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    preparingfiles

    When working with After Effects It is very

    important to have a clear understanding of how it

    interacts with other applications. The two applica-

    tions which I use most often in conjunction with

    After Effects are Adobe Photoshop and Adobe

    Illustrator, the three applications work seamlessly

    together as long as you are aware of how to get

    the best from them.

    In this chapter we will focus on Adobe Photoshop.

    If you do not have a copy of Adobe Photoshop you

    can download a demo version from the Adobe

    website (http://www.adobe.com) that you caninstallfor these exercises. The demo version

    works in the same way as the full version except

    for the fact you cannot copy, paste or save your

    final image. There are saved versions of all the

    images we will be working on, in the Training

    folder that you can open later if you are using the

    demo version. If you havent done so already,

    install Photoshop now.

    1 Open Photoshop and then go to File > Open,

    (or hit Command + O) go to the Training > Source

    Images > Angie Images folder, and open Ideas.psd.

    This is a file that I have started to prepare for a

    television opening title, the program is called

    Great Ideas Of Our Time.

    The program is of a documentary style and the titles

    need to convey thought, visualization, inventions,

    ideas. The program will be broadcast in the late

    evening so the audience will be mainly adults.

    It is important, when creating a design for any

    medium, that you attempt to think through the

    viewers eyes, imagine what would inspire them.

    Originally trained as a fine artist, I was encouraged to

    explore my own thoughts and ideas and to create

    intensely personal pieces of artwork which would

    give the viewer an insight into my view of the uni-

    verse. Since becoming more interested in design, I

    have had to learn a new approach to creating artwork.

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    As a designer you must think about who is com-

    municating the message, you are being paid to

    communicate somebody elses ideas. Of course

    your own style will come through, it wouldnt beright if it didnt but you have to learn to sympa-

    thize with other individuals views of the same

    universe. In my opinion, this is the main difference

    between fine art and design.

    As well as considering the person who is commu-

    nicating the message e.g. The director and/or the

    producer, you must also consider the target

    audience, what age are they? What social group do

    they belong to? Its sometimes hard for a fine artist

    to switch to this way of thinking as there are a lot

    of rules and stereotypes to adhere to. It is impor-

    tant, however to learn these rules, once you have

    learned them and know how to control them, then

    you can break them in a controlled way, creating

    your own unique style.

    For this particular job, Ive chosen some images

    from my footage libraries. There are several very

    good footage libraries available now, details of

    some of my favorites are included on the CD-ROM.

    I have looked for images that will communicate my

    message clearly, the close up of the eye conveys

    thought and concentration, the lightbulb is an old,

    cliched symbol for inspiration or ideas. In the

    design world you have to remember that cliches

    are often considered as good things, unlike in fine

    art where a cliche is generally avoided for not

    being original or unique.

    You can see that I have used a template here, with

    preset guides, there are two folders in the CD >

    AE_templates folder which contain templates for

    both Photoshop and Illustrator in the common 4:3aspect ratios. The guides mark out the 5% action

    safe area and the 10% title safe area.

    Designers should always design for the lowest

    common denominator. In television design this

    means designing for people who still use old

    television sets. Because of the convex shape ofolder television sets, images can appear to distort

    near the edges. Often on these old sets more of

    the picture is cut off at the edge of the screen than

    on new flat screen televisions. These safe zones

    are there to ensure your design will stay within the

    live area of the screen. Any title within the title

    safe area will be easily readable. Any footage

    within the action safe area is guaranteed to be

    seen on a regular television set. There are also

    guides marking the central axes of the screen,

    very useful for positioning elements precisely.

    Adobe Photoshop is the industry standard image

    manipulation tool. It was originally designed for

    print work but more consideration is now given by

    the programmers to designers of screen based

    mediums and although Photoshop is not built

    specifically for this purpose, more and more

    people are using Photoshop for TV design. Ill

    show you some of my favorite features which

    work very nicely with After Effects.

