1-2-1 online training

1-2-1 online training

COVID 19 Update

All bespoke 1-2-1 training courses to be taught remotely till further notice

During the current situation with coronavirus we have decided to provide all of our courses via secure online educational conferencing software till the situation is resolved. We hope to return to classroom training before long. But meanwhile we’ll run our courses using Adobe Connect software which is secure, extremely user-friendly and stable.

How will this training work?

Once your booking has been confirmed, you will receive an email from us inviting you to an Adobe Connect meeting. In order to commence the training you need only click on the link at the time and date specified to join the session. If you’d like to try out an Adobe Connect demo, please use this link.

We will be there waiting for you, ready to provide you with bespoke 1-2-1 training on your preferred application.

Easy to set up

It’s really easy to use Adobe connect.
All you need are the following;

  • A computer or laptop with the relevant software (either Mac and Windows – both are fine)
  • An integrated video camera (or an external one)
  • An integrated microphone
    Headphones or earphones that you can use on your computer
  • A reasonably fast, reliable internet connection (hard-wired ethernet is faster than wireless)
  • For the best experience we recommend a large monitor of 21″ or more. Smaller screens work almost as well but you may need to zoom in and out a bit more on those.
  • You should download Adobe Connect software before the your training commences. This will allow you to test your connection and computer before the training day.

So you see, it’s easy to carry out our bespoke training courses online. You can book by the hour – making it easier to fit around your busy schedule.

Images by janjf93 and Coffee Bean from Pixabay

Opus | Animation

Opus | Animation

Our senior trainer, Angie Taylor is a working animator, illustrator and motion graphic designer.

“it’s important for me to keep working at my day job – as well as being a training provider. About 50% of my work is training but I still take on a few creative jobs each year in order to test my skills and to develop new techniques. “

This animation was commisioned by Bright Marbles – a Silicon Valley company with an intruiging product, Opus. Opus is a product that uses artificial intellegence to help inventors to articulate and develop their products and ideas. Its a very difficult product to explain as it is quite unique.

“The company were looking for a new way to communicate the benefits of their product. They had previously used video of people talking about the product but felt that this was dull and did not get the concept of the product.

I directed and managed the project. I wanted a style of artwork that was loose, imaginative and humorous. So I decided to collaborate with illustrator, Belle Mellor on this project. I’ve worked with Belle before and I love the loose, freedom, humour and inventiveness of her work.

Together we brainstormed a few ideas, both sketching out a few core concepts. We then developed a script and storyboard based on the ideas becoming characters on a journey through a pipeline. Opus being the heroic, angelic character that helped the ideas on their journey from conception to final product production.

The first stage involved cleaning up the hand drawn images and splitting them into layers in Photoshop. Working out the correct scale of the images was an important factor. When you work in 3D, you tend to zoom in and out of the images. I had to ensure that all line work would look equal during the animation. It’s also important to remove any marks and backgrounds before animation takes place. I used Select and Mask and the Content-aware tools to adapt the drawings for this.

“I used Select & Mask in Photoshop to clean the layers, ready for animation in After Effects.”

I built a 3D pipeline in MasterpieceVR, using my trusty HTC Vive headset. I created the entire project on my Gigabyte Aero laptop. It’s a powerful beast with an on board NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1070 which coped admirably with all the VR and 3D rendering I threw at it.

This was all imported into Cinema 4D where I used the Sketch and Toon features to match Belle’s hand-drawn look & feel. I then imported the Cinema 4D file into After Effects via the Cineware plugin. In After Effects I composited Belle’s drawings and 2D stop-frame animations into the 3D scene. I also added some of my own animations here, animating some of the characters using the Rubberhose scripts and taking advantage of After Effects new Master properties to help make the complicated structure easier to manage. There’s a tutorial on Master Properties in my course about Rubberhose animation in After Effects here.

I then brought in musician, Lucy Edwards to help with the music. Together we came up with a humourous melody. Lucy played all the parts on my Roland W30 keyboard. I edited and produced it in Apple’s Garageband. I then added a few sound effects in Adobe Audition. I edited the Audio and the Sound effects to the animation in Adobe Premiere Pro. I found that the the Auto-ducking features to make this process failry quick and easy. The final voiceover was added at this satge so that it fitted the animation perfectly.”

You can find out more about Opus – the revolutionary IP Virtual Assistant here.

If you want to learn how to do any of the things mentioned in this article you can book Angie for one-to-one training at Creative Cabin. We run bespoke courses for all types of creative professionals. These courses can be booked at the Creative cabin studio, or can be done remotely via Adobe Connect.

