To Lock Or Unlock Masks; Saving And Reusing Masks; To Delete Masks; To Save A Mask - Adobe AFTER EFFECTS 7.0 Manual

Do any of the following:
3
•
To select one mask, click its name.
•
To select a contiguous range of masks, Shift-click the names of the first and last masks in the range.
•
To select discontiguous masks together, Ctrl-click (Windows) or Command-click (Mac OS) the names of any
masks you want to include.
Note: You can select only whole masks in the Timeline panel. To select individual vertices on a mask, use the Compo-
sition or Layer panel.

To lock or unlock masks

Locking a mask prevents you from selecting it in the Timeline, Composition, and Layer panels or setting it as a target
in the Layer panel. Use this feature to avoid unwanted changes to the mask.
1 In the Timeline panel, expand the Mask property.
In the A/V Features column, click the box underneath the lock icon
2
unlock. A mask is locked and cannot be selected when the lock icon appears in the box.
Note: To unlock multiple masks at one time, select one or more layers and choose Layer > Mask > Unlock All Masks.

Saving and reusing masks

You can reuse masks in other layers and compositions. It is particularly useful to store Bezier masks you've spent a
long time perfecting. You can even create a project with compositions that exist just to store complex layer masks.
Mask shapes are stored inside a composition in a project file. When you want to use a mask from another project,
import that project into your current project.

To save a mask

In the Timeline panel for the composition containing the layer and mask you want to save, expand the layer and
1
its mask properties.
Do one of the following:
2
•
To save an animated mask, select the mask keyframes you want to save.
•
To save a nonanimated mask, select the mask.
3 Copy the mask or keyframes, and paste the mask or keyframes to a new layer. The new layer can be a simple solid.
To reuse a mask
1 Open the composition containing the mask you want to reuse. If you saved the mask in another project, import
the project and then open the mask's composition.
In the Timeline panel, expand the saved mask's layer and mask properties.
2
3 Select the mask or keyframes.
Copy the mask or keyframes, and paste the mask or keyframes to the layer to which you want to apply the mask.
4

To delete masks

❖
Do one of the following:
•
To delete one mask, select the mask in the Timeline panel and press Delete.
ADOBE AFTER EFFECTS 7.0
next to the mask you want to lock or
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User Guide