Automation Blocks - Need to automate reducing a comp by 40 handles on either side and shorten comp

[ckuehne]

Hi,

I'm needing to take some footage that contains 48 frame handles (I know, right?) and reduce them to 8 frame handles, make the comp that duration plus one frame (for the slate), and place that footage into a precomp.

I'm really having difficulty with it...

Thank you for your time!

[shachar carmi]

what do you mean by "handles" and what do you mean by "reduce"?

i don't understand the situation...

[Mathias Moehl]

I just added a new block script to the Community Library for you. 

You find it at

Comps/Batch Create/For Each Selected Clip Create New Comp And Trim.xml

You can simply select some clips in the project panel and run the tool. It creates for each clip a corresponding comp and puts the clip in that comp. In the inputs panel you can enter a number of frames which should be trimmed from the beginning and the end.

If you set these input params to trim 39 frames from the beginning and 40 from the end, I think you get what you want. (39, since you want the extra frame for the slate).

Here is the code of the block script explained:

[ckuehne]

Thank you, so much!!!!!

[ckuehne]

Hi!

I'm sorry, I loaded this up and realized I wasn't clear in what I was requesting, and I wasn't able to take that and figure it out.

I currently have a comp I use as a template, so I do not want a brand new comp created.

What I have now is a "pre-made" comp, that I make has a very long duration, so I don't know how long the duration needs to be.

I drop footage for that comp onto the "pre-made" comp, so it is automatically the top layer (the default for After Effects, as I'm sure you know)

What I would like to do is take the footage, which is already selected, by default, and remove 40 frame handles from either side, shift that footage inside the comp "to the right", by one, leaving the first frame for a slate, and then make that current comp the new duration of the comp, plus one for the slate. Then take that footage, with handles removed and put that into a pre-comp. Hopefully, that makes sense.

Thank you, so much, for your time and help. 

[ckuehne]

(corrected unclear grammar)

Hi!

I'm sorry, I loaded this up and realized I wasn't clear in what I was requesting, and I wasn't able to take that and figure it out.

I currently have a comp I use as a template, so I do not want a brand new comp created, but would like the comp I have pre-made to have it's duration shorter without handles, leaving one frame at the beginning for a slate.

What I have now is a "pre-made" comp, which has a very long duration, because I don't know how long the duration needs to be.

I drop footage into my "pre-made" comp, so it is automatically the top layer (the default for After Effects, as I'm sure you know)

What I would like to do is take the footage, which is already selected, by default, and remove 40 frame handles from either side, shift that footage inside the comp "to the right", by one, leaving the first frame for a slate, and then make that current comp the new duration of the comp, plus one for the slate. Then take that footage, with handles removed and put that into a pre-comp. Hopefully, that makes sense.

Thank you, so much, for your time and help. 

[Mathias Moehl]

So instead of the block which creates a new comp, you probably want to use a block to duplicate your template comp. Since the block which duplicates the comp keeps its duration unchanged, you need to then set the duration using the Set Attribute of Comp block.

After that, inserting the new layer, changing its in point and start time should work exactly as in my example.

All you need to do is to duplicate a comp instead of creating a new one and setting the duration after the duplication.

[ckuehne]

I'm so sorry, I'm really struggling with making that adjustment.

I don't need to do anything as complex as creating or duplicating a whole new comp. I'm just wanting to take the one selected footage, in the current comp, trim the start and end, and make the comp the duration of that, plus one at the head for the slate.

[Mathias Moehl]

Then you just want a script which moves the selected layer 39 frames to the left and sets the duration of the active comp to the duration of that layer minus 79 frames? (-40 for trimming left handle, -40 for right handle, +1 for slate frame).

Script doing that is attached 

[ckuehne]

That's perfect! Exactly what I was looking for.

Thank you, so much, Mathias. I truly appreciate you sending me all these.