After Effects training

After Effects training

After Effects Training

Our remote, online After Effects training courses are taught by motion graphics expert, Angie Taylor – a motion graphic designer, author and illustrator with 25 years industry experience. Choose from our standard two-day After Effects training courses – all taught on a 1-2-1 basis. Or pick and mix modules from below to make up your own bespoke course.

You can choose from Beginners, Intermediate or Advanced courses in Photoshop. Or, pick and mix modules  to make up your own bespoke course. We offer remote, online training for individuals and groups.

Customer Reviews

Want to hear what our customers think of our courses? You can read reviews about our training courses here.

What we cover in our After Effects training

There are four levels of After Effects training available as well as custom courses. You can find example outlines of these courses by clicking on these links. Each of these is a 2 day course

How does the training work?

Angie will send you an evaluation form that takes a few minutes to complete. This will give Angie an indication of the level of After Effects training you require. She will customise the course to fit your own personal needs. Evaluation form example

Your Instructor - Angie Taylor

All courses are taught by artist, Angie Taylor. Angie worked as a motion graphic designer for over 25 years.

She was a demo artist for Adobe and is an Adobe Community Professional. You can see examples of Angie's work here on her portfolio.

Angie is a lecturer at the Univeristy of Brighton. She has taught children and adults at several colleges, schools and universities.

Angie has several books & courses  published on design & animation.

fundamental-after-effects

Getting comfortable in After Effects
  • An overview of the After Effects interface
  • Making use of task focussed workspaces
  • Customising the application preferences
  • Project settings you need to know about
  • Creating composition settings presets
  • Useful, advanced composition settings
Importing Images into After Effects
  • Supported image types in After Effects
  • Working with Photoshop files in After Effects
  • Working with Illustrator files in After Effects
  • Importing or creating image sequences
Working with video footage in After Effects
  • Supported video formats in After Effects
  • How After Effects works with aspect ratios
  • Adjusting video frame rates and looping footage
  • Understanding video compression and codecs
  • Working with interlaced footage and field order
Timing and motion graphics
  • Importing Premiere Pro animatic via Dynamic Link
  • Adding comp or layer markers in After Effects
  • Making motion graphics dynamic with sound effects
  • Animating elements in time with music
Mastering the five transform properties
  • Rotation
  • Scale
  • Position
  • Anchor Point
  • Opacity
  • Working with 3D in a 2D environment
Applying Effects
  • Adding video effects layers (Blurs, Color correction etc)
  • Applying effects to solids (Generator effects)
  • Creating backgrounds (Fractal noise, patterns, textures)
  • Using Adjustment Layers to apply effects to multiple layers
  • Applying shadows and bevels with Layer Styles
  • Masking effects to isolated areas
Panels
  • Essential Graphics
  • Motion Sketch
  • Smoother
  • Wiggler
  • Mask interpolation
Previewing your work
  • Customising the Time control options
  • Setting up a disk cache (purging)
  • Composition panel options (fast previews, region of interest, resolution, draft options, masks, channels, view options)
  • Timeline controls (shortcuts, view area, zooming, navigating, panels)
Keyframe Assistants
  • When to use Easy Ease and when to use Continuous Bezier
  • Time-reversing keyframes and animations
  • Fixing acceleration issues with Exponential Scale.
  • Understanding keyframe interpolation
  • Auto orient rotation options.
2 day course

