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Animate text using built-in animation presets
Overview
Name of explainer: Animate text using built-in animation presets
Creative theme: Beginning Adobe After Effects
Software used : Adobe After Effects
User level: BEGINNER
This is explainer 2 of 5 in this series
This series includes:
- Tour the Adobe After Effects interface and create a new composition
- Animate text using built-in animation presets
- Animate text using keyframes and easy ease
- Add an expression to make the video flicker and animate a light flare
- Export the animated composition as an mp4 video
This series is also available as a FREE, short online course!*
If you’d prefer to work through this series in a short online course format, where you can track your progress and receive a PDF certificate of completion, it will be available from December 2024* on our sister site pixelsofcourse.
The Software
This series of explainers uses Adobe After Effects, an application designed for creating motion graphics:
After Effects is a PAID applications. A FREE trial is available, after which ongoing use will require an ongoing subscription. For the latest information and pricing, see Adobe’s current pricing information. If you’ve never used After Effects before, create a free account, download the trial and let’s get started!
What are motion graphics?
TV idents (like these classic idents from Channel 4 in the UK) are an example of motion graphics:
Animated movie and TV titles (like this example from the recent BBC series ‘Sherwood’) are motion graphics. This animated ‘Sherwood’ title text is similar to what we’ll create for a dystopian AI movie title sequence in this series.
Entire animations, like this amazing animated photo-movie are motion graphics…
…and we use After Effects to create the animations for the start of every video explainer:
How to generate video clips using LTX Studio
We used the online AI storyboarding tool LTX Studio to generate the short video clips for our trailer, including generating a soundtrack and voiceover. If you don’t have clips of your own this is a great way to create resources to fit your creative vision! Here are the main steps we followed in LTX Studio:
1: The LTX Studio dashboard shows options to start ‘with an idea’ or start ‘with a script’.
2: Enter the general ‘idea’ for the movie. We used an AI generated ‘voiceover’ from chatgpt as our idea prompt:
3: LTX Studio generates a storyboard with individual scenes and a thumbnail image for each. You can regenerate a scene by changing the prompt and shot-type at any time:
4: Select the shot editor tab at the top of the window to regenerate an individual video clip. Four candidates are generated to select between:
5: Add an appropriate soundtrack and a voiceover for the perfect cinematic experience!
6: Export the sequence of scenes as a single video file. The sequence is below (The audio was retimed in post to better match the duration of the sequence).
More motion graphics inspiration!
If you’re interested in the ‘story’ of motion graphics, here’s Adobe’s own introduction:
https://www.adobe.com/uk/creativecloud/animation/discover/motion-graphics.html
‘Best motion graphics in adverts 2024’:
https://www.yansmedia.com/blog/best-motion-graphics-ads-examples
More brilliant examples of motion graphics!
The animated trailer sequence at the end of this series
This is the movie trailer at the end of this explainer series. This is the FULL trailer which includes additional video clips (and a soundtrack) generated in LTX Studio (see section above). In this series we use After Effects to create the animated text sequence at the end of the trailer.
Screenshots taken from the start, middle and end of the title sequence. The movie title ‘Models’ zooms in over the video clip. As it comes to rest, the subtitle ‘Sentient Shadow’ flickers in below the main text:
The pre-requisities
This is a BEGINNER Adobe After Effects explainer series. After Effects is complex animation software and is not recommended for new computer users.
Why would I do this?
Motion graphics often incorporate text elements, and After Effects gives you the power to make that text move with only a few clicks! Exploring the built-in text animation presets is a great way to introduce the power of After Effects before going on to animate manually using keyframes.
Let’s do it!
Click the play icon to watch this explainer video. Subtitles are available – Click the settings cog at the bottom right for options. You can watch this video full-screen by clicking the full-screen icon at the bottom right.
Video Transcript
Here is the full transcript for explainer two above.
00:15
Welcome to you.
00:16
In this explainer, I’ll create a new text layer, add the movie title text to it, and display the video inside of this title text.
00:25
This video is part of a series, but it can be viewed on its own.
