How to Use Adobe After Effects & Photoshop to Create the Line-Map Animation Effect (page 2)
Step 10
10 (Click to enlarge)The location of the Write-On varies, depending on your version, so find it by doing a quick search in the Effects & Presets field.
Step 11
Drag and drop this onto your Line layer.
Step 12
12 (Click to enlarge)Select the Mask Path by clicking on the Mask 1 beneath the Line layer.
Step 13
Copy and paste this layer into the Brush Position layer within the Write-On effect.
Step 14
14 (Click to enlarge)You should now see a series of key frames that correspond to the pen path you just drew.
Step 15
Set your brush size larger than your route line. For an animated reveal that closely follows the bends in your route, make it just a tad larger. If your Pen path is less precise, you may have to use a larger brush size. We used a setting of 20.
Step 16
Change the Paint Style to Reveal Original Image. This is located at the bottom of the Write-On options.
Step 17
17 (Click to enlarge)Depending on how much larger your map is than the NTSC preset, you may see only a portion of your image. Don't worry, we'll see it all in a moment. Now hit the RAM preview button to view what you have so far.
Step 18
18 (Click to enlarge)It is likely you will want to change the speed of your animated line. To do this, first highlight all of your key frames, then go into the graph edit mode and drag the group to the right to slow down your line or to the left to speed things up. We quickly lengthened the timing of our line from two to nine seconds with this method.
Step 19
Now for more fun, parent the line layer to the Map layer and, with the base layer now selected, let's zoom into and pan (scale and position) the map to where the line begins and create a key frame.
Step 20
20 (Click to enlarge)Drag the timeline cursor to the end of the animated line, pan the map to that point and create another key frame.
Step 21
21 (Click to enlarge)Analyze your movement and add additional key frames as necessary to track the tip of your travelling route as it meanders down the state.
Step 22
22 (Click to enlarge)To smooth out the movement further, adjust the Brush Position key frames left or right.
You now should have a simple animated line that closely follows your defined path. If you want to push this effect even further, look into modifying this base animation with the 3D effects that come packaged with After Effects.
Contributing editor Brian Peterson is a video production consultant, trainer and lecturer.
The Final Result
Click here to View the finished effect here.
