Script that links particular Emitter position to a nulls position.

[Stollnation]

Hi there, So I have a particle I want to play on multiple nulls I have imported from Maya. Easy enough I can just link the Emitter x,y to the pos of the null and then link the z to the pos of the null. One down 48 to go....  These nulls are all animated and the reason I am using nulls is because they can rotate  and I can control the rotation in Maya or in AE. If I control them in Maya I have to link the rotation of the emitter in particular from x,y,z to the Orientation of the null. X, Y, Z. This is extremely tedious and I feel like there has to be a script out there or something I can do where I just select the layer that has particular and the null i want and hit a link script.

Any Ideas?

Thanks

Jon

[Rick Gerard · Accepted solution]

For tedious expressions that I am going to be using all the time I save them as animation presets. Instead of a layer name you can use index-1 to indicate the layer above.

If I saw the timeline and knew exactly what you were doing I could give a better answer.

[Stollnation]

Hey Rick! That might work. Little new to expressions, How do you save the expression as an animation preset?

That index-1 might do the trick.

Basically i have this setup repeated in my comp 48 times

Solid layer

      Particular

         Emitter

             Position x,y

             Position z

              Rotation x

              Rotation y

              Rotation z

Null

position x,y,z

Orientation x,y,z

so I need to link the particular position to the null position and each Rotation axis to the null orientatoons.

Thanks for for your help

[Szalam]

Basically, do what Rick said. On your first layer, pick whip to the null's position, orientation, etc. to get it working. Then, in the expression, replace it's reference to the layer itself with the index -1 or +1 (depending on how you want to structure things). See if it still works. If so, great! Just duplicate the layer and move it in the layer stack.