[Chris Evans]

I figure most people use mice for After Effects and probably most programs. If you’re looking for something different, check out a wacom tablet or something similar. I’ve never used one, but I’ve heard they give you a lot more control and you can basically use them in any situation you’d use a mouse with the same functionality. You’d have to judge the cost effective-ness for yourself and see if you can afford it.

You could also look at a mouse that has multiple dpi settings like a decent gaming mouse. They often have a button you can hold to slow the mouse down to allow for finer control.

Ultimately, I don’t think something other than a mouse and keyboard are going to significantly speed up your workflow enough to really justify (though some would argue about wacom tablets I think). If you need that fine control, just zoom in. And a keyboard gives you all the buttons you need for shortcuts.

[Chris Evans]

Just walk around outside with your phone, hold it above your head (to get the angle a CCTV would likely have) and shoot some clips. Use the bad tv preset Dave mentioned and maybe a warp stabilizer to make the footage completely still.

[Chris Evans]

You could just keyframe the rotation and position. For example, if it takes 1 second for the shield to animate on, go forward one second, set a keyframe for position and rotation (not orientation) then go back to the beginning, drag the shield shape way back in z-space and set the x rotation to something like -10x and adjust that for how fast you want it to go.

Unless I’m misunderstanding you, you don’t need an expression. Though you could use something like time*50 if you wanted it to keep spinning forever.

[Chris Evans]

CC Radial Blur.

[Chris Evans]

I don’t have any idea why your resolution options are grayed out, sorry.

I do, however, have a possible suggestion to improve your workflow through dynamic link. Use Markers. Markers should translate between Premier and AE so you can set a marker at a certain time you need something to happen in AE and then in AE set the action according to that marker. Obviously, you can set multiple marker and even label them, you might even be able to color them, though I’m not sure about color.

Sorry I can’t be of more help, just thought I’d jump in and throw out something that might help.

[Chris Evans]

The comps from spreadsheets plug in works very well for what you need, but someone will have to manually run it. For anything beyond just creating the comps and rendering them, like opening ae or running the plug in, you’ll need an external program. Also, creating the spreadsheet requires some work as well, but that should be able to be done by your team.

[Chris Evans]

Can you post some pictures of what you mean by shadow? Element 3D doesn’t technically have shadows. Do you mean reflections? do you mean lighting?

Pictures really help.

[Chris Evans]

I just watched the video on YouTube at full quality and I could barely see any grain even when I was specifically looking for it, so don’t worry about that too much.

The only way to make your background whiter is to throw more light on it without putting any on your subject. I don’t know what kind of lights you are using, but if they have barn doors, you should be able to put them level with your actor (or even a little in front), out to the side of the shot and point them at the background without getting any on your actor. Since you are only using 2 of your lights now, that should be easy. Move your actor as far forward as you can and still get the shot and that will help spread the lights evenly over the BG. If you can’t get it even, just point the lights at the center and it will give you a natural vignette and nobody will even notice.

I think your video is actually really good. I like the white background and it looks great overall. I am a little distracted by the lights reflecting in his glasses, but that isn’t too much of a problem. Be proud of yourself, this is a quality product.

[Chris Evans]

I believe so.

[Chris Evans]

A full frame sensor (35mm) is actually 36mm by 24mm. The diagonal length is 43.3mm.

If you remove a lens from a camera and place a piece of paper at the focal plane of the lens (where the sensor would be), you will see an image of what the lens is seeing. The image will be a circle because lenses are round and the iris inside the lens is a circle.

For a lens that is designed for full frame cameras, the diameter (distance straight across) the circle produced by the lens at the focal plane will be greater than 43.3mm. That means that the light coming through the lens will cover the entire 35mm sensor when the lens is placed on the camera. For the sake of explanation, the edge of the circle is 1mm away from the corner of the sensor.

The Rokinon 8mm lens would produce a circle at the focal plane that is larger than 30.1mm (the diagonal size of an APS-C sensor. Again, for the sake of explanation, the edge of the circle is 1mm away from the corners of the sensor. If you put that on a full frame camera, the circle only covers most of the lens and the corners of the sensor don’t receive any light (the edge of the circle is inside the corners of the sensor, instead of outside), thus causing the vignetting. (you probably know this, but it’s important that you know all of this up to this point to understand the next part)

The FS100 (I assume that is the one you were talking about) has a super 35 sensor, which is about the same size as an APS-C sensor, so you will get full sensor coverage by lenses designed for APS-C sized sensors (assuming you have an adaptor that allows you to put them on the camera). It is important to note that the reason you can do this is because EF lenses have a longer flange distance than E-mount lenses. The flange distance is the distance between the back of the lens and the focusing plane. An adaptor adds the difference between the two flange distances so that EF lenses will focus on the same plane as the E-mounts do.

The Metabones Speed Booster is two things. First, it is an EF to E-mount adaptor. This means you can put EF lenses on cameras with an E-mount. Secondly, and more importantly, it is effectively a reverse telephoto extender. This means that it takes the circle that EF lenses produce on the focal plane and makes it smaller. Basically, it takes the light and compresses it so that it all fits on a smaller sensor. However, for a full frame lens, it does not compress the circle to a point where the edge of the circle is 1mm away from the corners of the sensor (which would give it the same coverage as a full frame sensor), the edge of the circle would be more like 2 or more mm away from the corners of the sensor.

The Rokinon 8mm produces a circle on the focal plane that is large enough that when it is compressed by the metabones speed booster, it still is larger than the sensor in the FS100.

That is why there is no vignetting on that camera.

Note: I don’t actually know how far away the edge of the circle produced by the lens is from the edge of the corners of a sensor, that was just for illustrative purposes to help you understand better.

Note #2: The edges of a the circle produce by a lens are not hard circles, they are soft. That is why a vignette isn’t a hard line. You could actually be seeing some vignetting on the corners of the image of the FS100, but you may not be noticing it because it’s just the edge of the vignette and doesn’t darken the corners very much.

Now you know.