Ideas for your next edit

When to use itFreeze frames, reaction shots and fight hits in AMVs, or a whole intro section of a football edit that reads like a manga chapter. It is strongest on holds and slow moves, because the dots crawl on fast motion.

Printed manga uses three kinds of ink at once: solid black for shadows, a dot screen (screentone) for the grays, and hand-drawn line art. One halftone effect on its own gives you only the middle part, which is why it reads as a filter. Build the three parts on separate layers and the result reads as print, because your eye recognizes the same structure it sees on a real page.

The dot screen here is fully built-in. You make one soft round dot, tile it across the frame, add it on top of a black and white copy of your footage, then put Threshold above the pair. Where the footage is dark, more of each dot falls under the threshold, so the black dots grow. Where it is bright, they shrink and vanish. That is exactly how a print screen works, and you control dot size by changing the tile size.

The ink lines come from Find Edges, but only after Median has removed small texture. Without that step you get scribbles on every leaf and pore. A tiny Turbulent Displace that changes evolution every few frames makes the lines boil like hand-drawn animation. Everything finishes with a cream Tint and a faint paper texture, so pure white turns into paper and pure black turns into ink.

1. Precompose your clip as SRC. Inside it add Black & White (defaults are fine) and then Levels with Input Black 20 and Input White 235. Contrast before thresholding is what keeps the grays from going muddy.
2. Make the dot: new solid 14 x 14 px. Add Gradient Ramp, Ramp Shape Radial Ramp, Start of Ramp 7, 7 with Start Color black, End of Ramp 7, 0 with End Color white. Add CC RepeTile with Expand Right, Left, Up and Down all at 1400, then rotate the layer 45 degrees. A diagonal screen hides the grid from the eye, which is why print uses it.
3. Build a precomp called SCREEN: SRC at the bottom, the dot layer above it set to Add, and an adjustment layer on top with Threshold, Level 190. The threshold must sit above both, because it has to see their sum.
4. Build SHADOWS: another copy of SRC with Threshold Level 50. Set it to Multiply above SCREEN. This gives you flat black areas the dots alone cannot make.
5. Build LINES: a copy of SRC with Median Radius 3, then Find Edges (Invert off), then Threshold Level 180, then Turbulent Displace Amount 3, Size 12. Set it to Multiply above SHADOWS.
6. Above all of it, add an adjustment layer with Tint: Map Black To #141414, Map White To #F2EDE1. Then a solid with Fractal Noise (Contrast 60, Scale 40) in Multiply at 12% opacity for paper.
7. Top layer: adjustment layer with Posterize Time Frame Rate 12. Stack order bottom to top: SCREEN, SHADOWS, LINES, Tint, paper, Posterize Time.

posterizeTime(8);
random(0, 720);

When to use itSlow sections, emotional anime scenes, sunsets, edits to soft vocals or piano. Use it as the base of a whole section, not on single shots, so the haze feels like the world rather than an effect.

This look is three things in a specific order: a gentle grade, a diffusion pass, and grain. The order matters. Grade first, then diffuse, so the bloom picks up your warm highlights and spreads that color into the frame. If you grade after diffusing, the glow takes on whatever color you push later and the haze turns muddy or orange.

Diffusion always lifts your blacks, because the soft copy spills light into dark areas. That is part of the look, but too much and the image goes gray. A small Curves layer right after the diffusion pulls the black point back down without touching the glow. Think of it as putting contrast back where you want it, after the bloom has had its way.

Grain goes last and on top of everything. Grain is texture of the medium, not of the scene, so it should never be blurred or glowed. When grain sits under the diffusion it turns into soft noise blobs, which looks like a compression problem rather than film. On top, it ties the soft image together and stops the smooth gradients from banding on social media upload.

1. Add an adjustment layer called GRADE above your clips. Apply Lumetri Color: Temperature 8, Contrast -15, Highlights -20, Saturation 90. In Creative, set Faded Film 10 and drag Highlight Tint slightly toward orange.
2. Add a second adjustment layer called DIFFUSE above it. Apply Gaussian Blur with Blurriness 40 and Repeat Edge Pixels on, then set the adjustment layer's blend mode to Screen and its Opacity to 35%. Adjustment layers respect blend modes, so this screens a blurred copy of everything below over the sharp image: the sharp detail stays, and the bright areas spread a soft halo, which is exactly what a mist filter does.
3. Add a third adjustment layer called BLACKS with Curves. Pull the bottom-left point to the right by about 10 units on the RGB channel so the shadows return to near-black. Leave the top of the curve alone.
4. Add a fourth adjustment layer called GRAIN on top with Add Grain. Set Viewing Mode to Final Output, then under Tweaking set Intensity 0.35, Size 1.2, Softness 0.6.
5. Optional: add a vignette in the GRADE Lumetri (Vignette Amount -0.8, Feather 70) to keep the eye in the bright center.
6. Final stack bottom to top: clips, GRADE, DIFFUSE, BLACKS, GRAIN.

35 + Math.sin(time * 1.5) * 5;

When to use itPhonk, drift phonk and hard trap edits of cars, football, fighters or anime. The ramps go on the build-up and the drop; the shakes and flashes go on the kick and snare.

A velocity edit lives on contrast in time: footage rushes at 300%, slams into 20% slow motion right on the beat, then rushes out again. The eye reads the slow section as the important moment. The ramp needs real in-between frames, which is why Twixtor sits first on the clip and RSMB right after it. RSMB has to see the retimed motion to blur it correctly, so swapping their order gives you blur on the wrong frames.

Everything above the clip lives on adjustment layers, stacked in the order the eye notices them. Grade sits lowest because it is the base image. The shake sits above the grade because moving pixels does not care about color. The chromatic split sits above the shake so the color fringes follow the shaking frame. Flashes sit at the very top, because a flash should hit everything, including the fringes.

The grade is dark and cold with crushed but not dead blacks, and the saturation pulled down. That makes the white flashes and red fringes feel brighter by comparison. Keep the accents short: 2 frames for flashes, 4 to 6 frames for shakes to decay. Long effects blur the rhythm; short ones punctuate it.

1. Precompose each ramp clip. Inside, apply Twixtor, set Frame Interp to Motion Weighted Blend and keyframe Speed %: 300 until 6 frames before the beat, ease down to 20 on the beat, hold 20 for 8 to 12 frames, ease back to 300 over 4 frames. Use Easy Ease with 80% influence on the slow keyframes.
2. Under Twixtor, apply RSMB. Start with a blur amount around 0.5; raise it to 1 on the 300% parts for streaky motion.
3. Add an adjustment layer GRADE with Lumetri Color: Contrast 35, Blacks -20, Saturation 70, Temperature -12. Add Curves after it with a strong S shape.
4. Add an adjustment layer SHAKE with Transform. Uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle, set Shutter Angle to 180, keep Uniform Scale checked and set Scale to 105 to hide edges. Paste the expression below into Position and add a layer marker (* on the numpad) on every kick.
5. Chromatic punch: precompose everything so far as EDIT, duplicate it. On the bottom copy apply Shift Channels with Take Red From Full Off. On the top copy set Take Green From and Take Blue From to Full Off, blend mode Add. On the beat, keyframe the top copy's Position 14 px to the right, back to center over 5 frames.
6. Add an adjustment layer FLASH on top with Exposure, Exposure 0 most of the time and 3 for exactly 2 frames on big hits. Use hold keyframes (Ctrl+Alt+H) so there is no fade.
7. For snare hits, add a 1-frame adjustment layer with Invert above FLASH.
8. Final stack bottom to top: clips with Twixtor then RSMB, GRADE, SHAKE, chroma pair, FLASH, Invert frames.

var amp = 40, freq = 18, decay = 7, out = value;
if (thisLayer.marker.numKeys > 0) {
  var m = thisLayer.marker.nearestKey(time);
  if (m.time > time && m.index > 1) m = thisLayer.marker.key(m.index - 1);
  var t = time - m.time;
  if (t >= 0) {
    var e = amp * Math.exp(-decay * t);
    out = add(value, [Math.sin(t * freq * 6.283) * e, Math.cos(t * freq * 5.1) * e]);
  }
}
out;

When to use itAMVs and anime edits to pop, EDM, and melodic songs where the cuts should feel smooth rather than aggressive. Zooms on bar changes, Jaws on snares, color pops on vocal hits.