Intermediate After Effects

Color and channels
  • RGB, HLS and other color systems
  • Using RGB channels for color adjustment
  • Compositing images with alpha channels
  • Color spaces & color management in After Effects
Presets & Templates
  • Building a comprehensive preset library
  • Using Essential Graphics panel to create Templates
  • Working with Master Properties
Spatial Animation
  • Creating motion paths
  • Adding or removing path keyframes (drawing paths)
  • Four basic keyframe types (Linear, Auto Bezier, Continuous Bezier, Bezier)
  • Using Hold keyframes to animate sudden changes
  • Using Auto Orient to automatically rotate objects along paths.
  • Recording mouse movements with Motion Sketch
  • Creating randomness with the Wiggler
  • Physics (Balance, gravity, bounce etc)
  • Applying squash and stretch to animation
Temporal Animation
  • Adjusting timing in the Timeline (Keyframe interpolation, keyframe velocity)
  • Four basic keyframe types (Linear, Auto Bezier, Continuous Bezier, Bezier)
  • Viewing speed and value graphs in the graph editor
  • Roving Keyframes in time to even out speed changes
  • Retiming animations in the keyframe view (Alt-click and drag)
  • Matching keyframes between properties to avoid glitches (scale and position)
  • Creating overlapping actions
  • Going past the pose to create dynamism
  • Smoother
Shape Layers
  • Primitive vector shapes
  • Drawing custom vector shapes
  • Fills and strokes
  • Combining shapes
  • Shape operators
  • When to use multiple layers
  • Converting shapes from other applications
Text Layers
  • Character panel
  • Paragraph panel
  • Source text property
  • Arranging text along a path
  • adding text animator properties
  • The range selector
  • The wiggly selector
Working in the Layer Panel
  • Spotting Interlacing issues and other errors
  • Trimming footage in the Layer panel
  • Best practices for Ken Burns effects (Panning and Zooming)
  • Viewing effect paths and controls in the Layer panel
  • Working with multiple viewers
Grouping
  • Parenting
  • Nesting
  • Precomposing
  • Collapsing Transformations
  • Layer and render order
2 day course

Advanced After Effects - day 1

Expressions
  • Rotation linking
  • Working with 2D properties
  • Wiggle
  • Looping
  • Audio control
  • Expression controls
  • Rigging
Keying and Compositing
  • Using masks to isolate areas
  • Auto-tracing images and movies
  • Rotoscoping footage with the Rotobrush
  • Keying out green screen with the Keylight effect
  • Creating transparent keys with the Color Difference effect
  • Matte Correction technique
  • Auto-tracing movies or images
Working with the Graph Editor
  • Understanding the speed graph
  • Animating dimensions individually with the Value Graph
  • Tips tricks and techniques with the Graph editor
RGB images and channel effects
  • Blending modes
  • Mattes and Matte effects
  • Alpha channels
  • Channel effects
  • 32-bit/ linear workflows
Combining Effects
  • Procedural V’s non-procedural effects
  • Creating Fire/smoke/water with Turbulent Noise
  • Saving effect presets
  • Adding color to effects or layers
  • Distorting surfaces with turbulent displace
  • Effects that refer to other layers (Displacement maps etc)
Character Animation techniques
  • Forward Kinematic animation with layers
  • IK animation
  • Puppet Tool
  • Character Animator

Power User

Contact us for details

Advanced After Effects - day 2

3D 
  • 3D properties
  • Working with the 3D view menus
  • Navigating custom views with the Camera tools
  • Controlling the Axis modes
  • Cinema 4D Renderer
  • Extruding and bending layers
Cameras
  • Basic camera properties
  • Using the camera tools to adjust or animate the Active camera
  • Manually adjusting using position and point of Interest and orientation
  • Using nulls
  • Zoom
  • Depth of Field
  • Keyframing cameras
  • Auto-orient options
Lights
  • Basic Light properties
  • Light types
  • Material Options
  • Shadows
Cinema 4D Lite and Cineware
  • Importing a 3D object into your comp
  • Adjusting the render settings of cineware
  • Editing the file in Cineware
  • Cineware and After Effects cameras
  • Creating a new 3D object for your comp
  • Multipass compositing
Tracking
  • Masks
  • Layer Tracking
  • Camera Tracking
  • Mocha AE
  • Capturing camera moves from a GoPro
Rendering and Distribution
  • Image sequences versus movies
  • Adobe Media Encoder
  • The Render Queue
  • Render Settings
  • Output Modules
  • Templates
  • Watched folders
2 day course
After Effects training in Brighton

After Effects training in Brighton

Adobe After Effects with Angie Taylor

Please Contact Us to find out about Angie’s next After Effects course and book your place.

Here are some of the things you’ll learn

  • How to control timing and adjust values with the graph editor
  • Tips to help visual artists manually draw key frames in the Timeline
  • All the different interpolation types in After Effects
  • How to use the rules of animation to create compelling animation
  • How to demystify effects and make sense of them
  • How to convert vector artwork into animated shapes for infographics
  • Create 3D per-character animation directly in After Effects using the Cinema 4D Renderer
  • Build your own valuable library of custom presets and templates.

About your trainer

Angie Taylor is a motion graphic designer with 25 years experience in the film and TV industry. She’s a Lynda.com author and an Adobe Community Professional. Angie has presented seminars at conferences worldwide including After Effects World, Macworld, NAB, IBC, BVE, Reasonsto, Flash on the Beach and FMX. Angie has worked as a demo artist for Apple, Adobe and MAXON