Uploaded June 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago

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This After Effects tutorial shows how to make realistic, calligraphic brush strokes with a write-on effect. Or you can download the animation preset at creationeffects.com/effects/scribe-after-effects-brushstroke.
The animation preset is just $19 and has customization controls and additional features not shown in this tutorial.
With this technique that uses the Echo effect, you can get a stroke with parallel streaks (like a paintbrush) and varied width (like a calligraphy pen). The stroke writes itself out as it follows a path that you draw with the Pen tool.

At 6:00, paste the following expression onto the Brush layer's Rotation:

p1 = position.valueAtTime(time - thisComp.frameDuration);
p2 = position.valueAtTime(time);
value + radiansToDegrees(Math.atan2(p2[1] - p1[1], p2[0] - p1[0]));

at 8:45, paste this expression into the "Echo Time" property of the Echo effect:

s = effect("Echo Spacing")("Slider");
- thisComp.frameDuration / s;

Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:54 Make a brush texture
02:03 Scribe (optional preset)
03:07 Draw a path
05:30 Adding streaks
07:07 Echo effect
10:01 Keying out streaks
10:51 Compositing and color
11:40 Roughen edges
11:54 Rotating & scaling brush
14:40 Mixed Media Effect