A clean AMV is about control. Anime is already flat color with strong lines, so heavy effects bury the art. You sharpen a little, grade a little, and let the motion do the work. Every move is eased, so nothing starts or stops dead. That is why many editors use Flow: one curve, like an expo in-out, reused on every zoom gives the whole edit one consistent feel.

The smooth zoom transition has a fixed stack. On an adjustment layer over the cut, Motion Tile goes first with Mirror Edges on, then Transform second. Motion Tile builds mirrored copies around the frame, so when Transform scales the frame down, you see mirrored image instead of black. Reverse the order and Transform shrinks the frame first, leaving empty borders, and Motion Tile then just repeats those empty borders.

CC Jaws is different: it works on the outgoing clip itself, not on an adjustment layer, because it cuts that layer open and needs the next clip underneath to show through the teeth. The glow goes at the very top, after the grade, so it takes on the graded colors and stays subtle. A glow under the grade gets saturated and looks cheap.

1. On each anime clip apply Unsharp Mask with Amount 60, Radius 1.0, Threshold 2. Upscaled anime sources are soft; this brings the line art back without halos.
2. Add an adjustment layer GRADE across the edit with Lumetri Color: in Basic Correction set Contrast 10 and Saturation 105; in Creative set Vibrance 25. A touch of Sharpen (10) in Creative is fine on top.
3. For a zoom transition, add an adjustment layer that covers 6 frames either side of the cut. Apply Motion Tile (Output Width 300, Output Height 300, Mirror Edges on), then Transform (uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle, Shutter Angle 180).
4. Keyframe Transform Scale: 100 six frames before the cut, 250 one frame before the cut, 40 on the cut, 100 six frames after. Make the 250 key a hold keyframe (Ctrl+Alt+H) so the jump to 40 happens between frames and is not smeared by the motion blur. With Flow, give the first pair an expo-in curve (accelerating into the cut) and the second pair an expo-out curve (decelerating after it). Without Flow, see the Built-in alternative below.
5. For a snare cut, apply CC Jaws to the outgoing clip: Completion 0 to 100 over 5 frames, Height 40%, Width 25%, Shape Spikes. Put the next clip directly underneath.
6. For a color pop, add a 2-frame adjustment layer on a vocal hit with Hue/Saturation, Master Hue +150, Master Saturation +30.
7. On top, add an adjustment layer GLOW with Deep Glow. Keep it low: Radius around 120, Exposure around 0.25, threshold high enough that only highlights and eyes glow.
8. Stack bottom to top: clips (Unsharp Mask, CC Jaws where used), GRADE, zoom and color-pop adjustments, GLOW.

var n = 0, out = value;
if (numKeys > 0) {
  n = nearestKey(time).index;
  if (key(n).time > time) n--;
}
if (n > 0) {
  var t = time - key(n).time;
  var v = velocityAtTime(key(n).time - thisComp.frameDuration / 10);
  out = add(value, mul(v, 0.04 * Math.sin(3 * t * 2 * Math.PI) / Math.exp(6 * t)));
}
out;

When to use itFashion edits, pop and hyperpop music, fan edits of 2000s icons, and intros that need a shiny logo. It suits bright, flashy footage and fast cuts.

Chrome is just a lightness map pushed through a wavy curve. Real chrome reflects sky and ground in alternating bright and dark bands, so if you give a title a smooth bevel and then run it through a Curves adjustment with two or three peaks, the smooth gradient turns into those reflected bands. The multi-peak curve is the whole trick. Everything else in the chrome stack only feeds it a better gradient.

The order on the title is fixed: Bevel Alpha builds an edge ramp, CC Glass adds bumpy lighting from a blurred copy of the text, Curves turns both into chrome bands, Tritone gives a cold blue-silver tint, and CC Light Sweep runs a shine across the finished surface last. Moving the sweep before Curves would get bent into bands too and stop reading as a highlight.

The footage side is a cool, slightly lifted grade with a fisheye from Optics Compensation, then sparkles, then glow on top so the sparkles bloom. A small orange date stamp in a digital font sells the era instantly; put it above the glow so it stays crisp, like a real camera overlay.

1. Type your title in a heavy rounded font, white, and precompose it as CHROME. Duplicate the text inside, apply Fast Box Blur Blur Radius 12 to the copy, precompose that copy as BUMP and turn it off.
2. On the visible text apply in order: Bevel Alpha (Edge Thickness 8, Light Intensity 0.6), then CC Glass with Bump Map set to BUMP, Property left on Alpha (the blurred edge of the copy becomes a smooth height ramp), Height 60, Displacement 0 so the letters are lit but not bent.
3. Add Curves. On the RGB channel make an M shape: points at roughly input 0 to output 0, 64 to 230, 128 to 40, 192 to 255, 255 to 120. This is what makes it chrome.
4. Add Tritone: Highlights #FFFFFF, Midtones #8FA8C8, Shadows #101828. Then CC Light Sweep: Width 40, Sweep Intensity 60, Direction 30, and keyframe Center from left of the text to right over 18 frames.
5. For footage, add adjustment layer GRADE with Lumetri Color: Temperature -15, Contrast 15, Saturation 85, Faded Film 10, Highlight Tint toward cyan.
6. Add adjustment layer LENS with Optics Compensation: Field Of View (FOV) 60, Reverse Lens Distortion off (turning it on does the opposite and removes fisheye). If the frame edges go transparent, add Transform after it on the same layer with Scale 110 to push them out of frame.
7. Sparkles: shape layer Star with Points 4, Inner Radius 6, Outer Radius 60, white. Place a few on highlights and add the scale expression below.
8. Top: adjustment layer GLOW with Deep Glow, threshold high, Exposure around 0.5. Above that, a text layer date stamp like 10 14 2003 in #FFB000.
9. Stack bottom to top: footage, GRADE, LENS, sparkles, CHROME title, GLOW, date stamp.

var s = Math.abs(Math.sin(time * 4 + index)) * 100;
[s, s];

When to use itNostalgic edits, home-video style memories, 80s and 90s throwbacks, lo-fi music, and intros to retro sections. Works on anything, but best on footage that is already a bit warm and low contrast.

VHS damage happens in a specific order, and copying that order is what makes it believable. Recording loses horizontal detail and lets color smear sideways. Playback oversharpens to compensate, which creates bright halos. Tracking errors tear a band of the picture. Finally the TV adds scanlines and curvature. Stack your adjustment layers in that same order, bottom to top, and every layer damages what the layer below already damaged.

The key built-in is Channel Blur. VHS stores color at a much lower resolution than brightness, so red and blue smear horizontally while edges stay roughly sharp. Blurring only those channels, only horizontally, is a more accurate trick than offsetting RGB layers, and it is one effect instead of three duplicates.

The tracking band lives on its own adjustment layer that is only 80 px tall. An adjustment layer only affects what is under its own pixels, so its size becomes the band. Animate its position with an expression and the warp rolls up the screen. The on-screen text goes near the very top, above the damage, because the VCR drew it onto the signal after the tape.

1. Adjustment layer TAPE above the footage: Fast Box Blur, Blur Radius 2, Blur Dimensions Horizontal. Then Channel Blur: Red Blurriness 10, Blue Blurriness 14, Green Blurriness 0, Blur Dimensions Horizontal.
2. Adjustment layer COLOR: Lumetri Color with Contrast -10, Blacks +15, Saturation 120, Temperature 6, Shadow Tint toward teal, Highlight Tint toward magenta.
3. Adjustment layer PLAYBACK: Unsharp Mask with Amount 120, Radius 4, Threshold 0. This oversharpening halo is very VHS. Then Wave Warp: Wave Type Smooth Noise, Wave Height 1, Wave Width 400, Direction 0, Wave Speed 3, so the image wobbles slightly.
4. Tracking band: new adjustment layer, then in Layer Solid Settings set it to 1920 x 80. Add Wave Warp (Wave Height 15, Wave Width 30, Direction 0) and Noise (Amount of Noise 40%). Add the expression below to its Position.
5. Adjustment layer NOISE: Noise, Amount of Noise 6%, Use Color Noise on.
6. Scanlines: black solid with Venetian Blinds, Transition Completion 50%, Direction 0, Width 4, Feather 1. Set the solid to Multiply at 20% opacity. It has to be black: a white layer in Multiply changes nothing, so the lines would be invisible.
7. Adjustment layer CRT: Optics Compensation, Field Of View (FOV) 20, Reverse Lens Distortion off, for a slight bulge. If the edges go transparent, add Transform after it with Scale 104. Then add Lumetri Color with only the vignette: Amount -1.2.
8. On top: text layer PLAY and a counter like SP 0:00:12 in a blocky monospace font, white with a slight black drop shadow.
9. Stack bottom to top: footage, TAPE, COLOR, PLAYBACK, tracking band, NOISE, scanlines, CRT, text.

