Create Paths from Repeater, Twist, Round Corners etc.

[hellopaul4]

It'd be nice to be able to do a "Create Shapes from Shapes" kind of thing, to convert a Shape Layer's "modifiers" such as Repeater, Wiggle Paths, Round Corners etc. into actual vector paths. This could work exactly like the existing "Create Shapes from Text" function - it'd duplicate the layer (but the modifiers would have been converted to paths) and hide the original layer. Not sure (or entirely necessary) if it'd be possible to carry over any animated values such as a wiggling Wiggle Paths etc.

[JohnColombo]

Thanks for making this request, @hellopaul4! I've moved it into the After Effects Ideas forum so that it can get further upvotes.

If AE had this kind of "baking" function for Shapes, what kind of workflows would be improved for you?

Cheers,

- John, After Effects Engineering Team 

[hellopaul4]

I was inspired to request it because I had this situation today:

• I created a simple rectangle (to use as a matte), with a Repeater (3x).
• I used that matte for three separate video layers.
• When the client wanted the video layers (not the mattes) bigger, I found that the edges of the videos overlapped into the adjacent rectangle mattes, so I needed to create 3 separate matter layers (each with one rectangle) instead of one matte layer with three rectangles...so each video layer had its own matte (like in the pre-pick-whip-matte days!)
• So I deleted the Repeater, noting the repeater's offset.
• I then duplicated that matte layer twice (to create 3 matte layers in total; one for each video layer) and offset each of those by the amount that I'd previously used in the Repeater.
• It occurred to me that if I could just "bake" the repeater, I could then do ctrl-D, ctrl-D, and delete the redundant rectangles from each layer to create my 3 matte layers, each with its own perfectly positioned rectangle.

Obviously if we could pick-whip a shape rather than a whole layer, I could keep all three rectangles on one, nice, tidy layer! (Worth doing another FR maybe??)