Simple Text for After Effects: Script overview

If you followed the articles I wrote about text animation and advanced text animations, you noticed that Simple Text is everywhere.

It’s a script I created to make text animation in After Effects more intuitive and faster.

Every technique I taught can be conducted without the script, but it saves a lot of time when integrated into your workflow.

GET TO KNOW SIMPLE TEXT

WHY A SCRIPT?

For some time, I’ve been creating After Effects templates like the Design and Motion Character Kit. I noticed that, if I wanted to take my projects to another level, I would have to venture into the universe of scripts.

It’s a whole new world for me, and the experience of learning how to create a script from scratch, without being a programmer, has been mesmerizing. Much more interesting than I imagined.

As simple as it may sound, a script can make ideas accessible to a larger number of people, as it makes complex solutions in After Effects applicable just by clicking a button.

This project is deeply meaningful to me, not only is the beginning of a journey filled with learning, but it is also a means that I found to improve the workflow of the text animations in After Effects, something that I always felt could be done in a faster, better, more intuitive way.

HOW DOES THE SCRIPT WORK?

The idea is pretty straightforward. Instead of using the After Effects animator structure to create text animations, you animate a controller based on a shape layer.

This makes text animation in After Effects more intuitive as you have all the control over the animation.

I made the workflow simple with three steps:

1. Apply Simple Text to your text layer. You just need to select the layer and click the Simple Text button. All the structures needed to create the text animations are created at this time.

2. Create the animation. Using the generated animator, you will create the text animation. Use your imagination to create unique animations.

3. Choose the type of delay. In this step, you must choose the delay time between the letters, and also the type: normal, reverse or random.

By working with the animators, you can create animations that would be impossible to do only with the After Effects animators. You have access to the Beziers of your texts’ animation path and you can work the acceleration curves directly in the Graph Editor of After Effects.

Another possibility is to reuse animators. If you have created an animation, and want to use it in other projects, you can. Just import the animator and apply it to any text layer.

Visit the script’s website to better understand how it works!

GET TO KNOW SIMPLE TEXT

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I hope this script will reach its goal of being simple enough to make your life easier by turning text animations in After Effects into something quick and intuitive.

Studying scripts and coming up with a new solution that can generate real value to users was only possible because I could rely on people who used their time to help me learn this new skill. Whether it was about creating courses, testing the script or even openly sharing knowledge, to the point I will have a hard time being square with them.

For this, I’m thankful to everyone who contributed, right from the initial stage of this project, that happened via social media, in which many people shared their difficulties related to text animation in After Effects.

My special thanks go to these people, some of them quite close to me, others who don’t even have an idea about who I am: