. Unfortunately, I couldn't find anything at all like AEGP 101 However, I learnt about all the methods in the example files for an effect plugin and skeleton example. But don't know where I should go now? I'd be grateful to know.

What I want to achieve is selecting a layer that has an effect plugin and in effect controls, click a button. From this question Any way to click a button on an effect?​ I have learnt that what I want to achieve can be achieved by "Sending the PF_Cmd_USER_CHANGED_PARAM via AEGP_EffectCallGeneric to the effect, and setting the extra.param_index to the proper parameter # was enough to click the button.", but I feel like I'm in a boat in the middle of an ocean.

I'd be grateful for any advice and help.

S
Community Expert
shachar carmiCommunity Expert
Community Expert
March 31, 2017

well, the theory is this:

Effects reside on layers and process/generate images/audio.

AEGPs are general plug-ins that are loaded when AE boots, and stay loaded throughout the session.

AEGPs can do a lot of things, that don't have to do with being applied to a layer, such as: adding menu entries and being triggered when said menu entry is clicked on, periodically checking the project and operating is needed, they can create comps, layers, apply effects and even change AE's settings.

in other words, AEGPs can do pretty much everything but are not related to the rendering pipeline.

an effect can initiate communication with an AEGP using custom suites. look at the "Checkout" and "Sweetie" sample projects to see how that's implemented.

an AEGP can read and write param values and other data from any effect. but to trigger functionality on that effect, the AEGP can use AEGP_EffectCallGeneric(). that would cause AE to call the targeted effect and have it execute it's native response code to the command passed in the generic call.

so, given you're dealing with similar circumstances as those in the thread you mentioned, you'll want your AEGP to trigger the target effect's USER_CHANGED_PARAM handing code, and hopefully that would perform the operation you wanted performed by emulating a click on the effect's button.

S
Community Expert
shachar carmiCommunity Expert
Community Expert
March 29, 2017

AEGPs don't show up on the effect menu. only if an AEGP registers a menu

command, it would appear in the menu set in the register call.

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