Parent Layers & Properties in After Effects - AE Fundamentals

In this After Effects Fundamentals lesson, you'll learn all about parenting. Parenting is a way to connect layers so a child layer inherits the animation of a parent layer. This can also be done with properties (as opposed to entire layers).
In this video:
0:27 Parent Layers
2:54 Parent Properties
4:09 Nulls as Controllers
➡️ Check out the visual notes that accompany this video to help you quickly remember how to do something in After Effects: www.meganfriesth.com/aefundam...
My website: www.animationexplained.com
Instagram: / animationexplained
Pinterest: / explanimated
Get a 1 month free trial of Skillshare: www.skillshare.com/animatione...

[@zoned3mon838]

Thank you Megan ,This was Awesome ,The best After effects course on YT🙏🙏🙏

[@id-cercle-it1455]

I like these kind of tut that explain the basics. When i watch complex tut i can understand them better knowing what that little icon can do. Make tut for noobs like me so i can learn smarter. Thank you for this kinda video. ^.^

[@bbanggitanggit9320]

very useful, thanks for sharing, keep it Up!

[@Kenny-Ross]

Very clear easy to follow tutorial! Thank you!

[@animation-explained]

Thanks! Glad you thought so!

[@caromikalef4602]

ohh you save my day! with the explanation, exactly what I need it !, thank u!

[@animation-explained]

Glad I could help!

[@Grimeaper]

if you drag the icon to the layer and it vanishes just use the second option the drop down menu one. I dunno why it vanishes but mine did. I assume one inherits properties or something.

[@Xandercorp]

You can also Edit>Copy expressions and this would've been useful to include. I would advise making more advanced techniques into tutorials, that'll likely get you more views, Megan.

[@animation-explained]

Good tip! I didn't want to get into expressions for these beginner tutorials, but I plan on doing more advanced tutorials in the future.

[@Xandercorp]

@@animation-explained Coolio. Sounds like a plan. It could help if you can figure out a way to exemplify that looks cool as well. For example, creating a stack of these parent child rigs at the end of the video, with a null as the master and triangles as children, and making those react to music - just to have something practical tied to the lesson. Maybe even just show the result and ask the audience to figure out how it was made :)

[@animation-explained]

Thanks for the suggestions! We’re thinking along the same lines-after this After Effects Fundamentals series I plan on doing more project-based tutorials.

[@breezyazzedits3570]

Plz plz help me no one else is responding i was wondering if you can parent more the one layer?
An if so how can i fix this because i use the body as parent an i link the shoulder to the body an the arm to the shoulder but the only thing that seems to work is the body an the shoulder but not the arm

[@animation-explained]

A parent can have multiple child layers, but a child layer can only have one parent.
It sounds like what you're trying to do is create a chain of parented layers (kind of like child, parent, grandparent), which is totally possible. You should be able to parent the arm to the shoulder and parent the shoulder to the body. When the body moves, the shoulder and arm should move. If you move the shoulder, only the shoulder and arm move, and if you move the arm, only the arm moves.
If you're using an add-on tool (plugin) to animate characters, this could change how things work a bit.
Hope that helps but let me know if you have any other questions!

[@AjayRavi-dd4zl]

Hey, Is there a way to parent same child to multiple parent layers. Please help

[@animation-explained]

Unfortunately there’s not an easy way to parent the same child to multiple parent layers. What you can do is cut and duplicate the child layer where you want the parent to change (keyboard shortcut is command/ctrl shift D). Sorry I don’t have a better solution!

[@moticco]

Thanks for the lesson, interesting. How to place triangles in a circle? 4:17

[@animation-explained]

To place the triangles in a circle, you could move all of their anchor points to the center and then adjust the rotation property to move them into place. I did this in Adobe Illustrator (and used Overlord to push them into After Effects) but you could do the same thing right in After Effects.

[@moticco]

@@animation-explained Thank you for the answer🌻

[@icywarrior4818]

but mine doesnt work after parenting, after parenting it, it moves individually idk why

[@animation-explained]

The child layer should be able to move independently of the parent layer. The parent layer should not move independently of the child layer (whenever the parent moves, the child does too). Does that help?

[@elanehayduk7255]

😃 【ｐｒｏｍｏｓｍ】