Adobe After Effects and Animation Intermediate Short Course
Course description
Course overview
Adobe After Effects is the industry-standard tool for motion graphics design, digital visual effects and for compositing video, animation, logos, text and graphics. Designers, illustrators, motion artists, videographers and post-production professionals use it for web, social media and educational content, for promo videos, animation, film and TV content to tell stories or to promote brands, products, or their own artwork, and to engage audiences.
After Effects brings life and motion to graphics, text, logos, titles, characters, shapes, illustrations and more by combining and animating multiple layers, adding effects, mixing video with other visual content... the possibilities are endless! After Effects integrates tightly with other applications such as Photoshop, Illustrator and Premiere Pro, and in this course, we will use designs created with Photoshop to animate in AE as well as video clips to create composite shots that use footage, animated graphics and text, all tracked in the app.
In this short course you will work through a series of mini projects step by step with the tutor, expanding your existing knowledge of After Effects, covering topics such as 3D, cameras and lights; animating graphics, tracking video clips and creating composites, blending in and matching the footage; controlling and manipulating speed and values of your animation more accurately and confidently; creating a uniform look; separating video elements, tracking and inserting designs and text in the footage; working with chroma keying and track mattes, working with expressions and more.
A basic working knowledge of After Effects is expected, such as the Beginners short course or equivalent. We will dive deeper into the software and explore various workflows and techniques that will help you to create more complex visual projects, mixing and compositing text, graphics, animation and videos in this powerful and versatile program.
This course is available both on campus or online.
Who this course is for
This course is ideal for video artists, filmmakers, graphic designers and graphics professionals looking to gain a fuller understanding of Adobe After Effects.
You should have completed the Adobe After Effects and Animation Beginners Short Course or be familiar with Adobe After Effects.
Key information
Topics covered
- Working in 3D with AE cameras and lights
- Animating graphics
- The 3D camera tracker: compositing animated graphics in a video clip
- The graph editor and keyframe interpolation
- Animating with expressions
- Creating a uniform look and animation presets
- Rotoscoping
- Animating and compositing text in a video clip
- Tracking with the Mocha planar tracker and compositing animation in footage
- Chroma keying
- Track mattes
- Preferences and key settings
- Keyboard shortcuts
- Rendering and exporting
Learning outcomes
- Track footage, insert and animate text and graphics
- Generate animated graphics, animate strokes and create composites with footage
- Create and animate design elements with shape layer animators
- Control animation values and speed with the graph editor
- Animate type and create animation presets
- Animate with expressions, with or without keyframes
- Understanding and using 3D, cameras and lights
- Position layers in 3D space and animate multiple cameras and lights
- Optimise preferences
- Render and export After Effects projects into different formats
- Digital badge and certificate of attendance
Materials
On Campus or Online
Please note it is advisable to save your work on a Cloud based platform of your choice OR on a portable storage device (USB-C) throughout your course.
IMPORTANT - Adobe ID Login for Short Course Students
- Students will need to create an account with Adobe (unless you already have one) in order to access the Adobe suite at the college; instructions are included below. You will need to use a personal email address to create this. If you already have an account with Adobe, please make sure you bring your login details with you on the first day of the course.
Please note:
- Creating an Adobe account is free.
- The software will only be accessible when logged into a UAL networked computer
- The same account can be used outside of the University, but software will only be accessible through a personal paid subscription that students will need to set up independently
- You can still create an account on the day but doing this beforehand will save time and avoid delays to the start of the class.
- If you already have an Adobe ID/ subscription you can use this on your short course rather than setting up a new account.
- To create an account students will need to:
- Go to Adobe Sign in page
- Select 'Create an account'
- Enter your details and select ‘Create account’
Please also bring to the first session:
- Notebook and pen
If you are taking this course online, please see our Guide to taking online short courses
Tutor
Francesco de Manincor
Francesco de Manincor is a character designer, animator, motion designer and videographer with over 20 years of experience in the creative industries in London.
As a freelance audiovisual artist with a passion for education, Francesco has been teaching for UAL and UAL Short Courses since 2016, and has a broad experience in visual storytelling, from storyboarding to animation, video production to post-production.
You can view Francesco's projects on https://demanincor.tv/ and https://spoonfyysh.tv/
Book a course
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