aescripts + aeplugins

ian boldon

is there a way to make the nodes have children of other nodes?

Orrin Zucker

ian boldon said:

is there a way to make the nodes have children of other nodes?

Sure- Create a build excluding the second set of children (don't select those). You can build all the way through (layout, lines, animate etc). Then do a second build, but this time select the parent first, then its children. You can repeat the process as many times as you want, though it might be a good idea to increase the size of the comp, then scale it all down at the end.

Robert Penczak

Hi - could you explain in more detail how to do an animation where the children nodes have children of their own?

For instance, if I create a list of words: Parent; Child1, Child2; Grandchild1a; Grandchild1b; Grandchild2a; Grandchild2b

How can I make Parent appear in a big circle in the middle, then have Child1 off to the left in a square, with Grandchild1a and 1b above and below it in diamond; and with Child 2 off to the right in a square, with Grandchild 2a and 2b above and below that in diamond shape?

Thanks

Orrin Zucker

Robert Penczak said:

Hi - could you explain in more detail how to do an animation where the children nodes have children of their own?

For instance, if I create a list of words: Parent; Child1, Child2; Grandchild1a; Grandchild1b; Grandchild2a; Grandchild2b

How can I make Parent appear in a big circle in the middle, then have Child1 off to the left in a square, with Grandchild1a and 1b above and below it in diamond; and with Child 2 off to the right in a square, with Grandchild 2a and 2b above and below that in diamond shape?

Thanks

sure...the layout:

1) Generate your text: Parent; Child, Child; Grandchild; Grandchild; Grandchild; Grandchild

2) Shapes: 

     A ) Select Parent & Circle / Build 

     B ) Select both Children & Square / Build

     C ) Select all Grandchildren & Diamond / Build

3) Layout Radial: Algorithm Circle

    A ) Select Parent & Both Children / Left / Scale: First Layer Max (Default is ok) / Build

    B )  Select Child 1 & 2 Grandchildren / Up / Scale: First Layer Max (Try 30/100) / Build

    C ) Select Child 2 & other 2 Grandchildren / Up / Scale: First Layer Max (Try 30/100) / Build

Build lines and animate.

If you have more children or grandchildren you might want to play with Semicircle or linear, but in this case, Circle works fine.

Hope that helps

Orrin Zucker

it should look like this- when building the lines you'll need to select the shapes in much the same way as the layout...multiple builds. You might have to experiment with the Scale since the words and shapes are different sizes...

BTW- This took about 1 minute to build

Robert Penczak

Thanks for that very clear explanation. Worked perfectly, and I have a much better idea of how this works now. Thanks for the great scripts you guys make for the AE community!

Orrin Zucker

Robert Penczak said:

Thanks for that very clear explanation. Worked perfectly, and I have a much better idea of how this works now. Thanks for the great scripts you guys make for the AE community!

Thanks for the kind words Robert!

Default Username

Installation Question: Are we just adding the NodeKit.jsxbin into the AfterEffects ScriptsUI Panels folder? I know TypeMonkey had an additional folder that needed to be moved – curious if there's another folder that accompanied the NodeKit.jsxbin. Perhaps these steps could be included in the next NodeKit User Guide. Thanks again for all your guys' work! : )

Orrin Zucker

Isaiah Adona said:

Installation Question: Are we just adding the NodeKit.jsxbin into the AfterEffects ScriptsUI Panels folder? I know TypeMonkey had an additional folder that needed to be moved – curious if there's another folder that accompanied the NodeKit.jsxbin. Perhaps these steps could be included in the next NodeKit User Guide. Thanks again for all your guys' work! : )

Hey Isaiah- yeah, the jsxbin and the Nodekit folder all go into the scriptsuipanels folder...it should look like this:

steve schmitt

after clicking shapes, I get- no eligible layers found. I have 6 circle shapes in my comp, I must be missing something.

Orrin Zucker

steve schmitt said:

after clicking shapes, I get- no eligible layers found. I have 6 circle shapes in my comp, I must be missing something.

Hey Steve- offhand, it sounds like the shapes were already applied. Best to open up a support ticket and send me s screen shot...I’ll help you from there.

Oz

Stuart Rankin

Can you make classic line charts using these scripts?

