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How to subdivide a path in After Effects

Community Beginner ,
Jan 19, 2017 Jan 19, 2017

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Hi - I have drawn an open mask path in AE and then used the position data to attach an emitter. The problem I have is that the path is not subdivided enough, meaning that the emitter jumps from point to point creating a hard line, even though the bezier path is curved. So I am looking for a way to change the subdivisions or interpolation of the path to add intermediary points.

Can anyone help?

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correct answers 1 Correct answer

LEGEND , Jan 23, 2017 Jan 23, 2017

Just change the Position Subframe option under the emitter settings. Linear is the default and it's not what you want. Try 10x linear. If that's not enough, try the next one and the next. Each one is slower, but each one is more accurate.

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LEGEND ,
Jan 19, 2017 Jan 19, 2017

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Copy&paste it to Illustrator, do all refinements there and then paste it back.

Mylenium

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Community Beginner ,
Jan 19, 2017 Jan 19, 2017

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No, the path itself is fine. The points I was talking about turned out to be the frame steps, so I dont think there is a way of making the emitter follow the path more accurately apart from upping the frame rate, which I cant do. So I dont think there's a way around it.

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LEGEND ,
Jan 20, 2017 Jan 20, 2017

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What particle effect are you using? Particular has options to "subdivide the path" as you call it, but many of the built-in effects don't.

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Community Beginner ,
Jan 23, 2017 Jan 23, 2017

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I am using Particular. I have precomped it in a comp with double the frame rate then put it back in with 'honour framerate' ticked in the comp settings which I think is working so far. Any tips on workflow or how Particular can subdivide (what should I call it?) are welcome.

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LEGEND ,
Jan 23, 2017 Jan 23, 2017

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Just change the Position Subframe option under the emitter settings. Linear is the default and it's not what you want. Try 10x linear. If that's not enough, try the next one and the next. Each one is slower, but each one is more accurate.

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Community Expert ,
Jan 23, 2017 Jan 23, 2017

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If you need a keyframe for every frame on a motion path you can add this expression to position:

value

Then select the keyframe assistant and covert the expression to keyframes.

Screen Shot 2017-01-23 at 10.10.59 AM.png

becomes

Screen Shot 2017-01-23 at 10.11.06 AM.png

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New Here ,
Aug 27, 2022 Aug 27, 2022

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I know this is extremely old, but Rick, thank you, this trick is super clever and helpful. I also added a posterizeTime() which allowed me to fine tune a coarser result. This is also great for resampling shape layers / masks:

Copy the path ▶  paste it on the position property of a null object ▶ run through the process ▶ copy the position result back onto the path property.

neat as! 

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Community Beginner ,
Jan 26, 2017 Jan 26, 2017

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Thanks everyone

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