Quickly Center Stuff Horizontally & Vertically


In this quick tip, I talk about how to quickly center stuff horizontally and vertically using the ‘Align’ panel, something sometimes overlooked in After Effects. Rather than manually adjusting the layers and using the title safe, simply click two buttons and your layer should be perfectly centered.

Remember, this works with virtually all layers of After Effects (not audio layers of course) and does not apply to just text. So the next time you try to center stuff, use the ‘Align’ panel. I suggest adding it to your custom workspace for easy access.

Of course if you have any other questions, feel free to leave them down below as I love doing these quick tip videos! Many thanks for your support guys!

About VinhSon Nguyen

VinhSon Nguyen is a motion graphics designer and hosts a series of creative design tutorials related to Adobe After Effects on CreativeDojo.net. Aside from motion graphics, he enjoys music, photography, and sketching.
View all posts by VinhSon Nguyen

There are 8 comments. Add your comment.

  1. Nice! I’ve been wondering if this was possible and it’s just like Photoshop! Thanks a lot VinhSon!

    • VinhSon Nguyen

      Haha, yes it is possible! Many thanks Robert :)

  2. mark

    nice. i’m guessing this doesn’t create keyframes if you have the stopwatch for position enabled? or does it? also is that text from c4d? looks pretty good if it’s only AE

    • VinhSon Nguyen

      Hey Mark, I’m pretty sure it does set keyframes because when you center it up, it changes the position parameter. Try it out :) And no, the text is completely made in AE. I may do a tutorial on creating some nice looking text in AE soon! Thanks for your feedback comment!

  3. saul

    Hey men, how do yo do the 3d text????

    • VinhSon Nguyen

      It’s simply just a bunch of stacked up 2D text layers to give it the illusion of 3D text.

  4. G

    can’t believe i missed this feature!! I always use guide lines to help me threw the struggle lol, thanx man

    • VinhSon Nguyen

      Glad you learned something, and thanks for your feedback!

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