Loading Wheel Animation in After Effects (Full Process)

In this full process video, I will show you how to create a basic “loading wheel” animation in after effects! Here are some timestamps to make this workflow more understandable: 0:00 - Final Result 0:05 - Creating the base (circle) for our new loading wheel 0:15 - Turning off the fill and enabling the stroke 0:28 - Aligning the wheel to the center and renaming it 0:41 - Brain Freeze. 0:48 - Adding the “Trim Path” feature to our stroke 1:37 - This shape will help us create the “fade-out tail” effect 2:15 - Positioning the shape correctly… 2:47 - Alpha Inverted Matte does the trick 2:58 - More adjusting… 4:51 - Creating a Pre-comp so that we can rotate both of these shapes simultaneously (fastest way) 5:12 - Using keyframes to add rotation 5:37 - Enabling Motion Blur - Notice the difference in smoothness 5:45 - Adjusting the rotation direction & mirroring the Pre-Comp 6:25 - Previewing to see what could be improved 7:09 - More adjusting… 9:10 - Trying to apply keyframe easing, which doesn’t really look good