Lower third template using Essential Graphics issue

[Bendik Ramm]

Hello great people!

I am making a lower third template for a client in After Effects and need it to be dummy proof and editable inside Premiere Pro.

The lower third template has two lines of text: name and title. The two lines of text use different fonts with a different font size for hierarchical purpose. Behind the text there is a shape layer that automatically resizes to the width of the text. For this auto-resizing to work my two lines of text are placed inside the same Text layer (with a line-break to separate the two lines) so that the "sourceRectAtTime" code on my shape layer scales to the widest of the two lines.

I have exported this whole composition as an "Motion Graphics Template" through the Essential Graphics panel and it's imported into Premiere Pro without problems. Everything looks as it should until I try editing the Source Text. When doing so my second line of text is suddenly formatted the same as the first line (same font and size). So my question is simply if there is a way around this?

Here are three possibilities I have considered:

1. Separate the lines into two text layers

But how do I then get the "sourceRectAtTime" to pick the width of the widest/longest line of text? Is this possible somehow using if/else commands?

2. Separate the lines and precompose

But then the "sourceRectAtTime" extracts the width of the entire precomp, not just the width of the text.

3. Define shape layer width through a slider control

Instead of auto-resizing the box I could define the width of the shape layer through a slider that I include in the Essential Graphics template, but then I won't have control of the margins, and I do not trust the client to use it correctly.

I would immensely appreciate any help I could get!

Thank you very much for your time!

[OussK]

Really their are a lot of solution for this issue, right now i want to give solution for the No.3

you can use expression like this on the box size, and create a slider called slider control on the same layer

x = effect("Slider Control")("Slider");

y =content("Rectangle 1").content("Rectangle Path 1").size[1];

[x,y]

also you can add a slider control with the sourceRectAtTime expression so user can extend the box more

simple add +effect("Slider Control")("Slider")

[Bendik Ramm]

Thanks for taking the time to answer OussK​! Option No. 3 is really the worst case scenario as I'm not really comfortable letting the client control the size of the shape layer as I'll have no control how they will use it. For instance they might make the shape layer too wide or narrow.

You mention that there are several solutions to this, do you know of a way that I can split the two text layers and still keep the shape layer auto-resizing to the widest of the two text layers? If not I'm leaning towards resizing the shape layer according to the name as this in most cases will be the longest, but I think this is also a bit unprofessional as I'm tasked with creating templates.

[Bendik Ramm · Accepted solution]

This problem is now solved with great help from Dan Ebberts over at Creative Cow. The solution was splitting the text layer into two, and using Math.max to automatically resize to the widest of the two text layers.

See solution here:

Essential Graphics lower third template – Editing source text changes font size : Adobe After Effect...

[OussK]

Great you find the best solution for your issue, and thanks for sharing it so this can help other users later