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solutionboy
Known Participant
November 30, 2021
Question

After Effects Menu bar not working at all

  • November 30, 2021
  • 13 replies
  • 10547 views

HI there.

 

This has been an issue that has been heppening more often to me, until today I can't clear it at all. Clicking on anything in the menu bar will just highlight the top level item, with nothing dropping down. Sometimes, the drop down will flash briefly then vanish. I was able to resolve this with an app restart innitially, This then grew to needin g system restart. Now I can't clear it at all. It has also now affected right clicking within the app - nothing happens. This occasionally effects other CC apps as well, but at the moement it has competely rendered AE unusable. 

 

I have both 2021 & 2020 installed. I need 2021 in place, because you cannot export to Media Encoder in 2022, but that's a whole other story. The menu bar & right clicking isn't working in either version.

 

The menu bar and right clicks are fine in all other apps. I'm using a magic mouse on MacBook Pro 2019, but the results are the same with a plugin mouse or the trackpad.

 

At a loss with what to do to be honest. The amount of time I've lost to Adobe problems in the last 2 months is sickening - So many little bugs and issues that soak up work time. This issue has brought things to a standstill though.

 

Can anyone help? Thanks in advance!

 

    13 replies

    A
    Admirable_operator0D4C
    Participant
    May 7, 2022

    THIS WORKS!

     

    Read someone's tip on the following link:

     

    https://adobe-video.uservoice.com/forums/911311-after-effects/suggestions/44588847-bug-report-ae-22-1-1-menu-bar-and-all-right-click

     

    STEPHEN ROBERTS

    Yes, clicking on the AE icon in the dock restores normal menu behaviour. I closed AE, then opened it again, and it worked properly again without needing to click on the dock icon.

    Not sure if I'll have to do that again, but for now, it is a simple workaround.

    S
    smallbot9812854
    Participant
    April 15, 2022

    Just click to AE icon on the dock and menus will be ok

      Z
      Zebadeee
      Participant
      April 15, 2022

      Clicking on the AE icon in the dock worked for me - menus now appear normally

        B
        blaowskiton
        Participant
        July 27, 2022

        Worked for me, ty very much!

        A
        Austin5FF5
        Participant
        April 6, 2022

        Isn't Adobe the worst?  haha.  God I can't wait until I can get away from After Effects.

        Anyways, what helped me was to unclick a bunch of scripts from the window bar, even though that was a challenge with the bug, and then restart.  After that I was able to reset my workspace to previous setting.

        Hey After Effects team: If you're going to charge us monthly make sure your garbage software works.  Oh. and maybe have an easy to find list of KNOWN bugs from your creative cloud app so we don't have to dig around in Google looking for answers from other lost souls.  Been dealing with this sort of nonsense for as long as I've been using this garbage software for decades.

          J
          jackg23119511
          Participant
          April 5, 2022

          Spec: iMac Retina 5K 2020


          Hello fellow enfuriated people!

           

          This worked for me. I hope it sorts it for everyone else. I had plugins by AEJuice installed. I deleted these from the 'ScriptUI Panels' folder and restarted AE and it has worked!! 

           

          This is the first time posting on a forum, I hope this at least helped one person out.

           

          Bye

          Jack

          The Fez
          The Fez
          Participant
          March 16, 2022

          had this a lot with previous versions, after searching a lot online i found what works for me .

          around 5 clicks through the layouts, click standard, libraries, small screen and back again, that for some reason made me be able to use the bar afterwards.

          Hope that works for the moment, it's a horrible bug

            R
            ravis88125312
            Participating Frequently
            March 21, 2022

            Hi All,

             

            I'm using a new Macbook Pro M1 and After Effects CC 2022 and am experiencing this same deeply annoying issue - luckily I'm not on a job at the moment otherwise it would be a bigger problem.

            Some plugins ONLY work on versions of AE after 2020 which was why I upgraded top the MacBook Pro.

            I tried your suggestion of clicking the Libraries, Layout (!?) and for some bizarre reason this seems to fix the issue temporarily, though I find that I have to click and hold on the touchpad (it will be the same for the Magic Mouse) before the drop-down menu hangs there long enough to make a selection.

            Not ideal so please fix this ASAP.

             

            Ravi

              S
              Stefano5C20
              Participant
              September 27, 2022

              same for me, that solved it. But yeah rerrible bug, please fix asap

              G
              GlenMcKnight
              Participant
              March 15, 2022

              Yep same scenario as the above users. Fully stops any work from happening as I can't open files. 

              On M1 Pro. 12.2.1
              Can't even open the apple menu if after effects is in focus. 

              Attached a video to show behavior. 

              nishu_kush
              Community Manager
              nishu_kushCommunity Manager
              Community Manager
              March 16, 2022

              Hi all,

               

              After Effects engineers are aware of this issue. Please check out the UserVoice link and add your vote. Also, check out the workaround suggested by John.

              Let us know how it goes.

               

              Thanks,

              Nishu

                J
                JonnC
                Participant
                February 3, 2022

                Same here!!! AE 22.1.1

                MR0
                MR0
                Participating Frequently
                February 10, 2022

                Same here on macOS 12.2/AE 22.2.1, and occurs since BigSur/AE 22.0.1.
                That's was a real nightmare (it renders AE unusable) until i found some tricks to overcome the issue :
                1, clean all caches with the freeware Onyx then restart, then reload your project.
                Things should be fine until you quit AE and restart it then no more menus again…

                2. delete preferences files (not worth it as the bug will re-appear some time later)

                3. if you have 2 screens, put your secondary screen off. Then wait a little, it should be temporarily fixed.

                This bug occurs only at work on my MBP 16" + external screen, but not on my desktop machine with a single screen at home (hackintosh with same OS/AE/plugins version as my office laptop).

                MR0
                MR0
                Participating Frequently
                February 10, 2022

                Error on reported OS/AE versions : it's macOS 12.2/AE 22.2.0…

                  C
                  coreycreative
                  Participant
                  January 8, 2022

                  Has ANYONE figured this out!! dont see and answer yet this is a major issue. I have a dealine and AE is unusable 

                    T
                    touchalifemedia
                    Participant
                    January 22, 2022

                    SAME HERE PLEASEE FIX ASAP!!

                     

                    K
                    Kaaos
                    Participant
                    January 6, 2022

                    Same. 2022 version on mac is useless after last update. Back to 2021.

                      OpticSugar
                      OpticSugar
                      Participant
                      January 4, 2022

                      I'm also having the same issue.  I'm on a new M1 Max MBP.  I had initially set it up with migration assistant, but I was experiencing this and many other oddities so I thought it would be best to wipe the system, re-install MacOS Monterey, and re-install my apps from scratch.  

                       

                      Still having this menu issue.  When it happens, the menus usually don't appear, but occasionally, they flash on (like the OP described and like Rajovo's shared video).  If I am patient, I can sometimes outsmart it by clicking or double-clicking and holding until I can get the menus to stay open while holding the mouse down.  This may let me choose a root level option, but I can't open sub-menus.

                       

                      I'm running After Effects version 22 .1.1 (build 14) on MacOS Monterey 12.1 with a Wacom Inuos Pro (although the problem also occurs with my MBP's trackpad.  Everything was freshly installed from scratch just days ago.

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