[value[0], 1180 - (time * 160) % 1280];

When to use itShort films, travel edits, clean cinematic edits, music videos and any section that should feel shot on film. Best on footage with practical lights, windows or sun, which give the halation something to work with.

Film looks come from a stack of small physical effects, and the order follows the path of light. A base grade sets exposure and color. Halation, the red glow film gets when light bounces off the back of the negative, sits right above that, since it comes from the brightest areas of the image. A soft print curve then rolls off the highlights. Gate weave and grain come after the image is finished, because they happen to the film strip, not to the scene.

Halation is built from the image's own highlights: Extract keeps only the brightest pixels, Fast Box Blur spreads them, and Fill turns them red-orange. Added back in Add mode, it glows only where light was strong. That is the difference from a regular glow, which brightens everything in the same color.

The bars go on top of the weave, so they stay locked while the picture under them drifts a pixel or two. That small mismatch is what a projector does, and the eye reads it as real. Work at 24 fps if you can, with frame blending off. Film has crisp individual frames, and blended frames feel like video.

1. Adjustment layer BASE: Lumetri Color with Contrast -5, Highlights -25, Shadows +10, Saturation 90. In Color Wheels, push Shadows slightly toward teal and Highlights toward warm orange.
2. Halation: precompose the footage plus BASE as FILM, duplicate the precomp layer and put it on top. On the copy apply Extract with Black Point 200, Black Softness 40, then Fast Box Blur Blur Radius 18, Iterations 3, then Fill with Color #FF3A1A. Set the copy to Add at 45% opacity.
3. Adjustment layer PRINT: Curves, pull the top-right point down to about 240 output and add a gentle S below it. Lift the bottom-left to about 8 output for a soft film black.
4. Adjustment layer WEAVE: Transform with Uniform Scale checked and Scale 101.5, and the expression below on Position.
5. Adjustment layer GRAIN: Add Grain, Viewing Mode Final Output, Intensity 0.6, Size 1.1, Softness 0.4. Under Animation, keep Animation Speed at 1.
6. Bars: black solid with a rectangle mask, Inverted, Mask Path set to 1920 x 804 centered. That leaves two 138 px bars for 2.39:1.
7. Stack bottom to top: FILM precomp, halation copy, PRINT, WEAVE, GRAIN, bars.

posterizeTime(24);
wiggle(5, 0.8);

When to use itCyberpunk and gaming edits, electronic and dubstep drops, tech intros and night city footage. Use the glitch in bursts on drops and transitions, not continuously.

This look is neon color that keeps breaking. The grade pushes shadows to deep blue and highlights to magenta and cyan, then a glow makes signs and screens bloom. The glitch goes above the glow, so it tears the bright neon into hard-edged blocks, like the final signal is corrupting. If the glow came after, it would blur those torn edges and soften the digital feel.

The block tear is built-in. A hidden layer of Fractal Noise set to Block noise, stretched wide and thin, becomes a map of horizontal bars. Displacement Map pushes the image sideways by the brightness of those bars. A posterized evolution changes the pattern a few times a second, so it jumps instead of flowing, which is how digital errors behave.

Twitch sits at the top for the punctuation: random slides, color shifts and light flashes timed to the music. The RGB split is done last, on a duplicate of the whole finished edit, so one offset fringes everything at once: footage, neon, torn blocks and Twitch's jolts. Doing it earlier would mean splitting every layer separately, and the fringes would not line up.

1. Adjustment layer GRADE: Lumetri Color, Temperature -25, Tint +20, Contrast 25, Blacks -15. Shadow Tint toward blue, Highlight Tint toward magenta.
2. Adjustment layer NEON: Deep Glow, threshold high so only lights glow, Exposure around 0.6.
3. Glitch map: new solid named MAP, apply Fractal Noise with Fractal Type Basic, Noise Type Block, Contrast 400, uncheck Uniform Scaling, Scale Width 2000, Scale Height 40. Add posterizeTime(12); time * 200 to Evolution. Precompose it and turn the precomp off.
4. Adjustment layer TEAR: Displacement Map, Displacement Map Layer MAP, Use For Horizontal Displacement Luminance, Max Horizontal Displacement 60, Max Vertical Displacement 0, Edge Behavior Wrap Pixels Around on. Add the expression below to the layer's Opacity.
5. Adjustment layer BLOCKS, only 2 to 3 frames long on hits: Mosaic with Horizontal Blocks 48, Vertical Blocks 27.
6. Adjustment layer TWITCH on top of those: apply Twitch, enable slide, color and light, and keyframe its amount up only on the drops.
7. Precompose everything as EDIT, duplicate it. Bottom copy: Shift Channels, Take Red From Full Off. Top copy: Take Green From and Take Blue From Full Off, mode Add, Position offset 8 px to the right.
8. Scanlines: black solid with Venetian Blinds (Transition Completion 50%, Direction 0, Width 3) in Multiply at 15%. Black, not white: white in Multiply leaves the image unchanged.
9. Stack bottom to top: footage, GRADE, NEON, TEAR, BLOCKS, TWITCH, then the EDIT RGB pair and scanlines in the output comp.

posterizeTime(12);
random() > 0.8 ? 100 : 0;

When to use itFootball, basketball and fighter edits, player showcases and highlight reels. The freeze intros go on the first beat of a section, the hits go on goals, dunks and tackles.

Sports hype edits sell the athlete. The grade is clean and punchy so kits and grass look rich, then the edit stops time to introduce the player: a freeze frame, the background darkened, the name huge behind them, a glowing line tracing their outline. Each layer of that intro has a fixed spot in the stack: blurred background, name text, cutout, outline. The text must sit under the cutout, or the player cannot stand in front of their own name.

The glowing outline uses Saber, which draws along masks. Instead of drawing masks by hand, run Layer > Auto-trace on the Roto Brush cutout. It turns the alpha into masks on a solid that Saber can follow. Animate Saber's end offset and the line draws itself around the player in 8 frames.

The hits go on adjustment layers on top: Radial Blur in zoom mode, a scale punch and a 2-frame exposure flash. Keeping them on top means they also blur and flash the outline and text, so the whole frame reacts as one.

1. Adjustment layer GRADE: Lumetri Color, Contrast 25, Shadows -10, Saturation 105, and in Creative Vibrance 30. In HSL Secondary, select the grass green and lower its saturation slightly so kits stand out. Then select the footage and GRADE and precompose them together (Ctrl+Shift+C) as GAME, so every copy you make next is already graded.
2. Freeze the intro shot: park on the frame where the player looks best and split GAME there (Ctrl+Shift+D). Select the right-hand piece, choose Layer > Time > Freeze Frame and trim it to the intro length (24 to 48 frames). Duplicate the frozen piece once (Ctrl+D). After the intro, place another copy of GAME starting from the same source moment so the action continues.
3. Bottom frozen copy BG: Gaussian Blur Blurriness 12 with Repeat Edge Pixels on, Exposure Exposure -1.2, and in Lumetri Saturation 40.
4. Above it, the player name in a wide heavy font, 400 px tall, white at 90% opacity, kerned tight.
5. Top frozen copy CUTOUT above the text: Roto Brush the player (Alt+W) on the frozen frame and refine the edge. Precompose it (Move all attributes) so the roto is baked into the alpha, then run Layer > Auto-trace on the precomp with Channel Alpha, Tolerance 1 and Apply To New Layer on. You get a new layer carrying the outline as masks.
6. Outline: rename the auto-trace layer OUTLINE, move it above CUTOUT, apply Saber and set Core Type under Customize Core to Layer Masks. Glow Intensity around 40%, Core Size around 2. Animate the end offset from 0% to 100% over 8 frames. Set the layer to Screen, or set Saber to render on a transparent background in its render settings.
7. Adjustment layer HIT on goals and dunks, 6 frames long: Radial Blur, Type Zoom, Amount 40 down to 0. Transform with Uniform Scale checked, the expression below on its Scale, and a layer marker on each hit.
8. Adjustment layer FLASH on top: Exposure 2.5 for 2 frames with hold keyframes.
9. Stack bottom to top: GAME (footage plus GRADE), BG, name text, CUTOUT, OUTLINE, HIT, FLASH.

var out = value;
if (thisLayer.marker.numKeys > 0) {
  var m = thisLayer.marker.nearestKey(time);
  if (m.time > time && m.index > 1) m = thisLayer.marker.key(m.index - 1);
  var t = time - m.time;
  if (t >= 0) out = value + 12 * Math.exp(-10 * t);
}
out;

When to use itCar edits, JDM and drift edits, night city drives and rolling shots. It works best on footage shot at night with street lights, headlights and neon in frame.

