Coming in AE 2020, Mr Footage™  "I see you're trying to make a movie!....." haha, this would be fun! Or the skip the desktop market and concentrate on mobile ... View more

You can drag the panels out of the main screen and place them where you like. Press CTRL + # (German AE, German keyboard) to maximize the panel view (this also works for the main window). Save this as your new workspace and you are done. *Martin ... View more

Would love to see a competitor software towards After Effects, especially when it comes to motion graphics, character animation and vectors. There is BlackMagic Fusion and Affinity already. However, I don't believe in a Saint Company, which has the power to compete against Adobe and will do it a lot better. Have a look at Avid: crazy bugs, have a look at Microsoft: crazy bugs as well, have a look at Intel: massive hardware bugs, have a look at Apple: overpriced and also buggy as the others. I work on a daily basis with Adobe software and most of the time, everything works just well. Yes, AE is slow, yes AI doesn't make any sense in a lot of ways, but once you figured out how to handle all of this and once you got an optimized computer, you hardly run into any issues. Adobe should correct the hardware recommendations to realistic values and should make clear that learning their software is a process of years. I understand the disappointment, every time I see one of their marketing videos. *Martin ... View more

I don't say anything without my lawyer! You can create a mask on LAYER 2 (fireball) and mask out the fingers, or create a new layer 3 with only the fingers and put it in front of the fireball. *Martin ... View more

I always help myself by pressing and holding ALT or SHIFT key while clicking on one of the handles (I think it's SHIFT with the curve tool, and ALT with the normal black arrow). If I don't need the other handle, I just move it to the vertex - maybe there is a way to remove it at all? *Martin ... View more

When using RenderGarden, the critical resource is not CPU, but RAM. Running out of RAM seems to be the main cause for a failed render, also it increases the rendering time in large amounts. Instead of starting 8 gardeners, you better start only 2, let them run until the first frames are rendered and have a look at the space left in RAM, then you decide how many more gardeners you can start. On my last project only one render process was almost to much - I also have 64GB of RAM. *Martin ... View more

Have you cleared the cache? You'll find the option in the settings menu. Also, check for GPU driver updates and reset your workspaces (use workspace "default" to check if anything shows up again). *Martin ... View more

Just checked on latest version and you are right, text should appear were the courser is. However - you can just write the text and move it to it's desired position afterwards. No big deal. In most cases, you'll do it anyways, since pointing and clicking is not close to the precision of typing in coordinates or using guides. *Martin ... View more

What version of AE are you using? The latest versions for Win7 are not the latest versions of Adobe Cloud, as far as I know. Can you make a screenshot of those glitches? Can you render to PNG sequence without errors? Try to deactivate GPU support in project settings. Can you try your old projects on a different computer? It is possible that the combination of new drivers, old OS, old hardware and new, or not that new AE is malfunctioning. Did you change anything before the first glitch appears (manual or automatic updates, new software, codecs, ... ). A workaround could be to render your full size image in 2 passes, since rendering in half resolution works. Create a comp half the size of your full-res-comp ( I assume HD, so you need 960x1080). Place your comp into it, the way you see the left side of the image. Duplicate this half-res-comp and repositioning the full-res comp in it, until you see the right side of the image. !Pay attention to work pixel perfect! Then you render one by another and put both sides together in PR or AE afterwards. You should think about getting a new computer, too. I wounder that AE even runs on this weak hardware. *Martin ... View more

You PC specs seems fine, except CPU. 18 cores are nice for everything, but AE can not really benefit from it. Better less cores at higher clock speeds. I recently had a large comp double your size and run into failures, too. AE crashes several times, rendering took forever, RAM was instantly filled up. Nothing to wonder about, though. When going back to an older AE solved the issue, I guess that GPU effects where used. In project settings, you can deactivate GPU support, too. Concerning the workflow, it is always the best way to render single images (PNG for instance). You can make changes, without re-rendering everything and when render fails, you just start at the last finished frame. For this purpose, RenderGarden does a very good job - but only if your computer has enough capacity left for a second or third render instance. In this case, with 64GB and very large comps, I think you could hardly benefit from RG. Sometimes I get render failure messages from RenderGarden, too. In most cases, the frame was rendered but the post render check recognized an error for some reason. Well, I don't care much about those checks since the most important is missing (detect 0kb files). *Martin ... View more

