Ray Traced 3D

In order to get the best 3D visuals in After Affects often using Ray Traced 3D is the best option. Ray Traced 3D is when an image is made based on tracing the path of light through pixels in an image plane and making the effects based on this. This will take a longer render time but ultimately will help drastically with the realism of your design.

Because Ray Tracing takes a long time to render sometimes it is not optimal to use it until you have enough time to let your computer sit and render things for awhile. 

In order to understand Ray Tracing one must first understand some general properties of light. once light has been emitted from a source 4 things can happen. It can either be reflected, refracted, absorbed or fluoresced. In order to have a realistic image the behavior of light within that image must be realistic as well which means including these 4 properties which Ray Tracing does by algorithm and genesis. 

In the image below one can see the difference between Ray Traced 3D text and a 3D text which is not Ray Traced

Here is a helpful link to a more detailed description on this feature: Ray Tracing