Overview

Cube transforms a two-dimensional layer into a manipulatable faux-3D cube.

Cube is a faux-3D effect that can be applied to any 2D layer on the timeline. Simply add the effect to a layer, and it will be automatically transformed into a cube.

Figure 1: This image has been turned into a cube.

Cube has the following settings:

Orientation allows the rotation of the cube. Pitch, Yaw, and Roll each control one axis of rotation and are each measured in from -180 to +180 degrees. Note that tapping and dragging on the Preview will also rotate the cube.

Width, Height, and Depth each control the length of the cube along one axis. 

Crop shows the percentage of the base layer that is visible each cube face. A value of 1.0 indicates that the layer is stretched to exactly cover the faces of the cube. Layers with values under 1.0 are cropped from the center and stretch out beyond the edges of the screen. Layers with values over 1.0 do not fill the entire face, and are repeated on all sides.

Distance indicates the distance of the cube from the screen. Smaller values are closer to the screen, and higher values are further away.

Figure 2: Unlit vs Lit Cube

The effect also contains a light source with the following settings:

Enable Lighting toggles the light source on and off. When set to On, sides facing the light source will appear to be lit, while other sides will be in shadow. When set to Off, all sides will appear as they did in the base layer.

Intensity determines the strength of the light source. Values approaching zero percent will cause the cube to approach black. Values approaching 100% will start to override the base layer's color with that of the light source.

Color changed the color of the light source.

Angle changes the direction in which the light is shining on the cube.

Elevation changes the height of the light source. Lower values will place the light as if it were further behind the cube, while higher values will place the light is if it were further in front of the cube.

Notes

Horizontally Flipped Sides

Due to how Cube is rendered, three out of 6 of the sides will be horizontally flipped. This is a side effect of the algorithm.

Figure 3: Text is inverted on the top side.

Stretch to Fill

Images will stretch themselves to fill each side of the cube. To avoid this, either make the original layer you're using square, or use the Width, Height, and Depth controls to alter the sizes of each axis to make the most visible sides appear less stretched.

Partial Transparency

Cube does not support transparency. Any transparent areas in the original layer will appear as black. However it's possible to render these parts of the cube invisible in the cube in two ways. Note that neither way will allow you to see through to the other size of the cube, they will just render the black/green areas as the color of the background.

Figure 4: Text Layer with Cube and Screen applied.

1. Color the transparent parts of the layer green, then use chroma key to make them transparent. This method will work under most circumstances.

2. Let the transparent parts turn to black, and then turn Enable Lighting in Cube to Off. Then go to Blending & Opacity and set the blending mode to Screen. This will render the black parts transparent. This method is much cleaner than chroma key, but it doesn't work if the background layer is black.

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