Orrin Zucker

Stuart Rankin said:

Can you make classic line charts using these scripts?

Hey Stuart-

Gut feeling...yes....but if you can show me a specific example of what you're thinking I'd be happy to comment. If you want to check yourself, you can download a free sample and play around with it. 

Patrick Campbell

What if I want to have a two word node? Like I want Data Center in the same node, not two separate ones.

Orrin Zucker

Hey Patrick-

You have a few options for that...

-You can switch over to Lines if you want to have them on the same line

-If you want to have them stacked you can either just set them using the regular ae character generator or set them in illustrator or psd and import them using retain layer size.

Hope that helps.

Matthew Phelan

Would it be possible to include a 3d mode that makes all your layers 3D so you could then do a move with a 3d camera as well? Turning on 3d works for the nodes itself, but the lines gets screwed up and expressions lost if you do it to them.

Orrin Zucker

Matthew Phelan said:

Would it be possible to include a 3d mode that makes all your layers 3D so you could then do a move with a 3d camera as well? Turning on 3d works for the nodes itself, but the lines gets screwed up and expressions lost if you do it to them.

Yeah- the problem is the lines, not much we can do about that.

If you don't have to manipulate the nodes themselves in 3D space and just want to move a camera between them, you could try building it in 2D in a large comp, and then pre-comping that build (drag the comp into the little comp icon at the bottom of the project window to avoid potentially breaking expressions) and then turning the entire comp 3D...not a perfect solution but might work if you play around with the line widths.

Hope that helps...

Alon smoller

What about working wuth camera?

Orrin Zucker

Alon smoller said:

What about working wuth camera?

Excellent question.

We designed Nodekit as a 2D script because the lines (shape layers) don't work in 3D. The best I could offer is to fake it by scaling and moving the Node Control if you want to pan from one to the next...or drag the build into a new comp and make it 3D...

Hope that helps...

-oz

Chris Marriott

Any way to get this working back with older versions? like the early CC versions and CS6?

Orrin Zucker

Chris Marriott said:

Any way to get this working back with older versions? like the early CC versions and CS6?

Hey Chris- 

The goal of all our scripts is to have them work with CS6...until we reach a point where we just cant figure out a way to make some of the core functionality work in those versions. That was the case with NodeKit. 

It was just not possible to make the connecting lines happen the way it needed to in anything under 2018. 

Sorry!

Chris Marriott

No worries at all Thanks for the explanation

Even at times if CS6 didn't support say a latest feature (and didn't affect the core workings), it would be cool to even have a slightly limited version for CS6 support than not at all. But it sounds like the core functions on this one wouldn't work which is a shame! 

Looks a great tool! Again thanks for the super fast reply!

Andreas Kress

If you have just one complex diagram to create, this is the right weapon you should choose.
This tool is awesome. Perferct workflow, easy to understand and no error messages.
It interacts so nice, and editing is a pleasure. Like the author promised, it is totally stable. Even with my very old graphics card. 

I created more than ten great looking diagrams in the shortest time right after i bought the tool.
With a png screenshot of the diagramm it is also easy to create real 3D objects ( Element 3D ) of your diagram.
If you like to create something fancy looking stuff.

However, of course AE is able to create such diagrams. But it can take hours to animate them. 
With Nodekit you are done in minutes.

So, thank you for that great tool. Excellent work Sirs.

Orrin Zucker

Andreas Kress said:

If you have just one complex diagram to create, this is the right weapon you should choose.
This tool is awesome. Perferct workflow, easy to understand and no error messages.
It interacts so nice, and editing is a pleasure. Like the author promised, it is totally stable. Even with my very old graphics card. 

I created more than ten great looking diagrams in the shortest time right after i bought the tool.
With a png screenshot of the diagramm it is also easy to create real 3D objects ( Element 3D ) of your diagram.
If you like to create something fancy looking stuff.

However, of course AE is able to create such diagrams. But it can take hours to animate them. 
With Nodekit you are done in minutes.

So, thank you for that great tool. Excellent work Sirs.

Thank you Andreas!

Kid Kyote

How do you animate off? 

Orrin Zucker

T.J. ODonnell said:

How do you animate off? 

