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Wouter24668973swhn
Participating Frequently
September 18, 2023
Answered

Jagged lines in After Effects especially when zoomed out

  • September 18, 2023
  • 1 reply
  • 1903 views

Hi everyone, 

I have a strange display of lines in After Effects, but also Illustrator. Especially in diagonal lines / corners you can see stepped / jagged lines. Not sure what is the issue. 

I tried: Various versions of my GPU driver, different display, turning off and on GPU. 

Maybe it is normal, but on my macbook I don't have this issue.

Hope someone can help me, it doesn't look nice and is therefore not great to work with.

 

 

This topic has been closed for replies.
Correct answer Rick Gerard

If you open Illustrator, turn on Pixel Preview, and turn on Shap to Pixel, you can create lines that match the pixel grid in After Effects. The trick to using thing lines in a video design is to create the illustrations in their hero position, then animate them in and out of position in After Effects. 

 

You should also do your final previews with the Comp Magnification Ratio of 100 or 200%. You also have to be suspect of any media player previews because they will scale the video to the size of the media player. Thin lines, one pixel (or one point), are always problematic, especially when they are high-contrast lines. Black lines on a white background are especially difficult to deal with. The only chance you have for perfect horizontal or vertical lines solid black lines in your final comp is to use the snap-to-pixel feature in Illustrator and check the Pixel Preview at 400% or more. 

 

I hope this helps. 

1 reply

Mylenium
Mylenium
Legend
September 18, 2023

Nothing wrong. Your lines are very thin and at acute angles. This is impossible to get perfect antialiasing on and technically it looks like it should as far as AE and AI go if you scale vector content designed at a higher DPI . Chances are that your Mac simply applies a second pass of screen space antialiasing and/ or the screen is scaled, so oit looks softer, but ultimately it won't be different from what you see here. The only way to really be sure is to construct everything at 72 DPI and 100% or else you won't be able to correctly judge and fix these issues like applying slightly thicker lines or additional effects.

 

Mylenium

win07
win07
Participant
September 18, 2023

Hi Mylenium! Thank you for your answer. Always good to hear nothing is wrong. I guess it might be a resolution thing than... My Macbook (which is officially a worse in terms of requirements) somehow only starts showing these lines at 12,5% zoom. I got quite annoyed by this, I guess the best way to visually look if all works is have always a 100% view on a big screen maybe?

W
Wouter24668973swhnAuthor
Participating Frequently
September 19, 2023

If you open Illustrator, turn on Pixel Preview, and turn on Shap to Pixel, you can create lines that match the pixel grid in After Effects. The trick to using thing lines in a video design is to create the illustrations in their hero position, then animate them in and out of position in After Effects. 

 

You should also do your final previews with the Comp Magnification Ratio of 100 or 200%. You also have to be suspect of any media player previews because they will scale the video to the size of the media player. Thin lines, one pixel (or one point), are always problematic, especially when they are high-contrast lines. Black lines on a white background are especially difficult to deal with. The only chance you have for perfect horizontal or vertical lines solid black lines in your final comp is to use the snap-to-pixel feature in Illustrator and check the Pixel Preview at 400% or more. 

 

I hope this helps. 


Thank you very much. Great help!

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