USER MANUAL

Description

Movie Credits is a Title generator plug-in powered by FxFactory that helps you in the creation of your film’s main movie credits from your text in a creative and interactive manner using special settings to let the software do the hard work for you.

Movie Credits comes available as a plug-in for Apple Motion, Adobe After Effects and Adobe Premiere Pro, and also as a collection of template-based generators for Final Cut Pro X.

Movie Credits is not to be confused with a Movie Title Creator or a Movie Title Designer, however it could very well be used for that purpose if the user wishes to do so.

The main feature of Movie Credits is that it is capable of taking a list of names of the people who participated in the creation of a movie, such as Producers, Directors, Editors, Actors and Actresses who play an important role in the movie and whose names should be featured at the beginning of the film.

Text Preparation

In order to use Movie Credits successfully, the list of names and roles needs to be typed in a format that the plug-in will understand.

The text preparation can be done in any word processing document, such as Text Edit or the built in text editor, and the following format should be typed as indicated:

Use a TAB between Name, Last Name (surname) and Role

The plug-in has been designed to hold the three most common elements in a Movie Credit such as the Name, the Last Name (or surname) and the Role that the person plays in the production of the movie.

When typing this list, the text elements should be separated by a TAB as shown in the following example:

Keep in mind that the use of the three text elements in your credits is optional but not required.

There are times when you may need to use just one name, or maybe not use the role, or have a list with a combination of all of these. Whatever the case may be, simply leave blank where the text element should be typed, but make sure to enter a TAB between the empty spaces so the plug-in knows there is a blank element in there.

Every movie credit that contains the three text elements must be typed in one line, and to add more lines press Enter to type the next movie credit line.

TIP : You can add empty spaces in your credits by simply pressing enter without typing any text.

Every time you press enter, you are telling the Movie Credits generator to count it as a new name and role line (You can add as many Enter keystrokes as you desire to add more time between the movie credits beyond what the plug-in provides).

Parameters

Setup : Use this button to enable the setup timeline to aid in the timing of the animation.

Navigation UI : Menu that allows the display of selected parameters in the interface.

Main Setup

Text : You can Import or type your text directly in this text editor. Click on the Edit button to open the text editor in a floating window.

Name : Select the font and weight for the Name for each of the credits.

Surname : Select the font and weight for the Last Name (or Surname) for each of the credits.

Role : Select the font and weight for the Role of each of the credits.

Text Blending : Creates a brighter color by adding its color to the other text layers below.

[ SHADOW ] : This slider provides a way to add a shadow to the text.

Softness : Controls the soft quality of the shadow.

Horizontal : Controls the horizontal offset for the shadow.

Vertical : Controls the vertical offset for the shadow.

Text Settings

Name Size : The size of the text for the Name and Last Name.

Role Size : The size of the text for the Role.

Size Bias : Creates a different size for the Name and Last Name based on the Size already selected.

Full Name In One Line : By default Movie Credits separates the Name and the Last Name as two individual elements. This button makes the Name and Last Name be one element instead.

Use this parameter only if the Name and Surname should be treated as a one line of text. When this parameter is enabled, the X, Y and Z will have no effect in the text separation because the full name is now one element, not two.

Style : Provides some usual combination of capitalization styles, as well as a style to let the text display as it was typed.

Justification : Provides the usual configurations of text justification, such as Right Justified, Left justified, Centered and a special setting called Left & Right Justified that places the end of the Name at Right Justified and the last name (or surname) at the Left Justified side for special type of setups.

Letter Spacing

Controls the kerning or letter spacing of the Name and Surname text elements with optional application preferences.

Apply to : Optional menu to apply the kerning value to one or both text elements.

Kerning : Sets the value for the separation of the letters.

Timing

This group of parameters control the time and animation behavior of the text elements, and it is linked to the timeline shown in the Canvas window when the setup button is enabled.

Duration : Provides a selection to use the clip duration or a manual duration. The clip duration uses the clip timing and duration to span all the credits.

