If you have followed the fire, smoke, water and lightning tutorials on this blog, you know how many drawings go into a single second of 2D FX. Liquid Elements is the largest library of that kind of work we know of: more than 1200 frame-by-frame animations, ready to drop into a video.
Who made it
Liquid Elements was built by the team behind this blog. Every animation was drawn by professional frame-by-frame animators with 15 years of experience, and the library has kept growing for years. Disney itself bought licenses for it.
What it is
Every single animation is hand drawn at 12 fps, the classic 2D frame rate, with a real use case in mind. Over 50 categories cover splashes, explosions, water drops, claws, smoke, lightning, tears, fire, doodles, speed lines, stars, noise, waves, skulls and more.
Change the style of everything at once
Liquid Elements has its own style engine. Each animation comes in multiple looks, such as glow, doodle and textured. If your project is in a doodle style, one click switches all 1200+ animations to doodle. Pick another color and all of them change color with it, so the effects always match your design.
What is inside
1200+ frame-by-frame animations
50+ categories
Hand drawn at 12 fps
Style engine with glow, doodle, textured and more
Works with any color scheme
Works in After Effects, Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve, Final Cut, Vegas, Blender and other video editors
Where people use it
Commercials, music videos, explainer videos, tutorials, fan videos, events and social ads. It is used by large companies and by more than 100,000 individual video editors.
License
The license is single user with unlimited videos and unlimited clients, so you can use it in client work and in monetized videos. There is a 14-day money-back guarantee.
Need ready-made explosion animations for your videos? Flash FX by AEJuice has hundreds of hand-drawn 2D FX elements. Works in After Effects, Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve, Final Cut, CapCut and more.
Four elements constitute an explosion:
1) The Initial Blast
2) The Smoke
3) The Fire
4) The Debris
The fire and debris are optional, what if it's only a fast and sudden puff of smoke? Batman's gas pellets from his utility belt just burst out quickly in high volume, with no heat, fire or shrapnel, but it can still be considered to be a small explosion. So these aren't hard and fast rules, but we'll try to cover these four points, there are many types of explosions, we'll go over a few in this post, more different types and styles of fire, gas and water explosions in a few weeks.
First thing... RESEARCH
This is just a few of hundreds of great quality video you can use to study and reference. I can't stress enough how important research is in understanding the physics behind animated elements such as smoke, water, fire and countless of other effects-related scenes you may encounter. Observe how the initial blast bursts out the dissipation of the smoke all the dozens of elements to keep in mind, the flow and direction and swirling properties in certain areas versus others.
See more great slow-motion photography here.
Research, observation, practice, and planning are the number one rule for ALL animators. Step one - The Initial Blast
RESEARCH, RESEARCH, RESEARCH.
Always find as much research as possible.
The very first thing that CG animators for feature films do once they receive their layouts is seek out reference materials. Find and study footage relevant to your shot, then start planning out the shape, volume, position, and timing of your effects.
A last footnote regarding cleaning up your final lines... Cartoonist Bob Flynn shows here on his blog how to clean-up comics in Flash. These techniques most definitely applies to FX linework as well, though most effects animation is self-traced (colored outlines) being careful with your inked lines and how to tapper and thicken your brush-lines can go a long way in improving the quality of the final lines, here's an excerpt: Step two - The Smoke
Right after the flash, the smoke takes over. It shoots outward fast and then slows down hard, so give it a strong ease out: big jumps between the first few drawings, tiny ones at the end. Think of it as volumes rolling over themselves, not as an outline that grows. As it slows, let the big shapes break up into smaller puffs and thin out at the edges. Smoke hangs around far longer than the fire does, so it is usually the last thing on screen.
Step three - The Fire
The fire lives inside the smoke for a short moment. Keep it fast and flickery, changing shapes every one or two frames, with tongues of flame licking upward out of the smoke. It burns out quickly, and the smoke swallows it, often turning darker as it does.
Step four - The Debris
Debris is pure physics: every piece follows an arc. It is fastest right at the blast, slows at the top of its path and speeds up again as it falls. Small pieces travel farther and faster than big ones, and a few spinning chunks with short trail lines sell the speed. Let some pieces bounce or skid when they land, that secondary action is what makes the explosion feel heavy.
Put the four together, blast, smoke, fire and debris, offset in time so they don't all peak on the same frame, and you have an explosion that reads in an instant.
