aescripts + aeplugins

Herr Machbar

Hello,

nice try, and I bet it was a hell of a work to script this, but ... I'm not experiencing wonders, but with this script, creating write-on text is still elaborationg as before.
Sad thing that the AE-team at Adobe have never improved the use of Vector Text (Illustrator) and using them as Strokes and use the animator to accomplish work much easier than still masking out every singe character.
Even Apple Motion makes this task MUCH easier.

Laurence Yates

Hi Thomas,

I hear what you're saying - QuickDraw certainly isn't a text animation preset like the Typewriter preset or any of the cool Animography scripts that have surfaced at aescripts recently.  

What I have been mostly using it for, and what I developed the script for is revealing illustrations in a style not unlike the whiteboard animations at RSA Animate http://www.thersa.org/events/rsaanimate - a text block was just an easy example for demo purposes. Creating the masks is still done by hand (sadly even imported Illustrator line-work becomes outlined shapes) but the real time-saver is how QuickDraw sets the animation keyframes, and how relatively simple it is to tweak those timings and to reveal different segments in time to a voice-over track.

cheers,

Laurence.

Laurence Yates

This series of videos done for the Rental Tenancy Authority are a prime example of QuickDraw in production.

• Youtube Link: Starting a Tenancy
• Youtube Link: During a Tenancy
• Youtube Link: Ending a Tenancy

lital shahar

hello

i didn't understand : constant rasterize asterisk ticked - how i can change it?

lital shahar

do u have anoter tutorial aboat the quick draw?

i didn't anderstand the instruction' and your tutorial un u tube/

i want to use this script but didn't understand how.

thank u

Laurence Yates

Hi Lital,

Currently the only QuickDraw tutorial video I have made is the one in the video section - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrb0isLNj_M

Sounds like you're having trouble getting the Paint Effect to draw onto a layer that has the "constant rasterise" setting enabled.  As you are unable to disable this for text layers and shape layers, the best option is to precompose the layer and then draw/paint with the Paint Effect onto the precomp.

For vector artwork that you would like to have the "constant rasterise" asterisk checked, I recommend turning off "constant rasterise" while using the Paint Effect, then use the "Layer Matte" method to produce a Track Matte. You can then turn on "constant rasterise" again on the original layer, but not the Track Matte layer.  The Paint Effect will pixellate if you zoom-in too far, but this is only on the Track Matte layer, not the image you are revealing.

If you turn on "constant rasterise" on a layer with the Paint Effect applied, the Paint Effect becomes warped, so you won't be able to use the "Effect Matte" method in this instance.

I hope this has been helpful.

cheers,

Laurence.

Nik Ska

Hi, Laurence. A very useful script indeed. Though working with it for over 2 weeks, I've found a number of bottlenecks.

1. Allow script to remember last setting, it's annoying to set all values again every time I open AE.

2. It's not really convinent to hit "animate Strokes", then "Apply", then go to Buttons tab and then click Layer Matte. One button may do all of this.

3. Now it's impossible to create layer matte for multiple selected layers.

4. The script takes up too much space. That would be logical to move checkboxes down, so user would have only necessary buttons even when script is in in minimal mode.

5. I would gladly have an option to inherit layer's label color

Laurence Yates

Hi Nik,

I really appreciate you taking the time to provide feedback, and great to hear that it's been a helpful tool thus far.

The size of the palette is definitely something I need to slim down and putting the less-used stuff (like checkboxes) at the bottom so they are first to disappear on resizing the palette is a great idea. 

All of your suggestions sound like they would be great additions to QuickDraw. Just to clarify #2, are you suggesting a quick "JUST DO IT" button that sets the keyframes and layer matte in one go?  I like the sound of it ... it could probably go right at the top :-)

cheers,
Laurence.

Nik Ska

Hi, Laurence.

Unexpectedly I get a very strange  error message:

Unable to execute script at line 1. Unable to create temporary image file

What do you think is the reason for this?