    If you now look at the Layers palette, on the right

    hand side of your screen, you will see that this

    image is composited from several individual

    layers. Working with layers makes it easy for me to

    alter the design at any time.

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    2 Switch the layers visibility on and off, one at a

    time, by clicking the eye icons for each layer. To

    quickly switch them all back on again simply click

    and drag the mouse/pen over the eyes.

    3 Double click the type icon on the top

    layer named Ideas, this will select any

    existing text and make the Type tool active.

    Type remains live in Photoshop until you decide to

    render it as a regular layer. This means that you can

    alter settings such as tracking, leading, color, font size

    etc. all the way through your design process. You can

    tell when a text layer is still live, as it will have a text

    layer icon (pictured above) on it.

    At the top of the screen you should now see the Tool

    Options bar (pictured below). This options bar is

    context sensitive and changes according to which-

    ever tool is selected. With the Type tool selected, it

    contains some of the most commonly used type

    controls including ones for font, size and color.

    4 Click on the color swatch in the Tool Options

    bar and change the color to white.

    Because television screens use light to display

    images, the color tends to bleed a little from the

    edge of the letter forms, making them appear to be

    fatter than they actually are and visibly reducing the

    space between them. It is always a good idea, when

    designing text which is to be viewed on screen

    (especially light text on a dark background), to give

    it a little extra tracking. Tracking is a typographic

    term referring to the space between letters. Adjust-

    ing the tracking value alters the space equally

    between each letter in the word (or words) selected.

    5 To access the Tracking controls, click on the

    Palettes button in the tool options bar to open up

    the Character palette, this palette provides you

    with even more control over your type.

    6 Make sure all the letters are selected in the

    main window and then click once in the Tracking

    text field (circled below). Hit the Up and Down

    arrow keys on your keyboard to scale the Tracking

    up and down in increments of 20, make sure that

    the value ends on 110.

    Kerning is another typographic term, adjusting the

    Kerning value will alter spacing between individual

    letter pairs, allowing you to create a different

    amount of space between each of the letters. If you

    look at the text through half shut eyes, you will see

    that the E and the A are too close together when

    compared to the other letter pairs.

    7 Place the cursor so that it lies between the E

    and the A and then click once in the Kerning text

    field to make it active. Hit the Up arrow key

    repeatedly till the Kerning value reads 0.

    8 Use the Right and Left Arrows to move the

    insertion point between the letter pairs, checking

    the Kerning values as you go. Adjust them if you

    feel it is necessary, using the same technique.

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    9 Select the letter I and change the Font Size to

    186, then retype it as a lowercase letter i.

    10 Select the Move Tool (V) and then, in the mainwindow, click and drag the text to the same position

    as pictured in the diagram below. The left edge of the

    D should be up against the central, vertical axis.

    11 Hit the T key on the keyboard to select the Type

    tool again and then create a new layer by Alt-clicking

    on the New Layer button at the bottom of

    the Layer palette. Holding down the Alt key

    will bring up the New Layer dialog box

    where you can name your layer Great.

    12 Place the cursor so that it sits on the intersec-

    tion of the two central axis and click once to create a

    new line of text.

    13 In the Type Options bar, change the Font toArial, the Font Size to 41 and the color to white.

    Type in the word Great and then change the

    alignment to Right.

    14 Select the Move tool again (V) and then click

    and drag the text so that the left edge sits up

    against the central, vertical guide and then use this

    or the arrow keys on the keyboard to nudge yourtext into position, lying on the horizontal guide.

    15 Double click the Hand tool in the toolbar.

    Doing this will expand your view to the maximum

    display size possible for your monitor resolution.

    16 Double click the Zoom tool, this will resize

    your image to 100%, notice that the text is now

    much smoother and the image quality is much

    improved, it is always best to view your images at

    100% wherever possible. If the palettes are getting

    in your way you can toggle them on and off by

    hitting the Tab key. Shift + Tab key will hide all

    palettes but keep the Toolbar visible.

    17 Hit Command + R or go to View > Show Rulers

    if your rulers are not already showing. Notice that

    the rulers (as default) measure the image in

    centimeters.

