Apple Motion 5.1.1 - Manual (Page 234)

Chapter 7 Basic compositing 234
Blend modes
The following section describes how blend modes cause layers to combine to create different
results. The blend modes are presented in the order in which they appear in the Blend Mode
pop-up menu, arranged into groups of modes that create similar results.
Most of the examples in this section are created by combining the following two reference images:
Boxes object Chimp object
The resulting image illustrates how differently the color values from each image interact under
each blend mode. When examining the results, pay attention to the white and black areas of
the colored squares, as well as the highlights and shadows in the chimpanzee image. These
show you how each blend mode treats the whites and blacks in an image. The other brighter
and darker colors serve to illustrate each blend mode’s handling of overlapping midrange color
values. The yellow, red, pink, and blue squares, in particular, all have very different color and
luminance values that contrast sharply from example to example.
Important: Depending on the blend mode, layer and group ordering may or may not be
important. Some blend modes behave differently depending on which image is on top.
Normal blend mode
The default blend mode for layers. In a layer set to Normal, any transparency is caused by the
Opacity parameter or by an alpha channel.
Darkening blend modes
The following blend modes tend to create a result darker than either of the original images.
•
Subtract: Darkens all overlapping colors. Whites in the foreground image go black, while
whites in the background image invert overlapping color values in the foreground image,
creating a negative effect. Blacks in the foreground image become transparent, while blacks in
the background image are preserved. Overlapping midrange color values are darkened based
on the color of the background image. In areas where the background is lighter than the
foreground, the background image is darkened. In areas where the background is darker than
the foreground, the colors are inverted. The order of two layers affected by the Subtract blend
mode is important.
Boxes object on top Chimp object on top
67% resize factor