Laurence Yates

Hi Nik,

A very strange error as the script doesn't perform any image manipulation.  After a quick search online, it looks like it could be the embedded QuickDraw logo which is a PNG image encoded to a base64 string.

I am in the middle of implementing a redesign of the layout and incorporating your other suggestions ... I think it could probably do without the logo - especially if it is causing issues!

Have you updated After Effects recently? (I know 12.1 was just released) It would be good to know what caused the error message after two months of smooth sailing.

Is the script completely broken, or was it a one-time error?

cheers,
Laurence.

Laurence Yates

Just to be safe, I have uploaded a new bug-fix version of QuickDraw with the embedded logo removed.  

Also did a quick switch around with the layout of the checkboxes so that they're at the bottom. It doesn't save your last used settings yet, but it's definitely coming.

Nik Ska

Hi, Laurence.

I think it was some platform-specific bug. after clean reinstall and upgrade to CC everything went back to normal.

PS. Please make the script remember last settings for stroke duration and overlap. It's won't take you more than 20 minutes, I'm working with your script almost every day now and found more or less satisfactory settings for my project but forced to input them every time.

Laurence Yates

QuickDraw v1.0.3 now remembers settings between sessions. Enjoy!

Nik Ska

One more trouble. Now with expressions. So the layer has an expression that moves it, the matte inherits expression AND parents to the original layer, thus making double movement. As long as you parent matte to the layer, you have to remove expressions for Position, Rotation and Scale, otherwise there is a mismatch between them.

You may test it with my expression, but it doesn't matter actually.

np = thisComp.layer("control").position;

tp = position;

shift = degreesToRadians(thisComp.layer("control").effect("shift")("Angle"));

l = length(sub(np,tp));

alpha = Math.atan((tp-np)[1]/(tp-np)[0])+shift;

X= l*Math.cos(alpha);

Y = l*Math.sin(alpha);

np+[X,Y]

Laurence Yates

Hi Nik,

I hadn't even considered that a layer might have any expressions applied before creating the write-on mask. Yet another improvement to add to the list! I will make sure this is part of the next release.  

Bruno Quintin

Hi,

panel problem, the GO buttons is hewn. I can see just a little toe. See the capture.

http://alturl.com/zbs2m

After Effects CC 12.2  - Win 7

Laurence Yates

Hi Bruno,

I haven't seen it render the panel like that before, but I have an idea what could be causing it. I'll post a patch this evening which should rectify this for you.

cheers,
Laurence.

Bruno Quintin

Thank you very much for your quick response.

I noticed that there was no picture in my Quick Draw panel (the logo Quick Draw). I downloaded all versions and I did not find this file, should be with QuickDraw.jsxbin.

Laurence Yates

Hi Bruno,

I had a customer report a problem with rendering the QuickDraw logo and I figured it was probably just taking up valuable screen real estate and so removed it. The logo was embedded in the script, so perhaps this was causing the issue.

I have been working on updating the layout of the panel, and have just recently decided that it really requires a full rewrite of the code. Since I'm updating the old panel tonight anyway (to help with the cropped buttons), I have added in some new features that were requested by Nik Ska (see previous comments).

The new panel is still a while off, but if you think it would help to make the panel identifiable I'll certainly consider including the logo in the new panel design.

Nik - if you're reading this, the one major thing I haven't included is processing multiple layers. It will definitely handle multiple layers in the major release of version 2.

Now, to upload version 1.0.4 ...

cheers,
Laurence.

Bruno Quintin

Thank you, this is perfect !

Bruno Quintin

I recorded a video tutorial in French, based on your excellent script ;-)

Thank you again for all !

https://partner.video2brain.com/after-effects/video-62155.htm

Laurence Yates

Thanks Bruno, that's great :-)

Jon Bonebrake

Laurence,

I love your script. Here's a project I created using it... It's the first "whiteboard" type of video I really tried, and I think I'm going to have lots of fun with it and your script helps a TON. 

