[Daniel Skrobowski]

Hey Kirk…just a thought…. When I was experimenting with this technique, I found that the array, when an opacity control map with text as the filter track was applied to it, was very dark and was not showing up/conforming to the text correctly. It was because the control map was set to look at the XY Luma of the text track. Change the control map so that it looks at the XY Alpha or XY Alpha Inverse instead, and see what happens.

[Daniel Skrobowski]

Hello Dirk,

Thanks for the great video. It was informative. That is a really cool way to use that effect. I appreciate you taking the time to explain…and the quick reply.

I should have mentioned that I am using Boris RED 5 as my environment. So, I’m not sure if I will be able to use the project file, but I’m sure somebody else will be able to.

I was able to replicate what you did in the video except for directly manipulating the graphs for the control maps. I did not see where I could use that feature in RED.

Thanks again.

[Daniel Skrobowski]

Thanks Peter. That would be great!

[Daniel Skrobowski]

Ok,

Thanks for the tips.

[Daniel Skrobowski]

Here is a solution and method for creating an environment map in RED.

This method is similar to the method used in the After Effects tutorial video that I first posted.

To create an environment map:

1) Add 3D Sphere media.
2) (at default settings) Click the little S next to the Lock/Unlock Track button. The S should change to an M. This allows you to set different media for the inside and outside faces of the sphere, but what we will do is disable the visibility of the outside face.
3) Disable the visibility of the outside face of the sphere by clicking the Toggle Track Visibility option for the outside face of the sphere.
4) Apply an equirectangular environment map image to the inside face of the sphere by clicking the Change Track Media option for the inside face….
5) Enlarge the sphere to fill the composition window using the Scale X parameter in the sphere’s position options.
6) Place the sphere inside of a 2D Composite container by clicking the Add Container button in your timeline tools.
7) You will probably have to decrease the distance parameter inside of the container Camera options.
8) Place media that you want to use in your environment inside of the container, and adjust the media’s position parameters so that it is visible in front of the sphere.
9) Your environment is set up. Use the Tumble, Spin, and Rotation Position options for the conatiner to navigate your environment map. Don’t attempt to change the container type from a 2D Composite to a 3D model container with a position camera. You will not experiance the same results.

[Daniel Skrobowski]

Hey Peter, thanks for the advice. I did look up Boris BLUE again, and it does have the feature that would make this easier. However, I have a hunch that there is a relatively simple way to do what I am trying to do in RED as well.
The effect is achieved two ways in the first video that I posted. One method was to use AE CS6’s built-in environment map feature. The other method was to use Video Copilot’s Element 3D “Environment” feature, which looks very similar to the 3D sphere feature/capability in RED. This is why I am confident that it can be done properly in RED.
Here is another video that I quickly put together to demonstrate what I am trying to do.

3D sphere/environment map

As you can see, this is not my main machine that I use, and my trial version of RED has expired.
This method that I use would almost be perfect except for one glitch. The 3D sphere is set to a 99.99% wrap ammount. This is not desirable because one can see the crack in the sphere when the camera does a 360 degree turn. Setting the wrap ammount this way is the only method that I know of that will let the 3D container’s camera look inside of the sphere. When I set the wrap amount to 100%, with all of the other parameters in the project the same as they were originaly, the camera blacks out when it gets inside the sphere.

Does anybody know how to do this properly or to get the visible crack in the sphere to be invisible?

[Daniel Skrobowski]

Sorry about that…figured it out. I just messed up while translating some After Effects instructions into Boris language.

[Daniel Skrobowski]

Hey Peter,

Again, I appreciate any help that I can get with RED. Unfortunately, the ammount of help, documentation, and tutorials that you can get a hold of for RED is miniscule compared to what you can get for After Effects, but these forums are a good remedy for this situation.

I thought that I would post a summary of what I did for some simple depth compositing in RED for anybody else who might have the same needs…. My goal at this point would be to figure out whether or not the way I did things was the most effective way to do them.

My original goal was to do some depth compositing in Boris RED. I had some main/background footage, some z-depth footage, and some other footage that I wanted to depth composite (some smoke/dust in this case). Since I had the z-pass footage already, I didn’t really need to use the BCC Z-Blur filter. However in order to use the z-depth footage, I had to raise the contrast of the luma information (crush it so that it showed highly contrasted whites and blacks only…), create alpha information for it, and, eventually, set it (the crushed z-depth with new alpha…) as a matte/mask for my dust media. Fortunately, there is a filter that does the first two things for you-BCC Make Alpha Key. This filter will basically crush the image for you, set alpha information for white vs. black, and provide additionally useful capabilities such as feathering your contrasting whites and blacks.
Once the z-depth footage had been edited with the BCC Make Alpha Key filter, I used it as a matte for my dust footage by dragging it (the z-depth…) onto the track mask (the first mask track that you see when you twirl down/expand a main track).

This is what worked for me (in my first test project). I might be a little wrong in my usage of some of the terms. If anyone wants to correct it, feel free.

Thanks again for all of the help. If anyone wants to add anything that they think would be helpful, please do. I would also be interested in knowing if there are more effective ways of doing this…is RED.

Happy compositing,

Dan

[Daniel Skrobowski]

Awesome! Thanks Peter,

I experimented with the Z-Blur filter. It is useful, but it does blur instead of straight mask, even when you have the blur amount set to the max.

I appreciated the help on tracks. I was able to set my z-pass image as a mask/matte for a track. I applied a color choker to the image so that I had contrasting white and black. However when the image is acting as a matte for a track, it doesn’t recognize black as alpha/transparent and white as opaque. How do I fix this.

The reason that I know that the matte was working was because the z-pass image that i was using as a matte already had some alpha channel information/regions on it. Therefore I was able to see my masked media behind the portion of the image that was alpha/transparent.

What I am trying to do is take away the initial alpha channel info and set the highly contrasted white and black as opaque and transparent (respectively).

…any suggestions?

Thanks again,

[Daniel Skrobowski]

Awesome! Thank you for the tips.