Night car edits are about lights against darkness. The grade sinks the shadows to teal-blue and keeps lights warm, so tail lights, signs and headlights become the subject. Then you make those lights do more: they leave trails, they glow, and they stretch into horizontal streaks like an anamorphic lens. Every light effect starts from the same isolated highlights, so the dark areas stay clean.

Light trails need Echo, and Echo does not work on adjustment layers. It reads earlier frames of its own layer, so it needs real footage pixels. The trick is a duplicate of the clip with Extract, so only lights survive, precomposed, with Echo on the precomp. Echo ignores effects applied before it on the same layer, so without that precompose step it echoes the whole frame and the car smears into mush.

RSMB goes on the clip itself, before any grading, so it reads clean motion. Deep Glow sits on top of the light layers and grade, so the trails glow too. A slow floating wiggle on a Transform adjustment makes even locked-off shots feel like they were filmed from a moving car.

1. On each clip, apply RSMB with a moderate blur amount (around 0.6). Raise it on whip pans and rolls.
2. Adjustment layer GRADE: Lumetri Color, Temperature -15, Contrast 20, Blacks -10, Saturation 90. Shadow Tint toward teal, Highlight Tint toward orange. In HSL Secondary pick the tail-light red and push Saturation up.
3. Light trails: precompose the clip, duplicate the precomp and move the copy above GRADE. Apply Extract (Black Point 190, Black Softness 30) to the copy, precompose it again (Move all attributes) as LIGHTS, then apply Echo to LIGHTS with Echo Time (seconds) -0.033, Number Of Echoes 10, Starting Intensity 1, Decay 0.8, Echo Operator Maximum. Set the layer to Add.
4. Anamorphic streaks: another copy with Extract (Black Point 220), then Fast Box Blur Blur Radius 150, Iterations 3, Blur Dimensions Horizontal, then Tint with Map White To #4AA8FF. Set to Add at 60%.
5. Adjustment layer GLOW above those: Deep Glow, high threshold so only lights glow, Exposure around 0.4.
6. Adjustment layer FLOAT: Transform with Uniform Scale checked and Scale 104, uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle, Shutter Angle 180. Add the expression below on Position.
7. Adjustment layer GRAIN: Add Grain, Viewing Mode Final Output, Intensity 0.3.
8. Stack bottom to top: clips with RSMB, GRADE, trail copy, streak copy, GLOW, FLOAT, GRAIN.

wiggle(1.2, 6);

When to use itVillain edits, crime and detective edits, sad or tense sections, and dark anime moments. It suits close-ups, slow pushes and footage with one strong light source.

Noir is about light you do not get. The black and white conversion decides which colors turn bright and which turn dark, so skin can glow while backgrounds sink. Then a hard Curves crushes the shadows and leaves half the frame black. Shadow is the main shape of the image, and everything in this stack either adds more of it or makes the remaining light feel precious.

The signature shadow of window blinds is built-in: a solid with Venetian Blinds makes even slats, Fast Box Blur softens them like real cast shadows, and Multiply lays them over the image. It goes above the grade but under the grain and vignette, because a cast shadow is in the scene, not on the lens. Rotate it and mask it to fall across faces and walls only.

A slight Glow on the highlights stands in for old lens bloom, and grain sits on top. A flickering bulb is one Exposure effect with a random expression. Keep it rare, one dip every second or so, or it becomes a strobe.

1. Adjustment layer BW: Black & White, Reds 70, Yellows 90, Greens 40, Cyans 30, Blues 10, Magentas 60. High reds and yellows brighten skin; low blues darken skies and clothing.
2. Adjustment layer CRUSH: Curves, drag the bottom-left point right to about 40 input so deep shadows go pure black, and pull the highlights up into a steep S.
3. Blinds: black solid with Venetian Blinds, Transition Completion 45%, Direction 0, Width 70, Feather 5. The black slats are the shadows; the gaps are where light comes through. Add Fast Box Blur Blur Radius 10. Rotate the layer 25 degrees, scale to 130%, and draw a feathered mask (Mask Feather 150) over the area where the blind shadows should fall, such as a face and the wall behind it. Mode Multiply at 70%.
4. Adjustment layer BLOOM: Glow, Glow Threshold 80%, Glow Radius 30, Glow Intensity 0.4.
5. Adjustment layer FLICKER: Exposure with the expression below on Exposure.
6. Adjustment layer LENS: Lumetri Color with only the Vignette section: Amount -1.5, Midpoint 35, Feather 60.
7. Adjustment layer GRAIN: Add Grain, Viewing Mode Final Output, Intensity 0.8, Size 1.3.
8. Stack bottom to top: footage, BW, CRUSH, blinds, BLOOM, FLICKER, LENS, GRAIN.

posterizeTime(12);
random() > 0.92 ? -1.2 : 0;

When to use itVaporwave, synthwave, city pop and lo-fi edits, aesthetic intros, and retro-internet themed fan edits. Works best on slow footage, statues, cityscapes and sunsets.

Vaporwave remaps color. Instead of grading the footage, you throw its colors away and paint new ones based on brightness: deep purple shadows, hot pink mids, cyan highlights. Tritone does this in one effect. Set contrast before Tritone, because Tritone only reads brightness, so a flat image turns into a flat pink wash and a contrasty one gets clear pink and cyan zones. Keep both inside a precomp with the footage: an adjustment layer changes everything below it, and you do not want the sun and grid remapped too.

Glow goes after Tritone so it blooms in the new colors. A glow before it would just be brightness that Tritone then repaints, losing the colorful halo. A little Noise and a lower frame rate with Posterize Time make it feel like a cheap 90s render rather than a modern filter.

The background set is all built-in: a sun made from a circle with a yellow-to-pink Gradient Ramp and Venetian Blinds slicing its lower half, and a grid floor from the Grid effect on a 3D solid tipped back. Scrolling the grid's anchor gives you the endless drive toward the horizon.

1. Background: purple solid #1A0533. Sun: ellipse shape layer 600 x 600 px, precompose it. Inside, apply Gradient Ramp with Start Color #FFE66D at the top, End Color #FF2E88 at the bottom.
2. Duplicate the sun precomp layer. On the top copy, draw a mask over the upper half only. On the lower copy, mask the bottom half and apply Venetian Blinds: Transition Completion 35%, Direction 0, Width 40. The top stays solid, the bottom gets the classic slices.
3. Grid floor: new solid 3000 x 3000, make it 3D, X Rotation -80, position below the horizon. Apply Grid: Size From Width Slider, Width 100, Border 3, Color #FF71CE. Add Glow (Glow Radius 15). Add the expression below to Grid Anchor. Add a camera if you want to move it.
4. Footage or a cutout statue goes above the set, inside its own precomp called SUBJECT. Inside SUBJECT, add adjustment layer CONTRAST above the footage: Lumetri Color, Contrast 30, Saturation 0.
5. Still inside SUBJECT, adjustment layer MAP above CONTRAST: Tritone, Highlights #01CDFE, Midtones #FF71CE, Shadows #2A0B4F.
6. Back in the main comp, adjustment layer BLOOM above everything: Glow, Glow Threshold 60%, Glow Radius 40, Glow Intensity 1.
7. Adjustment layer LOFI: Noise Amount of Noise 5%, then Posterize Time Frame Rate 15.
8. Main comp stack bottom to top: background, sun, grid, SUBJECT (footage, CONTRAST, MAP inside), BLOOM, LOFI, then text.

