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matthewb47295357
Participant
June 28, 2019
Answered

Scaling a shape without changing the position

  • June 28, 2019
  • 1 reply
  • 15856 views

Hello,

I am a novice to After Effects and have a question. I am creating a short animation for a video project and I want a series of circles to emanate from the same position in the composition, scale up and then disappear. When I animate the scale of the layers the end position of the shape is always different, whereas I want all the shape layers to retain the same start and end position, only for their size to change from that centred position. I guess this has something to do with Anchor points but I cannot find the answer. Many thanks for any advice!

Correct answer Roei Tzoref

Sure, one thing I forgot to mention: this is basic stuff. Ae is not a video editor. it's not that intuitive. you have to make sure to nail the basics before you dive in or else you will get stuck over and over, and with it - feel frustrated.

make sure you at least exhaust the free tutorials on the Adobe page:

After Effects tutorials | Learn how to use After Effects

1 reply

Roei Tzoref
Legend
June 28, 2019

if all your shapes are on one layer, you would need to scale them from the scale property of they group in the shape content hierarchy
Like this:

if the shapes are each on different layer you would need to center the anchor point for each layer so that the scale would be from the center. you can center the anchor point with shortcut Ctrl+Alt+Home and some other shortcut exist as well for this

matthewb47295357
Participant
June 28, 2019

Hey Roei, thanks so much for your reply! I will try again now using your tip.

Roei Tzoref
Roei TzorefCorrect answer
Legend
June 28, 2019

Sure, one thing I forgot to mention: this is basic stuff. Ae is not a video editor. it's not that intuitive. you have to make sure to nail the basics before you dive in or else you will get stuck over and over, and with it - feel frustrated.

make sure you at least exhaust the free tutorials on the Adobe page:

After Effects tutorials | Learn how to use After Effects