Bringing Text to Life with Descript Animations

Introduction to Text Animations

An easy way to make your videos more fun is to add animations to your text. Let's dive into Descript and see how to do it.

Adding Text Layers

In a blank project, follow these steps to add text layers:

1. Go to the Elements section.
2. Choose from the text options - Text, Subtitle, or Title.
3. Select the text in your editor.
4. In the menu that pops up over the text, you can modify your text to change the font, colors, and more. 
5. Double the text element and start typing to change the contents of the text layer.

Applying Animations

After adding your text layer:

1. Click on your text layer to open the menu.
2. Click on the "Animation" option.
3. Scroll down on the right side properties to find Animation settings.
4. Click the plus button (+) to add an animation.

Animation Options Explained

There are three animation types you can add:

• In: How the text appears. Options include blur, spin, wipe, etc.
• Out: How the text disappears. Same options as the In settings.
• Custom: You can set this yourself to animate in any way that you choose.

Exploring Animation Presets

Let's try adding a "blur" animation to the start:

1. Select "In."
2. Choose "blur."

Your clip in the timeline will show a small gray triangle, indicating an animation has been added.

Back up your playhead a few seconds and play your video to see how it looks.

Next, let's try other animations:

1. Click on your title layer again.
2. Scroll down to find the animation settings.
3. Change the current animation to "spin."
4. Play your video to see the effect.
5. Repeat the steps to try "wipe."

Customizing Animation Settings

You can adjust each animation's settings by clicking the little dials next to them. Some options you can change include:

• Duration: How long the animation lasts. Default is 0.4 seconds, but you can change it.
• Easing: This affects how the animation speeds up or slows down. "Natural" starts slow, gets faster, and then slows down again. "None" keeps the same speed throughout.
• Direction: If an animation moves, you can change the direction it comes from, like right, left, up, or down.

Demonstration of Animation Types

Here are some more examples of animations:

• Appear: This makes each word pop up one at a time.
• Fade: Starts invisible and slowly appears.
• Reveal: Words pop up one at a time from a chosen direction.
• Scale: Words start small and grow to full size.
• Slide: Words slide into the screen, one line at a time.

To see these in action, play around with the settings in your project. Remember, you can change how animations look to fit your needs.

Conclusion

Now you know how to add and customize text animations in Descript. Try these steps in your project to make your videos more engaging. If you want to learn more, check out my other tutorials and articles to dive deeper into animations. Have fun experimenting!