A new wave of creation

Taking a link from one of the many Youtubers that provides tutorials on animation software, I was particularly drawn to this one in particular called Hexjibber.  What I found to be unique about his tutorials is that they include techniques and working in more than one Adobe software program.  The playlist that I found was a series that creates some looping animations of special effects that are akin to those from anime.  There are some like waves washing, dust flying, dirt streaks, and even fire.  What makes these so valuable is that he goes through After Effects first to create a template to follow, and then draws over them in Flash.  The specific one I was working in was the tutorial that creates dust and smoke flying, which I wanted to use for creating a race car scene and have them drive past real quickly (still brainstorming how that will fit into my projects...).  The video starts out with applying a series of wave warp effects to some shape layers in After Effects, exporting them as a PNG sequence, importing it into Flash and then drawing over each reference layer to create your own effect.

It really was and is a great way to get more practice in both the technical and artistic side of animation, and it could be a great way for an animation team to create action sequences and special effects.  Members with the more technical knowledge would create the reference layers, and the lead animators would draw over them in Flash.  I love how this series of tutorials encompasses both pieces of software, making it for quite an interesting exercise.  I would have been able to do the drawing part if it weren't for the fact that me and my drawing tablet have a love-hate relationship.