Creating a Timer in AE at DVinfo.net

Alex Sprinkle · January 30th, 2007, 02:56 PM

I need a 10 minute timer in the form of minutes:seconds:milliseconds. Before going about it the LONG way (creating every frame), is there a generator or anything I can use that I'm missing?

Peter Jefferson · January 30th, 2007, 07:18 PM

I use a program called XNote Stopwatch
I then set the colours of the backgrounds and numerics for easy chromakeyiing, I set my timer countdown and run camtasia studio. I capture the video and then reimport that (i use Vegas)
This is then overlaid on the video track, and resized with pan and crop positioning. If i want it to be pretier, u can also use an animated lower third to "frame" the timer

Alex Sprinkle · January 31st, 2007, 12:27 AM

XNote Stopwatch? I've never heard of it... I'm running this on a mac. Compatible?

Peter Jefferson · January 31st, 2007, 06:46 AM

not sure, u might need to check that

Alex Sprinkle · January 31st, 2007, 11:06 AM

So the question still stands... AE timer available?

Conor Ryan · January 31st, 2007, 12:46 PM

It's not milliseconds, but you could use the timecode feature (under video effects) which generates timecode and displays it in hh:mm:ss:ff on the image. Apply it to a layer, pre-compose it, then retime the precomp layer to -100% (reversing it). Mask out the parts you don't want.

Sure, the numbers in the last area only go up to 24/25/30, but they go by quickly enough. You could even use cc force motion blur to make the frame numbers looks blurry.

Alex Sprinkle · January 31st, 2007, 03:22 PM

good call, thanks. That's what i was looking for

January 30th, 2007, 02:56 PM	#1
Alex Sprinkle Major Player Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Moore, Oklahoma Posts: 408	Creating a Timer in AE I need a 10 minute timer in the form of minutes:seconds:milliseconds. Before going about it the LONG way (creating every frame), is there a generator or anything I can use that I'm missing?

January 30th, 2007, 07:18 PM	#2
Peter Jefferson Inner Circle Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: Aus Posts: 3,884	I use a program called XNote Stopwatch I then set the colours of the backgrounds and numerics for easy chromakeyiing, I set my timer countdown and run camtasia studio. I capture the video and then reimport that (i use Vegas) This is then overlaid on the video track, and resized with pan and crop positioning. If i want it to be pretier, u can also use an animated lower third to "frame" the timer

January 31st, 2007, 12:27 AM	#3
Alex Sprinkle Major Player Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Moore, Oklahoma Posts: 408	XNote Stopwatch? I've never heard of it... I'm running this on a mac. Compatible?

January 31st, 2007, 06:46 AM	#4
Peter Jefferson Inner Circle Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: Aus Posts: 3,884	not sure, u might need to check that

January 31st, 2007, 11:06 AM	#5
Alex Sprinkle Major Player Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Moore, Oklahoma Posts: 408	So the question still stands... AE timer available?

January 31st, 2007, 12:46 PM	#6
Conor Ryan Regular Crew Join Date: Oct 2004 Location: Dublin, Ireland Posts: 67	It's not milliseconds, but you could use the timecode feature (under video effects) which generates timecode and displays it in hh:mm:ss:ff on the image. Apply it to a layer, pre-compose it, then retime the precomp layer to -100% (reversing it). Mask out the parts you don't want. Sure, the numbers in the last area only go up to 24/25/30, but they go by quickly enough. You could even use cc force motion blur to make the frame numbers looks blurry.

January 31st, 2007, 03:22 PM	#7
Alex Sprinkle Major Player Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Moore, Oklahoma Posts: 408	good call, thanks. That's what i was looking for