Flash FX VJ Morphology Zooms is a collection of 55 surreal zoom animations, where shapes keep morphing into each other as the camera dives in. It is part of the VJ series in the Flash FX line, made for visuals that loop without the audience seeing the seam.
Who made it
The pack was created by motion artist buzanmusic, who also made other Flash FX VJ packs, including Morphology, Trippy, Ink Blots and Glitch.
What is inside
55 video loops
ProRes 4444 versions with alpha channel
Made for VJ sets, music videos, live streams and YouTube videos
Works in After Effects, Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve, Final Cut, CapCut and other video editors
How to use it
Play the loops on their own as hypnotic backgrounds for a set or a stream
Layer the alpha versions over footage or a performance
Cut on the beat between loops for a music video
In After Effects and Premiere Pro, preview and drag them in with the AEJuice plugin
Custom VJ visuals like these are usually commissioned per show. This pack gives you a ready library at a fraction of that cost.
License
The license is single user with unlimited videos and unlimited clients, so you can use the elements in client work and in monetized videos. There is a 14-day money-back guarantee.
For years this blog has collected the best 2D FX animation from around the world: Disney effects breakdowns, anime explosions, student exercises and step-by-step tutorials on how fire, smoke, water and lightning are drawn. Flash FX is what came out of all that study.
Who made it
Flash FX was created by Ron, the original author of this blog. The same eye for timing and shape that picked the references and wrote the tutorials here went into drawing the elements, one frame at a time.
What it is
Flash FX is a library of over 890 frame-by-frame animated 2D effects. Frame-by-frame means every frame is drawn by hand, the classic way, the same way FX animators work on animated films and series. Nothing is generated by particles or simulation, so the elements have the snappy timing and bold shapes that make 2D FX readable.
What is inside
890+ hand-drawn, frame-by-frame elements
Fire, water, lightning, explosions, smoke, particles and more
Alpha channel, ready to drop over any footage
Works in After Effects, Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve, Final Cut, CapCut and other video editors
How to use it
In After Effects and Premiere Pro, the AEJuice plugin lets you preview every element and drag it straight onto your timeline
In any other editor, import the files like regular footage
Elements adjust to horizontal, square and vertical formats, so the same pack works for YouTube, Shorts, Reels and TikTok
Transparency is built in, so there is no keying or blending mode trick needed
Who it is for
Motion designers, YouTubers and video editors who want the look of hand-drawn FX without drawing it, and animators who want a reference library of finished effects next to the breakdowns on this blog. If the tutorials here showed you how much work goes into a single flame cycle, this is the same craft, ready to use when a deadline does not leave time to draw every frame.
License
The license is single user with unlimited videos and unlimited clients, so you can use the elements in client work and in monetized videos. There is a 14-day money-back guarantee.
The four classical elements plus lightning are the core of every FX animator's training. Most of the tutorials on this blog start with them: a candle flame, a water splash, a gust of wind, a rock breaking apart, a bolt of lightning. Flash FX Elements packs all of them into one set of ready-to-use animations.
What it is
Flash FX Elements is a pack of 160+ frame-by-frame animated elements, drawn by hand in the classic 2D style. It is a focused companion to the larger Flash FX library: instead of covering everything, it concentrates on the natural forces you reach for most often.
What is inside
160+ frame-by-frame animated elements
Fire, water, air, earth and lightning
.mov files with transparency
Works in After Effects, Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve, Final Cut, CapCut and other video editors
How to use it
In After Effects and Premiere Pro, the AEJuice plugin lets you preview every element and drag it straight onto your timeline
In any other editor, import the files like regular footage
Elements adjust to horizontal, square and vertical formats, so the same pack works for YouTube, Shorts, Reels and TikTok
Transparency is built in, so there is no keying or blending mode trick needed
Ideas
Magic and superpower moments in gaming and anime-style edits
Punchy accents in music videos and short-form content
Title reveals that burst into fire or splash into water
A quick way to block out timing before you animate your own FX
License
The license is single user with unlimited videos and unlimited clients, so you can use the elements in client work and in monetized videos. There is a 14-day money-back guarantee.
Want ready-made 2D FX animations for your videos? Check out Flash FX by AEJuice. Works in After Effects, Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve, Final Cut, CapCut and more.
Need ready-made explosion animations for your videos? Flash FX by AEJuice has hundreds of hand-drawn 2D FX elements. Works in After Effects, Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve, Final Cut, CapCut and more.
Want ready-made 2D FX animations for your videos? Check out Flash FX by AEJuice. Works in After Effects, Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve, Final Cut, CapCut and more.
