Joseph W. bourke
Forum Replies Created
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I would maybe try pre-comping the circles into groups of maybe 250 or dividing your total circles into 5 groups – something like that. I don’t know for sure whether it will decrease the overhead, but when you’re testing and tweaking, at least you can turn off some of the pre-comps you’re not working with. Yikes!
Another thought would be, when you’re happy with the movement of one of those groups, render it off, so you’re dealing with a clip, and not a mob!
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com -
Brian –
Another thing to think about is Ebay – although you have to be very careful, and send an Ebay message to the seller promising that if the software is not registerable with Adobe, they will take it back, you can get some amazing deals.
I bought the CS4 Production Premium bundle for a little over 800 dollars several months ago (full retail is 1200 if I remember correctly), and within the past few days I bought the CS5 Master Collection (everything Adobe makes) for 890 dollars (this is a 2400 dollar suite). The seller promised it would register. When I received it, I called Adobe Tech Support and gave them the S/N. They verified that it will register just fine. Be careful…but you can really save on legitimate Adobe software, and Adobe will register it.
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com -
I’m wondering whether you might be able to duplicate the font behind itself, then use one of the keying matte choker tools to fill it in? I tried it with an outline font, and got the background copy to fill in, the next challenge is to get it to cut the matte version with just the outer alpha of the original font – I’m stumped at the moment.
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com -
Yes, Dave, there is a Blu-Ray data disc. I’ve thought of using it for just the purpose I asked about in this thread, however, blu-ray drives seem to be as rare as hens’ teeth with my client base. I have never been asked to deliver on Blu-Ray, so I haven’t bothered to purchase a burner yet. As the price drops, I probably will give it a second thought.
My local problems have just been solved in terms of backup. I just bought a Drobo 2nd generation 4-drive unit with 8TB of storage. That ought to get me through at least a year of projects. I’ve only had it a few days, but it’s ridiculously easy to set up, and brainless to operate.
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com -
Thanks guys –
The thumb drive was the direction I was leaning, because of the moving parts issue. I can get a 36GB thumb drive for about 49 bucks at Best Buy – my secondary plan was the cheapskate in me thinking – why buy 36GB for 49 bucks when I can buy 500GB for the same price? It’s pretty hard to break a thumb drive!
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com -
James –
Here’s a good place to start:
https://help.adobe.com/en_US/AfterEffects/9.0/WSDE67F770-09B6-4f4b-AF9B-9E577311067A.html
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com -
Hi Dalton –
It sure looks to me to have been done in a 3D package, what with the nerve ganglion growing and rotating in 3D space. What you might do if you don’t have 3D is to take some stills of tree roots (or go out and shoot some branches), cut the various branches apart so they still look attached (Photoshop), put the pivot points where the bases of the branches join the main trunk, then size them up over time, and maybe overlay a few of these in 3D space, all well blurred, so nobody can see how it was done. Look up “growing” on VideoCopilot for some specific ideas on this. Good luck!
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com -
So just to finally simplify things before my head explodes, with HD video, PAL or NTSC, the frame sizes are now identical (1280 x 720 or 1920 x 1080). It’s merely the frame rates which are different. So if I drop my NTSC comp into a PAL comp set to 25fps, and turn on advanced frame blending, I should be in pretty good shape?
I just dropped an NTSC and a PAL version into my Dropbox, and the client will have his test files in an hour or so. If worse comes to worse, and there is stutter, I’ll just have to re-output my Max animations at 25fps. Or should I use the standard I’ve been using for years in NTSC with Max, and output 50fps, then conform in AE? This usually gives me smoother movement, and AE knows my 60fps should be 30. Thanks again for the usual quick, useful responses.
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com -
First off – Dave – you’re right – I’m a bit fried at this point and didn’t catch my typo. Thanks to both of you, and yes, the thing I’m most concerned about here is frame stutter in going from 29.97 to 25fps. I watched Rich Harrington’s tutorial on this topic, and that helped. Of course there’s also the issue of square pixels vs. rectangular, so I have to bear that in mind. I really have to get the most accurate spec from the editor in Africa to be sure.
What I’m doing immediately is sending a short test clip to my client for them to try it on their NLE. It’s going to end up going through FCP to a DVD, then being played back on a system on the road in Central Africa – so I want to make sure that what they get is the best possible quality, since it’s going to be strained through a sock into a tin can, so to speak.
Thank you both.
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com -
One last thing before you shoot – when you shoot against black, make sure that you have some white reflective objects around the trophy (on the camera side) so that you’re controlling your reflections, almost like a light tent. Two pieces of foam core on either side of the camera, within your angle of reflection should do the trick. Try different sizes of foam core – you don’t want a reflection of you and the camera, needless to say.
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com