Twinkling Stars

[Kathy Engelhard]

Is there an easy way to make twinkling stars? I tried by cycling 4 different white dots on a black layer but they looked like tiny jumping or shooting stars.
Has anyone done this already?
Thank you.
Kathy
I'm using TVPP 10.5 with a strong HP computer.

[slowtiger]

The trick with twinkles is to avoid a blinking. You have a basic star, just a little white dot, and only every second or so it brightens up a bit. Duplicate that layer, place it elsewhere, and change the timing and loop length so all twinkles will happen at different frames. Voila.

[Paul Fierlinger]

I've done it by erasing pinpoints into the background of a night sky and then creating a pan background behind the sky which is painted with streaks of semi-whites on white (or yellowish and even a pink here and there). I've used the same effect to achieve shimmering reflections in the water of objects on shore. The pan background of course is a secondary project combined with the primary project through the KeyFramer in the FX stack. When you drag a painted background like this behind the pin pricks you get a very convincing effect without ever seeing any repetitions.

[Kathy Engelhard]

Thank you Slowtiger and Paul. I am so glad that I asked because, I would have never thought of doing it either of the ways that you both suggest.
I recently finished studying the pan method in the manual and practiced doing it a couple of times.

I don't know about making a loop because I've only used the loop button when I play my project. Could you please give me more info or directions for making a loop?
Thank you both for such great help!
Kathy