pt_TextEdit 2
  • Federico PonceFederico Ponce
    Hey man great plug ing. Thank you so much for writing it, it's a real time saver. I wish it was possible to add sub-options to the Type box. For example I am using the Segoe typeface and it has light, medium, semi bold etc.. but I am unable to load it on to the Font section of the plug in. Am i doing something wrong or is this feature not included ?

     thank you :) !
  • Jeff SPJeff SP
    Hi Paul.. Great script!

    I have several 3 layer comps.   2 text layers with the same expression, linked to an audio file with metadata.

    Text_Dialogue
    Text_Dialogue_Single
    Audio File with metadata markers

    Your script recognizes all these text layers, allowing me to adjust, but I'm unable to filter each layer individually.
    I have several comps like this and would like the ability  to adjust each text layer independently.

    Is this possible?

    Cheers
  • chevallier christophechevallier christophe
    Hi, very usefull plugin. however, a very interesting function is missing : it could be very interesting to be able to copy the whole content of the table below. By exemple to copy and paste in excel for a translator (the whole table or only column text). The reimport could be cool too event if it is very complicated.

    thanks
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Yes that would be a useful feature. There are other scripts like CompsFromSpreadsheet and my own pt_OpenSesame script that already allow you to do that, but I'll certain consider it for a future version of TextEdit. If anyone else would find this useful, let me know.
  • marnix rckmarnix rck
    If possible i'd like to second the export-import function.
    I use it to translate comps into different languages and would be great to just export a set of text and replace it with another that already has been made. Personally I don't care if it's in excel or some ugly xml file (later even preferred :) )

    Besides that it would be great if it can edit all duplicate texts at the same time due to certain effect and shared titles most text's are present 3 to 5 times, it would be awesome to edit those all at once.

    thanks!
  • James HuenergardtJames Huenergardt
    I LOVE this plug-in. However, if I want to select multiple text layers and ONLY change the font, I have to it one layer at a time or the Edit Text checkbox somehow gets automatically checked and it changes ALL my text layers to the same text.

    Is this a feature or a bug, or am I doing something wrong?

    Thanks,

    Jim
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Jim, the Edit Text checkbox gets checked if you edit the text in the text editor box to the right (it assumes that if you're editing text you'll probably want to apply those changes) but it shouldn't happen otherwise. So you need to remember to uncheck it when you just want to change the font.
    I just tested it in AE CC and it was working as expected. If you're seeing different behaviour than this let me know exactly what steps you're taking and which checkboxes are on (including the ones besides Fetch and Apply)
    Paul
  • haley sanerhaley saner
    hey great script -- is there a bug with the alignment feature? It seems to want to change everything to left align. all my text is center aligned and then when i edit the text it changes to be left align. then i can't select and change back to center. it just wants to stay aligned to the left. Is there something i need to do differently? 
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Haley, I came across this in testing recently but it only seemed to affect certain text layers. I think it was happening on layers that had an additional line return after all the text characters. It appeared to be an After Effects scripting bug, not specific to pt_TextEdit.
    It would be helpful if you could you open a support ticket and attach a copy of your project (no footage needed) so I can check if you've encountered the same thing. Paul
  • haley sanerhaley saner
    ah yeah, i think that's it. it seems even an additional space after the text will cause the problem.
  • marnix rckmarnix rck
    it's me again.. would it be an option to hire you to get the import/export features included :) ?
    I checked the other script but that would over complicate things more then simplify.
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Marnix, if you open a support ticket we can discuss that off list. I don't have any plans to add that functionality to pt_TextEdit currently.
  • asART. 3D and motion graphicsasART. 3D and motion graphics
    Freaking awesome script .. Thanks a ton for that !

    Cheers
  • Jan HofmeisterJan Hofmeister
    May I propose a feature request? It would be VERY helpful to be able to sort the table by clicking on the column name, like in the project window. That way it would be easier to find text layers with identical content or attributes, while still seeing an "unfiltered" list.
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Column headers aren't clickable in the AE scripting UI, but the next update will allow you to sort the list by comp, font or text.
  • Jan HofmeisterJan Hofmeister
    Column headers aren't clickable in the AE scripting UI, but the next update will allow you to sort the list by comp, font or text.
    Yeah, I don't mind which way sorting works, but it's really an important feature missing ;) Apart from that it's an awesome script!
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Are you happy with just sort by comp, font and text? I thought they would be the main ones. I mean, I know you'd probably like the option to sort by any column type, but which are most important to you?
  • Jan HofmeisterJan Hofmeister
    Right now I mainly want to sort by "text", but feel free to add more options if you like ;)

    I've noticed that text layers that use several fonts or styles can't be edited properly (since fonts/styles are defined per layer, not per letter)... guess there's no way to fix this, right? This would probably require a WYSIWYG editor, thus it's out of scope for AE scripting.
  • Paul RoperPaul Roper
    For any future updates, is there any chance you could please make the 'Edit text' option OFF by default? It keeps turning itself on, and whenever I edit a bunch of fonts in a load of comps, it replaces the text with nothing! It's a VERY dangerous/annoying feature!

