Learn how to create 2 After Effects effects built from nodes in The GPUDog Den, live, with no code: a long shadow (plus an inner one) and animated chemtrail haze driven by a Flow Field.
The Den is the browser-based node editor that ships with the GPUDog plugin – a real GPU app in your browser, so your footage never leaves your drive.
I’m skipping the theory on purpose today. I wanted to show how fast it is to build something in here.
What I build:
– A long shadow out of one Trail Sampler node – black, coloured, gradient-mapped off the Distance output, and cast inward
– Animated haze trails: a Flow Field on the flow pin, a Time node on Phase, Coords and Per-Axis to drag the noise along
– Choosing what casts the trails – alpha, luma or max RGB
– Turning any node value into a real After Effects Effect Control
– Save, and it’s in AE. Or switch on Live Mode and don’t save at all.
The node editor and The Den are the Deep tier.
Next episode we slow down: every node, what it does, and why. The theory I skipped today.
CHAPTERS
0:00 The Den: GPUDog’s browser-based node editor
0:33 What you can build from nodes
1:11 First GPUppy: a Trail Sampler node
1:34 Footage picker, Blend and Mask by Alpha
2:09 Making the shadow black with Pre-mult
2:32 Colormap gradient, then Cast Inward
3:08 Angle, length and fade as parameters
3:34 Saving Inner Long Shadow with a thumbnail
4:00 In After Effects, then live mode
4:30 Chemtrails: Flow Field into Trail Sampler
4:51 Animating the noise with Time and Coords
5:20 Per-Axis time and a Divide for speed
5:49 Rotate, then share one angle parameter
6:40 Cast From: alpha, luma or max RGB
7:16 Colormap on the trails, Normalize with Multiply
7:46 Groups, flow speed, and back to AE
8:30 Any node property can be a parameter
9:01 Two effects, no code – what’s next
LINKS
Get GPUDog Deep: https://aescripts.com/gpudog-deep/
Free tier + Pro: https://aescripts.com/gpudog/
The Den: https://den.gpudog.dev
Discord: https://timfx.dev/discord
The Den walkthrough (the tour before this one): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CBplEgYPgg