Without knowing your computer specs we can't offer any help. Some weeks ago, another user had the same error - have a look here: Rendering error, error code (-1610153453) Read the whole thread, there are several suggestions to a detailed troubleshoot. Let us know, what you found out and give us your computer specs. *Martin ... View more

Yes, you can stack expressions, but it's not just like stacking effects. One way would be to apply the first expression as you always do. Then you add the transition effect, which gives you a second set of position, scale, rotation and so on. You can add the second expression to this effect. Following this logic, you can also outsource the expression to a Null-layer and parent your artwork to this one. Another way would be to understand that expressions calculate a value and that stacking expressions is nothing more than adding the result of two or more calculations. In your example, the trick would be to loop "time" which can easily done with modulo operator. Instead of using "time" as it is, you would modified it to:      t = time % looptime; You set up looptime as you wish and keep using t instead of time. Modulo is always a great way to make ongoing numbers to repeating ones. You are free to use every if/else statement to switch between expressions, too. But keep in mind that is sometimes faster and easier to just "keyframe the thing", than spending days in developing an expression, which you only need once. Happy coding! *Martin ... View more

On a closer look (Rick Gerard​) it is clearly visible, that the warp-effect also affects the actors in the foreground. So, no green-screen nor rotoscoping in the case, and yes, one can create this with an automatic filter! I know this effect when I was restoring old film footage for documentaries. In the software (PFClean) it was called "Dewarp" and it's purpose was to flatten the image, when the scanned film was curved through age. If the set up of the trackers and effect settings were wrong, the outcome looks just like the example movie. To recreate this effect in AE you can use an advanced tracker (like a 3D camera tracker) and set the tracking point to the actors or whatever is in focus in your shot. This is not how you would actual use a tracker, but it will create this effect. If you want to more warping you can add one the many distortion effects. Play round! *Martin ... View more

At first place, you did all right! The only mistake (or misunderstanding) is here, that you zoomed your preview to 212% and your composition is probably to small. While it is no problem in Illustrator to zoom in, in AE you have a fixed resolution. You can zoom in the preview for detailed work, but to evaluate image quality, you have to set the preview zoom to 100%. This also means that your composition have to fit the output size. If you want a HD video for instance, you need a composition size of 1920x1080px. It's good practice to set up the artwork in Illustrator to the size you need in your animation. I always create a HD sized artboard for that. It's possible to work with much smaller or much larger artwork, but it is unpleasant, too. At last, you should work pixel-perfect. In Illustrator there is a "snap to pixels" option, which should be used when marking artwork for screen. In AE you should pay attention to position and scale values since you can put both to subpixel values (980,2px and 95,4% for instance). *Martin ... View more

How long is the composition, you put the loop on? Could it be it just playing once, because it has only 5 secs in length? For further investigation, a screenshot of your project including the composition in question with the expression-text visible would be helpful. *Martin ... View more

You can link all properties with can be animated per expressions to a master effect, or master layer with UI controls (slider, checkboxes and so on). It's a bit of work for the set up, but you safe a lot of time when changes appear. Keep in mind that you can copy/paste effects with expressions. When you want to link a glow to a master glow, just build the links once, than copy the effect and past it to all layers which should get a linked glow. *Martin ... View more

Rick Gerard​ You are correct about the settings, but if you would read properly, you find that this options was checked - not in the cleanest English, yet understandable: "Every object is on its own layer. Saved with a compatible pdf. Imported as All Acceptable Files ..." RyanWing​ Could it be, that your artwork is simple not placed on the artbord, or the artboard is too small or something in this direction? Also, make sure that your AI file is in RGB color space. That's all I can think of right now. Good luck! *Martin ... View more

