Inside the VAT

VAT_4.0_1080p_Assets_AfterEffects

Many compositions in the After Effects project file make use of the Essential Graphics panel to help you change colors, text, text sizes, etc. Please be sure when you open an AE comp that you also open the Essential Graphics panel and select that comp in the Master dropdown in order to display the available sliders and options.

The folders you will use in your video productions can all be found in the _VAT_AE_4.0_Comps folder.

Chapter Cards

Use chapter cards to separate sections of a video, especially if the procedure has defined overall steps, for example, a) creating something and then b) adding the thing to a document.

ChapterCard_Layered If using one of the chapter cards, select the appropriate background color for the product your video is about, edit the chapter title text, and insert a screenshot into the UI_Placeholder comp.
ChapterCard_Main No-frills chapter card with text on the left and product color on the right. Text should describe what’s coming up, such as “Add the image to your document.” Use sentence case with no punctuation.

CTA

CTA = Call To Action. These animations provide several different options for displaying a URL. A CTA is usually used at the end of a video right before the Outro, in combination with voiceover saying “Learn more at…”

Highlights

Use these animated boxes, ellipses, or magnification to help call attention to something on screen. Usually, mouse movement, zooms, and pans are enough to guide the eye to the important UI, but sometimes a highlight works best. For the rectangles and ellipse, our standard is to use red, but if your background has a lot of orange in it, try using Blue or Gray.

Highlight workflow

Highlights are usually added near the very end of the editing process, after adding zooms and pans.
Take a reference screen shot of the frame where you want the highlight to appear and use that as a guide layer in the comp.
Place the play head on the Tap marker in the timeline.
Adjust the color, scale and position of the box around UI you want to highlight.
Make copies of the comp and repeat this process for each highlight you need, or use the highlights available in the Motion Graphics Templates to drop directly into Premiere Pro.

Intros/Titles

Two title cards are available, one showing a device (i.e., Surface or phone), and the other without device.
Replace the placeholder image with a screenshot of the primary UI that is shown in the video.
To set the product color, use the sliders in the Essential Graphics panel.
Select the appropriate device for TitleCard_Devices. Additional device models can be found in the Devices folder.
No sound under the title card itself. Voiceover should begin just as the card starts to move off screen.
The title should be as short as possible -- no more than 4 lines long, and no more than 50 characters long.
Avoid breaking a product name onto two lines.
- Good:
  Add a user to
  Office 365 Small Business
- Bad:
  Add a user to Office 365
  Small Business

LowerThird

Used mainly for names/titles of people in live-action videos, but can also be used to display a URL or other text in a training video.

LowerThird is the main comp. Edit the BG_Color precomp to select appropriate colors.

Outros

Two versions of our standard animated Microsoft logo, to be included at the end of every video. Our standard is to use Outro_White, but Outro_Black is OK if it fits your content better (for example, if your video ends on a dark or black screen).

If your video has a music bed, it's OK for the music to be ending as the logo appears. For example, you may want to time it so the final chord plays right when the 4-color logo appears.

Taps

Use these dots to indicate taps and swipes on touch-enabled devices. The standard is to use the Orange set, but if there is a lot of orange on the screen already, try Blue or Gray. Edit the BG_Color precomp to select appropriate colors.

TastyText

TastyText comps are white boxes with callout text inside that can be used to help present quick and succinct messages in combination with the voiceover audio.

Most text should be Segoe UI Regular, black.
Command names like File, Save, OK, Cancel, etc. should be Segoe UI SemiBold, and in the appropriate brand color for the product. The product colors are available in the VAT zip file (see below). For example, Microsoft 365's brand color is #0078D4, so a text box might be formatted as:

Select File > Save

With the words "File" and "Save" set to that color. If used, the ">" symbol should still be Segoe UI Regular, Black.

Transitions

Use the Transition comps to help make the jump from one screen to another. Other options include a simple crossfade or a chapter card, depending on what’s going on in the video. Select the appropriate brand colors for the product being shown.

VAT_4.0_MOGRT_Templates_AfterEffects

Motion Graphics Template (.mogrt) files

This folder contains many of the After Effects asset comps, but in a standalone .mogrt file format for easy implementation. In Premiere Pro, open the Essential Graphics panel, and in the lower-right corner of the Browse tab, select the Install Motion Graphics templates button, navigate to this folder, and import the templates you want to use. Once you are ready to use the templates, you can drag them into your timeline, and then in the Edit tab of the Essential Graphics panel, you can make adjustments, such as choosing product colors and customizing text.

If you're not familiar with .mogrts, search the Adobe website for "Motion Graphics Templates FAQ."

VAT_4.0_MouseMoves_PPro

Images

Placeholder image used in sample sequences.

Mouse Movements/Clicks

Our standard procedure is to strip the original pointer out of the capture and animate it in using PPro.

Mouse_Pointer.ai is our standard pointer. Use this by default unless you really need another pointer to demonstrate the feature. In Excel, switch to the cross cursor when working in the datasheet. You may also want to switch to the I-beam cursor if the video shows a lot of selecting text.
The Mouse Movements/Clicks sequence shows two example mouse movements and clicks, as well as the typical fade-in and fade-out.
- Note ease-in and ease-out are used on all movements, and a slight arc is added to the motion path.
- Scale is based on a 1920x1080 sequence. If you add the pointer in a sequence of larger dimensions, you may want to use larger default and click scale values.

Spotlight Example

This sequence shows an example of a spotlight highlight, using a black color matte that fades in to 50% opacity, and a mask to carve out the highlighted area. Use this technique as an alternative to the box highlights provided in VAT_4.0.

Other folders

Brand Colors

The current product colors can be found in the Brand Colors 2019.png chart.

Brand Symbols

Text file that contains a link to our downloadable Brand symbols.

Captions

Some of our videos require that subtitles or “open captions” be included as part of the video. This folder contains a bar that you can use as a background for these captions along the bottom of the screen.

Cursors

This folder contains an assortment of cursors or pointers that you can use to replace the original cursor. The default is Mouse_Pointer.ai.

Device Frames

Additional device frames to use in in your After Effects or Premiere Pro video projects.

Font

The default font for Office videos is Segoe UI, so if you don’t already have that on your system, you can extract and install it from SegoePro.zip.

Music

Text file that contains a link to our collection of music to add to your videos: http://aka.ms/VATMusic.

Outro

Two pre-rendered versions of our standard animated Microsoft logo, to be included at the end of every video.

Our standard is to use Outro_White, but Outro_Black is OK if it fits your content better (for example, if your video ends on a dark or black screen).
If the video is being produced for YouTube, also add the YouTube endscreen described below.

Sample Documents

This folder contains a large assortment of product sample documents that you can use.

Script Template and Guidelines

The Outlook Dark Mode Script.docx and Outlook Dark Mode Video.mp4 are a good example of how one takes a concept from script to final deliverable. The Video Production Guidelines.docx and Universal Script Template.docx files will help you get started on your video.

YouTube endscreens

If you're creating a video for YouTube, append one of these clips to the very end of your video.

The YouTube endscreen should immediately follow the Microsoft logo outro, with no transition or fadeout in between the two clips.
Use the entire clip (duration is 13 seconds) to match the timing of the YouTube "next video" overlays that will appear over the video.
Default is to use the white-background version, but a black version is also provided in case your video ends with a black-background Microsoft logo.

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