Is there an invisibility option for shapes?

[Nicohk92]

As we make layer appear and intervene by checking visibility on and off, can we do anything similar for individual shapes within a layer.

Ex: I'm animating a flower so that it grows. I make the stern grow with exposure but I need to keep the other elements like leafs hidden until they appear.

This is just an example but I've encountered this problem many times.

I usually work around it by putting the shape off frame or setting zero opacity until i want them visible but that's a lot of keyframes when there should be a quicker way.

Is there something I'm missing?


Thanks

[heyvern]

I usually work around it by putting the shape off frame or setting zero opacity until i want them visible but that's a lot of keyframes when there should be a quicker way.

That's pretty much the only way to animate visibility with shapes.

You could put each shape on its own layer and then use layer visibility.

[hayasidist]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdH0069VKS4 ... this was a pliot for a similar animation that gives you another approach to the question.

I drew the seedlings in their "finished" state on frame zero. This is the last layer in a switch.

I copy that layer, and in the copy I move all the points so that they make very very small versions of the leaves / stems etc and that becomes the first layer in a switch.

I set "interpolate" on the switch; and have just two keyframes: one for when the transition starts ("first layer") and one where it ends ("last layer").

That usually gives a growth pattern that isn't right; so copy the "last layer" and push the points around to make an intermediate layer... and so on.


If you have (as I did) several plants to grow, I made variations of intermediate and final stages (a total of 9 different drawings), I used 6 or 7 per seedling and staggered the timing.

finish it off with bones in the switch layer to add some sway etc..

[Nicohk92]

Inspiring use of switch layers. Thanks for the intel. I've been having fun with the freehand tool so I think I''d rather have some fun with it and stroke exposure and see how it goes.

[hayasidist]

enjoy the experimentation!

the other option you have for making things invisible is to use masking. e.g.

group: mask- hide all
> vector - leaves etc: "mask this layer"
> vector - masking shape: "add to mask but keep invisible"
> vector - your stem with stroke exposure: "do not mask this layer"

The shape(s) on the masking shape layer can be designed and animated to reveal the leaves in any way that you need.

[Nicohk92]

true tho I try to keep masking at a minimum, I notice it burdens my cpu quite a bit, when not simply crashing asp

[Nicohk92]

I usually work around it by putting the shape off frame or setting zero opacity until i want them visible but that's a lot of keyframes when there should be a quicker way.

That's pretty much the only way to animate visibility with shapes.

You could put each shape on its own layer and then use layer visibility.

There is a third way which is much easier when it's about making things pop into existence: Scaling it down all the way. setting it numerically to zero makes it of course disappear totally.