After Effects is, at its very heart, a compositing application and so After Effects comes with a bunch of compositing tools. One effect that has been around for decades is the displacement map – moving pixels in a layer based on the values of another layer.

Using displacement maps is a fundamental compositing technique and there are many old tutorials around that show how they can be used to integrate graphics onto rough surfaces like bricks and grass. Some of the very first After Effects tutorials were ones that demonstrated how to use displacement maps.

However After Effects actually has a few options in addition to the original displacement map effect, and it’s worth looking at them and their differences. The short version is that the CC Glass effect will probably always give you a better looking result – but don’t overlook the more complex Caustics effect, either.

In addition to these plugins, which are included with After Effects, I also mention UV Maps, which require a 3rd party plugin. The UV plugin that I use can be found at aescripts+aeplugins. But just a work of caution – I’ve worked with UV maps for many years and they can often cause grief to anyone unfamiliar with them, and it’s rare that a UV render from a 3D app works perfectly the first time. A UV map render needs to be at least 16bit, and you’ll need to turn off colour management for the uv map by choosing “preserve RGB” in the interpret footage settings. If the UV map isn’t working correctly then you might also need to experiment with settings for linear light – especially if the uv map is an EXR file. But once you get them working they can be magic!

If you’ve enjoyed this video, please take the time to check out my other After Effects articles.