Christian Darkin

So you've a copy of After Effects and an idea of what this professional motion graphics and effects tool can do...but what can you really do with After Effects? How far can you push it? What are the best effects that you can create? What are the essential skills and techniques that you need to really make your creations stand out? After Effects Most Wanted answers these questions in a refreshing and practical way. Looking at a wide variety of projects the original artists tell you why, and exactly how they created their masterpieces. The authors, all professionals who use After Effects to make a living, share with you the secrets of their successes and extend beyond that to give you the reasons why they did things the way that they did. More so than that, the accompanying CD has their creations available at your fingertips and the simple, step-by-step instructions in the book show you how they created these pieces. The projects covered are diverse, from a television commercial for McDonald's and Coca-Cola by Peter Reynolds, to a thought provoking work by renowned and controversial artist Simon Tsyko, a work featured by Adobe in their motion gallery. Other authors include: Joost Korngold of Renascent and Chris James Hewitt, whose Relokation Ne is the a featured work on the BD4D (By Designers For Designers) web site, Christian Darkin, a digital video journalist and author, and Mark Towse, who offers two pieces, one for TV, one for the cinema. Without long, redundant discussions of tools and application packages, After Effects Most Wanted is a book that delivers the techniques, skills, and effects that will let you bring your creations to life.. "Thanks to After Effects, a good small post-production house can do everything as well as the top Hollywood studio ñ if you have the relevant skills! There is no longer a technology barrier, working in DV. This means that we are going for absolute top level quality, and let's face it ñ if it looks good enough, the sky's the limit!" Mark Towse From the Publisher What we cover in this book: Advanced layering techniques Compositing 3D renders into real video footage Syncing video to music Amazing transitions and morphing Work for film, television, and the Web Some of the top third-party plug-ins available This book leaps straight into the production of high-level effects and as such you will need at least a basic knowledge of what After Effects can do and how its interface works. The effects in this book have been created with versions of After Effects ranging from 4.1 to 5.5, to recreate them exactly you will need at least version 5.0, but where possible our authors have offered advice of how to achieve similar things in earlier versions. As with all books from friends of ED our support is fast, friendly and free. Even if our dedicated support team are unable to solve your problem immediately, your queries will be passed onto the people who put the book together, the editors and authors, to solve. All of ED authors help with the support on their books, and will either directly mail people with answers, or (more usually) send their response to an editor to pass on.

Laura is a confused teenager - and so would you be in her place. Her parents are mad - her grandparents are madder - and someone is trying to assasinate her cat.None of this is helping her to work out what she wants to do when she leaves, school, who killed her grandfather, or why she keeps getting into arguments with celebrities.Is it her who is mad, or is it the rest of the world? Find out in Deadly Placebo - The hilarious and disturbing new young adult adventure from the author of the bestselling "Act Normal" books.Deadly Placebo is a timely reminder that you can't trust everything that calls itself medicine. ★★★★The perfect dark comedy to get you through self-isolation"★★★★

Suitable for ages 8-11 - The first full-length middle-grade childrens book in the Act Normal series.It started off as a way for computer coding fan Jenny to pick birthday presents for her friends. But Jenny and her brother Adam are soon being chased across the world by sinister magic fairy dolls, robot forklifts, and a mad party planner...In Act Normal And Don't Tell Anyone About The Present Machine there are detailed instructions on how to: Kidnap your own grandmotherBuild a giant magnetic liquid monster Code an artificial intelligence which hypnotises children Steal a train Make diamonds in your kitchen.Can Jenny do all this and then save the boys and girls of the world from being turned into toy-buying zombies? Find out in Act Normal And Don't Tell Anyone About The Present Machine...

Act Normal " is the top 3 bestselling series of children's chapter books for girls and boys (ages 5-9). Join Jenny and Adam at their party in space... If you've never had a zero-gravity food fight, you really should try it. Jenny and Adam's party is only the beginning of their adventures, though, and when they meet an alien spaghetti monster who wants to go to school with them, it's time to ACT NORMAL, and hope the teachers don't get too scared. But how can they get their new friend back home without anyone noticing? Read the book to find out...