Laurence Yates

Hey Jon,

That is an epic "whiteboard style" video! Thanks for posting. Great to hear that you're having fun with QuickDraw.

Looking forward to seeing more of these :-)

Cheers,
Laurence.

Sean Cawelti

Hi! Love this plugin. I'm using the latest version of After Effects and for some reason the plugin is not working. I have tried to reinstall and I can't get it to work. I am able to animate the keyframes and when I select to create a layer matte it looks like it works... however I can't see the animations work at all after I apply both the layer matt and the keyframes. Any ideas? Am I missing something? The plugin used to work perfectly for me so I am worried that it may be an error or compatibility issue?

Laurence Yates

Hi Sean,

As far as I can tell the QuickDraw plugin should still be working the same way with the latest version of After Effects - I just did a quick test to confirm. I'm just ruling out the obvious, but after you have applied the Track Matte are you viewing the animation in the Composition panel? In my test in a new project, after drawing the Paint in the Layers view panel I noticed that it doesn't automatically go back to the Comp view when the Track Matte is applied (which had me guessing for a second).

If it's not something simple like that (fingers crossed at my end), would you be able to describe your comp for me? Anything new with this one, like is the source layer parented to another layer or animated with expressions? 

While I'm just spitballing ideas, are you revealing black line-work over a black BG (sorry - another obvious one, but I'm just guessing at this stage).

Let me know how you get on.

cheers,

Laurence. 

Sean Cawelti

Hi Laurence, 

Unfortunately I can't get it to work at all. 

It seems to have stopped working for me for some odd reason. I have tried to make sure I am viewing the comp viewer and the image should show up just fine. It's just text with transparency layer. 

Here's a link to the file - https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/433483/The End Test folder.zip The animation is just a test to see if I can get it to work. Any help is appreciated! 

Sean 

Laurence Yates

Hi Sean,

I think I see where the problem lies. At some point your Paint settings changed from RGBA to RGB, so the strokes are not creating an alpha channel to be used as the Track Matte.

Quick fix for this is to twirl down to the Stroke Options for one of your Brush strokes and change it to RGBA. Then you can highlight "Channels" and Command+C to copy this property, which you should be able to then paste onto multiple strokes.

The preventative for next time is to make sure RGBA is selected in the Paint Panel before tracing the next one - but I should probably consider adding something that checks for this in V2.

Hope this helps.

cheers,

Laurence.

Sean Cawelti

Thanks Laurence! I knew it was something odd like that. Have no idea how it got changed. It works like a charm now. Thank you so much! 

Laurence Yates

Happy to help :-)

sharon palkowetz

Is there a way to link a graphic (like a digital hand) to make it look like it's drawing the lines?
With the "write-on" effect, it uses position, so it's easy to link the digital hand to the lines as they're being drawn,
but the write on effect, has issues of it's own (it's a series of dots which gets weird, AND it does a taper when i want the line to just 'end'".

Thanks!
Sharon

Josh Purple

Hi, Thank You for your time & help, and great tool !    

Pardon if I missed this, but when I use/create an animation with Quick Draw, & then send that AE file to a friend who does not have Quick Draw, -will they still get a working version of the animation (or would they get a missing plugin pop-up, 'X' over the frames, etc.) ?    Again, pardon, I'm a bit of newbie with AE.  I purchased the plugin & it's working great with AE CC 2017.  Thanks again, all my best ! 

Laurence Yates

Hi Josh,

Your After Effects project file can be opened without Quick Draw installed. Just the usual things to consider like collecting all files and making sure any fonts are available on the "other" computer.

cheers,

Laurence.

Josh Purple

Perfect !  Thank You Laurence!  

Mark Jobe

Just want to ask if there was ever a solution discovered to extract the position keyframes so that another layer (image of a hand holding a pen) could follow the path of the line being drawn on.