    Thanks!

    Paul
  • Paul RoperPaul Roper
    And another thing: Is it possible to force the 'filter by' (font name) to be literal, and not do a 'contains' search...for example:

    If I search for HelveticaNeue-Condensed, it finds all occurrences of HelveticaNeue-Condensed and HelveticaNeue-CondensedBold. I only want to find HelveticaNeue-Condensed.

    A 'Sort by font' clickable column heading would help fix this, as I've seen mentioned in these comments.
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    It turns on automatically if you edit text in the editor box. I assume that if you're altering the text there you will want to apply it. Are you seeing it turn on under other circumstances? Or would you alter the behaviour so altering the text in the editor box didn't turn it on, in which case you could edit the text and hit apply and it wouldn't necessarily apply the text you just entered?
  • Paul RoperPaul Roper
    It turns on automatically if you edit text in the editor box. I assume that if you're altering the text there you will want to apply it. Are you seeing it turn on under other circumstances? Or would you alter the behaviour so altering the text in the editor box didn't turn it on, in which case you could edit the text and hit apply and it wouldn't necessarily apply the text you just entered?

    If I close the pt_TextEdit script panel then re-open it, Edit text is     on by default, regardless of what state it was previously in and whether or not I've typed anything in the editor box.
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Perhaps instead of a "contains/is exactly" option I could bring over the boolean search I added to pt_ExpressEdit. So you could search for "Helvetica NOT Bold". This might be a far more useful than an exact match search option. What do you think?
    Sort by font will definitely be in the next update.

  • Paul RoperPaul Roper
    Yes, a boolean search would be very useful.
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    I will look into either saving the style checkbox settings between sessions or defaulting Edit Text to off on launch. Defaulting to off is easiest but restoring the settings is probably better.
  • Kimberly BlakeKimberly Blake
    My text get's changed to a blank text layer when editing the font. I have the "styles" box selected and the "edit text" deselected. It worked fine in trial mode so I purchased it. Now it's not working. I'm using CC2014
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Kimberly, Sorry about this. I've already had a report about it. Seems like a scripting bug in the latest After Effects update is causing it but I should be able to get an update out with a workaround fix in the next few days. In my tests it seems to only happen on the first action after launching the script. When it happens, if you immediately select Undo, uncheck the Edit Text box and try again, does it work ok then?
  • Christina WaiderChristina Waider
    Hi, brilliant script, but would be great when there is a line of text with two different font sizes that the script doesn't change to the text to one single font size.

    Thanks!

    Jon
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    @Kimberley. Sorry it took longer than expected but the v2.1 update is out now which fixes that issue along with a whole bunch of improvements. Hope it was worth the wait!

    @Jonathan. Unfortunately this is a limitation of AE scripting where editing a text layer causes all the text to adopt the style of the first character. I'd encourage you to fill in Adobe's feature request form at adobe.ly/BugReport if you'd like to see improved scripting support for text in future versions.
  • Jason HearneJason Hearne
    Hey Paul, This tool is great.  I use it for some many things.  Among the things I use it for, finding errant fonts.  However, if the text layer has two fonts in it, the first font is the only font your tool registers so you don't know if something should be corrected just from the "search list". It would be nice if it could show all the fonts under the font column (for example: Arial bold, Helvetica reg, Courier in one column) .  Is something like this possilble?
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Jason, Unfortunately, as with my last reply to Jonathan, this is a limitation of the access scripting has to text layers. It can only see the style of the first character. Please fill in Adobe's feature request form at adobe.ly/BugReport if you'd like improved scripting support for text in future versions.

    If scripting did have access to read/write each individual character's style, I imagine doing a search this way would be considerably slower, but I could at least make it an option you could turn on.
  • Jason HearneJason Hearne
    Having that option would be nice (as an "off" by default).  I don't see using it too often, unless I'm completely perplexed at the appearance of a mystery font.  Thanks Paul
  • Thomas WerleThomas Werle
    Hi Paul,
    thanks for the great script.
    I'm running ae on windows 8.1.
    Since today I can't see the text in the text edit window anymore...
    Do you have any suggestions?

  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Tanja, Do you mean that when you select a text item from the listbox, the text doesn't show up in the text editor box? Perhaps you turned off the 'auto fetch' checkbox (the checkbox beside the Fetch button) or don't have the 'Edit Text' checkbox enabled?

