In this After Effects Tricks post, we will be talking about some of the most important blend modes that you should remember.

BLENDING MODES IN PLAIN ENGLISH

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Screen Shot 2014-08-29 at 1.52.06 PM

  • NORMAL – Here is the logo without using a blend mode. You’ll notice that it has a white background. The blue is a background that I added in After Effects.

Screen Shot 2014-08-29 at 1.52.22 PM

  • MULTIPLY – This mode mode gets rid of lighter values, and makes non-pure-white values slightly visible.

Screen Shot 2014-08-29 at 1.52.57 PM

  • ADD – Almost like an inverse of MULTIPLE (or DARKEN), the ADD blend mode makes darker pixels less visible. Pure black is invisible. The background blue is lightened by portions of the dark logo that aren’t pure black (and therefore not completely invisible). It also pushes lighter colors to an even lighter/brighter spectrum.

Screen Shot 2014-08-29 at 1.53.10 PM

  • SCREEN – Similar to ADD, SCREEN makes darker pixels invisible. However, it doesn’t push the lighter parts of the logo (the letters) brighter.
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These are three of my favorite blending modes that I use, specifically to get rid of pure whites of a logo or image. Some of my other favorites that you can play with are OVERLAY, HARD LIGHT, & SOFT LIGHT.