Book excerpt: Discover techniques to enhance your videos with complex animation Key FeaturesDesign, animate, and sequence a complete motion graphics projectWork with compositions and pre-compositions to create animations speedilyMaximize your motion graphics and visual effects skillsBook Description If you’re thinking seriously about making and publishing your videos with professional editing and animation, look no further! Adobe After Effects is a popular tool among video editors and YouTubers to enhance their videos and bring them to life by implementing visual effects and motion graphics. This book will take you right from the basics through to the advanced techniques in Adobe After Effects CC 2018. You will start by setting up your editing environment to learn and improve techniques to sharpen your video editing skills. Furthermore, you will work with basic and advanced special effects to create, modify, and optimize motion graphics in your videos. Lastly, you will not only learn how to create 2.5D animations, but also get to grips with using Cinema 4D Lite to build and animate complete 3D scenes. By the end of the book, you’ll have learned how to package a video efficiently with the help of the projects covered. What you will learnCreate a lower third project for a TV show with complex layersWork with shape layer animation to create an animated lyrics videoExplore different tools to animate charactersApply text animation to create a dynamic film-opening titleUse professional visual effects to create a VFX projectModel, light, and composite your 3D project in After EffectsWho this book is for If you’re a student, professional, YouTuber, or anyone who is interested in video editing, animation, and motion graphics, this book is for you. You’ll also find this resource useful if you’re an Illustrator looking to put your creations in motion.