James Hooey
Forum Replies Created
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More problems too!!! I have also found out that currently I cannot get AE draft mode to work on the Invigorator layer…when I turn on draft quality the 3D objects dissapear entirely!
If I’m not learning something….I’m bored.
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Ed,
Pivot points still are flaky in the new 5.0.1 update….depending on zoom level and camera viewing position the set pivot points will randomly dissapear and re-appear….again makes setting these points very problematic.
I am having a second issue as well where I am not seeing any objects in Invigorators scene preview box…which makes it impossible to set up the camera unless I stictly use the AE camera and composition window, or jump inside of Invig and set up the camera there and then apply Invigs camera settings with the little camera button in the plugin window.
Lots of teething issues.
https://www.soundprostudios.com
If I’m not learning something….I’m bored.
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Thanks for the reply Edward,
As a user of Invigortor 4.5 I’m familiar with how it was to work with pivot points, thanks for the reminder though.
What I was suggesting though is that there are some glitches with 5.0 that the red pivot point dissapears at certain zoom levels and views making it hard to place.
And it was my hope that the pivot point system would get a revision with the new release giving us a pivot point control tool (not dialog boxes – or a null controller).
It’s a nice update…love the bezier drawing window and nicer layout, feels more functional….just finding some glitches and things I would have loved to see revamped a bit more.
All the best,
James Hooeyhttps://www.soundprostudios.com
If I’m not learning something….I’m bored.
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Just to finish off this thread I wanted to summarize what Edward Wu (Zaxwerks tech support) has suggested after looking at my project file in question. (Great fast response from Edward btw!)
So long story short if you are using comp lights with an Invigorator layer, particularly with the comp lights casting diffuse shadows you can expect really long render times.
Having compared this workflow (AE comp lights/diffuse shadows/invigorator 3D layer) vs (AE comp lights/diffuse shadows/AE 3D layer) I can say that there is a very large difference in how quick the render is. Using all AE 3D layers and lights/shadows is much faster, the flip side is of course that Invigorator can create far more complex 3D objects.
Mabey there’s more to consider here but it does highlight some of the factors involved.
All the best,
James HooeyIf I’m not learning something….I’m bored.
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Forgot to mention I’m using AE 9.0.1.51 from my CS4 Production Suite.
If I’m not learning something….I’m bored.
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I’m deeply grateful for you help!
The second expression is perfect. Adjusted factor to 1.2 and it was great!I also looked up Mark’s Book and ordered through Amazon.ca – I do see your contribution to the book so I hope you get a bit of a royalty from it!!
All the best,
James HooeyIf I’m not learning something….I’m bored.
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That’s incredible!
Thank you so much Dan! It’s almost exactly what I was hoping for. I think I would still like to find a way to tweak it a bit to have a bit faster opacity falloff for layers as they move off axis to the camera….but WOW again thank you so much!
On another note…have you published a book for AE expressions? I have “After Effects Expressions” by Marcus Geduld and I’m a little underwhelmed by it.
All the best,
James HooeyIf I’m not learning something….I’m bored.
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Dave,
Could you explain what you mean by ‘peak rendering efficiency”? Are you relating to the overall speed a render takes or the attainable quality the render can achieve.
I understand HDV format with all it’s deficiencies, just curious as to what you are alluding to in particular?
As for After Effects ‘freaking out’ when working with HDV….here again what sort of issues do you mean?
Considering I work with After Effects 9.0.1 with HDV footage quite regularly I have never had a functional issue with the software. Other issues such as colourspace are certainly a concern and when needed I will use a Cineform intermediate or uncompressed .avi codec.
I only mean to question to see if there are issues that I am unaware of.
Many thanks,
James HooeyIf I’m not learning something….I’m bored.
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LOL, for sure!…but it’s so hard to find actors with 5 inch round eyeballs and get them to fit inside a television 😉
If I’m not learning something….I’m bored.
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Hi Dave,
Really, that is the problem I am having….I do not want to have to paste the masks onto a similar sized, positioned layer.
The solution I have come up with is to copy and paste the mask to a white solid (which is the same size, PAR, rotation ect.) as it’s original layer and then use this as a luma matte over the photograph.
In my particular case it is an extreme version of Andrew Kramers’s demon face warp style effect. Use a texture to add veins and texture to a persons face.
The persons face and hands I masked out by hand (10 seconds long…carpal tunnel set in!!) so I had good tight masks to apply other effects to. I then used a texture photo which I keyframed the movement to match things like the movement and rotation of the hands (I’m trying right now to get Mocha AE to do this…but not having much sucess). Finally by using the original tight masks of the face and hands and duplicating them to a white solid and using that as a luma matte over the texture photo I am able to have moving textures that are perfectly matted to my hands/face.
The shot is far more complicated than Andrew’s orignal demo. The hands move on/off screen – in front of the face – head turns ect. Which is why I masked out everything very tightly for the full 10 seconds of the shot. The end results are working but the keyframing of motion by hand is still not coming out as tight as I would like so I am looking at some tracking ideas…point trackers won’t work…Mocha AE….seems to have issues too with the track. Hand keying may be the only solution.
As for the mask problem….solved that anyway!
Again though…if there is a more elegant solution I would love to hear it!!!
If I’m not learning something….I’m bored.