After Effects CS6 Tutorial - 52 - Masking with the Pen Tool Video Lecture | Adobe After Effects CS6: Complete Course from Novice to Pro - IT & Software

hello everybody how's it going buddy
Blackford here with another After
Effects cs6 tutorial this tutorial I'm
going to be teaching you how to use the
pen tool to basically mask out or mask
in different objects so we have this
picture of the some graffiti that I took
when I was living out in California and
we're gonna practice using parts of this
graffiti we're gonna practice masking
parts of it out using the pen tool so
the first thing we need to start by is
clicking on the pen tool up here and the
hotkey for pen tool is G now if you
press G again you will get the mask
feather tool and if you hold down on the
on the button here you can see the
different tools so the pen tool usually
just come changes from the advert X tool
or delete vertex tool or convert vertex
tool which the vertex is are basically
just points so we can start by trying to
mask out this little blue extrusion here
in the and the graffiti so all you got
to do is make sure you have your correct
layer selected and click on the image
and it creates a point now if you want
to go down to your next area and click
and then it'll create another point if
you hold your mouse button down and drag
it'll create Bezier handles and round
out your mask now we don't want to round
out the mask at this point at this line
right here because it's already straight
so I'm gonna click down here and keep it
straight
click on here keeping that one straight
straight
you'll get up here and now we can see
that this part right here is curved now
a trick that you want to learn is don't
use a whole bunch of Bezier points when
you could just use a few to accomplish
this curve so you don't want to do
something like this because then you got
a whole bunch of points now that you got
to edit and I'll be really annoying so
try just using only a couple so maybe
one right here where where it curves
then one over here and you just make the
Bezier handle come down even farther
there and then and then one up here on
the top click on my tool make sure my
pen tool looks like it somehow I
I hit my selection tool key by accident
will come up here and make another curve
now this curve didn't quite make it so
what I need to do is go on to the line
here and you see my pen tool turns into
a a plus click there and then you can
add another tool or you can add another
vertex point and now when the black
arrow is on it you can drag the point
down and add it in there now if you
don't want extra points
make sure your pen tool is selected and
hold down control over one of the points
and it'll come up with a negative there
click on it and it'll erase the point
what we wanted that there say you came
down to this side here and you can see
it's like cutting in a little there's
black out there so maybe you want to add
Bezier handles to it if you hold alt and
hover over your vertex point you can use
the convert vertex tool and drag and you
can get Bezier handles on it now when
you're creating masks you want to be
precise so you don't want this black
hang you know well I guess it depends
on your client sometimes they might want
to have you cut in but most of the time
they want to have you right on the edge
so you zoom in hover over and just move
on the edge of the pixels there same
with this now probably want to round it
a little now to close it click on your
last point and then you can resume
making points if you want to I was
taking control Z to close it and to
close or to go back and to close your
shape you click over the first point you
made and then you'll see a little circle
coming up next to your pen tool cursor
click and it'll close for you now it
cuts out the shape there and everything
else is gone
obviously so maybe you didn't maybe
didn't want to cut it out maybe you
wanted to cut it out of the actual
graffiti picture well you can come down
to here were you wear your mask is if
that's not there you just hit m4 mask
and it'll bring it up bring up your mass
properties you click on the blending
mode drop-down menu over here and you
get hit subtract say say you want to say
you want to have it on ad or something
like that in the final in your final
render but you need to make another
point or you need to make another mask
well you can't see anything so what I do
is I set the blending mode to none and
then I can start clicking again and
making another mask so on this eye here
now the way to use your Bezier handles
properly just a line drag out and align
your next align your Bezier handle with
where you think you're going to put
next point
and it takes some takes some practice to
get a little to get pretty good with a
what this is called this kind of like
it's called masking but it's also called
roto scoping when you're when you're
doing this frame by frame and I'll show
you that quick also in a next tutorial
actually so there's the eye that's
clicked out now if we put these both on
there you go you have the eye out of
there and you have this shape here if
you don't want to see your your mask
anymore just click on this button right
here
toggle mask path and shape visibility
and now you can see what it is and you
can go look in and fine-tune so I mean
there's a little bit of blue hanging out
here so when I come in and fine-tune
that looks like I cut in a little too
much right here so I mean you can go in
and then fine-tune your image you always
want to come in and zoom in so it
doesn't and make sure you're at where
you're supposed to be so it doesn't look
like crap