10 After Effects Plugins Every Motion Designer Should Have in 2020

Hi Friends,  in this post I am going to talk about 10 after effects plugins that I have used several times in my projects and they are just amazing. There is no categorization as such, most of them I use on daily basis. These plugins are all premium . If you want to know about free plugins, please check my earlier post  of 10 free after effects plugins

• AutoFill is a new type of keyframe-less animation in After Effects where you have complete control. I used to struggle with multiple layers to create a path or text filling effects by using 3d strokes and line strokes , it was time consuming and little complicated stuff until Autofill listens to it presented this amazing plugins to fill any kind of path and text super smooth. This filling animation plugin comes with 25 ready to use presets were you can try fluid animation and all. Price tag is only $49.95
• Motion design school comes with a handy plugin which solves the tedious job of morphing in after effects. Morphing is the transformation of an object into another one. There is always something to morph in a project, for instance, morphing one icon into another, or making a transition between scenes. It has Features like Morph any object in one click, Multiple morphing with many objects, Apply Trails, Apply Slicer and Easy Customization.
• Red giant VFX Suite,  offers a powerful toolkit for realistic visual effects composites in After Effects.

  This package has 10 amazing tools to surprise you and make your workflow smooth and less time consuming.

  First tool is Super comp, it is a compositing environment that makes it easy to create complex, seamless composites. you can composite complex VFX scenes in a minute and with realtime preview .

  King Pin Tracker which I have used several times , makes it simple to replace signs or add rectangular objects into a shot,With powerful To and From pins, and the ability to offset and rotate in planar space, you can pin whatever you want, wherever you want it.

  Primatte Keyer is a powerful tool for fast, automatic chroma keying. Primatte Keyer’s auto compute algorithms can often pull a perfect key automatically.

  Lens Distortion Matcher makes it easy to un-distort footage from any lens so that you can composite elements into your shot.

  Spot Clone Tracker is a tool for  simple object removal with a built-in tracker for moving footage. Easily fix blemishes or remove small, unwanted items.

  Optical Glow is a photo-realistic glow effect for you to use in professional visual effects and motion graphics.

  Chromatic Displacement uses one layer to displace the pixels of another.

  Knoll Light Factory is well known tool to creates camera-inspired, photo-realistic lens flares that render fast.

  Shadow is a plugin for After Effects that makes it super easy to add a perspective shadow in front of or behind a layer.

  Reflection is a tool that makes it easy to add a reflection to your layers.

  With Redgiant FX Suite’s  10 effective plugins, you will be able to create wonders. 

• Lockdown is the new kid in this town,  tracking warping objects and applying the warped movement to the object was somewhat challenging, or downright impossible to complete by using After Effects and no other software. Now, a new plugin called Lockdown from Chris Vranos & aescripts  seeks to change that. Lockdown is a revolutionary new plug-in that allows you to track warping surfaces inside After Effects. Perfect for beauty retouching and other previously difficult cleanup jobs!
• Element 3D:As almost every motion designer knows how important Element 3D is . Element 3D bridge that gap of 2d compositing and 3d world by allowing users to upload and use 3D models within Adobe After Effects. If you don’t know how to use modeling software like 3ds max or Cinema 4D, Element 3D can help you import and edit 3D models quickly. The plugin works incredibly fast, considering all the functionality it brings to After Effect.
• Trapcode Suite :Trapcode Suite is a set of 11 tools for 3D motion graphics and visual effects.Trapcode Particular is a plugin for After Effects that lets you add particles to your compositions to bring your motion graphics work to life. Use 3D objects for even more beauty and complexity.Hit the ground running with over 355 fully-customizable Designer presets. Particular 4 includes over 55 new presets that show off powerful features like fluid dynamics and more. Explore the library to find beautifully designed effects for creating fluids, text, fire, spaceflight, fireworks, muzzle flashes, explosions, smoke and more. Save your own presets, and share them across your facility.
• Stardust:Stardust is a Modular 3D particle system for After Effects. It has an easy to use node based user interface and ships with a host of presets to create stunning effects.Render and create stunning volumetric smoke effects from Stardust particles and VDB files.Particles and Models can interact, collide and affect each other while being affected by forces, allowing for the creation of stunning animation with ease. Take your particles to a whole new dimension. Render 3D models from OBJ Files, Primitives and Extruded shapes as particles, add some Image Based Lighting, Ambient Occlusion and you got super awesomeness.Nearly 200 textured 3D models loaded with a single click. Swiftly build designs for your projects with models from Sports, Music, Generic FUI, Technology, Biology and more.
• Plexus:Plexus is an unique plug-in which brings generative art closer to a non-linear program like After Effects. It lets you create, manipulate and visualize data in a procedural manner. Not only you can render the particles, but also create all sorts of interesting relationships between them based on various parameters using lines and triangles. The workflow for Plexus is very modular allowing you to create truly infinite set of configurations and parameters.the various effector fields create magic with lines and particles.
• Sapphire is a integral part o my motion-graphics career. I have used transitions and Sapphire glow numerous times in my project.

  Sapphire plug-ins from BorisFX let you create stunning organic looks with over 270 effects and 3000+ presets, a powerful Effect and Transition Builder, and integrated tracking and masking with the Academy Award-winning Mocha. Sapphire’s superior image quality, control, and GPU accelerated render speed offers massive time savings and allow creatives to focus on what matters most, delivering an impact that keeps audiences coming back. It features, color correction, lensflare,lights and glow,stylize or distortion of your footage, amazing blur modes,industry best transitions, time trails and many more.

• One of the important plugin tat I always use to edit footage is magnum. Do you get irritated by selecting all cuts in your edited film and make them separate composite for after effects?

  Magnum is such plugin that Automatically detects edits in footage with Highly customizable naming options. It gives Average scene color detection, with the option to use the first frame of the previous edit for cut reference. It gives Option to trim resulting clips and nice interface for easier use.  import your edited footage into after efects timeline, apply magnum and relax, you will get all pre composited cuts within a minute.

  These 10 plugins are my personal choice and hope you will get benefited from these too. 

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