Original subtitles

If you enjoy this video and you'd like

to learn more, follow the link in the

video description to check out my

premium courses. One of my favorite ways

to create map animations is via these

features in the geololayers panel. So,

here I have a feature collection of the

lower 48. And if I double click on any

of these states, it's automatically

going to zoom the map comp view right in

to perfectly center up that feature. So,

here if I click on California, Colorado,

and even the feature collection, it'll

zoom me back out. And I can use this to

quickly create an animation. For

example, if I just click on the key

frame button and manually add my key

frames right here on my map comp. Now, I

can move my playhead over here and just

quickly zoom in to Colorado. And then if

I move my playhead a little bit further,

I can head over to California and then

move my playhead over here even further

and then zoom back out. And now, just

like that, I've created this animation

where I fly into Colorado and then I go

over to California and then we zoom back

out. All right. Now, let me show you an

even better technique. So, I went ahead

and deleted all those previous key

frames. Now, I want to fly into Arizona

again, but this time I'm going to use an

automation method. So, if I click on fit

view to feature right here, we have

three different options, but two of

these are automated. And you can tell

that via the little key frame icon. So,

I'm going to select animate view to

feature. And what this is going to do,

it's going to animate from the current

view to the feature. So, I'm going to

click on this, and it'll also ask me how

long should the animation take. I'm

going to go ahead and go with the

default of 3 seconds. Now, it moved my

playhead. I don't see any key frames.

So, I have to hit U to actually see

these key frames. And now it

automatically created both the start and

the end key frames. So, I didn't even

have to manually create any key frames.

And what's really cool about this

particular technique is now if I want to

fly over to another state, like let's

say we want to fly all the way over to

Delaware. If I were to just double click

on this, you'll see that that just flew

it straight over. That's looking kind of

rough. Now, instead, if I click on fit

view to feature and say animate view to

feature, and we go ahead and click 3

seconds, it's going to animate from the

beginning of the playhead here. But this

time, it actually zooms it out and zooms

it back in. So, it added all these crazy

key frames. And I don't want this big

gap here. So, I could actually move this

back over here. So, now we have this fly

in. And now it's going to zoom out and

zoom back over. And you can actually use

this on multiple features. For example,

if I commandclick on Colorado here, so

we just have these two features

selected. Now, if I go like this, I can

say animate view two features, and it's

going to zoom out, and it's going to fit

it to basically frame up these two

features. And you can see here in our

bounding box, we have these two right

here, and it's perfectly framed up. So,

you can create some pretty complex

animations pretty quickly using these

features with automation modes. Now, if

you have a line feature, you can

actually animate the view to follow

along the feature. Here I have this

route from Albany to Nashville. So, if I

click on fit view to feature here, we

have animate view along feature. And I'm

going to click on this. And once again,

I can select the duration. For this one,

I want 5 seconds. And you'll notice it

just adds two key frames to each one

here. So, we have a start and an end.

And this will probably be good for this

zoom level. But, if I want more detail,

I can simply zoom in. So the zoom will

be relative to the amount of detail that

will be applied. Basically more key

frames the further in that you're

zoomed. So if we zoom all the way in to

something like here and we run this

automation again fit view along feature

5 seconds, you'll notice that it starts

to add more key frames here. And if I go

all the way in to something like this,

I'm going to automate this again, but

this time we're going to make it take a

little bit longer. So, we're going to do

like 15 seconds because this is going to

be moving around quite a lot. If I grab

all of these and I hold the Alt key, I

can actually rettime this, which is

really helpful. Now, here's an example

that I slowed down quite a bit. And in

fact, I probably want to slow it down

even more. But if you combine this with

an actual path animation and then you

manually uh basically key frame the

zoom, you can get some really, really

cool looks. Now, if you want to create a

dynamic animation between multiple

features, like have a jump around

between each feature, you want to use

the automation mode animate between

features. So, I'm going to grab these

first five states here in this feature

collection. And I'm going to click on

fit view to feature. And right here, we

have the automation mode, animate view

between features. So, if I click on

this, it's again going to ask us how

long should the animation take. But be

aware that now this duration is going to

be between each feature. So, since I

have five features selected, this will

give me a total duration of 20 seconds.

