Wednesday, April 19th, 2023 Posted by Jim Thacker

Free tool: HeliumX Lite for After Effects


HeliumX has released HeliumX Lite, a free plugin for importing and rendering 3D models inside After Effects, and extruding and animating 3D text.

The plugin is a cut-down version of Helium, HeliumX’s wide-ranging 3D toolset for Adobe’s compositing app.

Import 3D models and animate 3D text inside After Effects
Although After Effects can create simple 3D text, and can now import 3D models natively, at least in current beta builds, HeliumX Lite opens up a wider range of 3D workflows.

As well as importing 3D models in OBJ or FBX format, or adding 3D primitives to After Effects compositions, users can extrude and animate 3D text and paths, and use the plugin’s readymade 3D page scroll effect.

The full edition of Helium also includes toolsets for creating and animating arrays of objects for motion graphics work, generating 3D terrain, and creating and rendering volumetric smoke and fog.

Pricing and availability
HeliumX Lite is available free for After Effects 2020+ on Windows 10+ and macOS 10.14+.

Helium is rental-only, and is available via aescripts + aeplugins, priced at $50/year for the first year; $60/year thereafter.

Download free After Effects 3D plugin HeliumX
(HeliumX Lite is included as part of the Helium trial installer)