Check the continuous rasterization settings of the precomp and layers inside, as well as your preview resolution. If everything looks good on full res, you are good to go. Don't mind quality drops in half or less resolution. I also noticed a very thin outline - glitch, when have vector layers with exactly overlaying areas. I always solve this by moving the underlaying path a bit inside. *Martin ... View more

Alles was Mylenium sagt und dazu: Geh zum angegebenen Timecode (2:10) und schau, was da los ist. Am besten den Preview auf volle Auflösung stellen und falls Du Motion Blur verwendest, den auch aktivieren. Wenn es den Preview in dem Bereich rendert ist das schon mal ein gutes Zeichen. Der Erfahrung nach wird es den Preview aber nicht rendern und dann musst Du einzeln durchgehen und gucken welcher Layer/Effekt den Fehler verursacht. Dazu kannst Du immer die Klassiker einmal der Reihe nach durchprobieren: Cache leeren, AE neu starten, Rechner neu starten, beim Rendern mal CPU und vor allem RAM Auslastung im Blick behalten. Und generell empfiehlt es sich, die Komposition als PNG Sequenz rauszurendern und im zweiten Durchgang erst eine Videodatei zu generieren. Da brauchst Du Dir keine Sorgen machen, dass irgendwo mal ein Puffer leer läuft, irgendein Codec verhauen ist oder bei Fehlern Du mit dem Rendern von vorne anfängst. Für genauere Hilfe brauchen wir viel mehr Systeminformationen. RAM, CPU, Auslastung der Festplatten - sowie Projektinfos, wie Mylenium schon fragte. ... View more

For the objective authority, follow the Puget-Systems recommendation - link is above in one of the posts. From my experience, project files and assets on one drive are just fine. When it comes to the OS and Cache combo, there is no clear advice. Read about the pros and cons in the posts above. Creating a RAM-Drive for cache is not very useful in this case. First, AE will need all of the memory and can even fail during rendering, if there is to less RAM left. Second, transfer speeds to cache are kind of low, so you don't benefit from RAM drive speeds (see the post above, there was a screenshot with cache typical speeds). SSD is fine, NVMe more then enough. *Martin ... View more

Well, you actually provided the answer to your questions by yourself - non of your hardware is recommended to use with AE - except GPU. This one is fine. But AE barely use GPU. ... View more

AE seems to have trouble with mp3 files in general - better convert this to WAV with Media Encoder. If there is still the stutter, check the audio file before and after importing it to AE. You can also press LL so see the waveform. *Martin ... View more

Glad you solved it! ... View more

Then go to the point there the preview dies and dig down your comp. Switch off all layers and activate them one by another until preview dies again. When you found the faulty layer, dig down the layer effects, switch all off and repeat until the error reappears. Let us know, what you found out by then. What about RAM and CPU, about free space on drives? GTX 970m indicates that you are on a laptop, which is not a recommended platform - at least not from the realistic point of view. *Martin ... View more

If this is the whole script, it won't run as panel nor window. Those tutorials helped my to get a basic set up for panels and windows: https://www.provideocoalition.com/after-effects-extendscript-training-complete-series/ Have a look at episode 12. According the docs, you only need the preset name for applyPreset(), not the whole path. And maybe not even the extension ffx. http://docs.aenhancers.com/layers/layer/?highlight=applyPreset *Martin ... View more

Everybody would do this with a for-loop, but this is da(m)n clever! ... View more

Can you render the preview in full resolution and with all effects (motion blur switch)? Accelerated Render Error sounds like some GPU related issue. What effects are you using, what are your computer specs? Can you spot the failing frame range? Render everything to PNG sequence. Is it failing at a certain frame? What version of AE? Quicktime is not supported anymore, isn't it? ... View more