And again, the key frames here will

start to be pasted wherever my playhead

is located. So, I'm going to click

create animation. And now, you can see

we have a really smooth animation here,

zooming out and then zooming back in on

each map feature. Now, if you were to

use this other automation mode, animate

view to features, it would just do one

move, simply zooming out to perfectly

frame up all of these map features. One

of my favorite techniques is something I

like to call the neverending flyover.

And this is where you can animate your

map to move to the right or to the left.

And you can have it move infinitely. So

to do this, grab your map composition

and go to the effect controls panel. Now

up here, you want to go and grab

longitude. So this is an angle

expression controller. And on the left

side of this little controller, you have

the revolutions. And then on the right,

you have the degrees. If you grab this

little parameter on the right and you

start to like shuttle it around, you'll

notice that this moves your map

perfectly to the right or to the left.

So, all you need to do is animate this.

And it's really simple to make this loop

or to make it move infinitely. For

example, if I open this up down here,

I'm going to hit E in the timeline on

the map comp to bring up the effects and

I'll open up longitude. So, I'm going to

add a key frame at the beginning, go to

the 8second mark, and let's say I want

this to do a loop. that's eight seconds

in length. Well, all I really need to do

is come to the 8 second mark and do one

entire revolution. And now, as I play

this back, so you'll see it starts here

at the prime meridian, goes from the

left to the right, and then at the

8second mark, it will loop. Super duper

cool. Now, another technique you can use

is just use a simple expression. So, if

I just delete these key frames and then

altclick the parameter, I can do time

something like 25. And what this is

going to do, it will now instead of

looping, this is just going to animate

the movement here infinitely. Now, I

need to make sure I finalize this. But

if you're working with a really long

composition, this might be the technique

you want to use if you don't care if it

loops or not. So, let me just go back

and show you something here. I went

ahead and created a little animation.

So, I'm going to have this revolve again

right at the 8second mark. And the

reason I call this the never- ending

flyover is because right here I animated

this little 3D uh P-51 airplane and now

I have a little looping animation. So I

have this airplane looping and now with

the map underneath it, I've got like

this never- ending animation. So if I

just solo the airplane here, you can see

what's going on. I did some um simple

key frames on the rotation and the

position just to give me this little

looping animation. And now with the map

underneath, we have a cool little visual

here. Now, you can do the same kind of

technique if you want to do a

never-ending revolution or an orbit

around one specific location. So, I'm

going to go and grab my map composition

here, and I'm going to adjust the pitch

parameter to 60°. So, it's really

pitched out. We're looking at an angle

here. And I have this 3D object of my

P-51 just again as a reference. As this

map animation moves, it just helps you

see what's going on. Now, to create this

effect, we simply do the same type of

animation, but to the bearing angle

control right here. So, I'm going to

just move this. And you can tell that

when I do this, it kind of pans this map

around. So, if I just add a key frame

here and hit the U key to bring it up

down here, we now have this key frame.

And if I go to the 8second mark and just

set the revolutions to one, now it will

do a perfect 360 revolution around this

particular spot.

Now, one technique that I use to create

motion that will last throughout the

entire duration of my animation, no

matter the length of it, is something

called the pingpong technique. And you

can apply this to a wide variety of

different parameters, but two of my

favorites are the bearing and the pitch.

So, I have this current revolution, like

this never-ending orbit animation, but I

want to add a pitch move here that will

just loop. So, all I need to do for this

is grab this again and quickly add a key

frame to pitch. I'm going to hit U again

so I see the key frames here. So, here

we have pitch. Now I'm going to go out

to the 4se secondond mark because this

is an 8-second animation and I'm going

to be looping this. So it's going to

loop one time. So I want it to be right

in the middle of the duration. And now

we'll bring the pitch. We'll do a

drastic change here. So we'll go to zero

just so you can see that. So now this

animation is orbiting around here and

changing its pitch, but then it just

kind of keeps this pitch of zero

throughout here. I want the pitch to

kind of go back and forth here. So for

that, I'm going to altclick the pitch

here and I'm going to type in loop out

and select this. And then I'm going to

type in quotation marks so I can see the

different methods here. And I'm going to

choose pingpong. And now this particular

parameter will go here and then just go

back and forth here. And since we did it

right to 4 seconds, it should loop

seamlessly at 8 seconds because right

when this time gets here, this will have

looped back and gone here. here. So,

we'll just make sure again that it is at

the 4se secondond mark. To make sure

this loops nice and seamless, we want to

add some easy ease to this. So, I'm

going to do keyboard shortcut at F9 just

to ease both of these key frames out so

it's a smooth transition.