[value[0], value[1] + time * 120];

When to use itDay-in-the-life edits, travel and café clips, fan edits of soft characters, couple edits and quiet songs. It works best on bright, daytime footage with lots of skin, sky and plants.

This look is calm. Contrast drops, blacks lift into a matte gray, greens get muted, skin warms to peach, and everything sits a little overexposed. The grade does most of the work, so it goes first. A matte black is the base of the look: lift Blacks and use Faded Film, and the image instantly reads as a printed photo instead of video.

Bloom and light leaks come next, as separate layers. The bloom is a blurred copy in Screen, so bright areas soften. The leak is a drifting, warm blob of light made from Fractal Noise. Put the leak above the bloom, so the leak itself stays clear instead of being blurred twice and disappearing.

Grain goes on top of the image so the whole thing feels like one photograph. Text and frames go above grain or below it, depending on what you want: above for a clean phone layout, below for a printed scrapbook feel. Keep the type small, lowercase and in a serif or thin sans, with wide tracking.

1. Adjustment layer GRADE: Lumetri Color, Exposure 0.3, Contrast -25, Highlights -30, Blacks +25, Temperature 10, Saturation 85. In Creative, Faded Film 30, Highlight Tint toward peach. In HSL Secondary, select greens and lower saturation by about half.
2. Adjustment layer BLOOM: Gaussian Blur Blurriness 30, Repeat Edge Pixels on. Set the adjustment layer's mode to Screen at 25% opacity.
3. Light leak: new solid LEAK. Apply Fractal Noise (Contrast 120, Scale 600, Complexity 2), then Fast Box Blur Blur Radius 80, then Tint with Map Black To black and Map White To #FFB38A. Add the expression below to Evolution. Mode Screen at 40%.
4. Adjustment layer GRAIN: Add Grain, Viewing Mode Final Output, Intensity 0.25, Size 1, Softness 0.5.
5. Frame (optional): a white solid the size of the comp with a centered rectangle mask of 1840 x 1000 set to Inverted, which leaves a 40 px border. Put it above GRAIN for a clean layout.
6. Text on top: lowercase, serif or thin sans, 48 px, tracking 200 in the Character panel, white or #FFF5EC, opacity 90%. To animate it, add Animate > Tracking and ease Tracking Amount from 100 to 0 over 12 frames while Opacity fades from 0 to 90%, so the letters drift together as they appear.
7. Stack bottom to top: clips, GRADE, BLOOM, LEAK, GRAIN, frame, text.

time * 35;

When to use itOn a strong beat or a drop where one shot hands off to the next. Zoom in builds energy going into a hit, zoom out feels like a release after it. Fits AMVs, car edits, travel reels and almost any music edit.

Most zoom transitions look cheap for three reasons: the clip itself gets scaled so there is no shared blur, the edges go black when the scale drops under 100%, and the easing slows down right at the cut. The proper build fixes all three with an adjustment layer over the cut carrying Motion Tile and then Transform. Motion Tile fills the edges with mirrored copies, and the Transform effect has its own shutter angle, so you get strong, controllable blur without touching the layer switches.

You split that adjustment layer at the cut. If one layer jumped from 200% to 50% across the cut, the motion blur would sample the frames in between and smear a giant streak over your first frame of clip B. Two halves keep each blur clean. For a zoom in, the out half goes 100 to 200 and the in half goes 50 to 100. Each half is one doubling, so the zoom speed matches on both sides and the eye reads it as one move.

The speed should be highest exactly on the cut. Ease the far keyframes, keep the cut keyframes linear, and the speed graph becomes a ramp that peaks at the cut. That peak is where the blur is strongest, which is what hides the edit.

1. Put clip B straight after clip A. Park the playhead on the cut and press Ctrl+Alt+Y for a new adjustment layer. Trim it to start 6 frames before the cut and end 6 frames after (move the playhead, then Alt+[ and Alt+]).
2. Add Motion Tile first, then Transform. In Motion Tile set Output Width and Output Height to 300 and check Mirror Edges. The order matters: the tiles must exist before Transform shrinks the image.
3. In Transform, uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle and set Shutter Angle to 270. The effect renders its own blur from its own keyframes.
4. With the playhead on the cut, press Ctrl+Shift+D to split the adjustment layer into an out half and an in half.
5. Out half: keyframe Scale 100 on its first frame and 200 on its last frame. Select the first keyframe, press F9, then Ctrl+Shift+K and set Outgoing Influence to 85%. Leave the last keyframe linear.
6. In half: Scale 50 on its first frame, 100 on its last. Keep the first keyframe linear, give the last one F9 with Incoming Influence 85%.
7. Open the Graph Editor, switch to the speed graph and check the shape: a ramp climbing into the cut, then falling away. If the in half looks slower, lower its start value toward 40.
8. For a zoom out, swap the values: out half 100 to 50, in half 200 to 100, same easing.

When to use itBetween two shots that both have sideways energy, or on a snare or clap. Great in travel edits, football edits and fast music-video cuts. Avoid it between two static talking shots, it feels random there.

A real whip pan is a camera moving so fast the picture turns into streaks. You fake it by sliding the image sideways on an adjustment layer over the cut, letting Motion Tile fill the gap with mirrored copies, and blurring along the direction of travel. Since the frame is pure streaks at the peak, the viewer never sees the cut happen.

It is shorter than a zoom. Four frames on each side is plenty at 24 or 30 fps. The move should accelerate into the cut and decelerate out of it, like a real camera that starts and stops. Keep both halves moving the same direction: if clip A slides off to the left, clip B must arrive from the right.

The Transform shutter angle gives motion blur, but on a whip it can look stepped because the move per frame is huge. A Directional Blur on top smooths that into one clean streak. Tie the blur to the speed with the expression below and you never have to keyframe it.

1. Make an adjustment layer from 4 frames before the cut to 4 frames after, then split it on the cut with Ctrl+Shift+D.
2. On both halves add Motion Tile (Output Width 400, Output Height 100, Mirror Edges on), then Transform, then Directional Blur.
3. In Transform uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle and set Shutter Angle to 360.
4. Out half: Position 960, 540 on the first frame and -960, 540 on the last frame. Give the first keyframe F9 with Outgoing Influence 90%, leave the last one linear.
5. In half: Position 2880, 540 on the first frame and 960, 540 on the last. First keyframe linear, last keyframe F9 with Incoming Influence 90%.
6. On both halves set Directional Blur Direction to 90 (horizontal) and paste the expression below into Blur Length.
7. Scrub frame by frame. The two frames touching the cut should be almost pure streaks. If you can still read clip A, push the out-half influence higher so more movement happens late.

Math.min(effect("Transform")("Position").speed / 100, 150)

When to use itFor 9:16 TikTok and Reels edits, where the vertical swipe already feels natural. Also good from sky to ground (a jump, a ball in the air, a building to the street).

A vertical whip uses the same idea as a horizontal one: slide the image fast on an adjustment layer over the cut, fill the gap with mirrored tiles, and blur along the move. The difference is the feeling. Down reads as falling or landing, up reads as lift. Matching that to the content makes it feel motivated, like the shot after a ball kicked into the air.

In a vertical 1080x1920 comp the move is longer (1920 px), so you need more tile height and a little more blur. In a 16:9 comp, a vertical whip only travels 1080 px, so it covers less ground per frame than a horizontal one at the same frame count. A 270 shutter angle is usually enough there, and going higher just turns the short frame height to mush.

Add a tiny rotation of two or three degrees. A real tilt is rarely perfectly straight, and that small tilt is what makes it read as a camera instead of a slide.

1. Make an adjustment layer from 4 frames before the cut to 4 after and split it on the cut with Ctrl+Shift+D.
2. On both halves add Motion Tile (Output Width 100, Output Height 400, Mirror Edges on), then Transform, then Directional Blur with Direction 0.
3. In Transform uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle, set Shutter Angle to 270 for 16:9 or 360 for 9:16.
4. Whip up, 16:9: out half Position 960, 540 to 960, -540; in half 960, 1620 to 960, 540. For a 1080x1920 comp use 540, 960 to 540, -960, then 540, 2880 to 540, 960.
5. Easing: out half first keyframe F9 with Outgoing Influence 90%, last keyframe linear. In half first keyframe linear, last F9 with Incoming Influence 90%.
6. Animate Rotation: 0 to 3 on the out half, -3 to 0 on the in half, same keyframe times.
7. Add the speed-driven blur expression to Blur Length, or keyframe it 0, 120 at the cut, 0.