Hi T.J.- 

Nodes isn't really designed for that - its a multi-step process that is designed for flexibility of layout...animating out would have been rough. That said- the best way to animate out is to drag the comp into a new comp (don't precomp- it'll break the expressions) and then time remap the nodes layer in there.

Hope that helps.

-oz

Matt Ellis

Hi team,

absolutely loving node kit as a great way to draw an animated diagram really quickly, thank you!  (also loving some of your other plug-ins too )

However, I would like to do some additional drawing on the diagram after node kit has done its magic.  Particularly, I would like to add some animation effects to some of the paths that you have created to add extra story to the diagram.

The paths are created through expressions so that they move as you relay out the diagram etc (which is a brilliant feature in itself) - but is there a simple way to get to the paths so that I can use them for something else? An example might be to animate a spark along the path or reanimate the drawing etc?

I'm hoping that its something simple that I've missed as I'm fairly new to After Effects and very new to node kit itself.

Many thanks, in advance.

Orrin Zucker

Matt Ellis said:

Hi team,

absolutely loving node kit as a great way to draw an animated diagram really quickly, thank you!  (also loving some of your other plug-ins too )

However, I would like to do some additional drawing on the diagram after node kit has done its magic.  Particularly, I would like to add some animation effects to some of the paths that you have created to add extra story to the diagram.

The paths are created through expressions so that they move as you relay out the diagram etc (which is a brilliant feature in itself) - but is there a simple way to get to the paths so that I can use them for something else? An example might be to animate a spark along the path or reanimate the drawing etc?

I'm hoping that its something simple that I've missed as I'm fairly new to After Effects and very new to node kit itself.

Many thanks, in advance.

From Dan:

So this is an example of a position expression that would follow one of
NodeKit's paths, based on a slider value from 0 to 100:

s = effect("Slider Control")("Slider");
L = thisComp.layer("Line 1-5");
p = L.content("Group 1").content("Path 1").path;
L.toComp(p.pointOnPath(s/100))

Matt Ellis

Thank you for the very fast response! it shows just how much I need to learn about AE, and how much power gets unlocked when you start using expressions... Looks like I need to go and play some more, but it make take a while - there's about 30 paths that I need to do a secondary animation on.  Knowing that I can, that's the magic ingredient, thank you!

Steven Casey

Is it possible to have secondary objects attached to primary objects? For example, I have my center circle that has five circles attached to it, arranged in a radial pattern. Can those five circles have their own circles branch out? This would be like an org chart of sub-teams or a family tree graphic.

Steven Casey

Steven Casey said:

Is it possible to have secondary objects attached to primary objects? For example, I have my center circle that has five circles attached to it, arranged in a radial pattern. Can those five circles have their own circles branch out? This would be like an org chart of sub-teams or a family tree graphic.

It's been almost a month now. Any answer on this?

Robert Penczak

Is there a direct way to put animated precomps or .mp4 files into these nodes - or is it simplest just to create a mask and shift + parent to an existing node? (I couldn't get the crop feature under Shapes tab to work for animated files).  Thanks.

Robert Penczak

In the Shapes tab, I used a Stroke with no Fill and put a checkmark in the Crop Image box.

When I add lines, those go to the center of each circle, which looks a little odd.

Is there a way to have the lines cropped at the edge of the circle instead of going to the center - or is my only automated option to use a Fill (along with Stroke) in the Shapes tab?  Thanks.

Orrin Zucker

Robert Penczak said:

In the Shapes tab, I used a Stroke with no Fill and put a checkmark in the Crop Image box.

When I add lines, those go to the center of each circle, which looks a little odd.

Is there a way to have the lines cropped at the edge of the circle instead of going to the center - or is my only automated option to use a Fill (along with Stroke) in the Shapes tab?  Thanks.

Hey Robert- can you open a support ticket and send me a project with your UI setting so I can check it out - much easier to show it than describe it. :-)

Orrin Zucker

Robert Penczak said:

Is there a direct way to put animated precomps or .mp4 files into these nodes - or is it simplest just to create a mask and shift + parent to an existing node? (I couldn't get the crop feature under Shapes tab to work for animated files).  Thanks.

As long as its cropped to the active area it should be good. It uses the first frame to size it up...so maybe if thats what you want to use, time remap and freeze it to the point you want to use, then after you create shapes, go back in and unfreeze it.

