New CC update (10/6/14) change the Blue color????

I'm cross posting this info from the Premier thread about the same subject - sorry about that... hope it's useful.

Instructions for changing the hot text colour in After Effects 2014 on Mac OSX.

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First quit your favourite design and animation program.

Next in the finder press on the ‘Go’ menu whilst holding down the ‘alt’ key.

Select ‘Library’

Navigate to ‘Adobe After Effects 13.0 Prefs.txt’ in this location:

/Users/<username>/Library/Preferences/com.adobe.AdobePremierePro.plist

Drag a back up copy of this text file onto your desktop by holding the ‘alt’ key before dragging,

Open the file in TextEdit and use Edit>Find>Find…

Type in ‘hot’ and you should find this:

"Hot Text Color (0xAaRrGgBb)" = "0xffc69100"

  "Hot Text Color Override? (1 or 0)" = 00

First change the colour override to 01 instead of 00, meaning yes instead of no.

The last 6 characters are c69100. They simply represent a hex colour value for in this case yellow text (because I’m in AE 2014 with yellow text).

Change this text to a colour value chosen in Photoshop, something like “00ff4e” for a bright green. Look for the hex values in the colour picker preceded with a # symbol.

This gives you: "Hot Text Color (0xAaRrGgBb)" = "0xff00ff4e"

Save the file and restart AE.

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This is tested for the release named After Effects CC (2014).

If you want to change the blue text in the October 2014 release please give this technique a go and tell me if it works!

I have to join the chorus here...

I find the colour choices of the new UI a real step backwards.

* The blue is very hard on the eyes - and less distinct - all at the same time!

As an example I find the difference between selected and unselected keyframes much less obvious with the blue.

* I find the overall scheme too dark - I have it ramped up to it's lightest setting currently.

* Comp icons have gone mono - again less distinct.

The gold scheme was much better.

This UI is a major issue when your users are staring at a screen most of the day.

Agree that the colour should be user-defined, or at least come with a couple of themes, so we have some control. The blue is too strong IMO, it affects the whole look of the window, including whatever footage is viewed.

Also many of the asset icons in the project panel are monochrome - even the comps - with no options to change. It makes locating footage, image sequences and comps that much harder, I much prefer the old CC icons in the project list.

As mentioned before this is not a minor change it is dramatic, when you staring 12 h a day on a screen that is hurting your eyes.

If i compare it to the very well balanced color scheme of my cinema 4d R16 Interface a few things come in mind.

1. The Contrast of the white typo is to harsh. Make it a touch of grey and it is ok.

2. Because of the complete lost of the tiny bevels (buttons/Menues) the only chance for the ux-designer is to raise contrast. It´s not well done. Way to high. For me flatdesign is not working with greyshades

3. The Flyoutmenues (Mainmenues, but even the Menues in the effects) pop up with a very bright grey (Windows standard). At c4d it is integrated in the color scheme. Looks sweet

4. Give us controll over the different elements of the interface. Some presets and custom controll.

For me the blue labels look fresh (maybe a litle brighter because of the greyshade contrast) but i canot enyoy the color because of the other interface mistakes.

For me it is a bit straining to work with ae these days :-)

PS: Dont like the arrows in the effects menues (2 different, too big)

I like the new UI improvements, but the new blue Highlight-Color is cancer for my eyes and is more distracting than helpful. It would be great to have an option to change this.

I am really not loving the blue accents in this version. They pull my eye away from my content and towards things that don't matter. I don't really understand why it was necessary? To me, the program should blend in and the project itself should be the focus. Right now it seems like someone got a bit carried away

Personally, I am fine so far what I called the 'Tronfication' of the UI.  Against the dark background the Cyan and Blue stands out nicely... no real issues with the distinguishability of selected keys either.  What is taking me some getting used to are the monochromatic asset icons, but again not a deal breaker for me.  I think for the most part for those of us seeing for the first time is that something we've been familiar with for so long is suddenly unfamiliar, and the overall comfort level has decreased as a result.  However, I think that's just temporary... we'll get used to it.

Having said all of that though, I would point out that blue is the among the harder colors for our eyes to process due to its high frequency, so there definitely is some validity to the concern over eye fatigue when using it over the course of a long day.  I think that, rather than simply fiddle with the colors until you feel it has been dialed in, you should simply add a color picker to the preferences and let folks use the color that works best for them (I was never a big fan of the old school-bus yellow FWIW)

The flat UI is nice, but the high contrast is killing my eyes.  I think I have to uninstall and revert back to the previous version.  I just can't work efficiently.  The UI is getting in the way of getting stuff done.  Really wanted the new features of PPRO too, but it's a mess too.

In reading the updated features, any of the CC applications no longer allow the brighter settings "The range of the Brightness slider in the Appearance preference category is more limited than in previous versions; there is no longer a “light” mode for the interface. The default brightness setting is darker than in previous versions."

WIth more contrast this is very hard on the eyes, especially when staring at a project for 10-12 hours.  Please bring back the ability to have the interface brighter.  Been using After Effects since 2.0 and it has always had the brighter settings.  Or at least allow the text and icons to dim as well.  Cinema 4D has a nice contrast ratio to look at if you are going for a darker appearance.

I kinda like the blue in overall UI, but the selected keyframes color is terrible to visualize, there's no contrast in it. We can't differenciate the selected keyframes from the others, a lighter blue or even a user selectable color it's far more interesting.