    18 Go to Edit > Preferences > Units and Rulers.

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    19 In the Preferences dialog box, change the Units

    to Percent and notice, in your original image, that

    the guides have been placed exactly in the center of

    each axis using percentage measurements.

    20 Change the Units to pixels and then click OK.

    I find that I usually prefer to work in either pixels

    or percentages, depending on the situation.

    21 Go to File > Open and open up the file named

    Bits_bobs.psd from the Training > Source Images >

    Art Explosion folder. Make sure that you can see

    both images simultaneously. This is another image

    chosen from the 750,000 images which make up

    the Art Explosion collection.

    22 With the Move tool selected, click on the

    Bits_bobs.psd image and then hold down shift key

    whilst dragging it onto Ideas.psd, then release.

    Holding down the shift key will snap the new

    footage to the centre of the existing footage.

    23 Go to Window > Show Info to display the Info

    palette if it is not already showing.

    The Info Palette is an indispensable source of

    information for you. If you watch the Info palette

    whilst moving your cursor over the image, it will

    tell you the RGB value of each pixel plus its X and Y

    coordinates. You can change the display options for

    units and color values in the options pull out menu,

    you can even use the Info palette to preview color

    changes and log sampled colors for comparisons.

    The Info palette should be explored fully, see the

    online help menu for more details about it.

    24 Double click the Hand tool to optimize your

    work area again and then hit Command + T or go

    to Edit > Free Transform to bring up the Free

    Transform bounding box.

    The Free Transform tool allows you to use one

    bounding box for various different types of layer

    distortion. You can resize, rotate or reposition

    your layer, as well as alter its skew, distortion and

    perspective values, all by using one tool.

    25 Click and drag the left, middle handle of the

    bounding box towards the right. You can use the

    rulers for a guide, move to the 250 pixel mark on

    the top ruler. If you watch the Info palette as you

    drag it will give you a reading for the new size of

    your layer which should now read W:520, H:576.

    26 Double click inside the bounding box or hit

    Return to accept the Transformation. You should

    now be able to see the eye layer beneath.

    27 Go back to your Layers palette and look at the

    Blending Mode drop down menu which, at the

    moment readsNormal. Click and hold this menu to

    see its contents. You will see a list of blending

    modes, these modes determine how one layer

    blends with another layer when they are compos-

    ited together.

    28 Choose Difference from the menu and notice that

    the way that the layers combine has now changed.

    In its default mode (Normal) Photoshop will paint

    the top layers pixel color over the bottom layers

    pixel color, completely obscuring the underlying

    layers. Using any of the other blending modes will

    blend the layers together in different ways.

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    Difference mode looks at the two images and

    subtracts whichever are the brighter pixels from

    the darker pixels, regardless of which layer is on

    top, the resulting effect is similar to that of aphotographic negative.

    You can find out more about the various layer

    modes in the Technical.pdf document in the CD >

    Extras folder. Theres also plenty of information

    regarding these modes in the online help system.

    29 With the Ideas.psd image active, look in the

    Layers palette you will see an Opacity slider next to

    the Blending modes drop down menu, this effects

    the opacity for each individual layer. With the new

    layer still selected move this slider down to 35%.

    30 Alt + double click the layer to bring up the

    Layer Options dialog box and type in Bits & Bobs

    as the new name for the layer.

    31 Still in the Layer palette, click and drag the

    Bits and bobs layer down till it sits directly above

    the Eyemask layer.

    Well now use a layer mask to gradually fade the

    layer into the Eyemask layer. Notice that the

    Eyemask layer already has a layer mask attached

    to it. A layer mask is a matte which uses grayscale

    pixel information to determine which areas of an

    image are opaque and which are transparent.

    White areas will be made transparent and will

    allow the image underneath to show; black areas

    will be opaque and will obscure the underlying

    images; 50% gray areas will be 50% transparent.

    The nice thing about working with Layer masks isthat the changes you make are always reversible.

