Working with Photoshop and After Effects

Working with Photoshop and After Effects

If you use Photoshop to create still images, you can use After Effects to bring those still images together and make them move and change. In
After Effects, you can animate an entire Photoshop image or any of its layers. You can even animate individual properties of Photoshop images,
such as the properties of a layer style. If you use After Effects to create movies, you can use Photoshop to refine the individual frames of those
movies.
Comparative advantages for specific tasks
The strengths of After Effects are in its animation and automation features. This means that After Effects excels at tasks that can be automated
from one frame to another. For example, you can use the motion tracking features of After Effects to track the motion of a microphone boom, and
then automatically apply that same motion to a stroke made with the Clone Stamp tool. In this manner, you can remove the microphone from
every frame of a shot, without having to paint the microphone out by hand on each frame.
In contrast, Photoshop has excellent tools for painting and drawing.
Deciding which application to use for painting depends on the task. Paint strokes in Photoshop directly affect the pixels of the layer. Paint strokes
in After Effects are elements of an effect, each of which can be turned on or off or modified at any time. If you want to have complete control of
each paint stroke after you’ve applied it, or if you want to animate the paint strokes themselves, use the After Effects paint tools. If the purpose of
applying a paint stroke is to permanently modify a still image, use the Photoshop paint tools. If you are applying several paint strokes by hand to
get rid of dust, consider using the Photoshop paint tools.
The animation and video features in Photoshop Extended include simple keyframe-based animation. After Effects uses a similar interface, though
the breadth and flexibility of its animation features are far greater.
3D objects, 3D models, and 3D images
In general, After Effects 3D functionality is limited to the manipulation of two-dimensional layers in three dimensions. Photoshop, however, can
manipulate complete 3D models and output two-dimensional composites and cross-sections of these 3D models from any angle. After Effects can
import and render 3D object layers from PSD files. You can set a layer based on a PSD 3D object layer to honor the active camera in an After
Effects composition. When the camera moves around such a layer, it views the 3D object from various angles.
To see a video tutorial about using 3D object layers from Photoshop in After Effects, see the Adobe website.
After Effects can also automatically create 3D layers to mimic the planes created by the Photoshop Vanishing Point feature.


To see video tutorials about using Vanishing Point data from Photoshop in After Effects, see the Adobe website:
Working with Vanishing Point in Photoshop and After Effects
Using Vanishing Point to map a 3D environment
Exchanging still images
After Effects can import and export still images in many formats, but you will usually want to use the native Photoshop PSD format when
transferring individual frames or still image sequences between After Effects and Photoshop.
When importing or exporting a PSD file, After Effects can preserve individual layers, masks, layer styles, and most other attributes. When you
import a PSD file into After Effects, you can choose whether to import it as a flattened image or as a composition with its layers separate and
intact.
It is often a good idea to prepare a still image in Photoshop before importing it into After Effects. Examples of such preparation include correcting
color, scaling, and cropping. It is often better for you to do something once to the source image in Photoshop than to have After Effects perform
the same operation many times per second as it renders each frame for previews or final output.
By creating your new PSD document from the Photoshop New File dialog box with a Film & Video preset, you can start with a document that is set
up correctly for a specific video output type. If you are already working in After Effects, you can create a new PSD document that matches your
composition and project settings by choosing File > New > Adobe Photoshop File.
Exchanging movies
You can also exchange video files, such as QuickTime movies, between Photoshop and After Effects. When you open a movie in Photoshop, a
video layer is created that refers to the source footage file. Video layers allow you to paint nondestructively on the movie’s frames, much as After
Effects works with layers with movies as their sources. When you save a PSD file with a video layer, you save the edits that you made to the video
layer, not edits to the source footage itself.
You can also render a movie directly from Photoshop. For example, you can create a QuickTime movie from Photoshop that can then be imported
into After Effects.
Color
After Effects works internally with colors in an RGB (red, green, blue) color space. Though After Effects can convert CMYK images to RGB, you
should do video and animation work in Photoshop in RGB.
If relevant for your final output, it is better to ensure that the colors in your image are broadcast-safe in Photoshop before you import the image into
After Effects. A good way to do this is to assign the appropriate destination color space—for example, SDTV (Rec. 601)—to the document in
Photoshop. After Effects performs color management according to color profiles embedded in documents, including imported PSD files.