Just purchased Quick Draw. Such a huge timesaver. Thanks very much for taking the time to create it!

sharon palkowetz said:

Is there a way to link a graphic (like a digital hand) to make it look like it's drawing the lines?
With the "write-on" effect, it uses position, so it's easy to link the digital hand to the lines as they're being drawn,
but the write on effect, has issues of it's own (it's a series of dots which gets weird, AND it does a taper when i want the line to just 'end'".

Thanks!
Sharon

Laurence Yates

Hi Mark,

QuickDraw V2 is currently a work-in-progress ... or currently not in progress as these things happen. I got the path extraction working, but I haven't given it a thorough field-test. I'll have give it some attention, and it might be something I could release for beta testing to get the ball rolling again.

cheers,
Laurence.

Mark Jobe

Hi Lawrence,

Thanks for responding to my question. I'm working on a project at the moment where using your script has proven to be a massive timesaver (thanks again!) and being able to extract the path would be the final piece of the puzzle. I'd be happy to beta test how you managed to extract the path and report back to you with how it goes and any issues that I encountered.

cheers,

Mark

Laurence Yates

Hi Mark, I'll PM you.

Hardy Thorson

Hello Laurence, I'm going to pick up your script soon, maybe even today, I just had one question before I do so. Will the brush stroke effect look as good as it does in your video if we use something like a trackball instead of a Wacom tablet? I have an older Wacom tablet at home, but it's a pain to lug around with me and I'm not always at home to be able to use it. I always use a trackball at home and on the go. I didn't watch the whole video, so if you've implemented something into the script that will help make the process better when people don't have access to a Wacom tablet that would be great. Thanks!

Laurence Yates

Hello Hardy,

The only thing you will miss out on is the pressure-sensitive line thickness available with the After Effects Paint effect. I find this useful for navigating intersecting lines with characters like 't' and 'f', but usually the text reveal is too fast to notice this anyway.

If you are confident in tracing artwork and text using the trackball, the keyframing and timing benefits of the QuickDraw script will be the same. I find the tablet to be faster than the mouse or trackpad, and a Cintiq even faster for this kind of tracing job, but the script will treat your Paint strokes the same regardless of how you make them.

As a side note, I have found that the pressure sensitivity in After Effects (on Mac OS) doesn't seem to work properly with Wacom drivers newer than 6.3.15-3. I either have to turn off pressure sensitivity or roll back the driver version otherwise all strokes are drawn at 0px width.

Hope this helps.

cheers,

Laurence.

Nathan Meenen

Hi Laurence,

I make long, whiteboard-style animations, and QuickDraw is a crucial part of my workflow, thank you!  

Question: Maybe I'm barking up the wrong tree here, but it would save me hours upon hours, if not full-on days over time if I could simply assign shortcut keys to the "In" "Out" and "Go" buttons in your plugin.  (Extra credit for the "Selected strokes only" toggle.  I would be in heaven if I could assign them to the F1-F3 keys, or anything really.  

Maybe you (or a reader here) can send me in the right direction?  So far I haven't had any luck finding a script that lets me assign shortcut keys to buttons within a script.  Any thoughts/solutions?

Thanks!

Nate

Laurence Yates

Hi Nate,

Great to hear that QuickDraw has been useful :-)

I have made it a New Years resolution to finish (and release) a QuickDraw v2. Now that I've posted that, I guess I'm committed to it!

I drafted a v2 a couple of years ago but I wasn't happy with it, and I'm currently rewriting it to be compatible with Adobe CEP panels (ie. an Adobe Extension rather than ScriptUI panel).

I will double-check, but I believe that keyboard shortcuts are only available to panels when they are highlighted / in-focus. One feature that I have implemented is that the In and Out markers for measured-strokes are determined by the render range instead of setting timecode fields, so this would give you the B and N shortcut keys. This should speed things along, even if you have to click in the panel to then set the keyframes.

