Microanimations in 2D with After Effects (Spanish, Multisub)

Learn to design characters with Illustrator and Photoshop and animate their movements Pilar Guerrero and Jorge Tortosa, graphic designers and founders of the Modik design studio, will teach you how to make a 2D microanimation with After Effects.

A microanimation is a piece of very short duration that performs a concrete action which we can promote in a video format or as a GIF.

To do this, Pilar and Jorge will take as an example a small traveling circus and teach you the best tricks to illustrate and animate characters as diverse as the strongman, the tamer, the contortionist or the tightrope walker.

What will you learn in this online course? You will begin by getting to know the work and references that have most influenced Modik, particularly around animation.

Next, it will be time to create the characters in the animation. To do this, you will conduct a search of images related to the world of the circus as a temporal and aesthetic contextualization and you will learn how to make a micro-storyboard where you will capture the actions that the characters will perform.

Once the characteristic actions of each character have been defined (character, objects they use, study of the movement), you will prepare the material to animate and export it to After Effects.

Modik will make a presentation of the program and will teach you to import files, use the control panels, make compositions, the basic principles to animate, advanced techniques and how to install free plugins to save time.

Then, you will compose the final scene in the form of a circus tent under which to place the micro-animations of your characters. By using the camera and the traveling mode, you will compose the final video and you will know how to export it in different formats.

Finally, Modik will talk about professional platforms to promote your microanimations in 2D and get the widest possible dissemination.

What is this course’s project? The final project of the course consists of illustrating four circus characters with a personal style and then choosing the actions they will perform by animating them following the examples explained during the lessons. As a final staging, microanimations will be placed on a circus stage where the characters will be able to demonstrate what they are capable of.

Who is this online course for? To animators, designers, illustrators and creatives in general who are not afraid to pick up a pencil, or any other tool, to illustrate characters and give them life through basic animation concepts in After Effects and move from the static to the movement.

Especially we welcome those who feel dizzy when talking about animation because they will see how, with some basic notions, you can do very interesting things applicable to countless projects.

Requirements and materials Have basic knowledge of illustration and management of Illustrator or Photoshop. It is not necessary to know how to use After Effects because during the course its operation will be explained from scratch.

Regarding the materials, you will need a PC or Mac with Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop and After Effects, recommended in its CS6 versions or, much better, the CC.