BACKGROUND
A few years ago, I began searching for a better method to create gradient noise inside of After Effects. I wasn’t happy with the results I was getting with Layer Styles and other various methods. So, I started experimenting with more procedural and effects based methods. I developed an initial preset, which was essentially an early version of the ‘Noise Shading’ preset inside of ShadeThrower today.
In the last year, I also began to experiment with a similar yet slight variation of the noise gradient technique, which focused more on a flat / cel shaded type look procedurally applied to any layer with an alpha channel. I thought that if I combined the noise shading and flat shading presets into one easy to apply script, it might be useful to other Motion Designers out there.
SO, HOW DOES IT WORK?
When you press a button on the script, it applies an effects preset to the selected layer. That effects preset is comprised of a stack of standard AE effects, linked with expressions to a pseudo effect controller, making it easy to control the essential functions in one place.
Noise Shading
When I built the initial preset, I was looking for a better and more versatile way to control gradient noise without relying on layer styles or masking manually for edge shapes. Layer styles and other effects lacked the control I was looking for. I wanted to control noise size, contrast, softness, frames per second and more, so I was on the hunt for an effect combination that would do this procedurally.
Enter Fractal Noise, maybe AE’s most versatile native plugin. If you start with a black white gradient on any layer, then apply Fractal Noise, scale the noise, really small and set the internal blending mode to ‘Overlay’, you have grain right where the greys between the black and the white fall. Fractal Noise also has a random seed controller which is perfect for animating the noise at a custom frame rate. After that, it’s easy to adjust contrast with curves, levels or the not so often used Brightness and Contrast effect.
The next step is finding an effects technique to mimic an ‘inner shadow’ layer style, as for the above to work around the contour of a layer, we need a black white gradient that follows the edge of the layer with an angle control before the Fractal Noise is applied. This is solved by using Drop Shadow and some compositing effects. We apply a pure black Drop Shadow, set it to ‘Shadow Only’, then we use Solid Composite to fill the background with white. Then we use CC Composite with ‘Stencil Alpha’ to use the layer’s original alpha to cut through the black and white. We can then adjust the softness of the Drop Shadow effect to control the falloff of the black white gradient. Fractal Noise on top as described above, and that’s basically it.
Flat Shading
The next challenge was finding a similar procedural method to create flat / cel shading inside AE. This type of shading is typically characterised by being slightly offset from the edge of a layer and is great for indicating glossiness of a surface. While this flat shading preset isn’t a bulletproof replacement for bespoke design, it can certainly get you pretty close, pretty quickly.
Similar to the noise shading preset, we start with a Drop Shadow effect to set up the initial edge shading. Still using ‘Shadow Only’ and Solid Composite, and CC Composite, the next effect is Simple Choker, which shrinks the preceding shading in from the edge, creating the offset look. We then use Extract to key out the black, leaving solely the white shading. At this point, it looks pretty rough, so we can use Roughen Edges to control the smoothness of the overall shape. And, the rest is extra detail - the majority of control is derived from the Drop Shadow distance, the Simple Choker amount, and the Roughen Edges settings. The original layer is added back at the very end using CC Composite set to ‘Behind’.