After Effects 23.4.0 is now available for download!

[nishu_kush]

We are excited to announce that the May update of Adobe After Effects, Version 23.4, is now available for download. With several new features, this release includes the Properties Panel to ease your workflow.

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What's New?

Properties panel for Text and Shape layers

Creating motion graphics is easier and faster with the Properties panel. Use this to quickly access the important properties of selected Text and Shape layers in the timeline without twirling open multiple layer hierarchies or opening a different panel. It improves the accessibility of layer properties that speed up your workflows.

Read more about the Properties panel in After Effects.

Effect Manager

After Effects now attempts to identify effects potentially interfering with your project workflow and forcing the application to crash.

You can use the Effect Manager notification on the next startup to keep it enabled and proceed as-is or disable the identified effects before proceeding with your work. This can save you a lot of time, as you won't have to continually deal with the issues caused by problematic effects.

You can also use the Manage Effects under the Effects menu to view a list of all your installed effects and disable any effects on the next startup.

Learn more about Effects Manager.

Startup & Repair in Preferences

Use the Startup & Repair panel under Preferences to troubleshoot your set preferences in After Effects without changing or removing them or starting over from scratch. 

Start in Safe Mode - Launch After Effects once using only the default After Effects preferences and disabled third-party plugins. It helps you identify if any of your current set preferences are corrupt and need a reset.

Empty All Caches - Empty all After Effects cache folders. This action can resolve certain startup issues as well as clear up additional storage space. 

Reset All Preferences To Defaults - Reset all preferences to defaults permanently. 

Reveal Preferences in Finder - Navigate directly to the locally saved After Effects preferences file. 

Migrate Previous Version Preferences - Migrate all preferences from previous After Effects versions to the current one.

Learn more about the Startup and Repair feature in After Effects Preferences.

Improved file sorting in the Project panel 

Sort filenames in the project panel using a more natural method that works better for names with numbers.

Learn more about working with After Effects workspace and panels.

3D Gizmo position snapping

You can now snap layers in 3D space while dragging the constrained X, Y, and Z position handles of the 3D Gizmo. This includes the XY, XZ, and YZ combo handles of the 3D position gizmo. 

With this new improvement for 3D workflows in After Effects, you can use snapping, both constrained and non-constrained while working with 3D model layers.

Revamped Track Matte pick whip icon

The new Track Matte pick whip icon is designed for you to easily differentiate it from the Parent & Link one. The new icon combines the pick whip shape with a hint of transparency grid and is effortlessly identifiable while working on your workflows.

Learn more about Track Matte in After Effects. 

Support for new formats

After Effects now offers support for the footage shot on Sony VENICE 2 V2.00 and on iPhones in Cinematic mode.

Take a look at all the supported formats.

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What's Fixed?

• Fixed an issue that caused some options from the camera submenu to be greyed out.
• Fixed an issue that caused a ‘zero denominator in ratio addition.’ error when dragging the anchor point of a shape layer in 3D space.
• Fixed an issue that caused After Effects to hang when collecting files that contain a Cinema 4D file in composition.
• Fixed an issue where After Effects could crash when using a Wacom Tablet with Paint and Brush tools.
• Fixed an issue where 12-bit color DNxHR HQX video in MXF files was being decoded as 8-bit.
• Fixed an issue where Media Browser favorites were not being saved.
• Fixed an issue with migrating preferences that caused After Effects to become unresponsive.
• Fixed an issue with the render engine that caused After Effects to crash when choosing a folder from Watch Folder in the file menu.
• Fixed an issue with Puppet Tool that caused After Effects to crash when changing the engine from Advanced to Legacy. 
• Fixed an issue that caused MXF assets with Alpha Channel to not be transparent.
• Fixed rendering notifications for non-English OS languages.
• Fixed an issue where footage containing audio using 16kHz, 64kHz, 88.2kHz, or 176.4kHz Sample Rates would not play or export correctly.

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How to update After Effects to version 23.4?

Open the Creative Cloud desktop application and click the Updates tab on the top left. Find After Effects in the list and click Update.

I don't see the update in my Creative Cloud desktop application. What should I do?

Click Help > Check for Updates from the Creative Cloud desktop application to refresh it.

NOTE: Updates are rolled out in phases. Please check back after a few hours if you don't see the new version in your CC desktop app.

[Teoderik]

HI! With this update all the shapes I create are transparent!!!! Although it says Solid color in new Properties window

Please fix ASAP!

[nishu_kush]

Hi Teoderik,

Could you share a full-screen screenshot? That would give a better idea of what's going on.

We're here to help.

Thanks,

Nishu

[ericmlevy]

Which Nvidia driver should we be using for this release? The latest or the rolled back one suggested for the previous version?