Act Normal " is the top 3 bestselling series of children's chapter books for girls and boys (ages 5-9). Learn about elections and democracy with Jenny and Adam... Jenny decides she wants to give everyone some fun by inviting a fair AND a circus to town, but it's the eve of the Election and she gets more than she bargains for... 100 fairs all turn up at once, and soon, she has to take both competitors in the political race on the run from the press in the world's largest roller-coaster. Jenny and her brother try to ACT NORMAL, but can they get the candidates to agree before they get caught up in the media circus? Read the book to find out...

Act Normal - The best stories for children aged 5-9. Learn about endangered species and rhino poaching with Jenny and Adam... Rhinos might be endangered animals, but when you're trying to hide them in your house, it certainly seems like there's a lot of them Jenny is playing with magnets. Her brother wants to join in, but he thinks he can make a magnet that will attract rhinoceroses Jenny thinks this is very funny... Until he succeeds With a house rapidly filling with endangered animals, and poachers surrounding the garden, all she can do is ACT NORMAL. But can she think of a plan before things get out of hand? Read the book to find out...

Act Normal - Stories for girls and boys who know how to stand up for themselves (ages 5-9). Jenny is a girl who will never be a damsel in distress... When developers threaten to pull down an old building the children play in, Jenny and her brother, Adam decide to take matters into their own hands. The diggers arrive to begin demolition, but there's more to this old ruin than meets the eye. Without knowing it, the children have created something impossibly wonderful... Will the developers get their way? How can Jenny and Adam stop the destruction? And what is the secret of the Castle Made Of Sweets? Read the book to find out...

✓A girl who loves science. ✓A boy who loves chaos.What could possibly go wrong in this hilarious series of chapter book mystery adventures?Learning to read independently has never been so much fun Every adventurous child deserves to be introduced to Jenny and Adam - two clever kids who have the weirdest adventures. Jenny's latest experiment has accidentally turned her chickens into tiny dinosaurs. Her brother, Adam thinks this is great, and decides to feed the same experiment to some ostriches at a local farm...Jenny is used to strange things happening in her life, and thinks the best move is to just ACT NORMAL, but can they escape from the giant ostrich-dinosaurs and get everything fixed before the adults start to notice?Order today as an ebook or Paperback, or read free with Kindle Unlimited Prime, and join the mad-cap adventure Act Normal early reader chapter books are the essential stepping stone from children's picture books to longer middle grade fiction. They are Thrilling, funny stories designed to get boys and girls reading in Key Stage 2 (KS2) in the classroom and at home, Perfect for reading together or independent reading, Act Normal stories are ideal for encouraging 5-8 year olds to take their first steps towards reading on their own, or for engaging older, but more reluctant readers to get back into the library.

Act Normal - the bestselling series of children's chapter books for girls and boys (ages 5-9). Learn about global warming and the melting ice-caps with Jenny and Adam... Jenny is a clever and funny girl, who does things her own way - Now, she has worked something out, and it's not good news... The melting ice-caps meant that the bluebells came out 3 weeks early this year, and so did the butterflies. So by her calculations, Santa Claus will be early too. Unless she acts now, Christmas this year will fall on 4th December, and Father Christmas will be very confused There's only one answer - make a new ice-cap in the school library, and then ACT NORMAL and hope nobody notices. The plan goes pretty well until somebody makes the fateful decision to turn the heating on... With everyone trapped in a school filled with water, Jenny needs a submarine and a guiding angel but where will she find them? Read the book to find out...

Act Normal - the bestselling series of children's chapter books for girls and boys (ages 5-9). Learn about the dangers of videogames with Jenny and Adam..."The problem with grown-ups is that they spend far too much time playing on their mobile phones, and not enough time playing with their children." All the adults in the town are in the grip of the addictive "Zombie Robots" video game, so nobody notices when Jenny and Adam accidentally create a plague of real zombie robots made out of the old and broken toys left abandoned under their beds. In this hilariously silly adventure, it's not long before the whole town is being overrun. Can the children ACT NORMAL and fix things before the grown-ups stop playing video games and start to notice that something is wrong? Read the book to find out...