I guess that's it: https://images.creativecow.net/305983/aftereffects.png (copy/paste the link) *Martin ... View more

I did wrote two scripts so far (Free Plugin! Motionblur and Collapse Transformation , the other one is for expressions management and not official released yet, since I want to add more features) and I'm pretty sure that I can write such a script. But I don't think that I can do it very soon, since I'm deep into animating a small series of 5 films at least until the end of November. *Martin ... View more

Sounds very interesting and is clearly doable with a script! If the point of the script is not automation, you can manually switch visibility of the layers and add the comp one by another to AME queue. However, if you need to do it more than once, a script is probably the better way. *Martin ... View more

The only thing I can think of are fields. When you put your comp into AE render queue, check render settings as well as output module. If both are as you wish, use your command line without -OMtemplate argument. This is just for trouble shooting... ... View more

Can you share your project with the WAV? This might speed up the trouble-shooting. Thanks! ... View more

Hi! I assume that the WAV plays back correctly in a media player software (VLC or something like this)?! Is the WAV longer then is should be after you imported it into AE? What version of MacOS and AE do you have? Also computer specs, please. *Martin ... View more

Where is this command-line from? How do you set up your render garden? I'm wondering about rendering into a MOV with multiply instances, which isn't working. You can only use parallel-rendering in combination with image sequences. Also, it's using the output module template YesDVC, whatever this is. ... View more

I've never seen such a output before... What's the command line you are using, what does the whole environment look like? Do you get more repeated frames when you start 3 processes on parallel? On a sidenote: have a look at RenderGarden | by Mekajiki They are using an AE script for separating the comp and python scripts, to launch aerender.exe. *Martin ... View more

Did you separate your comp into smaller pieces before rendering and if not, have you checked the skip frames option in the render queue? *Martin ... View more

If your error'd frames have 0 byte, it's very easy to find them using Explorer (and for sure Finder, too). Also, you can find those faulty frames quiet easily, if you open the sequence in Premiere and let it render from start to end (tested on CC2018). It also gives you a nice dialog which exact frame is failing. I recommend using RenderGarden | by Mekajiki  instead of BG Renderer. RG has built-in error checks to prevent this situation (unfortunately no 0 byte check...). *Martin ... View more

You issue is very likely not connected to RAM or free-space. Without any further information to your comp, it's hard to tell, but have a close look at your keyframes and have a look at them with the speed-graph. Try to find out what is the difference of the one frame without MB in relation to the others. Also, switch off RSMB. And if the issues still exists, switch of native MB and only activate RSMB. Maybe something interferes there. Let us know! *Martin ... View more

Nevermind. I can recommend this script: ExtendScript Developer Utility - aescripts + aeplugins - aescripts.com It let you execute your script-code right out of AE. Very helpful for UI design. *Martin ... View more

I forgot: I'm an german AE, so you will run into translation issues with the expressions at Box-Anchorpoint. x = -content("Rechteck 1").content("Rechteckpfad: 1").size[0]/2; equals: x = -content("Rectangle 1").content("Rectangle Path: 1").size[0]/2; and the same for y. ... View more

Hi Lucy! I've made the little project - maybe you can adapt it for you - at least you can play around with the values and understand how it works. Dropbox - BoxyBox.aep It's necessary to set the box-width to 0 manually once. I'm not sure why, but even though there is an expression, I still can drag and change the size-value and (and that's I don't know why) it has effect on the box when I get over the calculated size. I can make the box bigger, then it should be, but not smaller. Maybe this is the issue you got. Also, setting up position and anchorpoint is a bit tricky, since with shape layers there are at least two of each of them (one for the layer, one for every content). Therefore, it's easy for things to get off... I hope this helps! *Martin ... View more

Hi Lucy, I checked the expression on my side and it's working on loooonng texts, too. However, I'm still on CC2018 and can only confirm, that's working for this version. But if I see right, the box seems to be cut away on the right side. Is there a mask? Have a look at the bounding-box: the width seems correct. And I can see, that the box is more then 2000px long, assuming you are working on a 1080p project, the box-size seems to be plausible with this long text. Let me know. *Martin ... View more

Hi Lucy, I checked the code and corrected it, a brace was missing: layersincomp = thisComp.numLayers; maxWidth = 0; for (n = 1; n <= layersincomp; n++){      L=thisComp.layer(n);      X=L.sourceRectAtTime().width;           if (maxWidth < X){           maxWidth = X;      } } P=thisComp.layer("Control").effect("Slider Control")("Slider"); boxWidth = maxWidth+P; [boxWidth, value[1]]; This code is instead of your one - but I don't know your overall composition or project. I created 3 text layers and a shape layer as box, then put the code into the shape-layer -> Content -> Rectangle 1 -> Size. Somehow it's still possible to drag the x-size in the property and make the box larger then it should be - I don't understand why, but you'll never run into this, if the box-size is simple way smaller then the text in the first place. (setting this size seems to be more setting a min-size). You'll also need to take care of anchor points and position in order to make this work. By default, shape layers always scales from the middle. *Martin ... View more