00:29
Currently, I have only one layer in my composition, the short video clip titled clip 5.
00:34
To add text to this composition, I’m going to need a new after effects text layer.
00:39
Right click in the timeline panel.
00:42
New.
00:43
Text.
00:44
An empty text layer is created above the existing clip layer.
00:48
As this is a text layer, the text tool is active in the toolbar and basic text properties are displayed on the right.
00:56
I’ll click centrally in my preview and enter the text models, which is the main title of the movie.
01:02
And, no, it’s not a sequel to the 1999 film of the same name.
01:07
Text can be edited, moved, and resized in just the same way as in most applications.
01:13
I can change the font, the size, and the alignment, etcetera, in the properties panel or by clicking the selection tool and working directly with the text in the preview window.
01:25
I’d like this text to be precisely centered horizontally in the composition.
01:29
To avoid guessing, I’ll click on the window menu and switch on the align panel.
01:36
From here, I can easily align the currently selected layer horizontally in the composition.
01:41
At the moment, I’m setting this text to be as I’d like it to look when it finishes zooming in and is at rest.
01:49
Next, I want the video clip to show through my text as though the text is a window.
01:53
Speaker 0
This technique’s very popular in movie and TV titles.
01:57
Here’s a recent example from the BBC’s Sherwood drama.
02:01
To the left of the timeline are the properties for each layer.
02:04
To start with, there’s this eye icon on the far left which toggles on and off the visibility of a single layer.
02:11
At the very base of this panel, click the button to toggle between switches and modes.
02:17
The fields here update to show the mode and the track matte for each layer.
02:21
The modes are blending modes.
02:23
In other words, how will the colors on the selected layer interact with colors on any layers below it?
02:29
You’ll recognize these options already if you’ve worked with layers before in almost any creative software.
02:36
This track match field lets me select the video clip layer, but only display the video content based on the colors of a specific other layer, which in this case is going to be my text.
02:47
I’ll select the model’s text layer like this, and the video now shows through the text.
02:52
It’s as easy as that.
02:54
Think of the white text as a window through which you want to look at the video, and it all makes sense.
02:59
Okay.
02:60
It’s time to animate the text.
03:02
After Effects includes 100 of built in effects and animations.
03:06
Before learning to manually animate, let’s have some fun with the built in text animations.
03:11
In the effects and presets panel here on the right, search for the word text then select the text folder.
03:18
Next, select the animate in category.
03:22
Make sure the playhead is at the point in the timeline where I want the animation to start.
03:27
I’ll select decode in and drag and drop the effect onto the text layer and play the composition to see how it looks.
03:35
As you start your after effects journey, the built in effects can be all you need.
03:40
Before continuing to the next explainer, try out some of the other built in text effects.
03:45
You can undo your last action using the keyboard shortcut control zed.
03:50
In the next explainer, I’m going to create a precise animated zoom for the movie title using keyframes.
Good to know
We’ve only scratched the surface with After Effect’s built-in text animations in this explainer. Be sure to try out some of the others before continuing on to the next explainer in this series!
There are lots of other text presets to try out in the ‘Animate In’ category:
If you’d like to try something more ‘fancy’, have a go at applying a preset from the ‘3D text’ category:
Here’s the text animating in using the ‘3D flutter in from left’ animation:
Where to next?
In the next explainer we’ll manually animate the main title text of the movie, ‘Models’, to zoom into place from ‘behind’ the camera.
Remember, this is part of a series of explainers – Join us again for the other explainers in the series 🙂
Notes and updates
There are no notes or advisories at this time. This video explainer was last updated in October 2024. This page was last updated in October 2024.
We at pixels.cool are not responsible for the content of any external webpages or software downloaded from third party sites. Any links are included in good faith at the time of writing. All explainer content is compiled in good faith using processes and methods used by the team. Modern software provides users with many ways to accomplish a task, and for reasons of clarity we choose not to refer to multiple options. All computer users must run up to date virus / security software at all times to minimise risks of data loss.
This is number 2 of 5 explainer videos in this series. Make sure you join us for the others!
