The overlaps are just to prevent rendering artefacts where the paths meet.Ĭonvert the first stroke path layer to a shape layer (Right click layer → Create Shapes from Vector Layer), that should give you a new shape layer with a single path - you can then delete the original AI layer. This looks a bit complex but it isn't really, you just cut both the path and mask in three and place everything in its own layer (After Effects needs everything in its own layer to import properly). You need to do this with both the stroked path and the mask paths. Still in Illustrator, separate the paths so that no path intersects itself (in this case you need three paths).

You should have something like this (viewed in outline mode): The outlined stroke to use as the mask just needs to be an outlined version of your variable width path. It can have a basic stroke but nothing else (and you can change the stroke once we're in After Effects anyway). The path for the stroke needs to have a basic appearance to import in to After Effects correctly no brushes or width profiles.

In Illustrator, you first need a path for the stroke animation, and an outlined stroke for the mask. The explanation looks long and complicated, but it actually only took me ~15 minutes once I knew what I was doing. The easiest solution is to separate the paths so each overlap is its own distinct path (with its own mask too). There's not much of a way around that while keeping it as a single stroke (you could cleverly mask the overlaps, but that's not very practical). Unfortunately with a single intersecting path then you'll end up with something like this: If you're trying to animate a variable width stroke then you'll need to animate a regular stroke and use the outlined variable width stroke as a mask. Thanks for any help.Īfter Effects doesn't have variable width strokes so trying to import them from Illustrator will just expand the stroke. on the masks in After Effects but that still makes no difference to it still being split into 2 separate masks. Is there anyway to join the masks into 1? I don't understand why After Effects is splitting a single stroke into 2 separate masks? I have experimented with using Add, Subtract etc. Copied it into After Effects the same way and After Effects splits the single stroke into 2 paths? I have the same problem. So then I drew the logo with one single stroke using the variable width tool to adjust the stroke width. So now the logo is 5 different shapes and not 1 continuous stroke. I originally had a fill in illustrator but when I copy and pasted it into a new solid layer in After Effects it splits the fill into 5 masks and animates each new mask individually. So it basically draws itself over and over. I am trying to animate this logo to behave as if it is being continuously drawn.

I am new to After Affects CC but very experienced with Illustrator.

Animate stroke after effects