Hi! You have to circle through your layers to find the longest one. layersincomp = thisComp.numLayers; maxWidth = 0; for (n = 1; n <= layersincomp; n++){      L=thisComp.layer(n);      X=L.sourceRectAtTime().width;           if (maxWidth < X){           maxWidth = X;      } P=thisComp.layer("Control").effect("Slider Control")("Slider"); boxWidth = maxWidth+P; [boxWidth, value[1]];     // set up heigth manually, it's not changing, is it? Didn't test the code, but should go in the right direction. *Martin ... View more

Have you tried to re-download and re-install the script. We got trouble, too (not the same as you), because the script file was somehow broken. I'm using CS lately and may can help, but I need more details. The script is a bit tricky and when it comes to Puppet Tool, you really need to know, what to do. *Martin ... View more

You'll find hundreds of similar posts around here of people wondering about the low performance of AE. Jepp - that's normal for AE. You can reduce fps and quality for RAM preview (check out all the options in the preview-panel) to speed it up. For renderings to file, I recommend RenderGarden (RenderGarden | by Mekajiki ). It launches several instances of AE render engine and really speeds up your export. *Martin ... View more

It's insane to update Adobe or OS (thanks Win10!) or anything as long as one is in a project. You are digging your own grave, guys! When Adobe updates its software, - first you do nothing for a couple of weeks and check the forums for bugs - you finish all running projects - you update the software and keep the old one - you make some tests, the more intense - the better - you make your first project with the new software, small projects prefered - when everything is running well, you officially switch - you de-install old version months later Had to learn this the hard way, too. *Martin ... View more

Hi Juliet, if you apply Dan's expression you need to put it in your shape-groups -> form -> fill and contour. You can use QuickExp-Script to insert the expression on multiply properties at once, but you will most likely to select each of them before (and if you have 1000 groups with fill and contour, this is a selection of 2000 items and a lot! of clicking). https://lesterbanks.com/2018/10/expressions-quickexp-script/ You can still go the text-layer way, but instead of animation random letters, you just add an animator for opacity. The advantage in this way is, that you can put the whole string into one text layer and use the start and end property of the animator to change the opacity for some letters only. You can try to use random() expression on start and end, too: for start: seedRandom(index,true); start = random (something); for end: seedRandom(index,true); end = start + random (somethingelse); // prevent from going backwards Then, you duplicate this text-layer a lot of times and in each layer, another part of letters got the opacity change. The result should be near to what you want, but you don't need to re-create everything in AI and you don't need to put apart the artwork in hundreds of layers. Maybe there is another way, but my recommendation is to have a look into the text-animator options. This is truly an animators playground! *Martin ... View more

What happens is exactly what should be, if you apply this expression to the global opacity, as you did. As a second thought: Why don't you use just text ("lorem ipsum ...") and add one of the text-animation-presets to it (there is a random-preset, which gives you letters and numbers)? You can easily add an opacity animation to it, too. Then, you take another text, 2 and 0, as a mask for your text-fill. Or: create the final shape in AI (use small text-objects, and pay attention to put everyone of them to a single layer), import this as a comp, animate opacity with keyframes, copy-paste keyframes to all layers and use a script (I use "keyboard", but there are free scripts for sure) to randomize those keyframes. *Martin ... View more

After Effects is not Premiere! ... View more

True that - once it's green, it should playback in realtime. Does this happen when you create a new project from scratch? Can you try your project on a different pc? If you have the possibility to re-install AE, try this. You can also re-install OS. Maybe something got messed up in the meantime. Even if this shouldn't happen, a clean install can solve a lot of problems which appear over time. *Martin ... View more

Which version for AE do you use now and which version did you use before? And what exactly do you mean by "broken"? Usually preview is not realtime when frames are not pre-rendered, but as soon as AE has rendered everything, RAM preview is fine. However, overall performance is really low since forever. *Martin ... View more

We usually render your vector based film as PNG sequence and they always looks good. Take in consideration to create your vectors in the same size you'll need them in the film. Later you can scale them in the way you want, which is an advantage of vectors. But there is no need to create them much larger or much smaller then you need them, knowing that you have to scale them in any cases. If you scale them down, you'll need to scale them in full even increments in order to avoid unwanted anti-alasing or interpolation. Also don't use your video player to check quality after export, but AE again. You don't know, what your player adds on "quality improvements". Cheers, Martin ... View more

What's your AE version, OS and general PC specs? Does this happen, when you create a new project with only one comp, one layer and glow effect? Does this happen, when you use Media Encoder for rendering? And the trivial ones: AE restarted - HDD cache cleared - full reboot? ... View more