Chris Smith
Forum Replies Created
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If you haven’t bought the books “Creating Motion Graphics” and “After Effects in Production” by Trish and Chris Meyer, you are doing yourself a huge disservice. They will get you way up to speed.
In general:
A matte is any greyscale image that defines the opacity of an image on a pixel by pixel basis.
An Alpha channel is a convenient 4th color channel that is embedded in some file formats and is a fundamental part of the video stream internally in any compositing program that defines the transparency. Basically it can be called the “matte channel”A mask is AE’s name for a shape that can be drawn on screen. That in many cases is used to define alpha channels. Obviously these shapes can be used in different ways. They can be blended, subtracted, intersected, etc.. They are one of a compositors tools to create mattes. Other tools are keyers (like when doing a greenscreen or luma key), paint brushes, or other images that contribute their RGB channels as luminance mattes for other layers (like when using a luma track matte in AE).
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
Very interesting tut. However, I don’t see a reason why echo is involved. It seems like quite a strange work-around. Why not just use the same pasted path as a stroke path or write on path with a wide brush for the reveal. If you want squared ends then make a square mask that follows the tip with the stroke behind it instead of an echo effect.
But what I took away from this is that the answer to the original question is a few layers of drop shadow with hard edges, different color and 100% opacity.
If you look at the Mk12 animation frame-by-frame, you will see the thickness of their drop shadow change everyonce in a while as an animation effect. Which makes me think they animated the drop shadow offset or animated the multiple shadow layers on and off.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
Very interesting tut. However, I don’t see a reason why echo is involved. It seems like quite a strange work-around. Why not just use the same pasted path as a stroke path or write on path with a wide brush for the reveal. If you want squared ends then make a square mask that follows the tip with the stroke behind it instead of an echo effect.
But what I took away from this is that the answer to the original question is a few layers of drop shadow with hard edges, different color and 100% opacity.
If you look at the Mk12 animation frame-by-frame, you will see the thickness of their drop shadow change everyonce in a while as an animation effect. Which makes me think they animated the drop shadow offset or animated the multiple shadow layers on and off.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
lol..yeah, POSITION I mean 🙂
I really should check what I write.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
also see if mokey has a ‘copy to AE keyframes’ option like Commotion does. That way you just click on a potion parameter and selct ‘paste’ and they show up.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
I’d be blown away if they actually animated the camera at all. There would be no need. If you notice, it’s not one giant comp, it’s a bunch of “sections” that pass by the camera and once they aren’t used anymore, I’m sure they are turned off.
This was obviously well planned out, and part of that planning, i believe, is that they different sections and laid them out in 3D space and parented them to a null. Then just animated that null around in front of a static camera. When that section was out of frame is was not in the comp anymore and shut off. It’s like a stylized version of a dad setting up his home camera on a tripod then shuffling his kids in and out of the shot to show the grandparents.
BUT, if there is difficult motion of any sort (especially camera motion), I highly recommend never doing all your motions on just the camera layer. Use layers of nulls to isolate different motions.
For example, say this Brazil piece indeed was the camera moving. I would do it like this:
Layer 1: Null -only animate X and Y position on this null
Layer 2: Null -this is parented to the null above it. This will only be “up and down” motion.
Layer 3: Null -parented to layer 2 – this would be some other motion like maybe cam shake or rotations
Layer 4: Camera – parented to Layer 3. No animation except camera specific parameters like focal length or focusThis way all the motion is isolated and easy to control without conflicting or confusing keyframes.
my 0.2
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
Did you change the settings under your comp window to Open GL?
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
Very simple. Open your tracker controls and do a 2 point track. Use this data on a null layer. Parent your footage to the null layer and it will ride along. You will want to scale up your footage a touch as you will surely see the edges when it takes on the motion.
However, I have had very good luck simply using Motion Sketch recording at 50% speed then jiggling my mouse then using these keyframes on a null (which the clip is parented to). Remember to turn on Motion Blur for the full effect. You would be extremely hard pressed in shots that aren’t too wide of a lens which is a track and which is motion sketch. Obviously wide lens distortion in a very wide shot would give away that it is a 2D move.
For more info on Motion Sketch or the Tracker controls, check your help files or of course your AE manual.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
Well, D1 is standard for Broadcast, especially going to an Avid for output, you will want to stick to the same resolution so yes I would always work in that (unless it’s HD of course).
IMO, ANY work spent in AE that will ever hit a video monitor is worth using SDI or component outs from an uncompressed card like a Decklink. Really Decklinks are so rediculously cheap that there is no excuse anymore not to use them (or others like them). It’s far more than checking color on a monitor, but the quality of your graphics, your edges, etc.. Cheaper compressed cards or bridges like DV will not give you good results for broadcast. They will be OK, but not the real deal.
You can by a Decklink card and a great Sony monitor for the same price as AE itself (used monitor).
As far as 3D, you may not NEED it, but a 3D/2D pipeline can take your work to quite another level.
Both 3D programs (C4D and 3DS) offer demo versions. Download them both and feel them out.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
Well based on the list of Sapphire Plugs:
https://www.genarts.com/picture-index-ae.html
As a general guess, I’d say ‘monochrome’ then ‘soft focus’. However, I would think it would be done with basic color correction to obviously pull the color out, then get the levels the way you want. As far as the soft look, in AE do the ol’ copy the layer, blur the top copy and drop it’s opacity to taste. Also as an alternative, set the top copy to Screen transfer mode instead of Normal.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com