[nishu_kush]

I discussed this with the engineers recently, and they suggested the latest version from Nvidia works better.

Let us know how it goes.

Thanks,

Nishu

[Wasim299960634kd4]

After Effects Starting Issue unable to resolve in Safe Mode, Manage Preferences or Manage Plugins! Kindly Suggest how to resolve this with any kind of option is not working....

[GoatWar2000]

Well done, you have broken AE in a brand new and impressive way - it now won't start without instantly crashing. 

Tried going back a version and it's also broken. It was working OK (about as well as AE does anyway) before this update.

Got deadlines today.

USELESS.

[Francisco5E87]

Whatever ya'll did, AE is now crashing on my alienware desktop with a 3090, my Imac 2021, and my 2018 Imac pro atleast 5 times a day, sometimes more. Please fix whatever happened. And no I am not going to disable Universe that has been working great.

[wfpalmer]

crash crash crash. 
I can't get past the splash screen, 

Splash screen says "initializing MediaCore" and that's it. gone. 
I'm running the latest NVIDIA driver (Studio 531.61) on my Windows 11 Raider laptop.
Tried rebooting, uninstalling and re-installing, safe mode, dump all settings, reloading the graphics driver, apparently everything. 

Went back and installed 23.3 - same problem. 

Have lost of crash files now, and when I try to upload them with e "attach files here' button on this thread I get "file type not supported" so I added .txt to the file name. (do you guys do that on purpose?)

[PanBeep]

[Ondrej2464823311dz]

Playback behaving completely erratically now (Apple M1 Max).

It either plays too fast, or without sound or always starts at the composition beginning (regardless of timeline position) or any combination of this three bugs. 

This is very frustrating to work with.

[Ondrej2464823311dz]

Also, for example Drop Shadow Effect is not working now. 

[viralsquirrel]

RAM preview does not play in real-time in this or the more recent previous release. Using latest MacOS on an 16" 2021 M1 Max MacBook Pro. Reverting back to AE version 23.1 works perfectly fine.

[amedeot50833200]

Please solve the "low memory warning" issue,  with previous version this never happened, now after 20 minutes of working I have to restart after effects because of this issue. 
I'm working with a Apple macbook pro M1, 16gb Ram.

[Ghith30250254kkks]

لقد اشتريت برنامج افتر ايفيكت ونزل لدي برناج  CREATIVE CLOUD  حسنا كيف اقوم بتحميل الافتر افيكيت بعد الدفع لم يظهر لي

[cfabros]

I Can't finish my rendering without after effects crashing every time I try. What the hell did you do? I did not even use any plugins or any effects for one of the projects but still, it stops rendering, it did not crash but like it was paused, I can click stop or pause but it won't do anything. I can switch tabs but rendering still won't continue or stop so I have to force quit and retry in a new project and safe mode just to finish rendering. Im running an Macbook Pro 14" M1.

[Shebbe]

Great update thanks.

I'm really annoyed however with the new sorting system. Is there any reason "_" is now lower in hirearchy than numbers? Our team have always used "_" to make sure folders stay on top of a list but now they're on the bottom. It also seems very random/inconsistent with other symbols. Should we not just have all symbols or at least the underscore be higher priority than numbers?

[ericmlevy]

I second this. It’s expected behavior on a computer that _ goes to the top.--

—

Clean Plate FX
www.cleanplatefx.com

[PanBeep]

Come one! They've been worning on this whole year. I know there must be a concrete logic behind this, they would not do this just to annoy it's own clients.

[pkroll]

Holy crap - yes, adding my vote here as well. Please let _ stay at the top of searches.

I love the idea of using natural number sorting so 1 and 01 are read the same, but _ at the top is an ancient computer sorting tradition used by many.

[Kerem30248293glbc]

Really bad update. My pc keeps crashing while using this version. It gives me blue screen which i havent get it with anything else. I'm using latest game ready (536.23) driver but i tried studio aswell it gave me crash too. I tried previous game ready driver too(535.98). I tested almost all my hardwares. They all work stable. I tried many things to fix this. Clean install of windows 11, uninstalling gpu driver with ddu and install latest studio driver. I opened my case and control cables, gave it air to clean dust, i updated bios to latest version. Noone of them work. How can i fix this problem?

Do i have to go previous after effects versions?

[Omid Pakbin]

BUG REPORT: This update broke the EXR Sequence function.

When I import an EXR Sequence, it only renders the very first frame. Every other frame makes the screen black no matter what.

I did some troubleshooting and nothing fixes it.

[martinc13962311]

At what point are you going to properly test these releases before inflicting them on people? The last few releases are simply terrible. Poor performance, crashes, and a truly shocking lack of care. I see you have not even bothered having any release notes for 23.5.0? Should we just guess what has been updated? Or further broken?