    Rather than erasing part of an image, by using a

    layer mask to remove parts of the image, you will

    still have your original image intact, in case the

    image needs to be altered at a later date.

    32 Click on the New Layer Mask button

    at the bottom of the Layers palette, this

    will create a completely white layer mask, allowing

    the whole image to show through, nothing willappear to have changed at this point but by

    painting directly into the layer mask we can

    determine the transparent areas.

    33 Hit the G key to bring up the Gradient tool

    (this may be hidden behind the Paint Bucket tool).

    34 In the Gradient tool options bar, make sure

    you have the default black and white gradient

    selected and then uncheck theReverse checkbox.

    35 Click and drag from the bottom left of the

    letter i in ideas to the point where the key hits

    the action safe guide and then release the mouse.

    If you are not happy with the results you can undo

    the last stage by hitting Command + Z. The end

    result should look similar to the one pictured in

    the diagram below.

    Notice that the Layer Mask is now filled with a

    gradient. If you solo this layer youll see that the

    areas that are 100% black are transparent and thatthe areas that are white are opaque. If you want to,

    you can adjust the opacity of the layer to make

    this more obvious but make sure that you finish

    with the opacity back at 35% and all layers visible.

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    Adjustment layers

    OK, lets take a look at Adjustment Layers. Adjustment

    Layers carry color or tonal changes for a layer (or

    layers) without affecting the layer itself. Think of it asplacing a filter over the layer which will apply the

    settings you specify.

    Adjustment layers will affect any layers situated

    underneath them in the Layer palette. You can also

    choose to apply them to single layers by creating

    Clipping Groups. As well as leaving your original

    image unaltered, Adjustment Layers have the added

    bonus of applying adjustments globally, apply the

    changes to one adjustment layer and it will affect all

    the layers in your image without having to merge the

    layers together.

    1 In the Layer palette, click on the New

    Fill or Adjustment Layer button and

    choose Hue/Saturation from the

    drop down menu.

    2 The usual Hue/Saturation dialog box will appear.

    Bring the Hue slider down to 180 and the Saturation

    slider up to +30 and then click OK.

    3 Notice that all layers under the adjustment layer

    have a blue hue applied to them. Try toggling the

    Hue/Saturation layer on and off to see for yourself

    that the adjustment is carried on a separate layer

    from your other layers.

    4 Click and drag the Adjustment Layer above the

    Bulb layer so that it also affects it. The bulb will also

    turn blue.

    You can also select areas of your image to apply

    Adjustment layers to in the same way as you wouldcreate a layer mask, by painting on with grayscale

    information.

    5 Hit the G key to select the Gradient tool again. In

    the Gradient tool options bar, select the Radial

    gradient tool and make sure that the Reverse

    checkbox is unchecked.

    6 With the Hue/Saturation layer still selected,

    click and drag from the centre of the eye (the pupil)

    to the title safe guide to the left of the eye.

    If you look in the Layers palette at the Adjustment

    layer you will see that you have created a white

    radial gradient on a black background. If you look

    at your image you will see that only the eye is now

    affected by the Adjustment layer. As well as using

    the Gradient tool to define areas, you can also

    paint areas onto the mask by hand.

    7 Hit the B key on the keyboard to bring up the

    Brush tool. From the Brushes palette, select a

    large feathered brush (second row, far right).

    8 Make sure that you have white selected as

    your foreground color by hitting the D key on the

    keyboard to select default colors.

    9 Begin to paint around the lightbulb, notice

    that as you paint it changes to blue rather than

    painting on solid white, this is because the white

    is revealing the Adjustment layer.

    10 Lets take a closer look at this Layer Mask.

    Click on the Channels tab in the Layers palette.

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    When designing for broadcast you will work in

    RGB mode. There is more information about

    mattes and channels in the Technical.pdf in the CD

    > Extras folder but basically;

    RGB images are made up from three, eight bit,

    grayscale images, called channels. Each image

    consists of a red channel, a green channel and a

    blue channel.

