What It Does
Faux Parent breaks the standard parenting relationship in After Effects. You can parent each transform property (position, scale, rotation, opacity) to different layers, control how much influence each parent has, add frame delays, and invert directions. This lets you build complex motion systems without keyframing every layer.
Key Features
Per-property parenting. Assign up to four different parents to a single child layer, one for each transform property. A shape can follow one layer’s position while inheriting rotation from another.
Parenting modes. Position and scale offer eight modes: XY, X Only, Y Only, XY Inverted, X Only Inverted, Y Only Inverted, X Inverted + Y Standard, X Standard + Y Inverted. Rotation and opacity use Standard, Inverted, and Target (rotation only). Inverting flips the relationship so the child moves opposite to the parent.
Influence control. Set how much the parent affects the child, from 0% to 1000%. At 50%, the child follows the parent halfway. Above 100%, the child exaggerates the parent’s motion.
Delay options. Add frame offsets to child layers. Batch Delay applies delays to multiple layers at once using Random Mode (random values within a range) or Sequence Mode (evenly divided values across selected layers). Useful for staggered animations.
Batch influence. Apply different influence amounts to multiple children in one go, either randomly within a range or sequenced across layers. Makes it simple to create parallax effects where background layers move less than foreground ones.
Independent anchor points. The child rotates and scales around its own anchor point, not the parent’s. This gives you more control over where transformations happen.
Non-destructive workflow. Faux Parent runs entirely on expressions. Projects using it can be shared with others who don’t have the script installed, and the relationships still work. Version 1.4 rewrote the sync engine for faster performance and compatibility with After Effects in other languages.
Who It’s For
Motion designers building mechanical animations (gears, linkages), parallax effects, or layered motion graphics where traditional parenting is too rigid. Also useful for anyone who wants to experiment with procedural animation without keyframing every parameter. The ability to offset and invert transforms makes it easier to create organic, offset motion across multiple layers.
Pricing
$9.99 for a single user license. A trial version is available from the product page.