@pbretz

It can depend quite a bit on how your systems are configured, but I’ll try and outline the basics here. To run Event Scripts, the first thing you’ll need is a copy of Templater Bot. Event Scripts are only available on this version of Templater, so if you’re using Pro or Rig, this won’t be an option.

Once you’ve got Bot set up, head to the Templater Preferences window and click on “Setup ExtendScripts”. From there, you should get a box that will allow you to choose which Templater event you’d like to use to trigger the Event Script.

When I tested the script outlined above, I registered it on the “After layers update” event under “Layer Processing”. This instructs the script to run after any data versioning and Time Sculpting have been applied to the project.

If you’re running Templater via CLI, you’ll want to specify the script you’d like to run in the templater-options.json file on the appropriate Event. In this case, you’d want to add it to the “post_cmd_update” event.

Those are the basics, but more information can be found in this article from our support website. Additionally, we have some example scripts on our GitHub Page located here.

If you run into any hurdles or if we can answer any questions, just let us know!

Thanks!

@motion-jp

Glad to hear it! My guess is that something went wrong when the previous project was imported, and an asset was incorrectly reported as a JPEG sequence instead of a static image file. It’s possible that AE then cached that asset state, so every time the file was loaded, AE saw it as a sequence regardless of whether it was previously removed or not.

We haven’t seen that particular scenario before, but it’s good to hear that you were able to get it resolved. If you run into any additional problems, please feel free to get in touch.

Thanks!

@unclemonty

It seems like you’ve already found a solution, but I wanted to chime in and say that it should, theoretically, be possible to map the same value to both a footage and text layer simultaneously. In this case, the footage layer should be swapped out, and the text layer should be replaced with the filename present in the cell.

As you noted, you’d need to use an expression to strip out any subfolder information or file extensions, but from a theoretical standpoint, it should work.

If you have any other questions or run into any problems, let us know, and we’ll do whatever we can to get you up and running.

Thanks!

@joevac

Thanks for getting in touch with us. This issue most commonly occurs when a value besides {{off}}, {{on}}, or a valid precomp name is referenced in the Data Source for the project. What typically happens is that Templater tries to reference the value in the Data Source and map it onto the precomp layer as either text or as a footage reference. This is what is causing the pre-comp to turn into an image when cycling through the rows. The first thing I’d try is to check and see if you have anything besides {{off}} or {{on}} in your Google Sheet if you’re primarily using Templater to control layer visibility.

Hopefully, that’s all it is, but if that doesn’t change anything or you have any further questions, please feel free to let us know. Thanks, and happy rendering!

@lucarech

Templater can absolutely handle all of those sorts of assets! In fact, swapping out text is our plugin’s most common use case. Videos and music can also be swapped in as long as they’re in a format that After Effects can read. I’d recommend taking a look at the tutorial videos on our Youtube channel as well as the documentation on our support website for further details.

If you have any other questions, please feel free to let us know.

Thanks!

@pbretz

It’s relatively similar but actually a bit easier with Shape Layers. Since Shape Layers intrinsically have a “Color” property under the “Fill” section, there’s no need to add a Fill Effect to the layer. You can simply add the Expression directly to the “Color” value.

Adobe has also added a more streamlined Expression that can convert hex codes to the RGB values needed to determine a layer’s color. This Expression:

hexToRgb(""+thisComp.layer("layername").text.sourceText+"")

should perform the same function as the Expression referenced in the previous post. The layername value will need to be swapped out for the name of the text layer with the hex information you’d like to use for the fill. Other than that, it should work the same.

Let us know if you run into any issues, and we’ll see what we can do to help.

Thanks!

@ben-forman-0

Sure! You can use a few different Expressions, but the basics are relatively similar.

For solids, the mapping is automatic, so you can apply Templater to a solid and then directly input the hex code you’d like to use in the data source. For other layers, the process is a bit more complex. First, you’ll want to create a text layer with the Templater Effect applied and map it to your data source. For the purposes of this example, we’ll call that layer “color” (with no quotes).

Next, you’ll want to add the “Fill” effect to the layer whose color you want to change. Finally, you’ll want alt/option click the “Color” value of the “Fill” effect and add this expression:

hexToRgb(""+thisComp.layer("color").text.sourceText+"")

This should change the value of the “Fill” effect to the hex code brought into the “color” text layer.

Hopefully, that’s enough to get you started, but if you have any issues or additional questions, feel free to let us know.

Thanks!

@jeff
oh, thank you for clarifying

@yansfeld

The answer is most likely going to have to do with the way that Templater processes project files. Because of how tangled and dependent AE projects can become, Templater reversions all the layers in all the comps in a project when it runs. This is mainly to ensure that layers aren’t accidentally left out of the process due to an error in dependency logic.

That’s just a guess, but we’ve seen issues in the past where Expressions on plugins that aren’t being used can cause an issue since they still need to be reversioned when Templater runs.

It sounds like everything is running normally, but if you run into any other issues or have any further questions, please feel free to get in touch. Thanks!

@rgutierrez

Unfortunately, Templater requires layers that are being versioned with data to be set to “visible” in After Effects. This has to do with how AE reports layer visibility to plugins like ours. That being said, we’ve encountered issues like this in the past, and I believe that there might be a workaround that could work for you.

Generally speaking, the way around this is to create a second text layer and then use the pick whip to map the “Source Text” property to the original layer that has Templater applied. This should allow you to manipulate the second text layer’s visibility settings while still maintaining the data from the primary layer.

Hopefully, that solution should work for what you’re trying to do, but if you run into any problems, just let us know, and we’ll see what we can do.

Thanks!

@jeff Thank you for clearing things up!
I was thinking the same, that the only way would be to go with Templater Bot Event Scripts.

@jeff
Thanks! Very clear

@ariestav Thank you! It’s a great feature when building from scratch - much appreciated.

@jeff Thanks for the feedback!

@jeff Checking those worked. Simple fix. Thanks Jeff!

@jeff thanks for your detailed answer.
So currently, the only way is to work in a team project, is to convert to local before Templaer, and then import the resulting project to a new team project.

Brobably is not worth the mess, as a project becomes big enough to require a team project, this could be messy.

We will try to find other ways of colaborating in big projects.

thanks!

@jeff That was it! Thank you. I am trying out Templater 3 and so far so good.

@jeff Thanks!

Hi @jeff many thanks for the information - this is exactly how I ended up doing it after learning about the curly braces feature after 3 years of using Templater, incredible.

Cheers!

@jeff
I got it now.
Thank you!