Chris Smith
Forum Replies Created
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hmm. Works fine on my Powerbook. I’ve never visited the Cow from my PC but I assume it works.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
Generally speaking, I think what you learn on almost any app will take you were you want to go. Even Carrera which has probably one of the most unique ways of working. Because the overall concepts are the same, but each 3D app will get you to your goals in their own ways. I LOVE Maya, but for what it’s worth, since I don’t do ILM sized projects needing heavy MEL code, I switched to C4D Studio Bundle and am generally a lot happier. As a generalization, I would put Maya and C4D on par for overall use. Where Maya excels in programability and character tools, C4D makes up in elegant and logical design. I knew Maya “pretty well” after working on it for 3 years, but I learned C4D significalntly faster and am far more productive, creative, and simply quicker using it.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
ctrl-d.
The manuals are downloadable from the Maxon site.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
The Cow should remember that you set your messages to ‘entire thread’ after selecting it only once. Unless you untag them or maybe have your cookies off.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
Also very important a 3D app to compliment AE, I recommend Cinema4D for motion graphics. The Decklink will allow you to setup your output monitor as a second desktop monitor in apps that don’t directly spit out video (like AE). So in C4D, I set the test render window at D1 specs and put it off screen into the Decklink desktop mirror area. So whenever I hit the render button, I see it on a broadcast monitor to know my colors and levels are in the ballpark.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
“Best” is subjective, but I would recommend:
AE 6.5 (Don’t need Echo Fire since AE 5 I think?)
Decklink Xtreme Card (www.decklink.com)
Decent Sony monitor (preferably with an SDI card but if not at least component)
A fast comp (if you don’t mind the OS, building custom PCs are super cheap even maxed out, if OS is important, then latest G5 at higher cost).Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
I would either get AE and the invig plug-in (both work for PC) and just learn how to use the basics of AE and Invig to get by. Or pick up a program like Carrera (eovia.com) that is a few hundred bucks and is pretty easy to do basic things.
If this is too much then I’d take the software budget you have for it and hire someone to bang it out in a couple of hours.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
As far as the tracking, if I understand you correctly, you want a different color for the cap, but you also want it to show video inside it at some point that is also locked to the cap? Well you could render the cap in 2 passes. One pass with just the color cap and another pass with the video mapped to the cap. Then in after effects, just do a dissolve (or whatever transition) to the video render.
If you really want to ‘track’ it as in motion track, assuming your star cap is always in the same perspective, you can make a quick texture (like say a circlular grad) that makes a small white dot on the cap to motion track in AE, but this seems like a sloppy workaround.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
Rough generalizations:
PI good for things like smoke, flames, steam. Good library of particle sprites to do that sort of stuff. Don’t care for it’s other presets that much.
Motion: Use particles basically just for creating a bunch of instances of an object, but Particular does this so much better.
Particular: Pretty hard to mess with. 3D space, incredible features. Nice AE integration.
If it were me, if it was smoke, dust, steam, flames, or pixie dust type things I’d bang it out quickly in PI. I’d use Particular for about everything else. I’d only use Motion’s if I was doing the whole comp in there and it was convenient.
my 02.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com -
Whoops, sorry Jon, I found the thread I was thinking of and it was AE to Maya, not C4D. Someone posted a link where there was a AE plug that generated a Maya file. Sorry, I confused it.
Chris Smith
https://www.sugarfilmproduction.com