Imagine taking Adobe’s superb render engine at the heart of Photoshop and setting it to a timeline not unlike an Avid or Final Cut Pro editor. Every Photoshop parameter that is numeri-cally definable is now also key-frame enabled. The result is the ability to animate composites of two dimensional layers with full channel operation functionality, in a Z plane ... over time. Using bézier curves not just for shaping objects, but for elegantly describing intricate velocities and trajectories, amongst other complex characteristics, for highly polished results.... The starting point for all After Effects projects is the project window. For those coming from an Avid background, think of this window as you would a series of nested bins. All your assets; video, vectors, bitmaps, audio and compositions are kept in this one window. The project windows fea-tures reflect its function, like a mini file system, you can nest folders within folders, and rename and reposition items at will. With an eye towards entropy, keep this window well organized.... The term footage, is what Adobe chose to call assets intended for After Effects. Just as one captures video prior to editing, the very first step in an After Effects project is to import footage, the source files to be used in the composition. After Effects accepts most file formats for bitmaps, vectors, video and audio. To import footage: