neon light flicker effect?

I usually go with the Random or Wriggle behaviors to create flickering effects.

.. and it has something to do with the 'Sequence Text' behaviour...

Just noticing: no 'transparent' 3D material??

... but I have no idea, how to 'wriggle' btw. NeonON, NeonOFF.....LOL

oops, an Ross not Russ - SORRY!!!!!

A few ways to do this. But basically they'll all use the Wriggle perimeter behavior. Most basically, using text or a shape, go to the Properties, to Opacity, and right-click it. Add Parameter Behavior > Wriggle. Set to subtle settings at first.

If you want it to effect stuff around it, like it is a real light, add a Light, make it a Point or Ambient light, and apply the Wriggle parameter behavior to its Intensity.

BenB wrote:

... basically they'll all use the Wriggle perimeter behavior. Most basically, go to the Properties, to Opacity, and right-click it. Add Parameter Behavior > Wriggle. ...

Yep, that's a start.

Would be nicer, if individally letters 'wriggle' by random... therefor my suggestion of using the Sequencer... but I have no idea how to handle it for switching btw. a light/no light status .....

Ross H wrote:

.... Karsten: no harm with "Russ". ..

yeah, me and names; have to read my own IDcard every morning, "ahh, that's my name!" - I'm a complete fool when it comes to 'names'..... 😝

.... hmm, for that Sequence Text feature, Steve&Mark once made a tutorial, have to dig in my bookmarks. That behaviour avoids zzillions of key-frames ... and if I remember correctly, it has some 'random' mode.

Idea is: put TWO versions of the same neon sign over each other, one shining in red, the other 'off', greyish, no glow ....the Sequence Behaviour then switches randomly the red ones of, ....

... that's he concept.... missing the execution.. LOL!!!

Ross H wrote:

… I'm such a noob at Motion

me too, me too 😝

I finally understood some basics of Sequenced Text, but it doesn't 'flicker', it's more a lazy switchON, switchOFF

… and I still don't understand the 3D-materials ... surprised, there are no 'transparents' , colored glas for example.

My attemp is a bit different, no wriggling, but a random Text Sequence Behavior, and 3 tracks:

• the sign with a Sequenced Text behavior on opacity, switching each letter randomly on/off
• a copy/clone of that layer, no 3D material, just very blurred yelllow = the glow; it has the same Behaviour on it = when the neon switches off, the correcponding glow too
• and another copy, no behaviors, but a diff. material, grey/no glow .

When the light switches off, the grey 'off' one gets visible....

... but that's all far from convincing me .... sky high ambitions, but down to earth skills.... typical me 😀

Motion's new 3D text can help. Most of creating an "effect" is creating the conditions that "sell" the effect. For neon, you need "tubular" glass. The font I used helps out a lot (http://www.1001fonts.com/maxwell-font.html) Maxwell Bold (it's free.) Every font will be different for exact settings. For roundness, you can set the 3D text Depth to 0 and adjust the Round Front Edge Size to an approximation of a tube. Adjust the Weight downward if necessary, etc. Depending on the font, you will have to play with the settings to get the look you need.

For both of my samples, I set the Lighting to 1000%.

Material should be Substance Generic. Neon is just to the violet side of blue... at least the way I see it. (I do have color "blindness" issues in some parts of the color spectrum.) Set the Opacity to around 30%.

To create the flicker, I relied mostly on splitting up the 3D appearance to foreground and background, so with the initial substance created and colored, I changed the Material to Multiple. Select the front and click the "link" buttons on the Front Edge and Side. Then click the Back tab and the "link" button on the Back Edge. The flicker is created by animating the Brightness and Opacity of the Back and Back Edge.

Right click on the Brightness and Add Parameter Behavior > Wriggle. Set the Amount relatively high (for the first example, around 1450%); Frequency to about 0.1 and Noisiness to 1. Right click on the Opacity and add another Wriggle. Set the Amount to about 30-35; Frequency to 1 and Noisiness to 0.