    Each grayscale channel determines how much of

    each color will be used in the final image. Where

    there is white, the color will show at 100%. Where

    there is black, there will be none of the color.

    Where the image is 50% grey, there will be 50% of

    the color. When these three grayscale channels

    are blended together they make up a full color

    image.

    11 Switch off visibility for the Green and Blue

    channels so that only the red channel is visible.

    As you can see it is just a grayscale image but it

    represents all of the red information for that

    image. Where the grayscale image is at its lightest

    there is a lot of red in the image, where it is black

    there is none.

    If you solo the Green and Blue channels you will

    see similar results. Notice that with the blue

    channel soloed the eye is very dark, this is

    because there is very little blue in the eye.

    Interestingly in an RGB image, the red channel tends

    to contain most of the contrast information, the green

    contains most of the detail information and the blue

    channel contains most of the noise. This is usefulinformation when correcting images, if your image is

    noisy then either blur only the blue channel or

    substitute the blue channel with a copy of the green

    to remove noise without losing contrast and clarity.

    RGB colors are also known as additive colors. Each

    channel ranges from 0 (black) to 255 (white). When all

    three channels are at 255, pure white will be the

    product, hence the name additive colors. When all

    three channels have a value of 0, pure black will be

    the result.

    If you find it useful, you can also choose to have the

    individual channels displayed in their own color, this

    may help you to understand how the colors are

    mixed.

    12 To do this go to Edit > Preferences > Display and

    Cursors and check the box next to Color Channels in

    Colorand then click OK. Solo the individual channels

    again to see the difference. Try switching them on and

    off two at a time to see how the channels mix together.

    13 When you have finished looking at the color

    channels, go back to the Preferences and un-check

    the Color Channels to Color box and click OK.

    14 Switch the RGB channel back on so that you can

    see a full color image again.

    15 Switch visibility on for the Hue/Saturation layer.

    Youll now see your mask represented by a rubylith

    overlay.

    This works in a very similar way as working in Quick

    Mask mode. Painting with black will add to the mask,

    painting with white will take away from it. The

    rubylith represents the black area.

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    For anyone who hasnt used Quick Mask mode

    (shame on you!) you really should check it out in

    the online help system.

    This allows you to continue painting your mask

    whilst still being able to see the original layer

    underneath the best of both worlds!

    The term Rubylith comes from traditional

    photography. It was a semi transparent material

    which was painted onto negatives to mask away

    areas of the photograph.

    There is a fourth channel available to you when

    you save out certain file types in Photoshop.

    These files are 32-bit files and they contain one,

    extra 8-bit grayscale channel called an alpha

    channel.

    Think of an alpha channel as a matte which is

    embedded into your image. It contains information

    about which areas of an image you want to be

    transparent and which you want to be opaque.

    White represents opacity while black represents

    transparency. Fifty percent gray will be fifty

    percent transparent and so forth. Think of it as a

    way of selecting areas to be invisible without

    losing the original information.

    16 If you now switch off the RGB channel you will

    see your mask in solid black and white. By viewing

    the mask in this way, you can easily check for any

    holes in it.

    17 Use the Paintbrush to paint out any holes

    that exist in your mask. Hitting the X key on the

    keyboard will toggle between the foreground and

    background colours.

    18 Hit the O key to select the Dodge tool, drag

    this over the radial gradient you created for the

    eye to brighten up the mask and therefore,

    increase the effect of the adjustment layer.

    19 Switch the RGB channel back on and the

    Hue Saturation mask off for final adjustments to

    the mask.

    As well as using the tools to manipulate the Adjust-

    ment Layers, you can also use filters to change the

    way they look. After finishing this tutorial you can

    try experimenting with some of them.

    At any time you can go back to the Adjustment

    Layer to make changes to your settings, this is

    perfect for situations when you have an awkward

    client who keeps changing their mind about color

    schemes etc. (a very rare occurrence of course!)

    Adjustment Layers keep their settings live so you

    can go and change them at any time without losing

    the original image information. Imagine that a

    client has said to you;

    Mmm, not bad but could you just change this, this

    and this?

    after youve spent hours working out the perfect

    design solution, well its no problem if you use

    Adjustment Layers, Ill show you why . . .