Math.min(effect("Transform")("Position").speed / 100, 120)

When to use itOn a big hit or the first beat of a drop. Common in car drift edits, skate and football edits, and AMVs on a spin attack or a turn. Use it once or twice per edit, it is loud.

A spin is easier than a zoom because rotation never jumps: the angle keeps climbing straight through the cut, so you can use one adjustment layer across the whole thing instead of splitting it. The clip changes underneath, the spin carries on, and the motion blur at the fastest point hides the swap.

The tricky part is the corners. A rotated 16:9 frame leaves big empty triangles, and at 45 degrees you would need nearly 200% scale to hide them. The common fix is Motion Tile with Mirror Edges, so the corners fill with mirrored picture that disappears in the blur. A small scale bump at the cut helps too.

Ease both ends and let the speed peak in the middle. The cut must sit exactly at the fastest frame, which is the middle of the move if both keyframes have the same influence.

1. Make one adjustment layer from 6 frames before the cut to 6 frames after. Do not split it.
2. Add Motion Tile (Output Width and Output Height 300, Mirror Edges on), then Transform.
3. In Transform uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle and set Shutter Angle to 180. Rotation blur builds fast, so you need less than for a zoom.
4. Keyframe Rotation 0x+0 on the first frame and 1x+0 on the last frame (one full turn over 12 frames).
5. Select both keyframes, press F9, then Ctrl+Shift+K and set both influences to 80%. The speed graph should be a hill with its top on the cut.
6. Keyframe Scale 100, then 120 on the cut, then 100 on the last frame, all with F9. The bump pushes the mirror seams out of frame at the busiest moment.
7. Preview at full resolution. If the middle frames still show clear detail, raise Shutter Angle to 270.

a = degreesToRadians(effect("Transform")("Rotation"));
r = thisComp.width / thisComp.height;
100 * (Math.abs(Math.cos(a)) + r * Math.abs(Math.sin(a)))

When to use itThe smooth-transition look from TikTok and Reels travel and lifestyle edits. Works on slower songs or the soft part before a drop, where a hard zoom would feel too aggressive.

This is the clean zoom with two changes: much stronger easing and a lens bulge that peaks on the cut. The easing is what makes it feel smooth. Instead of a gentle ramp, the speed stays almost flat for most of the move and then rockets up in the last two frames. That gives a long, calm drift followed by a snap, and the snap is where the cut hides.

Getting that shape with plain Easy Ease takes fiddling in the Graph Editor. Flow makes it one click: select two keyframes and apply an exponential curve. If you do not own Flow, push the influence to 95% or higher and drag the handles in the speed graph.

The warp comes from Optics Compensation with Reverse Lens Distortion checked, which bulges the frame like a fisheye. Keyframe its Field Of View (FOV) up into the cut and back down after, and the image seems to bend through the camera.

1. Make an adjustment layer from 8 frames before the cut to 8 after and split it on the cut with Ctrl+Shift+D.
2. On both halves add Motion Tile (Output Width and Output Height 300, Mirror Edges on), then Transform, then Optics Compensation.
3. In Transform uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle, set Shutter Angle to 270. In Optics Compensation check Reverse Lens Distortion.
4. Out half: Scale 100 to 250, Field Of View (FOV) 0 to 80. In half: Scale 40 to 100, Field Of View (FOV) 80 to 0. First and last frames of each half.
5. With Flow: select the out half's keyframes and apply an expo-in curve. Select the in half's keyframes and apply expo-out. Do the same for Field Of View (FOV).
6. Without Flow: on the out half set the first keyframe's Outgoing Influence to 95% and keep the last keyframe linear. Mirror it on the in half (first linear, last Incoming 95%).
7. Check the speed graph. Each half should look like a hockey stick, almost flat and then very steep at the cut.
8. If the corners pull in and show black at the warp peak, lower the peak Field Of View (FOV) to about 60 or raise the Scale end values by 10.

When to use itWhen you want the viewer to see both shots at once for a moment: before and after, player to player, car to car. Fits clean sports edits, social recaps and comparisons.

Unlike a whip, a push keeps both clips sharp enough to read. That only works if they really sit side by side, so you build a wide strip with clip A on the left and clip B on the right, then slide the whole strip. Both clips get the same motion and the same blur, which is why it reads as one physical move.

The overshoot is what gives it weight. The strip slides a little past its final spot and settles back over three or four frames. Normally that overshoot would show a black edge on the right. Put Motion Tile with Mirror Edges on the strip layer and the overshoot reveals a mirrored sliver instead, which nobody notices.

Motion Tile only mirrors the outer edges of the strip, the far left of A and the far right of B, so it never touches the seam between the two clips. That is the reason to build a strip instead of animating two layers.

1. Select clips A and B and choose Layer > Pre-compose (Ctrl+Shift+C), move all attributes. Open the precomp's Composition Settings (Ctrl+K), click the left-middle square of the Anchor grid on the Advanced tab, then on the Basic tab uncheck Lock Aspect Ratio and set Width to 3840. The left anchor keeps clip A where it was.
2. Inside the precomp, set clip B's Position to 2880, 540. Slide clip B so it starts 8 frames before clip A ends, so both are playing during the push.
3. Back in the main comp, set the precomp layer's Position to 1920, 540 so clip A fills the frame.
4. On the precomp layer add Motion Tile (Output Width 120, Output Height 100, Mirror Edges on), then Transform. Uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle, set Shutter Angle to 180.
5. Keyframe Transform Position X: 1920 at the first push frame (the first frame of the overlap, where clip B starts), -40 at frame 7, 0 at frame 11. Y stays 540.
6. Easing: first keyframe F9 with Outgoing Influence 75%. Middle keyframe F9 with Incoming Influence 40%. Last keyframe F9 with Incoming Influence 75%.
7. Line it up so the frame where the strip is halfway (X about 960) lands on your beat.

When to use itReveals and reversals: a before and after, a player's two sides, a character change in an AMV, or the turn into a chorus. Feels playful, so it suits fan edits and recaps more than moody cinematic edits.

A card flip is two half-turns. Clip A rotates from facing you to edge-on, and the moment it is edge-on you swap to clip B, which finishes the turn from edge-on to facing you. At 90 degrees the layer is a thin line, so the swap is invisible.

The easiest built-in way is to make both clips 3D layers and keyframe Y Rotation. Adding a small push back in Z while it turns gives the flip depth and keeps the corners from swinging into the camera. Turn on layer motion blur so the edge smears as it spins.

There is also a one-effect shortcut: Card Wipe with one row and one column is literally a single card flip. Set Rows and Columns to 1, point Back Layer at clip B, and keyframe Transition Completion.

1. Turn on the 3D switch for clips A and B. Check that both anchor points are centered (960, 540).
2. Clip A: keyframe Y Rotation 0 at 5 frames before the cut and 90 on the cut. First keyframe F9 with Outgoing Influence 80%, cut keyframe linear.
3. Clip B: keyframe Y Rotation -90 on the cut and 0 at 5 frames after. Cut keyframe linear, last keyframe F9 with Incoming Influence 80%.
4. On both clips keyframe Position Z: clip A 0 to 400, clip B 400 to 0, same frames and easing as the rotation.
5. Turn on the layer motion blur switch for both clips and the comp's Enable Motion Blur button. In Composition Settings > Advanced set Shutter Angle to 180.
6. Put a dark solid or a blurred copy of clip A at the bottom of the stack so the background behind the card is not empty black.
7. Shortcut version: apply Card Wipe to clip A, extend A 5 frames past the cut, set Back Layer to clip B, Rows and Columns to 1, Flip Axis to Y, then keyframe Transition Completion 0% to 100% over 10 frames with F9 on both. If clip B sits right under A, you see it behind the card mid-flip; to keep that space dark, point Back Layer at a duplicate of B with its eye off (effects can read hidden layers) and start the visible clip B on the frame the flip ends.

When to use itFunny, bouncy or cartoony moments: meme edits, anime comedy beats, kids' content, a bass wobble. Avoid it in serious cinematic edits.