For this next example, I added a Glow > Glint Filter to the Group containing the text (Glow filters always Rasterize a layer - in 3D, better to keep all the 3D stuff in the same group and apply rasterizing filters to the parent group... they tend to mess up 3D "space" and layer order. You can mitigate the Layer order problem by checking the Layer Order checkbox in the Group Inspector tab.)

Glint settings are approximatelyl:

Exposure 1.0

Tint 0

Glint Size 3.0

Streaks 1.0

Glow Softness 100%

Glow Amount 48

Intensity 0.75

Color Fringing 0

Doing this required going back to the original wriggle values and dialing them back... You can look at it in the project (link below.)

Example text on a "dimmed" checkerboard to show "glassiness" of the text. Background surface has a Reflection applied to it. Against a solid dark background, reflection can be used in place of a Glow filter to show a glow effect by setting the Reflection > Blur to a high value and moving the background reflective object close to the text (if you look very close at the top example, you might be able to see the refection blur/glow in the black regions.)

You can download both projects for inspection/experimentation here: http://sight-creations.com/motiondemos/neonLightDemos.zip

just in case I forgot to go over some other details.

It is quite possible that simply adding the Glint filter and applying the wriggle to ... I would go with Intensity (but exposure might work as well) ... would accomplish nearly the same effect and would be considerably more simple.

HTH

// full quote //

awesome, fox_m! Thanks for sharing - again - your profound knowledge of this program ...

That flicker/glow looks grrreat... 😁

Awesome tutorial. Although I was not looking for a text effect, I WILL definitely use this at some point in the future - it looks amazing.

One more question, however, and you can just give me a yes or no. Does Motion 5 3D effects for lines and strokes that are as robust as the 3D text options? You know, so I can apply a neon effect to shapes that also look tubular and glassy??

The glassiness effect is due in large part to the Specular "finish" that can be applied in 3D text. Specular is responsible for the subtle reflections of an environment on a surface. You're simply not going to be able to get the same kind of glass effect with other objects in Motion. The next best thing is to fake it.

A tubular somewhat transparent inner lit effect for shape outlines can be accomplished with a multiple filter application: 1) Hue/Saturation, 2) Aura and 3) Glint (I used to use Dazzle, but Glint is 100 times better!)

The outline color needs to be greater than 50% lightness so the glow effects can have effect. The width of the outline can be pretty much anything, but will look better at 20 or higher (I used 30 for the example below). In the Hue Saturation filter, boost the Value to about 1.5 (this is a "tweak point" you'll need to adjust in your finished product.) The Hue angle offset at about 60 works really well for a Neon and glow color differential (also a variable option). For the Aura filter, the Inner Radius needs to be greater than the Outer Radius. In my example below, I used Inner Radius = 31 and Outer Radius = 18. I set the Brightness to 33. For the Glint filter, Exposure = 1; Glint Size = 4; Streaks = 10; Glint Softness = 48%; Glow Amount = 20; Glint Angle = 30; Intensity = 2.82; Mix = 37.85.

For any parameters I *didn't* mention, leave at defaults. The starting color for the shape outline is: Red = 0.2; Green=0.53; Blue = 1.0. If you use a fill color, use a dark shade... otherwise the Glint filter will pick it up.

BTW, if your shape is a common shape like a circle, square, rectangle, star shape, etc. etc., check out the Unicode character set so you can use Motion's 3D Text features. At any text prompt, type: Option-Control-Space to call up the Unicode character picker. Examples: ➤⬢◼♠♣♥♦❉❅♨︎▷☆♔♕♖♗♘♙♫. (You cannot use color characters or emoji with a 3D "effect" applied—Motion won't accept them.) Here's a "detail" of an illustration that is 100% unicode characters:

That first symbol and a circle character... that's it! The whole composition is 4 characters (a rectangle used [with Slant applied] for the "feathers" on the other end). If you can find the pieces you need to create an illustration, then you have the full complement of 3D effects available to you (beware of filters that flatten images! You'll lose the real 3D nature of the illustration.)

HTH