Manual Duration : Becomes available only when the manual duration is selected.

Time Unit : Use this drop down menu to select what value in Frames or Seconds should the Manual Duration be using.

% Dissolve : Sets the amount of dissolve for when the text elements appear on the screen. A percentage value of the full animation is used in here which is divided in two halves for the beginning and the end dissolves.

This parameter has a direct relationship with the Setup timeline guides shown on screen and it is represented by the blue lines.

% Gap In-between : Refers to the time gap that can be placed in between each credit name animation, so that there is a moment or a time gap in between each movie credit.

This parameter has a direct relationship with the Setup timeline guides shown on screen and it is represented by the Green line.

Animation Bias : Takes the Behavior Curve of the animation and makes it more prominent at the beginning or at the end depending on the value.

Behavior Curve : Controls the type of behavior that occurs during the animation. Linear being a constant speed.

Position & Animation

The parameters in this group control the relation and animation between the Name and Surname elements with the option to randomize or link the animation behavior on each axis.

 

Position : Controls the position of the text elements in the Canvas window.

Size Bias Animation : Auto animates the size difference between the Name and Last Name.

X - Horizontal : Controls the position in the opposite horizontal direction of each other.

Y - Vertical : Controls the position in the opposite vertical direction of each other.

Z - Depth : Controls the position in the opposite depth direction of each other.

Random : Randomizes the global position of the text elements in the corresponding axis.

Animation : Adds a position offset for the animation to happen in the corresponding axis.

Link : Takes the movement of the elements and makes them travel in the same direction instead of the opposite.

Random Seed : A button that generates a new number for the calculation of the Random parameter.

Rotation

Controls the rotation of the Name and Surname in the selected axis with the possibility to enable automatic animation of the rotation offset.

Auto Rotation : Button that enables the automatic animation.

Axis : Select the axis for rotation.

Angle : Sets the initial angle on the axis selected.

Animation : Sets the offset angle where the animation should start from, or if the Auto Rotation button is disabled, simply provides an offset between the Name and Surname rotation.

Link : Inverts the direction of the rotation, making both text elements rotate in the same direction with the offset provided.

Invert : Rotates in the opposite direction.

Flip Vertical : Flips the Surname element in the vertical axis for special situations in which the offset rotation may be too high and one of the text elements is unreadable facing down. –This button will affect the vertical position of the Surname element.

Role Animation

The parameters in this group control the animation of the Role text element with the option to randomize or link it to the Name and Surname animation.

X - Horizontal : Controls the position in the horizontal direction.

Y - Vertical : Controls the position in the vertical direction.

Z - Depth : Controls the position in the depth direction.

Random : Randomizes the global position of the text element.

Animation : Adds a position o set for the animation to happen.

Unify Random : Uses the same Random values applied to the Name and Surname animation.

Background

These set of parameters control the look and visibility of the colored background.

No Background : Removes the background so that the movie credits can be used on top of a video layer or a custom background plate.

Center : The center location of the circular gradient.

Diameter : Determines the size of the circular gradient.

Smooth : Blends the circular gradient and the color background with extra smoothness.

Color Palette

This section contains a special Preset menu where you can load the color combinations used in the other themes included by default, or create your own combinations.

Each color well is identified with the corresponding name of the element.

Special

These are parameters that provide special rendering features to enhance the quality and look for special circumstances, and at the same time may have an effect on the playback and rendering performance.

DOF Simulation : Simulates the effect of depth-of-field when the Z - Depth animation has been enabled.

Motion Blur : Optional settings for blurring depending on the text movement, specially useful when higher quality is required in a given animation. –Related parameters become available to adjust the Shutter Angle and Offset.

Back Luminosity : Controls the luminosity of the back side of the text. This is useful only if the text happens to turn around and show the back side.

Back Intensity : Sets the intensity of the back side color.

Movie Credits v.2 Presets