    20 Go back to the Layer palette and

    double click the Hue/saturation icon on

    the Adjustment layer itself, doing this will

    open up the Hue Saturation dialog box

    again, notice that the settings have remained live.

    21 Change all of the sliders back to 0 to return

    your settings to their original position and

    then click OK.

    22 You can also add multiple Adjustment Layers

    to your image, go to Layer > New Adjustment

    Layer > Channel Mixer. Well use the Channelmixer to create a rich, grayscale image.

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    23 In the Channel Mixer dialog box check the

    checkbox next to the word Monochrome and then

    change the Red slider to +200%; the Green slider

    to 150% and the Blue slider to +100%. Click OKwhen you are finished.

    24 The order in which you place Adjustment

    Layers is very important too, double click the

    Hue/Saturation icon on the Hue/Saturation

    Adjustment Layer to open up its dialog box again.

    Click once on the Colorize checkbox at the bottom

    of the dialog box.

    25 Change the Hue to 250, Saturation to 50 and leave

    the Lightness at 0, hit Return to accept changes.

    The Adjustment doesnt seem to have much effect

    on the image but if you click and drag the Hue/

    Saturation layer so that it sits directly above the

    Channel Mixer layer, you will see that by changing

    the order of the layers you are changing how they

    affect each other. The Hue Saturation changes are

    now happening after the Channel Mixer has made

    the image monochrome.

    When using Adjustment Layers, adjustments will

    be applied from the bottom up. You can try

    toggling on and off visibility for the two Adjust-

    ment Layers to see the different combinations of

    effects that you can achieve by combining only

    two Adjustment Layers. Imagine the fun youd

    have with more than two!

    26 Click and drag the Channel Mixer Adjustment

    Layer down and on to the trash can icon at the

    bottom of the Layers palette, this will delete the layer.

    What if you want an Adjustment Layer to affect onlyone layer instead of all the layers beneath it? You

    can easily do this by creating a Clipping Group.

    Clipping Groups are most commonly used for

    displaying images through text or other shapes, you

    can use the bottom layer of an image as a sort of

    stencil (or mask) for the rest of the layers in thegroup. If you are unfamiliar with Clipping Groups and

    how to use them please look in the online help for

    more information. I am going to show you how to

    use Clipping Groups to change the way that

    Adjustment Layers work.

    27 Hold down the Alt key and move the cursor

    between the Hue/Saturation layer and the Bulb

    layer, the cursor will change to two overlapping

    circles, when it does this, click with your mouse or

    pen to create a clipping group containing these

    two layers. Now the Adjustment layer will only

    affect the Bulb layer.

    You can tell that it is now a Clipping Group by the

    little arrow on the Adjustment layer and the under-

    lined layer name for the Bulb layer. Notice that the

    lightbulb is still affected by the Adjustment layer but

    the Eye is not, this is because the eye is not in the

    same Clipping Group as the Adjustment Layer.

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    28 Switch the Clipping Group off again by

    Alt-clicking on the layers again.

    Ok, so youve made several changes to youroriginal file, youve altered the Hue/Saturation,

    Channel mixer as well as the order in which

    everything is applied.

    Remember the awkward client we spoke of earlier?

    Well, imagine he/she came back, after demanding

    that you make all of these alterations and said to

    you;

    Actually, I preferred it the way you had it in the

    first place.

    I dont know about you but in my experience this

    is the most common phrase used by clients in a

    tight deadline situation, if you are still a student,

    take this as a warning!

    29 Double click the Hue Saturation layer to open

    up its dialog box, notice again that all the settings

    are as they were last time you visited.

    30 Uncheck the Colorize checkbox and then put

    all the sliders back to 0 to quickly reset your

    image to its original settings.

    Why not just delete the Adjustment Layer? I hear

    you cry. Well, from past experience I have a funny

    feeling that client may change his/her mind again

    so its more flexible to keep the Adjustment Layer

    with its hand painted matte, just in case they

    change their mind again - you never know!