One really cool way to work is to use

what's called map comp view features.

These are map features that will save

out your composition. So essentially all

these parameters right here, latitude,

longitude, zoom, bearing, and pitch. All

of these will be saved out. So to save

out a map comp view, you just click on

add features to browser and you click

right here. And now we can name this. So

let's call it uh actually United Kingdom

view is perfectly fine. So we're going

to save that out. Now we have this map

feature. Now what's so handy about this

is let's say we're working on a project

where we're just constantly jumping

between like a world view and this

closeup of England. So, what I could do

now is just zoom out to like a world

view. And now I'm going to save out this

map comp view as well. Call it world

view. So, now I can just manually add a

key frame as I showed you in the first

technique. Move my playhead over. And

now double click on United Kingdom view.

And now we've quickly jumped between

these two views. And what's really

awesome is if we go back out to world

view and I'm going to change the pitch

and the bearing quite a bit. We can save

out another mapcom comp view and we'll

call it world view pitched and again

it's going to save all these pitch

parameters. So if we zoom

actually we need to delete these key

frames. So we come back here and now we

go to world view pitched. So I like to

save out a couple of different map views

and then I can just quickly jump between

them and it's much better than like

having to manually go go like this and

then manually change your pitch and your

bearing. This is just way more

efficient. Okay, I saved one of the best

techniques for last. In this example,

I'm going to show you how to create a

custom path for your map comp view to

follow. And it's really easy. You just

grab the pen tool. Make sure you don't

have any layers selected cuz we want to

draw a new shape layer. We don't want to

draw a mask on any of these layers. It's

really important to deselect. And let's

say we want our map view to animate from

over here in Spain all the way over here

toward Russia, but we want it to follow

like this, like path like this. So, we

just draw the path that we want it to

follow. And now, once we have the path

selected and finished, we click on the

little addition button here and say

feature from layer. So, now we have this

path here. And what's cool about this is

now we can automate whatever we want

with this geo reference path. Now, if

you want to go ahead and parent your

shape layer that you drew to the map

comp anchor and turn the visibility off,

this is a great way to like tweak this

later if you want to use it later. But

we'll just go ahead and um hide this for

now. And now with this selected, I can

click on fit view to feature and just do

the good old animate view along feature

and move our playhead to the beginning.

We want it to take 5 seconds. That's

perfectly fine. Now, we have uh created

this little animation here. So, let's

see what it did. Okay, it's taking us

from Spain and it's going up to Russia.

Now, it looks like it's pretty much a

straight line and it's quite linear. And

if we look at the key frames here, you

can tell that indeed it is. Now, if you

remember from the earlier technique, it

this has to do with the zoom level. So,

the further in that we're zoomed, the

more detail it's going to give us to

follow this path. So, right now, cuz

we're zoomed so far out, it's basically

just taking us from here to here. So, if

we want to give a more detail, we can

zoom all the way in. I'm going to um

delete all these key frames. I don't

even know if you need to delete the key

frames. You might be able to just run

the automation again and it'll overwrite

them. I'm assuming it will. All right,

let's just run this automation again.

Animate view along feature. Now, we've

got a little bit more detail. And this

does not add key frames to zoom as you

can see. So, what I like to do is I like

to create these animations that follow

the path. And then I go in and I just

can manually animate the zoom here. So

you can, you know, zoom as it's flying.

So it can be zooming out, which is super

duper cool. And it's going to kind of

loosely follow this. Come out here and

maybe add some easy ease. Trust me, this

is a really crazy cool technique. And

when you start to combine this,

basically these automations with

latitude and longitude and then manually

key framing your zoom and then

pingponging your bearing and your pitch,

you'll get some crazy rigs that look

really great and before you know it,

you're going to be a master of

geololayers. Speaking of which, once

again, if you want to be a master of

geollayers, check out my geollayers 3

master class. If you're into battle or

conflict maps, I just released a new

course that's a battle maps master

class. Go check that out. And as always,

I have my Patreon page. All right, as

always, thank you so much for watching.

I'll see you in the next one.