Creating Motion Graphics with After Effects, 5th Edition

3 Basic Animation

Animating a layer’s transformations along with mastering motion paths

One of the most important skill sets in motion graphics is learning how to animate transformations: Anchor Point, Position, Scale, Rotation, and Opacity. Fortunately, many rules and techniques for creating transform keyframes can be applied to virtually all the other parameters throughout After Effects. And once you learn how to manipulate the handles of a 2D Bezier motion path, you can employ these same skills when using the Pen tool to create vector shapes for masks () and shape layers (Chapter 32).

In this chapter, we’ll concentrate on the basics, including tips for avoiding many common mistakes. You might be surprised to see how much can be done with just ...