Video Copilot

http://www.videocopilot.net/basic/

For a lot of my learning other than work I have done in class I have carefully followed the 10 videocopilot.net basic training tutorial videos. They have been very helpful indeed, they are very easy to follow and are full of useful information. I have made notes for all of the tutorial videos, and have made relevant pictures and/or video clips to demonstrate what I have learnt from them.

I won't write up the first two tutorials because the first is just an introduction and the second has things I have already covered is in this blog. The way I work is to make notes on paper while I watch the video of any information I think will be useful and then sometimes I try to use what I have just learnt straight away on a video or picture or I just keep the notes to help me later. I then write the notes up on here at a later stage because it is neater and less easy to lose and more easy to use, it also means I can make this blog my log book so I can print it off and hand it in with my assignment.

3. Animation

• Anchor point = Pivot point for layer (for all transformations). Use pan behind tool (Y) to change anchor point.
• Hold shift when changing position of the point, to move in a straight line.
• When setting work area - B sets to beginning N sets to End.
• F9 when a key frame selected to bezier key frame, which smooths the transition between key frames to make the animation look better/smoother.
• The motion blur effect works for most transformation properties and can be applied to a layer or globally (to all layers).
• Click and drag key frames to re-order them, click and drag last key frame to move all key frames simultaneously.
• Click the stop watch to get rid of key frames on that parameter. Click Reset to go back to default settings. You will lose your key frames this way, to get back, click Edit Undo (Ctrl + Z).
• Just like in other programs I am use to such as Blender, letters on the keyboard represent Transformation Parameters, for example S is for scale, this also saves workspace to just bring up one parameter to change rather than all of them.
• Pressing U brings up all parameters that have key frames applied to them, so basically just the properties you are working with, this is very useful!
• Double press U (U,U) brings up any edited parameters.
• Click and drag the Pick Whip (parenting spiral) to layers to parent one to another so when you change the parent parameter the parented parameter will follow suit.
• Layer> New > Adjustment layer. Adjustment layer will effect all of the layers underneath it in the composition window. This is useful to apply one effect to many layers. Effect > Colour Correction > Curves, lower opacity so less intense effect.