Customer Reviews

The After Effects Illusionist: All the Effects in One Complete Guide

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

First let me say that I'm a big Chad Perkins fan. His books and especially his video training series are great. You can't help but love his enthusiasm and depth of knowledge. So I eagerly snapped this book up when I was faced with a project that required me to do a lot of special effects that I basically had no clue how to do. This seemed like the perfect book for that.

Well, after having it a while, and reading some of the sections, I have kind of mixed feelings. What I was really hoping for was a good reference. A book that I could keep on my bookshelf and when I wanted to figure out how to use a certain effect in After Effects, I'd look up that effect in the appendix, turn to the chapter, and read what the various knobs mean and how to effectively use it. Sadly, it's not really that kind of book. It is well organized, and it contains a lot of good information. But when you look up an effect, instead of getting a very concise explanation of how it works and what the knobs do, Chad give you more of "here's one way you can use it".

Anyhow, decent book, I'm glad that I got it. Reading through the chapters is interesting and instructive, but I'm still left looking for an ideal reference manual to the effects in After Effects.

I've recently been reading a lot of books on creating motion graphics, and I must say that "The After Effects Illusionist" is definitely top 3, and quite possibly my number 1 favorite. I absolutely love the simplicity of the organizational structure of the book. Instead of organizing the content in a way that the author assumes the reader should see it, the author instead simply goes through every single one of the 189 effects included with After Effects CS4 in alphabetical order, the same exact way that they are listed in the Effects and Presets panel in After Effects. Additionally, the tutorials are incredibly easy to follow, and my favorite thing - the best part of this book - is the DVD that comes with it... It is quite apparent right away the amount of time and effort author Chad Perkins must have put into writing this book by the 1.96 gigabytes of data on the DVD. On this DVD, I was pleasantly surprised to find a boat-load of example projects that the author made for you to use as "starting points" so you can literally learn by doing. Often I will go through a particular tutorial on an effect, and then put the book down and just continue to mess around with the project based on the information I just learned.

Bottom line - this is an incredible learning tool if you want to become the next multimedia "illusionist" using After Effects. This is one of few books I can honestly say has far more value than it's price.

As an After Effects user for more than 10 years, I can't recommend this book highly enough. To have a resource that illustrates and explains ALL of the effects that ship with the program, you know, the ones you generally pass by on your way to your favorite third party plug ins, is long overdue. Though the subject has the potential to bog down and be dry, it never does thanks to the excellent humor and fullness of understanding of the author. Chad seems to be the sort of instructor that is infinitely patient, totally prepared and completely sincere while passing on a great deal of knowledge and keeping things fun. Again, I highly recommend this book.

The first thing to know is that this is not an introduction to After Effects. You've got to know how to work with the program in order to take advantage of this, and I'd suggest starting out with either After Effects Apprentice or Adobe After Effects CS5 Classroom in a Book. Once you've got the basics of working with layers and timelines and keyframes and 3D and text, though, a natural next step is to get familiar with the range of possible effects in After Effects. One thing you'll note if you work through the various intro guides, is that as they show you how to use a few effects they explain how to get the results that fit the specific projects you're working on. One thing I always wondered was what would happen if I tweaked the various values for each effect - you can always try 'em, but I thought it'd be a good thing to get to know what the various values mean, and it's not always obvious. This is a perfect supplement to the usual guides, that goes through each and every one of the factory installed effects in After Effects and explains not only how to use them to get the kinds of results they're designed for, but also how to tweak them so you get some very cool results that no one planned or deliberately programmed in. On top of that, the book is very clear and often funny and reads quite well. It would be very useful to have on the desk while you work on projects. Highly recommended - a very valuable reference.

There is a distinct line between the artistic side and logical side of motion graphic artists. Chad Perkins book hits a home-run with "The After Effects Illusionist" by perfectly bridging the gap between the two. The power of After Effects lies in effects, and Chad walks through them all. It is the most fun motion graphics book ever written. You will not be able to distinguish work from play when going through this book. Chad uses his strength of taking the most complex material, condensing it and making it understandable to everyone, all with his great well-known enthusiasm. The books covers areas I have not seen written or discussed elsewhere. I highly recommend it for all After Effects users.

Jackson Hunt
VP of Marketing
SerTech

Often when I use After Effects I end up only using a small handful of the effects available. Something I assume a lot of people do as well.

There are plenty of effects that most people try once, don't see any difference and never try again. The After Effects Illusionist is essentially a guided tour down the effects menu to show what they all do and how to best use them in your After Effects work.

Chad Perkins lets you know which effects are essential (including some alternative uses for them) and which ones are basically useless. And thankfully there's a CD with the project files, since most of these effects are hard to demonstrate in still pictures alone.

It is disappointing that the standard 3rd party effects like Keylight or the Cycore effects aren't covered since they're so powerful. There is one small blurb saying they are covered on the book's website, but that doesn't seem to be true. Considering the included CD contains a few final chapters, one more on those effects wouldn't be that hard to add.

The After Effects Illusionist is a book it wouldn't hurt to keep by your desk. It's bound to expand your After Effects vocabulary.

This was just an okay reference guide. The idea is allow you to become really familiar with the native After Effects plug-ins. For what I want to create, I only found a couple of pieces of information that were useful to me. Most of this was just a general "good know" pieces. I'm still looking for the perfect guide on transitions and keying. And now with CS5, some of these effects are outdated. This book is definitely not for a novice. A lot of the knobs are left unexplained. You're just told to adjust it, and not understand how it adds or detracts to the effect. You should learn the use After Effects the right way, and then maybe look into this book to learn the alternative tricks.

Probably the best book I've come across for AE. Although dipping in rather than reading through, I've already found numerous new ways to approach ideas I've had but am yet to put into practice. You need a basic operational level of knowledge, but that's all. Very easy to read, easy to follow, highly recommended.

This book will make you a better motion graphics designer. I was an average After Effects user...but no more. Chad has organized this book so effectively that you will become a better Illusionist immediately. It is written clearly and illustrated perfectly. This is the ULTIMATE reference for After Effect effects. It's a keeper. You can't have mine! Buy your own!

I ordered this book, thinking that it would just demonstrate some cool effects and show how to do them. I was wrong. It has helped me with so much more! This book basically goes into detail about every effect packaged with after effects. Some of the effects are also found in Photoshop and the book touches on that aspect as well a bit. If you are really into making effects and making your footage look its best, this book will certainly help! I used to poke around with different effects, until I found what worked for me, but after reading through this book, I have a much better understanding of how each effect is supposed to be used, and which effects work the best under different circumstances!