Trim the path of a stroke on a shape that also has a fill

[louq35778201]

Hi all, 

I'm currently animating a logo to go at the end of a promo video we are making for a new business. The grapphic part of it looks like the windows logo. The animation involves the squares coming together to create one larger square THEN I would like to create the gaps inbetween. I had originally tried deleting part of the path to create an open side, which works but I think I can only delete one of the sides. I'm now trying to use the trim path on just the stroke while keeping the fill. Not sure if this is possible or if not can someone sugeest another way please? many thanks

[Towerguy]

Hi. Mmmmm, I thought you could but no. You could duplicate your squares and on the top layers set the Fill to none and then trim path its Stroke. If you need to have the line drawing on from a certain vertex, right click on that vertex and select Mask and Shape Path/Set First Vertex. You could also draw a new shape, without fill, in the order you want it to draw on and then use Trim Paths on it.

[Rick Gerard]

Trim paths on a shape layer fill will rotate from the first vertex creating a radial wipe centered on the first vertex. You can simultaneously animate the rotation and offset angle to create a wipe, but it gets tricky. You can also apply Trim Paths to more than one shape in a shape layer. 

The default first vertex for parametric shapes is the upper right corner. If you convert to a Bezier Path you can use the pen tool to easily select any vertex and then use the Layer>Mask and Shape Path menu to set the first vertex. Sounds like you just need to break up your shape layers and set trim paths to just one shape path instead of the whole group.

[kntaylor]

Rick, this is about the hundredth post of yours I've come across this week while working on an AE project. Just wanted to take a moment to say thank you. I've learned so much from your eloquent explanations, including this one. I anticipate I will continue to benefit from them as I plow through these challenges. Thank you!

[Rick Gerard]

Thank you.