Various examples of the "Rotation" transform are shown here...this is a great resource for teachers and students.

I've decided to build my own little After Effects Visual Reference Library for when I'm teaching my motion graphics classes and post it here. This is in no way meant to replace the books out on the market when you are teaching...It's more of a visual complement to them.

There are several rotation examples below that you can play.

Some helpful shortcuts when dealing with rotation ( I'm doing these from a PC so the shortcuts might be different in some cases on a Mac...whenever it says CTRL switch that to CMND or Open Apple for the Mac )

R = Rotation
F9 = Easy Ease or look under the menu: Animation / Keyframe Assistant / Easy Ease
Shift F9 = Easy Ease In or look under the menu: Animation / Keyframe Assistant / Easy Ease In
Ctrl Shift F9 = Easy Ease Out or look under the menu: Animation / Keyframe Assistant / Easy Ease Out
W = switches to the rotation tool
J = Previous Keyframe
K = Next Keyframe
Home = Beginning of Timeline
End = End of Timeline

A. X orientation - only available on 3D layers
B. Y orientation - only available on 3D layers
C. Z orientation - only available on 3D layers
D. Convert layer to 3D
E. X rotation - only available on 3D layers
F. Y rotation - only available on 3D layers
G. Z rotation - available on 2D and 3D layers
H. Amount of complete 360 degree rotations. Amount can be = or -
I. Incremental amount of rotation between -360 and +360 degrees

A. Manual layer rotation tool

If you would like to use the After Effects project below you can find it HERE

X rotation can only be accessed if the layer is converted to 3D.

Y rotation can only be accessed if the layer is converted to 3D.

Z rotation can be accessed in both 2D and 3D space.

XYZ rotation can only be accessed if the layer is converted to 3D. All 3 rotations settings can be set to different degrees of rotation. 

The first number in the rotation setting tells the layer to rotate around a complete 360 degree access. The second number setting is for incremental degrees of rotation. Both number settings can be + or - degrees.  

The orientation settings are useful when overiding rotation accesses that have been changed due to the rotation of the layer. 

If you would like to use this After Effects project you can find it HERE