Squash and stretch is the oldest animation trick there is: things stretch along their direction of travel when they move fast and squash when they hit something. Applied to a zoom, the frame stretches vertically as it rushes into the cut and then lands slightly squashed before springing back to normal.

You get it by unchecking Uniform Scale in the Transform effect and animating height and width separately. Height leads and overshoots, width lags behind. The difference between the two is the stretch. Keep the area roughly constant: when height goes up a lot, width goes up less, and on the landing it flips.

The spring at the end is an expression. It reads how fast the value was moving at the last keyframe and adds a decaying wobble after it, so you get a natural bounce without hand-keying five extra keyframes.

1. Make an adjustment layer from 5 frames before the cut to 8 frames after and split it on the cut with Ctrl+Shift+D.
2. On both halves add Motion Tile (Output Width and Output Height 300, Mirror Edges on), then Transform. Uncheck Uniform Scale and Use Composition's Shutter Angle, set Shutter Angle to 270.
3. Out half (5 frames): Scale Height 100 to 190, Scale Width 100 to 140. First keyframes F9 with Outgoing Influence 85%, last keyframes linear.
4. In half (8 frames): Scale Height 60 at the cut, 100 at frame 5. Scale Width 80 at the cut, 100 at frame 5. Leave all of these keyframes linear. The bounce expression reads the speed the value arrives with, and F9 on the last key would bring that speed to zero and kill the wobble.
5. Paste the spring expression below on both Scale Height and Scale Width of the in half. The last 3 frames of the layer give the wobble room to play out.
6. If the wobble is too big, lower 0.05 in the expression to 0.03. If it dies too fast, lower the 8 to 6.

n = 0;
if (numKeys > 0) { n = nearestKey(time).index; if (key(n).time > time) n--; }
if (n == 0) { value; } else {
  t = time - key(n).time;
  v = velocityAtTime(key(n).time - thisComp.frameDuration / 10);
  value + v * 0.05 * Math.sin(4 * t * 2 * Math.PI) / Math.exp(8 * t);
}

When to use itWhen clip A has a dark opening or a strong subject you can fly into: a tunnel, a car window, a pupil, a phone screen, a jersey. Music videos and cinematic edits love it because it feels planned, not added.

Instead of zooming the whole frame, you cut a hole in clip A and put clip B behind it. As A scales up toward the hole, the hole grows until it fills the frame and you are looking at B. Because the hole is something in the shot (a door, a dark window), it feels like the camera flew through the world.

Dark areas are the easiest because the edge of the mask hides in shadow. A soft feather and a little blur on the edge do the rest. With a subject instead of a hole, use Roto Brush to cut them out and put B inside their silhouette. You fly into the person and come out in the next scene.

Set the anchor point on the center of the hole. Then scaling pulls everything toward that point, and the hole never drifts out of frame.

1. Put clip B below clip A and overlap them by 10 frames, so B starts 10 frames before A ends.
2. On clip A, draw a mask with the Pen tool (G) around the dark area. Set the mask mode to Subtract and Mask Feather to 15 px. If the camera moves, right-click the mask and choose Track Mask.
3. Use the Pan Behind tool (Y) to move clip A's anchor point to the center of the hole. If the hole moves, track it and keyframe the anchor to follow.
4. Keyframe clip A's Scale 100 at the start of the overlap and 1500 at the end. Apply an expo-in shape: first keyframe F9 with Outgoing Influence 95%, last keyframe linear.
5. Keyframe clip B's Scale 160 to 100 over the same 10 frames: first keyframe linear, last keyframe F9 with Incoming Influence 85%. B settling while A rushes past sells the depth.
6. Turn on the motion blur switch for both clips and the comp's Enable Motion Blur. Set Shutter Angle to 270 in Composition Settings > Advanced.
7. Trim clip A at the frame where the hole fully covers the frame (usually around Scale 800 to 1000). Anything after is wasted render time.

When to use itWhen you have a circle or spinning object in both shots: a wheel and a ball, a steering wheel and a vinyl record, an eye and a lens, a drift and a turntable. Car and football edits use it constantly.

A match cut works because the eye follows shape and motion, not content. If a round thing sits in the same spot, at the same size, turning the same way in both shots, the cut barely registers. Adding a forced rotation on top makes the link obvious and gives the cut a beat.

The work is in lining up. You move clip B so its circle sits exactly over clip A's circle, scale it to match, then rotate both around that shared center. Put both anchor points on the circle centers, and the rotation looks like one object spinning while the world around it changes.

Spin direction matters. If the wheel in clip A turns clockwise, rotate the frame clockwise too, and make clip B continue that way. Fighting the real motion looks wrong even if viewers cannot say why.

1. Find the frame on clip A where the round object is clearest. Use the Pan Behind tool (Y) to put clip A's anchor point on the circle center. Do the same for clip B.
2. Set clip A's Opacity to 50% temporarily, put clip B above it, and move and scale clip B until the two circles overlap. Then set A back to 100%.
3. If the circles move during the shots, track each one with the Tracker panel (Track Motion, position only) and apply the track to a null. Parent the clip to its null.
4. On clip A add Transform, set its Anchor Point and Position to the circle center, uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle, set Shutter Angle to 180. Keyframe Rotation 0 at 6 frames before the cut and 90 on the cut. First key F9 with Outgoing Influence 85%, cut key linear.
5. On clip B add the same Transform setup on its own circle center. Rotation -90 on the cut to 0 at 6 frames after. Cut key linear, last key F9 with Incoming Influence 85%.
6. Add Motion Tile above Transform on both clips (Output Width and Output Height 200, Mirror Edges on) so the rotated corners are filled.
7. Scrub across the cut at 50% speed. The circle should stay put while everything around it changes.

When to use itRecaps, intros and montage moments where you want to show many shots at once: a season recap, a team intro, a travel highlight. Also a strong opening for a TikTok that lists things.

The grid reveal tells the viewer that this shot is one of many. You pull back from clip A until it becomes the center tile of a 3x3 wall, hold for a beat so the eye can take in the grid, then push into another tile that becomes clip B. It is a zoom out and a zoom in with a pause between them.

Build the grid as a big precomp (three times the comp size in both directions) with a clip in each tile. Then animate the grid layer's Anchor Point and Scale together. The anchor point decides which tile you are looking at, and scale decides how much of the grid you see. That keeps every move centered without position math.

For a quicker version with no extra clips, Motion Tile on one layer gives you a grid of the same shot. It is less impressive but takes a minute.

1. Make a new comp 5760 x 3240 called Grid, same frame rate. Drop nine clips into it and place them at X 960, 2880, 4800 and Y 540, 1620, 2700. Clip A goes in the center tile (2880, 1620), clip B in the top right (4800, 540).
2. Optional: add a thin black border between tiles. Put a black solid at the bottom of the Grid comp, unlink each clip's Scale and set it to 99.8, 99.6%. That leaves an even gap of about 4 px on every side. Tiles read better with a thin border.
3. Put the Grid comp in your main comp. Set its Anchor Point to 2880, 1620 and Position to 960, 540, Scale 100. Now clip A fills the frame.
4. Frames 0 to 8: keyframe Scale 100 to 33.3. Anchor stays at 2880, 1620. Easing: F9 on both keys with 75% influence, or a Flow expo in-out curve.
5. Frames 8 to 14: hold. Copy the frame-8 Scale keyframe to frame 14, and also set an Anchor Point keyframe at 2880, 1620 on frame 14, so the full grid sits still for about a quarter second.
6. Frames 14 to 22: keyframe Anchor Point to 4800, 540 and Scale to 100. Same easing. The view dives into clip B's tile. If the tile swoops in a curve, move the end Anchor Point key earlier to frame 18 so the view centers on the tile before the zoom speeds up.
7. Turn on the layer motion blur switch and Enable Motion Blur, or use a Transform effect with Shutter Angle 180 and animate its values instead.
8. If the corners show empty space when the anchor moves, check that each tile edge touches the grid edge exactly.

When to use itCinematic edits and slow builds where a zoom would feel flat. Great when you have a cutout subject or overlay to place between the two clips so the camera passes something on the way.

A 2D zoom only changes scale. A camera dolly changes perspective: layers closer to the lens grow faster than layers further away. If you put clip A at the front, clip B deeper in Z and maybe a cutout or a dust overlay between them, the camera move gives you parallax for free, and the transition feels like traveling through space.

