AFTER EFFECTS WISHLIST

[Andrew Yoole]

What features would you like to see implemented in After Effects? New ideas for plugins? Interface changes? Post 'em here!

Let's keep bug identification to individual posts, as these will probably be addressed more readily. Let's use this thread for specific ideas about ways that AE can be improved and expanded.

These Forums are for users, not Adobe employees, so don't forget to also fill in an Adobe feature request form.

To view the Wish List posts prior to September 2009, look here.

[mgravish]

Would love to be able to open folders in the Project panel as their own dockable panels. Would ideally work exactly like Premiere's bins.

[mave1969]

And another…

If you import an existing AE project, it gets placed into a folder in your project bin with the same name as the project, including the file suffix. This is a bit daft in itself, but if you then collect the files it gets worse, because you end up with a folder which OS X treats as an After Effects file because it's got the .aep file suffix. The only way to then see what's in that folder in the Finder is to use the Show Package Contents command, which not many people are familiar with. - Filed as a bug report.

[mgravish]

A column in the Project panel that shows if an item is used and, if so, where. Currently can only see this for a single item at the top of the Project panel. Would be very useful to have it as a column, like in Premiere

[bryan.gough]

In the Project Window it's nice being able to click on an object to rename it.

It would be EVEN nicer to extend this to function to include the "Media Duration" column to allow quick adjustments to the duration of comps. Rather than "Right Click > Composition Settings > Duration > Ok"

It would also be nice to select a group of comps and set their durations to the same length.

[mave1969]

Yet another…

I'd like After Effects to not randomly completely lose its mind when I run the Collect Files… command and claim that assets which show as available and in use in the project, suddenly and mysteriously can't be found.

I'd ticket this as a bug but it's been a problem for so damn long now I have to simply assume that no-one on the AE team knows how to program this functionality properly.

[mave1969]

…or claim that a certain piece of footage can't be opened because it's in an unsupported format. EVEN THOUGH IT'S IN THE PROJECT AND BEING USED WITHOUT A PROBLEM!!! FFS THIS IS CAUSING ME SO MUCH UNNECESSARY GRIEF AND LOST TIME RIGHT NOW.

[mgravish]

For what it's worth, I've found that if you DON'T. TOUCH. ANYTHING. after clicking collect files it will work without error. As soon as you move the mouse even a pixel, it'll throw an error. Hope that helps. Terrible bug either way.

[mave1969]

Yes! That's it. I knew I'd heard about something like that when looking up this issue before, but couldn't remember it. Just tested it, and hitting ENTER at the collect dialogue box and then not touching the mouse resulted in a successful collect. Tried it again in the same location while noodling the mouse around, and it failed. Just shockingly sloppy.

But, THANKS for the tip, as I finally managed to get a large job over to a client without losing all of my hair!

[mgravish]

Glad it worked. I wish such a critical feature didn't need such a ridiculous workaround but here we are.

[Fred_van_Os]

Export to Adobe Edge. An easy way export your time line to use it Edge. Like a PNG sequence with the right code to insert it like a sprite into Edge.

[SERRANO76]

Hi! This is my Wish List for After Effects :: 40 Requests

Yo hago Motion Graphics / 40 After Effects Requests  THANKS in advance to Kevin from Adobe that show me this foruum thread.

[NoMagnolia]

1) It would be great to expand Shape Layers with their own set of effects. As well as merge, trim, and the repeater (which is flexible if you're patient, but a bit limited) it would be good to have deformers like Bend, Polar/Cartesian, Displacement Map, etc. Yes, you CAN do these using built-in effects, but if you're trying to do anything complicated it becomes really slow and unwieldy (presumably because it's distorting the layer pixel by pixel, rather than treating it as a couple of vertices), plus you're likely to need multiple layers. For character animation this would be tremendously useful, and it'd be nice to have everything in one place and on one layer.

2) Further to that... a really flexible shape layer cloner (like C4D's Cloner object) would be brilliant. Clone shapes/shape groups in a line, radially, onto another shape layer, etc.

[mformaria]

Layer Styles keyboard shortcut! Or even better, have them magically transfer in as Effects so we can get rid of this altogether

[Chris_Cousins]

I'd like the option to have a transparent 'missing frames' display, rather than the multicoloured thing we have now. It could be a simple cross on the frame, or just the frame number that's missing. Would work like this:

Reason is I often work to a an animatic/preview, replacing that with footage as it's rendered. Frames coming in from multiple sources aren't sequential, so there's often gaps. It means I'm continually soloing/unsoloing layers just to see the preview under the 'missing frame' screen.

Thanks! C

[Todd_Kopriva]

I saw that request on your other thread, Chris, and I like it.

The most effective way to get feature requests to us is here:

http://adobe.ly/feature_request

[Chris_Cousins]

Like a "passthrough"?

I think so - just transparent enough not to be obtrusive.

Todd_Kopriva wrote:

I saw that request on your other thread, Chris, and I like it.

The most effective way to get feature requests to us is here:

http://adobe.ly/feature_request

On it! I may have requested this before actually - or at least I meant to...

[dissidently]

Like a "passthrough"?

[Leonardo Sulzbach]

I wish realtime preview in AE CC 2015

[P.M.B]

A shortcut for creating shape layers.

[prowl]

Dynamic referenced After effects files

     Example...

          Import Translations.aep into master.aep with lots of comps in the translations...

          Go back and change Translations and the Master is automatically updated.

Also multiple projects opened at once!

[Insectula]

Sony Vegas has a tool called Color Match. You pick a frame or photo you want to match colors from and it tries its best to emulate them. It is the most awesome tool! Please!!

[Szalam]

Insectula wrote:

Sony Vegas has a tool called Color Match. You pick a frame or photo you want to match colors from and it tries its best to emulate them. It is the most awesome tool! Please!!

The Adobe mobile app that used to be called Hue (now just part of the Capture app) allows you to do something similar. You snap a picture and create a LUT that you can use in Premiere or AE to color your footage. Is that the kind of thing you mean?

[Insectula]

Cool! Will try it!

[seank33680394]

The ability to taper strokes

[Joe Creative]

Hi guys,

I just wondered why you guys haven't made subfolders like Photoshop? A little organization would help out since assets starts growing in your timeline. 

I found this plugin for AE: Layer Storage - aescripts + aeplugins - aescripts.com

Can you guys do this? Or do I need to buy this plugin???

Best,

Joe