Eric McGilloway

Anyone else having problems opening your NodeKit projects in AE 2021? When opening my 2019 project into AE 2021 there's about a 15 minute load-time, then after it loads i get the beachball (mac). It's only the NodeKit projects. All other projects open fine.

I've tried loading it in my original AE 2019 version and same issue.

I've cleared the media cache and deleted preferences.

Thanks!

_____FIXED______

It wasn't NodeKit. There is a corrupt font I used throughout Nodekit. Fixed and all is well.

Maximilian Alexander

Has anyone used this with Lottie? Before buying I'd love to see if they are compatible. 

Iraklis Pantazis

Hello, is it possible after putting the TEXT-Nodes into SHAPES to keep the original TEXT-layer name? Everytime I shape them their layer name is renamed into Node [nr]. So afterwards I have to rename them every single one of them in order to keep an overview.

Steven Casey

In the tutorial it shows a content cleaner script but it didn't install with my copy. How can I find it?

Thanks,

Steven

Orrin Zucker

Steven Casey said:

In the tutorial it shows a content cleaner script but it didn't install with my copy. How can I find it?

Thanks,

Steven

Hi Steven- it should be in the downloads...

jesua solis

Hello.  How can I install? tutorial is not in the downloads.

Thanks

jesua solis

where install the nodekit folder?

Jared McCoy

I'm attempting to use nodekit to animate the key concepts of an academic lecture in such a way that the clusters of related ideas will (ideally) follow the narration of the lecture sequentially over a 5-10 minute interval. My problem is that that AE begins to lag terribly after a few dozen nodes/lines are animated in this fashion (I'm on an i7 Surface Pro 7 w 16 GB of RAM btw). 

My question is whether there is a way to precompose the animation of some of the nodal clusters AND still be able to link certain nodes of subsequent clusters with the previously precomposed clusters. When I try to precompose a cluster of nodes with links to nodes outside of the precomposition the lines end up broken. 

My sense is that this plugin works best for animating several tiers of connection radiating from a central node/nodes as opposed to a more ad hoc/narrative animation of clusters without a well-defined center of the sort I'm attempting. 

If there is no good way to precompose and retain links to nodes outside the precomposition, would it be possible to anchor a transparent node to corresponding node in the precomposition or some kind or use some kind of workaround of that nature. Please let me know if I am mistaken as I am very new to AE!

Orrin Zucker

Jared McCoy said:

I'm attempting to use nodekit to animate the key concepts of an academic lecture in such a way that the clusters of related ideas will (ideally) follow the narration of the lecture sequentially over a 5-10 minute interval. My problem is that that AE begins to lag terribly after a few dozen nodes/lines are animated in this fashion (I'm on an i7 Surface Pro 7 w 16 GB of RAM btw). 

My question is whether there is a way to precompose the animation of some of the nodal clusters AND still be able to link certain nodes of subsequent clusters with the previously precomposed clusters. When I try to precompose a cluster of nodes with links to nodes outside of the precomposition the lines end up broken. 

My sense is that this plugin works best for animating several tiers of connection radiating from a central node/nodes as opposed to a more ad hoc/narrative animation of clusters without a well-defined center of the sort I'm attempting. 

If there is no good way to precompose and retain links to nodes outside the precomposition, would it be possible to anchor a transparent node to corresponding node in the precomposition or some kind or use some kind of workaround of that nature. Please let me know if I am mistaken as I am very new to AE!

Hey Jared- In general, these discussion pages are for more general questions - you have some pretty specific needs.

I'd recommend opening a support ticket and we can tackle it there...and if you can send over some visuals to help illustrate the problem it would help.

Much thanks

-oz

Colin Langley

I love this plug in but i see there is no way to animate the dash offset? Or am i missing something here?

Orrin Zucker

Colin Langley said:

I love this plug in but i see there is no way to animate the dash offset? Or am i missing something here?

Hey Colin- You're correct, we didn't build that functionality into the script, but you can do it manually by unshying the comp and selecting each line, twirling down on the Contents / Group 1 / Stroke 1 and clicking on the + next to Dashes. That will add an offset you can animate.

FYI - You can paste keyframes if you select 'Stroke 1' on other line layers to save a bit of time.

Hope that helps.

-oz