Adobe After Effects is a tool for creating motion graphics and visual effects for film, video, multimedia, and the Web. Introducing video, Web, and film producers to After Effects, this book shows how to create motion graphic effects that include basic animation, motion graphics, visual effects used in professional film making, and more.

Adobe After Effects is one of the most powerful motion graphics software applications in use today. It can be used to create film titles, television weather maps, Hollywood special effects, and is even being used to create sophisticated visual effects for the Web. Adobe After Effects 5.0 Classroom in a Book introduces video, Web, and film producers to the comprehensive set of tools available in After Effects. Version 5.0 expands the user's creative control with composite layers in 2D or 3D space, nondestructive vector paint tools to reveal an image over time and draw animated cartoons, and a new range of visual effects. Using the lesson files included on the CD, readers will take a thorough tour of the software by creating their own After Effects projects. Countless tips and techniques help readers become more fluent in After Effects. This official training series, tested in Adobe's own classrooms and labs, will appeal to beginning and intermediate users who may work, or are training to work, in the film, video, design, or Web media.

Getting Started.
Lesson 1. Creating 2D Elements from Hexagons.
Lesson 2. Building Elements from Squares.
Lesson 3. Animating Circles.
Lesson 4. Building Star-like Elements.
Lesson 5. Working with Text and Numbers.
Lesson 6. Building 3D Hexagon Elements.
Lesson 7. Combining 2D Elements in a Composite.
Lesson 8. Beginning the 3D Composite.
Lesson 9. Finishing the 3D Composite.
Lesson 10. Building the Final Animation.
Lesson 11. The Render Queue and Output Formats.
Index.