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NUMBERS

Provides multiple number formats along with accessible ways to modify their values within the constraints of their data type.

Presets & Video Walk-Through

Numbers provides plenty of presets to help pre-format your numbers, very much like formatting the numbers in a spreadsheet. Find our presets via the blue Open Dashboard... button or the Choose a Preset... button below it.

As with all other Universe tools, you can modify or create a Numbers look and then save it under its own name by pressing the Save Preset... button.

If you'd like a visual overview of Numbers before diving into this guide, we recommend giving our Cineversity tutorial a watch.

Modify the Effect

• The Text Style... button launches a modular window with various text adjustments including Font, Font Type, Font Size, Font Color, Justification, Line Spacing, and Letter Spacing.
  
• Position defines the coordinates for where within the frame your text will begin to appear.
• Number Type dictates the formatting options for numbers based your selection Numbers, Dates, or Time. Some conversion may be needed. For example, if you want the date of January 3, 2009, you might start with a Value of 0, which is January 1, 2000, then determine the number of days to your target — 3290, if you're curious.
• Value defines the current numeric value, which incorporates any offsets within the number type's parameters. Fun fact: The euro value shown in the image above is the highest number possible in Universe Numbers. You'll hit the same ceiling in other formats. Thus, we recommend using the Billion preset when illustrating, for instance, the national debt. (Below, we modified the preset via Numbers > Unit of Measure and editing the custom text.)
  
• Rate controls the speed at which the numbers increase (positive values) or decrease (negative values). In the following clip, we start with a half second of showing some date — Value: 9300, or June 18, 2025 — then we keyframe our January 3, 2009 target date at the four-second mark. Now, because this is a countdown, we set a series of increasingly negative keyframes on the Rate line that topped out at -100 for the clip's middle section. Finally, we gradually returned the Rate to 0 and left our target date showing for another half second. This all happens quickly in a five-second clip, but you get the idea.
  
  
• Text Settings
  • Font Size adjusts how large or small the text appears.
  • Font Color defines the text's color.
  • Justification determines if the text is aligned to the Left, Center, or Right.
  • Horizontal Tracking controls the spacing between characters.
• Numbers parameters affect output when you set Number Type to Numbers.
  • Number of Decimals adjusts the number of decimal places to include in the output, suffixing the decimal with zeroes to fill the number when necessary.
  • Minimum Integer Length adjusts the minimum number of integers to include in the output, prefixing the number with zeroes to fill the length when necessary. Note that with a top value of 24 here, you can add many more places than the maximum 2.147 billion Value discussed earlier.
  • Use Commas toggles whether commas are placed every three decimal places to the left of the decimal point.
  • Swap Commas/Period switches any placement of commas with periods and vice versa.
  • Unit of Measure denotes the number with whatever symbol represents the unit selected from the list.
  • Unit Placement determines whether the unit's symbol placement is dependent on the Unit of Measure selected (Smart ) or if it's strictly After or Before the number regardless of convention.
  • The Edit Custom Text... button spawns the Edit Text window shown earlier (see Value, above). By using this window with Unit Placement, you can modify your number output with the text or symbols you choose.
  • Insert Space toggles a space between the number and unit symbol.
• Dates parameters affect output when you set Number Type to Dates.
  • Year Offset sets the year from which your subsequent dates will be based. A value of 0 will show your dates as being in the year zero, which may vex fans of the Gregorian calendar system.
    
  • Day Offset adds or subtracts (for negative values) days to the current Value entered for the number. For example, the above values of Value: 120 and Year Offset: 1162 give us May 1, 1162, the official birth date for Ghengis Khan. A Day Offset of -1 changes the date to April 30. Values can only span from -365 to 365.
  • Date Format contains a list of formatting options for the day (DD), month (MM/MMM/MMMM), and year (YYYY) values. Note that MM yields 03, MMM yields MAR, and MMM yields March (unless you have Date All Caps enabled, and then it would be MARCH).
  • Date Separator controls what symbol separates your day, month, and year values. Formats with MMM or MMMM do not adhere to the Date Separator.
  • Date All Caps toggles whether any words in the Date Format selected are all capitalized.
• Time parameters affect output when you set Number Type to Time.
  • Format adjusts the formatting of the time relayed. You also have options for Timecode (HH:MM:SS) and a timestamp with frames (MM:SS:FF).
  • Hours Offset adds or subtracts hours from your starting time. A Value of 0.0000, combined with Time settings all at 0, will yield a time of 00:00:00:00 (assuming you have Show Milliseconds checked).
  • Minutes Offset adds or subtracts minutes from your starting time.
  • Seconds Offset adds or subtracts second from the current Value . So, with all zeroed out values, if we set Seconds Offset to 5, we get 00:00:05. If we then set Value to 10, we get 00:00:15. If we then set Value to 70, we get 00:01:15. Make sense? Apologies for turning this into a math problem.
  • Show Seconds toggles whether seconds are relayed.
  • Show Milliseconds toggles whether milliseconds are relayed.
    
  • Milliseconds Rate controls the speed at which the milliseconds increase.
  • Time Separator controls what symbol is used to separate the hours, minutes, seconds, and milliseconds.
  • Allow Negative Values toggles whether you can display...you know.
• Foreground Opacity adjusts the foreground's transparency between 0 (transparent) and 100 (opaque).
• Background Opacity adjusts the background's transparency between 0 (transparent) and 100 (opaque).
• Blend Mode includes the standard blending controls, which determine how the effect integrates into the rest of your composition.