    Layer Styles

    OK, finally, lets take a look at Layer Styles. These

    are groups of Layer Effects which can be saved,

    copied and pasted from layer to layer. Theirsettings remain live, allowing you to make changes

    to the settings whenever necessary.

    1 Select the Ideas layer and then go to Layer >

    Layer Style > Bevel and Emboss.

    2 Change the Angle to 135; Depth to 4 and

    Soften value to 3. Make sure that the Use Global

    Light checkbox is checked.

    3 Click on the Drop Shadow section from the list

    on the left of the dialog box to bring up the Drop

    Shadow controls.

    4 Change the Drop Shadows Distance to 10,

    and Spread value to 6.

    Because you have the Global Light checkbox

    activated, the layer effects will use the same angle

    throughout, no need to change the angle again. If

    you wanted the shadow and the bevel to have

    different angles you would uncheck this box.

    5 Click OK to leave the Layer Style dialog box.

    6 Go to Layer > Layer Style > Copy Layer Style

    to copy all of the Layer Effects to the clipboard.

    7 Select the Greatlayer in the Layers palette

    and then go to Layer > Layer Style > Paste Layer

    Style to paste the same effect settings onto the

    other type layer.

    Layer effects are great because they remain live.

    When you apply an effect using the Filters menu it

    is destructive i.e. it alters the pixels in your image

    permanently.

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    To remove or change the filter settings using the

    Filters menu, you would have to go back to a

    previous state either by undoing the effect, using the

    History palette or Reverting the file to its originalstate. Using Layer Styles is a much more flexible way

    of working and saves you from having to save

    several different versions of the same image.

    8 Double click on the little f symbol on the Great

    layer to re-open the Effects dialg box. Notice that the

    settings have remained the same. Select the Bevel

    and Emboss effect. Change the Depth to 2 and the

    Soften value to 1 and then click OK.

    OK, so lets recap on what youve done here.

    Youve made color adjustments, added effects,

    added text, composited bits of images together

    and all of it remains live. Your original files are still

    there, unaltered if you should need to get back to

    them. To demonstrate the difference between live

    layers and rendered layers you will render one of

    the type layers.

    9 Select the Great layer and go to Layer>Rasterize

    > type. This will render the text as bitmap

    information on the layer, you will no longer be able

    to edit the type with the Type Tool dialog box.

    Notice that the T has disappeared from the layer.

    Although the type is no longer editable, the Layer

    effects still are.

    TIP: Before you render a type layer, create a

    duplicate of the file or the layer, you never know

    when you might want to go back and edit the text

    again. To create a duplicate of the file, go to Image >

    Duplicate. To create a duplicate of the layer, first

    select the layer, click on the little black triangle, on

    the right hand side of the Layers palette and fromthe pull out menu, choose Duplicate Layer.

    This file has been created using PAL resolution. For

    the After Effects exercise that follows in the Import

    Chapter we will save a smaller version.

    10 Go to the View menu and check that your

    guides are not locked (so that they stay in propor-

    tion to your image) and then go to Image > Image

    Size and type in 320 for the Width, making surefirst that the Constrain Proportions checkbox is

    checked. Click OK.

    Notice that resizing the image has changed the

    appearance of the bevel on the text. Dont worry

    about this for now, well take a look at how to fix

    this in the Import Chapter (starting on Page 65).

    TIP: Another way of resizing your image is to go

    to File > Automate > Fit Image and then type in a

    new size. Try using this method to save an NTSC

    version of your file.

    11 Go to File > Save as, save the file as

    Ideas320.psd to your own Creative After Effects

    > Extras folder. If you are working with the save

    disabled demo version of Photoshop, there is a

    version of this file saved for you in

    Training > Source Images > Angie Images.

    If you want to see how these Photoshop features

    are supported by After Effects go straight to the

    Import Chapter (starting on Page 65) of the book

    and follow the tutorials from there.