Learn how to manipulate layers in After Effects using the Properties panel and timeline for precise control over position, scale, and rotation. Understand how selection, layer order, and keyboard shortcuts influence your workflow when working with imported footage and graphic elements.
Key Insights
- The Properties panel offers a modern and simplified way to adjust layer attributes such as position, scale, and rotation, while the timeline provides access to keyframes necessary for animation.
- Layer order in the timeline determines visibility, and users can rearrange layers by dragging their names or using keyboard shortcuts (Command/Ctrl + brackets).
- Noble Desktop highlights that After Effects uses the term "footage" to refer to imported files, which become layers once added to the timeline, regardless of whether they are images, videos, or other media.
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So by the way, I can move this manually, pick it up and drag it wherever you like. I can move it using numbers. Oh, look, properties, no properties, properties.
When you have something selected, you will see its properties in the properties panel. Depending on the type of layer, you'll get more options. Like text layers have a bunch of options, shapes have a bunch of options.
Layers you import basically have position, anchor point, rotation, opacity, and scale. That's it, okay? So that number, I'm just gonna hover over that first number, which is left and right movement. I'm gonna drag it like that.
I hold shift, by the way, I'm gonna scroll faster. Like that. Or I can type something in, 1,200, 1,300, right there.
Or I can pick it up and drag it around. Have fun, okay? You can also do this in the layer, in the timeline. The little arrow reveals transform.
The arrow for transform reveals those things. Why two places? Two reasons. One, properties is newer, that's the first reason.
Second reason, when we're animating, we create what are called key frames. They're only visible in timeline, okay? So a lot of ways to make the same adjustments. So if I wanted to change this in here, no problem at all.
1,200, it's just changing the number. That's all it is, okay? What is the other one I'm supposed to bring in? I'm gonna close that little hidey thing. It is the photo, it is the pink pic, pink pic, pink pic.
I'll drag that in. Oh, I can't see it. Why can't I see it? Because it's below the background.
Now it's above the background, yes. Oh, cool. I'm gonna rename that photo one.
And I'm just gonna change the scale to like 30, it says, but I can drag it down, or I can just type it in. 30? It says 30, yeah. And it wants to rotate to like 16 degrees, okay? Now, in the timeline, S would reveal scale.
R reveals rotation. Or in the properties panel, do it there, they're all there. Whatever you like.
Okay, there's a lot of ways to do the same thing. Properties panel is newer. So for most simple changes, properties panel is basically pretty easy.
Here's what it wants me to do for rotation. Change that number, not the first one next to the X, the one next to the degree symbol. It says like 16 or something.
And it rotates like that, have fun. Okay, if you wanna do it, not with those numbers, there's a rotate tool on top. Rotate, see? Whatever you like, it's fine, have fun.
Okay, just put it somewhere in the screen, make it small enough so you can see the background as well, and rotate it so it's not straight because it's a little boring when it's just straight up, okay? The fact that the selection tool cannot rotate itself, it can move and it can scale if you grab a corner, but it cannot rotate. You need the rotate tool in order to rotate anything. Or you could just change the numbers.
It's annoying. So the order of layers in the timeline here controls which one you're viewing. Dragging the name of a layer up or down changes its order.
Like that, 40%, that's what it said. And for the record, it's the name. You have to drag the name up or down to change the order.
The keyboard shortcut for changing the layer order, Command, right bracket moves it up the list of layers, Command, left bracket moves it down the list of layers. On Windows, it'd be Control, left or right brackets. Okay, okay, so if you were used to other programs, you're probably used to taking your selection tool and clicking on whatever you want to on your screen, like that, except it's failing.
I'm trying to click on that photo and it's not working, okay? I have no good reason for this, other than this is the way the program has always made this work. The fact that the background is so much larger, even though it's behind, is actually screwing up my ability to select this, okay? Two choices, sometimes it won't let you just click on something to select it, two choices. One, right click, at the bottom is select, that is a list of the layers, photo one.
They borrowed that from Photoshop. Two, just click on the layer in the timeline, there's the other way. Oh yeah, one more.
Do you notice that the layers have numbers to their left? Number pad, activates those numbers. So if you have a number pad, you can just click on it to highlight layers, but you got to select it to affect it. So technically, the name for files that you're going to work with, depending on where you're from, has different names.
I was taught to call it media, but After Effects usually calls the files you're working on footage, okay? I don't know why, I have no idea why, that predates me. So some people call it just files, or they call it video or images, and some people call it footage, some people call it media, but they're all made the same thing, the files you're going to work with in the program. Once a piece of footage, or again, something that you've imported is in a timeline, it's a layer in the timeline, okay? So technically, this is the photo one layer, but the footage it's based on, the source is the PinkPik file, that's the idea.
Okay, so yeah, it uses those weird, those different terms, things.