    There are times when you wouldn't want the text to update when you choose a different list item, such as wanting to replace the text with the current contents of the text editor (i.e. you don't want the text editor contents to be replaced when you select a different text item), so this is why there's the option to turn off 'auto fetch', in which case you can still populate the text editor with the new item by clicking the fetch button.

    Unless of course it has never worked for you in Windows 8.1? In which case it could be a bug.
  • Brad ChildsBrad Childs
    Hi, Paul, I'm wondering if you have a business pricing option available? I work for a company that has about 50 designers and we're looking into using scripts like yours to quicken our process. 

    Also, I noticed in After Effects CC 2015 that scrolling on the drop down menus doesn't work and the sort by font feature at the far right shows up in CC 2014, but not CC 2015. Is there an update coming that can fix those issues? Thanks!
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Brad, Yes we do generally offer bigger discounts for bulk purchases. If you'd like to open a support ticket we can discuss it there. I wasn't aware of those issues in CC 2015 but I will look into it. Thanks for letting me know.
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Brad, I'm not seeing the issues you reported with CC 2015. Let me know what OS you're running on and if launching through the Window or Scripts menu. If you open a support ticket you could post screenshots to show the issues.
  • Felipe Ruiz MendozaFelipe Ruiz Mendoza
    I'm getting "Unable to execute script at line 1. null is not an object" when opening pt TextEdit...
    I've used the script before, but it's been a while, and it's not working. I'm on CC15... and already tried 14. No worki...
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Felipe, Please open a support ticket about this as I'll probably need to get some more information off you. Are you running the latest version? Paul
  • MATT DELOACHMATT DELOACH
    This script is absolutely invaluable and saves an incredible amount of time. Can't thank you enough!
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Matt, Thanks for your message. It's always good to hear from a happy user!
  • Paul RoperPaul Roper
    Hello Paul,
    A couple of things:
    • I'm running a pre-release version of After Effects and noticed that the options screen does not close if it's opened a second time - it just stays there until I quit AE. Maybe you want to have a quick work with Adobe?
    • An easy way to change missing fonts would be fantastic. I know I can do this manually with quite a few steps, but a button to find all layers containing missing fonts, then have the ability to select the missing font(s) and replace them with another font would be great. I go through this process quite a lot, where a project is handed to me from a Mac system, and my Windows fonts might have a slightly different name, so AE does not recognise them as the same thing. Maybe you could even launch this as a separate product? I'd buy it!
    Thanks,
    Paul
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Paul, I am aware of the 'non-closing help window' issue in recent versions of AE (on Windows only?) but haven't had a chance to really dig down and isolate the issue or find a workaround. Sorry about that. It is on my to do list though.

    I looked into tackling missing fonts quite some time back but didn't find a good solution. Since CC 2014 we do have a couple of new scripting commands that might help, but it seems like at best it will produce an unreliable form of detection. I'll certainly take another look at it when I can.

    Recent versions of AE do have some features in this respect. Searching for 'missing fonts' in the project panel will show all comps with missing fonts. Searching in the timeline will show all layers. Once you've identified the fonts it's pretty easy to use TextEdit to replace them, but I realise searching each comp like this is tedious.

    If you're interested, you could contact me through a support ticket and we could have an ongoing conversation about this.


  • Eric StaswickEric Staswick
    In cc2017, no ability to scroll in the dropdown menus. Crippling. 
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Eric, Can you tell me which OS version you're having this issue on? I've been looking into it but it's working fine for me. If you can open a support ticket and attach a screenshot of what you're seeing that would be very helpful.
  • Michel BENSADOUNMichel BENSADOUN
    Thanks for excellent product, 
    Installation OK in Script Uipanel !
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hey Michel, Glad to hear you got it working!
  • Aaron LyonAaron Lyon
    Whoops. Just crossposted for another plugin!

  • Joseph RevelloJoseph Revello
    I am experiencing some issues in CC2017.  I realize CC2017 is not listed under the compatibility tab so these are just questions regarding the windows version.  Besides the 'non closing help window' which you are aware of, the only time I get search results to reveal all text layers or a specific text string is when I set the search to "all comps".  I can't get it to work when I search the "project selection" or the "current comp" with one exception.  It does find text layers if I open the nested comp and reveal all layers.  Searching the "current comp" issue may just be my misunderstanding.  I assumed it would look through the "current comp" if it is a nested comp or any nested comps inside the current composition.  Please advise and thanks for an extremely useful program.  I do love having this ability.
  • Paul TuersleyPaul Tuersley
    Hi Joseph,
    'current comp' just searches in the currently open and active comp, not any precomps nested inside it. 'project selection' will search any comps that have been selected in the project panel. If this isn't the behaviour you're seeing then please open a support ticket so we can investigate further.
    Or if you'd like to request a new feature like 'search current and nested comps' then let me know that too.
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