The 10 Best
Free Plugins for After Effects
Here are my 10 favorite free After Effects plugins.
Table of Contents
Omino
Features, that should actually be included in After Effects, which can be helpfull for more complex Motion Graphics and, to add some glitch Effects into Edits for Shortform Videos
Motion Bro
Motion Bro is known for their sheer endless amount of transitions, they offer, but they actually hav a lot more to offer, especially, when it comes to Presets and making a lot within a Short Timeframe.
A word of caution. You will only be able to install Motion Bro if you actually have a Creative Cloud subscription.
Duik
Duik is a plugin created, to animate 2D characters in After Effects. A bit like the puppet tools, but way more refined, and especially for more complex animations, better easier to use.
Primarily, I see three benefits in using Duik over the puppet tools.
Seperate Editor
For more complex animations, using a separate window instead of controlling everything within the After Effects timeline makes things easier.
Inverse Kinematics
Inverse Kinematics is a feature that a lot of Tool made for character Animations have. It Rotates the Bones automatically based on the position of another Part.
For example, you can move the Hand and the Joint of the Elbow and the shoulder to rotate accordingly.
Skelet Presets
Already working Skeletons make it so much easier and faster to get started. Especially for beginners in rigging, it is almost impossible, to make a good rig on their own that does not cause problems later on in the process.
Copy Ease
Ease Copy enables you, to copy the ease of the motion curve you’ve set within the Graph Editor. Which only makes sense if you use the graph editor, but if it makes things a lot easier because the only other way would be to try to recreate it, which never matches 100% and could mean a lot of work.
Open Copy Ease
You can find it inย Windowsย >ย EaseCopy.jsx. You can also dock it somewhere; it makes sense. Like every other window in After Effects.
Copy Ease
Select the Keyframes, you want to Copy the Ease from and Click on Copy within the EaseCopy Window.
Paste Ease
Select the key frames that you want to paste the ease on.
You can slo Select Multiple Objects to paste the Ease one at Once
And click on Ease in the EaseCopy Panel. If you click on Value, you can also paste the value of the key frames.
Schmeeer
Schmeeer create what I would describe as a Stylized Version of Motion Blur.
Without
With Schmeeer
Rift
Rift can Create an Offset within the After Effects Timeline.
Which is something I often made by hand before knowing this Plugin
Quick Chromatic Aberration 3
This Plugin adds in Chromatic Aberration Quick and simple.
Which is the effect originally created by cheap old lenses, which almost does not exist in modern photography.
But it gives a nice effect and creates the feeling of speed and dynamic.
Saber
Create a Star Wars Movie!
This After Effects Plugin is made, to create a Laser sword Effect. But it can be used in a wide variety of Scenarios.
What it does, it Adds a highly customizable Lasersword kind effect to any line you want to apply it to.
