Unit 3 - After Effects Lightsaber

Vid #1

Vid #3 Creating Contact Clashes

Make a new composition besides the one with your finished rotoscoping. First insert a new solid layer with color BLACK. Next insert a second solid layer with color WHITE. When done, use the pen tool to draw a mask on the white solid layer (like you would do when making lightsabers in AE). I recommend a shape like an oval or circle. After you have your masked out white layer, be sure itÂ´s still selected and then goto

effect->blur&sharpen->gaussian blur

Give it a value of let´s say 15 (depends on your resolution you´re working with, just play around). When done, duplicate this layer 3 times just like you would do with Ryan´s saber method. Now go for each of the duplicated layers and increase the blur amount to get something like:
layer 1 = 15
layer 2 = 30
layer 3 = 50
layer 4 = 80

Now you should have a nice gradient circle / oval.
Next thing is to insert this new composition in your already existing composition with the rotoscoped lightsabers. Do so. Now select the just inserted composition and goto effect->adjust->color balance. There you should go for something like
Midtones Red = 100
Midtones Green = 50
Highlights Red = 50
Highlights Green = 25

Don´t touch the shadow values and make sure "Preserve Luminosity" is ticked.

This should give you a nice yellow/orange color for your saber flash. Adjust a.m. values accordingly to your needs.

Finally set the transfer mode for your contactflash layer to screen or add (whatever suits your scenes the best in each situation).

That´s pretty much it. You can now use this layer as often as you need, just key frame it´s size, position and duration. Make it not more than max. 3 frames to show to get a nice result. Two frames should be sufficient (first big flash, second small flash, then gone).