Ink Reveal Effect

Above is a short video demonstrating the ink reveal effect I made for practicing AfterEffect techniques.   Making an ink reveal effect is straightforward, and I believe in "see one, do one, teach one" to reinforce what I have learned; therefore, I will be placing steps below on how to achieve this effect.  

Level: beginner to intermediate

Things you will need: 

1. Gather Assets. In the video, I used a video of a green liquid squirt and a multicolored image from Pexels.com, which will be available at the bottom of the tutorial.  The ink in the video will reveal the multicolored image.

By the end, your AE screen should look something like the one below.

2.Open AfterEffects and import the video 1st (Layer 2) and then the image(Layer 1).

(Skip 3 if you are able to see Track matte section in layers panel)

3. Select your image and set to track matt mode by clicking on the bottom left corner icon

of your Audio/video switches column within the timeline panel, as shown in the image. This will expand your layers panel to show the Matte section.

4. Move on to your Track Matte section (see 1st image) and set it to "Luma Inverted Matte." 

With your image selected, click on the dropdown menu of Track Matte (see below) and choose the video you chose for your ink reveal. In my case, I called my ink video "ink"; therefore, I chose "2. ink" (Always name your layers!). In the box next to the dropdown menu, click on the box until you get "Luma matte" (box with sun).  In the next box, click on it, to invert the box, as shown in the image below.

And that's it!!

You can also play with the blending modes and add other effects, such as waves, as I did on my "still paint" layer, and add textured paper and different ink videos.

See Below for Assets from Pexels.com

Credits: Pexels, Alexander Ant, Engin Akyurt, Dope Motions