If another developer happens to be reading this and has some suggestions regarding keyboard shortcuts, now would be the perfect time for me to implement them.

Cheers for the feedback, and good to know that "Selected Strokes" is useful (I'll keep it in!).

Laurence.

Nathan Meenen

Laurence,

Thanks so much for your quick reply!  Here's looking forward to v2 of QuickDraw!  

To follow up, I'm working with a ridiculous amount of In & Out points that I fiddle with a lot in order to make an illustrations' reveal look just right.  I discovered AutoHotKey does exactly what I need in creating a keyboard shortcut that will click those buttons.  The only drawback is needing to keep the IN, OUT, GO buttons in the same place on the screen (which is no big deal, using a post-it on the side of my monitor to mark the location).

If anyone else out there wants to assign shortcut keys that will click an X, Y mouse coordinate on their screen, download AutoHotKey and put in the script that Met posts on this forum:  https://autohotkey.com/board/topic/89133-keystroke-to-click-position-on-screen/

I now have the F1-F4 keys assigned to the IN, OUT, GO and 'Selected Strokes Only' buttons.

...And it's a huge time saver..... like QuickDraw. 

Cheers,

Nate

Laurence Yates

Hello Eimantas,

Attaching a layer to look like a hand is drawing the lines is not currently supported by QuickDraw

Walt Miller

Hi. Is QuickDraw V2 still in the works?

Laurence Yates

Walt Miller said:

Hi. Is QuickDraw V2 still in the works?

Hi Walt,

I'm reading back over this discussion thread and I see such enthusiasm and confidence in my replies early 2019. QuickDraw v2 is still in the works, despite missing the New Years resolution deadline. I'm using the panel on active projects and have a list of bugs/tweaks to apply before it is released. 

They say the last 10% is always the hardest but who could have predicted just how hard this year would be? No excuses really, sorry for the delays, but yes it is definitely in the works.

Thanks for the prompt,

Laurence.

Robert Penczak

Hi - I've seen a few people ask about attaching / tracking a png to line up with the letters being written on. Any update on whether that will be incorporated into the next version? And will V2 be a paid upgrade or will we automatically receive that upgrade if purchasing now?   Thanks for any clarification and looks like a useful script. 

Jenny Conway

Total newbie question: I'm confused about the difference between Sequence & Stagger? I thought Sequence was back to back keyframes and Stagger was w overlapping. But I also see I can adjust Frame Staggering w Sequence, so I'm not sure how that compares to Stagger itself? Thanks!

Laurence Yates

Hi Jenny,

The panel can take a bit of getting used to in the beginning. 

The default settings create keyframes for each brush stroke 0 to 100% over 3 frames with no overlap or space between each brush stroke – so they run back to back.

Sequence will re-order the existing keyframes and apply an overlap so you can start the next stroke before the previous one finishes. You can also use a negative number to add padding.

Stagger offsets the first keyframe for each stroke by a set number of frames. So you could have each stroke start drawing on at 2-frame intervals. The main difference between Sequence and Stagger can best be seen if you have adjusted the durations of each stroke individually then run the Sequence or Stagger function.

For example, it's possible to select strokes and apply a different duration to their keyframes – so you might select short strokes and use only 3 frames, and then select longer strokes and use 10 frames each. You can then select them all and resequence or stagger the keyframes using offsets for the first frame or overlaps of the first and last (sorry this is getting a bit jumbled). Depends whether you want all strokes to animate one after the other, or maybe just start one after the other and finish based on their individual OUT keyframe.

I hope this helps.

Jenny Conway said:

Total newbie question: I'm confused about the difference between Sequence & Stagger? I thought Sequence was back to back keyframes and Stagger was w overlapping. But I also see I can adjust Frame Staggering w Sequence, so I'm not sure how that compares to Stagger itself? Thanks!

Jenny Conway

Thanks so much for the detail, Laurence! Makes sense- very helpful and will try it out, thanks for explaining!