• Adobe After Effects

  growing claws in after effects?

  Posted by Brandon Schultz on January 20, 2011 at 9:41 pm

  I’m doing this as a favor AND I’m AE newby so I hope it’s something that I can follow. But any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

  So here’s the shot: the subject sits relatively still with his hand held up, partially obscuring his face, and the fingernails need to grow long into claws. Like a American Werewolf in London type thing with the subject watching his claws grow. The footage that I have is actually the final shot with the claws but they didn’t shoot any shots of him without the claw extensions. So I’m working backwards. The shot is only 4 seconds long so I could do it frame by frame but that’s a lot of work…

  Any suggestions?

  Thank you much!!

  Michael Szalapski replied 15 years, 7 months ago 3 Members · 2 Replies
• 2 Replies

• 

  Richard Harrington

  January 21, 2011 at 11:28 pm

  I just love posts like this and the ones that link to YouTube clips and ask someone to post step by step tutorials for Hollywood VFX.

  1. go to school
  2. Serve as an apprentice
  3. read books
  4. Go to workshops
  5. Find mentors
  6. Storyboard
  7. Test Shots

  Etc etc.

  Uggh. I dont feel so bad about getting older any more

  Richard M. Harrington, PMP

  Author: From Still to Motion, Video Made on a Mac, Photoshop for Video, Understanding Adobe Photoshop, Final Cut Studio On the Spot and Motion Graphics with Adobe Creative Suite 5 Studio Techniques
• 

  Michael Szalapski

  January 24, 2011 at 3:36 pm

  Have you heard the saying about making chicken salad out of chicken poop? Well, you can’t do it. And they haven’t even given you chicken poop to work with.

  However, you may be able to pull it off depending on the background behind the hands in the shot.
  Basically, you’ll have to clone the background into place like any sort of object removal. (For the tips of the fingers, take a photo of a hand using the same lighting, angle, etc. and try to match the tips of the fingers to the ones in the shot. If it’s moving, you may need to motion track.)

  But…yeah, they’re asking you to do a job without even giving you the basic pieces. No clean plate? No clawless shot? And you a newbie? Sorry, they’re asking a lot from even an experienced person.

  – The Great Szalam
  (The ‘Great’ stands for ‘Not So Great, in fact, Extremely Humble’)

  No trees were harmed in the creation of this message, but several thousand electrons were mildly inconvenienced.

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