After Effects CS5 First look

After Effects is the industry standard for motion graphics and compositing. It is used by video editors as well as motion graphics designers and compositors to create many of the cool graphics that you see in film and television today. No matter if you are using Mac or PC, After Effects is a staple in the workflow. We all know what CS4 brought to the table so with that said what can Adobe come up with to top that? A lot!

This time around, I’m very excited to adopt the new version of After Effects. This version of After Effects is loaded with killer new features that will have you salivating over the possibilities and lining up to get your upgrade. Let’s take a look at these new features and I will give you a rundown of what I think are the best of those new features. Here we go!

Native 64-bit application

This has to be the most important update to After Effects and one that has been on the “wishlist” for many for quite some time. With the newer cameras producing more HD video at higher bpc (bits per channel) the frame sizes are only getting larger and the 32 bit way had to change. We have all been in the position where we up against the limitations and sat by patiently (or impatiently in my case) while we had to wait while our larger projects re-rendered. Well with After Effects CS5 those limitations do not apply! As with the other programs in the suite (Photoshop) After Effects now has 64 bit capabilities and what that means to you is that your production capabilities just got a huge shot in the arm. With 64 bit comes the ability to use all of your computers RAM and not only part of it due to the limitations that the older versions gave you. Also, with the new found increase you will find dramatic increases when you are working on your high resolution projects!

A while back, Adobe announced that the next versions of the video products would be 64 bit only (This was so that people would avoid rushing out and getting new 32 bit systems). That’s right all the Production Premium apps are 64 bit. There is no longer support for 32 bit operating systems in CS5 video apps. All the windows users have to upgrade to 64 bit Operating systems to use CS5 (Mac users are already covered for some time now). The performance increase is worth it though.

Integrated memory management

When you have several Adobe Creative Suite 5 video applications installed in addition to After Effects CS5, you can coordinate RAM allocation for After Effects, Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe Encore, and Adobe Media Encoder, thanks to cross-component memory management. These memory settings may be accessed inside After Effects by choosing After Effects > Preferences > Memory & Multiprocessing (Mac OS) or Edit > Preferences > Memory & Multiprocessing (Windows). This allows you to make the most of your system resources without learning complex memory management settings.

Roto Brush

This is one that I know everyone will be excited about! We all have been in a position where we need to separate the foreground object from the background to use in a different project or scene. So what do we do? We jump in and rotoscope the project knowing that it is tedious and time consuming but a necessary evil to get the results we need right? Well yes, until now. The Roto Brush is going to floor you as it provides you with a fast, efficient solution for isolating theses foreground elements in new scenes that leaves you with an excellent initial matte for you to work from. Along with that comes the Refine Matte feature that helps clean up the edges around your objects better and faster than you ever could with the manual techniques we are all used to!
In action, this tool really works. You paint a selection, similar to the quick selection brush in Photoshop. After Effects detects the edges and creates a mask. The mask morphs with the shape of the object from frame to frame. It even does a good job where the foreground and background colors are similar. There are tools to tweak the mask. The edges are very smooth and realistic.

Mocha

It is more often than not that our projects require motion tracking and most of us experience the same challenges like tracking elements that partially go out of frame or include motion blur. Well you will be ecstatic to hear that mocha (included with AE CS5) has been significantly updated, making it easier than ever to handle even the most difficult tracking and stabilization tasks. Mocha now has the ability to apply motion tracking to the individual vertices of hand drawn masks that precisely trace an object’s outline. Motion-blurred or semitransparent areas are easily handled with new support for variable-width mask feathers. And like After Effects CS5, mocha for After Effects CS5 is now a native 64-bit application.

I Could Go On and On…

While I would love to go into all of the cool new features of After Effects CS5 in depth here I need to keep the article at a reasonable length. Here are some of the other features that I hope to go over in detail in the upcoming issues of Creative Studio Café.

AVC-Intra Support Plus Expanded RED Camera Support

Another great new feature is AVC-Intra. After Effects CS5 includes native support for the new AVC-Intra 50 and AVC-Intra 100 codecs, as well as expanded support for footage from RED cameras.

RED R3D File Support

If you are working with video and haven’t lived in a hole for the last few years, you will be aware of all the buzz surrounding the RAW empowered RED Cameras. After Effects CS5—like Adobe Premiere Pro CS5—provides full native support for RED R3D files, allowing you to import them directly without transcoding, rewrapping, or installing additional software. You can work with content in all common RED R3D file permutations, including 2K, 3K, 4K, 4K HD, 16x9, and 2x1, using a number of different frame rates.

Auto-keyframe Mode

After Effects CS5 now features an Auto-keyframe mode. When Auto-keyframe mode is on, modifying a property automatically turns on that property’s keyframe animation stopwatch, and adds a keyframe at the current time. This prevents you from working with a layer’s properties only to realize later that After Effects didn’t capture any of your changes.

Color Finesse 3 LE

After Effects CS5 includes the latest version of one of the most powerful color correction plug-ins available: Synthetic Aperture’s Color Finesse 3 LE. The latest release of this versatile tool introduces numerous refinements, including native support for 64-bit operating systems, providing you with new ways to perfect your images.

Color Look-Up Table Support

After Effects CS5 adds support for custom color look-up tables (LUTs) in the popular 3DL and CUBE file formats. This feature is the result of requests from artists using After Effects for high-end film-based workflows, where other tools are also being employed to treat the footage. LUTs exported by a color finishing system, for example, may now be loaded into After Effects CS5 to accurately simulate what the result would look like on a specific piece of footage or in a final composite.

Digieffects FreeForm

Digieffects FreeForm—included with After Effects for the first time in Creative Suite 5—vastly increases your 3D design options, allowing you to do more in After Effects without requiring a side trip into dedicated 3D software. This powerful plug-in allows you to bend or warp any layer in 3D space, using either a user-controllable mesh of points or another layer as a displacement map. FreeForm automatically responds to 3D cameras and lights in After Effects, making it easy to integrate the results of this effect into any 3D scene.

Wrapping up

Just a quick thanks for checking out the awesome new features of After Effects CS5. This release is by far one of the most exciting releases to date and one that is a must have upgrade for all of you After Effects users who want to step up your game.

About the Author

Bruce Bicknell is a video and animation specialist who is the founder of Digital Blue Productions. He has been an instructor on Adobes in-box training as well as published in Photoshop User, Layers Magazine, ATI Red, MacTribe and PhotoshopCAFE. His clients include Time Inc., DTCC, KW Media and has worked with magazines that include People, National Geographic, Adventure,
Photoshop User, and Layers magazines to name a few. Bruce is also an instructor at Sessions.edu teaching video and graphics courses.