Add the ability to crop a composition to its layer bounds. Useful for when you pre-comp and don't want to inherit the original comp bounds, but use the layer bounds instead.
Alternatively, add a pre-comp dialogue option to crop to layer bounds when creating a pre-comp.
Right now inside of After Effects, if you want to create a Precomp from an individual layer, the resulting Precomp will take on the size of the comp it was in. However, since the layer was already a layer with a specific size, there is almost no situation in which this result is desirable as default. Rather, it would make much more sense for the resulting precomp to take on the size of the layer it is pre-comping, similar in function to the "Trim to Transparent Pixels" command in Photoshop.
So the desired functionality would be this: I have a 1920x1080 comp with, say, 3 layers in it. The layer I want to precomp has a bounding area of, say, 965x345. When I choose to precomp that layer, I want the resulting precomp to have a dimension of 965x345, rather than 1920x1080, as would the case currently.
Currently, the only way to change the resulting size is to go in and manually resize the precomp, which is tedious.
There is a third-party script called Auto-Crop which can perform this function, but such a feature seems like something that should at least be optional natively within After Effects.
Thanks for your consideration and keep up the good wrok!
When pre-comping, it would be really useful if there were a tick box to fit the new comp to the size of the layers rather than the document size. I realise that this would need to be disabled for some pre-comps (audio files for example). I can do this manually, but changing the size of the pre-comp moves things around in my original comp which is not ideal.
Use the "area of interest" tool (under the preview window) ..... drag a box around your layer content and go Composition - Trim Comp to Area of Interest
****! Even if is still tedious, you could drag and drop your layer (from project window) to the "comp" icon to create a precomp, and then import your newly created precomp above your layer (inside the main comp) with the AltGr key (on windows) activated. It will replace the layer by the precomp with all the same parameters. It is far from the best solution, and I totally agree with the possibility to choose "comp or layer size" when created the precomp, but at least I feel it is a bit easier than resizing the comp manually or using the region of interest. I hope it can lessen a bit this tedious process. Regards.
it would be super useful to have an option when precomposing to "shrink new composition's dimensions to layer(s) size" so that the precomp can selectably be only the size of the items you're precomposing instead of just a duplicate of the parent comp--having to do this manually is a huge hassle, so this would be amazing to have
7
Replies
AdChoices