The numbers are simple once you know one thing: with a 50mm camera preset in a 1920 wide comp, the camera Zoom is 2666.7. A layer exactly that far from the camera fills the frame at 100% scale. So if you move the camera by the same distance as the gap between the layers, each clip fills the frame at its stop.

1. Turn on the 3D switch for clips A and B. Overlap them by 12 frames.
2. Set clip A Position to 960, 540, 0 and clip B to 960, 540, 3000. Both at Scale 100.
3. Add a camera (Layer > New > Camera), One-Node Camera, preset 50mm. Its Zoom is 2666.7.
4. Keyframe the camera Position Z: -2666.7 at the start of the overlap, 333.3 at the end. That is the same 3000 px gap, so clip B lands at full frame.
5. Easing: Flow expo in-out on both keyframes, or F9 with 90% influence on both. The camera drifts, accelerates through clip A, then glides to a stop on B.
6. Turn on Depth of Field in the camera options. Focus Distance 2666.7, Aperture 40 px, and keyframe Focus Distance so it stays on whichever clip is ahead.
7. Turn on layer motion blur for both clips and Enable Motion Blur. In Composition Settings > Advanced set Shutter Angle to 180.
8. Optional: put a Roto Brush cutout of clip A's subject at Z -800 with Scale 70%, so from the camera's start it lines up exactly over the subject in clip A (it is 1866.7 px from the lens instead of 2666.7). It then flies past the lens first. That parallax is what sells the depth.

When to use itWhen you need a lot of whips and swings fast, like a long montage with a transition every bar. The motion and blur are handled for you, so you spend time on timing instead of setup.

Sapphire's swish transitions do in one effect what the manual builds do with three. S_SwishPan slides the outgoing clip off and the incoming clip in with directional blur. S_Swish3D does the same but moves the frame in 3D, so you can tumble, flip or roll it with perspective. Both blend the two clips at the midpoint, which hides the cut even when the blur is light.

Sapphire transitions in After Effects work on two layers: apply the effect to the outgoing clip, overlap it with the incoming clip, and pick the incoming clip in the effect's Background layer menu. Then keyframe Wipe Percent across the overlap, or turn on Auto Trans to run it over the whole length of the outgoing layer. The overlap is the length of the transition, so trim your clips so they share the frames you want.

The Load Preset button opens Sapphire's preset browser with ready-made swish variations. They are a good starting point, then adjust the speed and blur to the song.

1. Overlap clip A and clip B by 8 frames for a whip or 12 frames for a 3D swing. Clip A on top.
2. Apply S_SwishPan (or S_Swish3D) to clip A from the Sapphire Transitions category.
3. In the effect's Background layer menu, pick clip B. Trim clip A so it ends on the last overlap frame.
4. Leave Auto Trans off and keyframe Wipe Percent from 0 on the first overlap frame to 100 on the last overlap frame.
5. Easing: F9 on both keyframes with 80% influence, so the fastest part sits in the middle of the overlap. Line that middle frame up with your beat. The effect also has Slow In and Slow Out controls; set them low if you ease with keyframes, so the two don't stack.
6. In S_SwishPan, set Direction to match the action (horizontal for most whips) and raise Blur Amount until the middle frames are pure streaks.
7. In S_Swish3D, choose which rotation to use: Swivel for a door-like swing around the vertical axis, Rotate for a roll in the frame's plane, Tilt for a forward tumble. Start with one, two at most, and keep Motion Blur up.

When to use itOn kicks and snares in fast edits where a full zoom would take too long. Phonk and velocity edits, sports hype, quick TikTok cuts. It is 6 frames total, so you can use it often.

This is the zoom transition cut down to its essence. Instead of scaling the frame a lot, you scale it only a little and let a radial blur do the work. The blur streaks every pixel outward from the center, so for two frames it looks like a hard zoom, and then it is gone. Because the scale barely changes, you do not need Motion Tile for most of it.

CC Radial Fast Blur is fast to render and does the job. Its Zoom menu has a Brightest option that keeps the highlights in the streaks, which gives a punchier, light-speed look than Standard. Peak the blur on the first frame of clip B, not the last frame of clip A. The eye reads the new shot as arriving out of the blur.

BCC's blur filters give a smoother, higher quality streak with more control over the falloff and the center, which helps when you want it to read as a lens effect rather than a filter.

1. Make an adjustment layer from 3 frames before the cut to 3 frames after. No split needed, the scale change is small.
2. Add Transform then CC Radial Fast Blur. In Transform uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle, set Shutter Angle to 180.
3. Keyframe Transform Scale: 100 at frame -3, 115 on the cut, 100 at frame +3. F9 on all three.
4. Keyframe CC Radial Fast Blur Amount: 0 at frame -3, 85 on the cut, 0 at frame +3. Make the cut keyframe linear and the outer two F9 with 70% influence.
5. Set Zoom to Brightest for a light-streak look, or Standard for a neutral blur.
6. Move Center to the subject if they are off center, so the streaks pour out of them.
7. BCC version: replace CC Radial Fast Blur with BCC Radial Blur (BCC+ Radial Blur in recent versions), put its center on the same point, and keyframe its blur amount with the same timing.

When to use itOn the drop, between two energetic shots, or from a calm section into a hype one. It is louder than a white flash and fits anime, gaming and phonk edits.

This transition works because at its peak neither clip is readable. You ramp the diffusion glow up until clip A breaks into bright colored streaks, cut to clip B on the strongest frame, then ramp back down. The viewer never sees the cut, only a burst of texture that swells and clears. It is the textured cousin of the flash transition.

Using an adjustment layer makes the ramp easy. An adjustment layer's Opacity blends its effects with the clips below, so animating that one property fades the whole stack in and out. Ease into the peak and come out a little faster, so the burst feels like it builds and then releases. Making the second half about two thirds the length of the first gives it a small push into the new shot.

Exposure does a lot of the work. The diffusion alone gets busy but not bright, so an Exposure effect after the glow lifts the whole frame toward white at the peak. Keep the peak just short of pure white so a bit of the streak pattern survives. That texture is what makes it feel like this effect and not a plain flash.

1. Cut clip A into clip B on the beat. Add an adjustment layer above them (Ctrl+Alt+Y, Cmd+Option+Y on Mac) that starts 9 frames before the cut and ends 6 frames after it.
2. Apply Omino Diffusion, then Glow (Glow Threshold 50%, Glow Radius 60), then Exposure, then Transform to the adjustment layer.
3. Keyframe the adjustment layer's Opacity: 0% at its first frame, 100% on the cut frame, 0% at its last frame.
4. Keyframe Exposure: 0 at the start, 1.5 on the cut, 0 at the end. Keyframe Glow Intensity 0.5, 2.5, 0.5 on the same frames.
5. Keyframe Transform > Scale from 100 to 108 on the cut and back to 100. Uncheck Use Composition's Shutter Angle and set Shutter Angle to 180 for motion blur on the push.
6. Select all keyframes and press F9. In the Graph Editor, drag the first keyframe's outgoing influence to about 80% and the cut keyframe's incoming influence to 20%, so the build accelerates into the cut. Or apply a Flow expo-in curve to the first half and expo-out to the second.
7. Preview at full speed. If you can still see the cut, raise Exposure at the peak to 2 or extend the build by 2 frames.

When to use itHard beats in phonk, velocity, gaming and tech edits, the switch into a drop, or any cut where you want a deliberately digital feel instead of a smooth one.

A block transition works the opposite way to a blur. Instead of softening detail away, it throws it away in big steps. When the frame is a handful of flat squares, two different shots look almost the same, so you can cut between them on the coarsest frame and nobody notices. The steps then shrink back to full detail on the new clip.

Omino Squares assembles your image out of small squares. Read the controls by what they do rather than by name. Square size is the one you animate. Big squares at the cut, tiny at the ends. Its futz section adds irregularity, including a wibble control that makes the squares jitter, which is useful when you want the grid to feel alive rather than clean.

Keep the keyframes stepped rather than smooth if you want the classic digital look. Hold keyframes make the resolution jump in clear stages, like an old game loading. Smooth keyframes give a softer pixel zoom. Both work, but pick one per edit so the style stays consistent.