Layering tutorial?

[Shawn42]

Anyone have a link for layering tutorial? All the ones I have seen are specific to mega trees. I am having trouble understanding the layering when it comes to the rest of the house/props. For example if I have my icicles on a solid color and I want to gradually transition them to a butterfly, I cannot seem to blend those two together seamlessly. No matter what I try on the layering panel I end up with a hard transition from one effect to the other. Or if I want to have a curtain open up to show another effect I cannot seem to blend those two together, they act independent of one another.
Anyone have a tutorial for this?

[Gilrock]

Should just be 2 layers with curtain on top and blend mode set to the default of Normal.  Type of model doesn't matter.

[Shawn42]

OK, but that was just an example. However I tried that and that does not work for me either. I threw an OPEN CURTAIN on my whole house model group (all lights except for my 2 mega trees) and snowflakes below it with layer blending set to normal. I only see the curtain and none of the snowflakes. Possible that I have my layout incorrect somehow?

I was hoping to find a tutorial that would help me to understand the way layering  works. My biggest hang-up is smooth transitions from one effect to another, I just can't get the hang of it. I just want my sequence to have a nice even 'flow' and not have these hard, block-like transitions that I currently have.

Maybe answering this question would hammer it into my head.

If I have my icicles on in the color red and I wanted to slowly transition them to snowflakes to where the snowflakes show through the red while the red fades out and the icicles fade in, how would I accomplish this?

[Gilrock]

If you move the snowflakes effect over by itself can you see it?  Show a screenshot of what the effect arrangement looks like and/or post the files we need to reproduce the scenario.

[Shawn42]

Gil,

Attached are the files. I am uncertain if I have my layout wrong in some way or if I am just using the layer panel incorrectly. The main thing I have the issue with is on my whole house model. I just can't seem to get any of those layers to work on that model group. Really appreciate the help.

FYI, I gutted the mega tree programming because it was a purchased sequence

[Gilrock]

So point me to a problem area in that sequence.  The problem with the Curtain effect over the Snowflakes effect you have in that sequence is you put a 1 second Fade In time on the Curtain so as it's fading in its allowing the snowflake effect to show underneath it.

[Shawn42]

Specifically on the attached file:

0:56 - Snowflake to butterfly. Could not them to blend so my work-around is a fade down on the first effect and a fade down on the second effect.

1:34 - 2 overlapping plasma effects. Cannot get them to smoothly transition.

1:40 - Curtain trying to reveal snowflakes behind. Snowflakes bleed through.

I guess what I am trying to accomplish here is to find out if my layout is wrong or I am not understanding the layering panel and method.

[Gilrock]

I already told you whats wrong with the curtain.  You are doing a fade in.  A fade allows effects underneath to bleed through.  By the time your fade is done the curtain is more than halfway open.

[Gilrock]

For snowflake to butterfly.  What do you expect to see?  A butterfly draws to every pixel so if you put it on top then you won't see anything underneath it.  If you want to see snowflakes on top of the butterfly then you need to move the snowflake effect above the butterfly effect.  Effects on a model render bottom to top.

Plasma effects also draw to every pixel so they won't naturally blend by themselves without you doing something like a fade to add transparency.  If you had black in parts of it you could use the 1 reveals 2 option to let what's beneath show through the black areas.  The fade out is the way to make it blend into the next effect so you already figured that out.

[Shawn42]

Ok, starting to make sense to me. I will keep screwing with it. Thank you Gil, always appreciate your assistance.