When starting a new project into faking real world object it really helps to go and get an idea of just how that thing works to know what you’re faking. Like with this upcoming tutorial where I talk about making and EKG screen I spent some time hooked up to one in the hospital just for fun. Actually I faked chest pains to skip the line but that’s another story. I suppose the moral is that before you go to make something in After Effects that exists or has some basis in reality just wiki it up and the process gets easier.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrocardiography