Beginner Motion Graphics for Editors: Avid to After Effects with Jonathan Dowler, CCE

A lot of great editors are NOT comfortable as soon as they are asked to open the Effects Palette in their NLE – anything more complicated than a few keyframes can be intimidating, and often the work is handed off to Assistant Editors, slowing down the creative flow. This course is intended to make motion graphics less scary. From the effects palette in AVID through the Boris FX suite of plugins, to the basic tools of After Effects, this course will try to make creating and editing motion graphics less intimidating for the editors out there. Through the 4 classes over a month, we’ll take you from beginner to novice, and give you the confidence to tackle some motion graphics the next time your producer asks you to throw in something ‘temp’.

-Fundamentals of the basic “AVX” fx plugins in AVID. Best ways to combine certain effects and how to use the FX editor, which is often frustrating as f***.
-How to use the Paintbrush, 3d Blend, animatte, chroma keyer and other common effects in AVID.
-Introduction into the BORIS FX suite of plugins for Avid, and how to tweak the most commonly used FX.
-Answers to FAQs for common troubleshooting issues when dealing with FX layers in AVID, and how they are handled differently compared to other NLEs.
-After Effects Intro BootCamp – The interface, how to navigate it, how to create a simple lower third graphic or edit pre-existing compositions. This is a straightforward introduction, and will not cover the entire suite, but gives students a great starting point to begin exploring the application.
-Course includes “school office hours” where Jonathan will make himself available to answer questions stemming from the subjects covered in the course for 2 hours a week.

Students should have decent working knowledge of Avid Media Composer, and need to have HEARD of After Effects. Basic familiarity with animation concepts such as keyframes, easing, cropping and motion blur would help.

Students would benefit the most by following along with their own versions of Avid Media Composer and a basic trial version of Adobe After Effects. Boris FX trials are available and recommended, but not necessary.

Jonathan has been in the industry since 2001, both in Australia and Canada. He has cut everything from documentaries, animation, sports news, but his extensive experience has been in cutting reality TV. He has worked on many of the large format shows such as BIG BROTHER, DRAG RACE CANADA, TOP CHEF CANADA, THE AMAZING RACE CANADA and LOVE ISLAND and LOVE ISLAND GAMES. He is a 19 time CSA and 18 time CCE nominated editor and has won seven CSA’s and five CCE Awards.