[Max Jackson]

The new item option sizes the comp, that’s good to know. I thought there should be something similar to the “New Comp” button in AE.

The thing is that the fitted window/comp is still squished inward from side to side after directly importing and placing on “New Item”.

What’s also odd is that I have to import folder. It doesn’t give me the option to select the files individually. Could there be a reason for that? I’d think I should be able to just select files individually as well.

Thanks Chris! 😀

[Max Jackson]

That’s awesome! I’ll let me crew know for posterity.

Thanks Mark!

[Max Jackson]

Hi Joe,

Yeah, that’s the thing. My shoot comprises of one small set in ambitious schedule. I just don’t think I have enough time really to make fog happen.

I have real “spotlights” coming through the window. That will have to do for this one before it’s in the can I’m afraid.

Thanks for the suggestion though! 🙂

[Max Jackson]

Yeah, as I gather doing fog in the box is really just not the same as on set.

I was thinking about doing a green screen shot of just the fog, and then composite it.

This shot is really challenging. I’m also guessing that adding fog would help create a lot of noise in the image as well, right?

It’d be great to have at least just a little fog as the set has a street light pouring through a basement window. Having a touch of thickness would be great. However, I don’t want to blow the entire shoot because of it, you know?

[Max Jackson]

That would be a lot easier. My actress’s second set of arms is actually a man. He has the same skin type and is really small. He really wanted the job, and I know him as an actor so…How can you turn down an dude who’ll shave and manicure himself for a job?

I should be able to post some picture a week or so from now. After shooting this thing I’m going to have to take a hiatus for a about a week.

Thanks everybody for all your help, it’s been a definite aid in getting this video project in the right direction.

Best,
-maX

[Max Jackson]

Most definitely, it might be a while though. 😀 I’ve got a lot of work to do in the can.

My meeting with the FX guy was worth it’s weight in platinum. Saved my butt on a number of points. The three that stick out most in the final dolly-in roto shot that I’m doing are:

1) Take BG photos of EVERYTHING that involves compositing/keying.

2) Go green all the way. Don’t partially greenscreen somethings and think you’ll match them. Go all GS with the element(s) in question, or all material. Don’t put one greenscreened object in the set (for my application) it won’t work.

3) Don’t shoot the floor! If the floor is in the shot and you’re looking to combine foreground and background elements it’s a dead giveaway to floating perspective. Your back wall will look fake unless you’re using a motion control rig to sync the background with the camera.

There’s a number of other things he mentioned as well, but it mostly pertains to my situation and is a bit too esoteric to make sense on a forum.

I was on the fence as to whether I was going to do a 1-person 2-pass approach or a 2-person 1-pass approach, and after a lot of thought I’m going to do the old school theatrical version where a 2nd person’s arms in a GS suit come through the jacket. The jacket is going to need clasped shut at the beginning so we don’t see the person come through. That and the whole motion of the subject turning to the camera and the arms coming out have to be in 2 stages not one. Otherwise, we’ll see the greensuit interfere with the back part of the jacket upon entry.

Really, really, REALLY tedious stuff, but I’m feeling somewhat better about this shoot. I’m still leaning more though just in case. The details in this shot are like army ants.

[Max Jackson]

That’s largely what I’m doing. I just purchased a full body green suit. My plan was to cut off it’s arms and do two passes.

1st pass: no green, just tracking markers as guides that I can paint later and she opens her arms above. The jacket is rigged with fishing line. Her left leg to the table (hopefully a pulley system) the right side manually opened.

2nd pass: same subject in full green suit, GS background full set tracking markers. she open up her arms below. That’s how we plan on isolating the arm elements.

3rd pass:

I really like your idea of a second set of arms coming out of her dress and doing one full pass. The keying out the person behind.

No doubt this shoot is not going to look polished and Hollywood. If it comes out like a CGI version of Evil Dead 2 or something I’ll be feeling like I got something accomplished. But I’ve got to give this shot as much consideration and focus as possible.

My camera guys says there’s no sense in dollying the second shot of the arms and that the tracking will largely depend on the primary image and what we’re attaching it to.

I’m also speaking with a senior SFX guy today to ask him what more or how I should approach this on set w/o a motion rig for the camera.

I’ll definitely add your perspective to my consultation with him.

Thanks Mark!

[Max Jackson]

We’re doing some trial test before-hand but we’re borrowing the dolly so I’m only going to have it the day before. We’re going to do as much testing that evening before-hand, but it doesn’t give us that much time for the next day. It will give us an amount of perspective in approach. I’m want to ramp pass after pass into this thing more and more like a stunt or something.

Also, we are going to do still takes as well as dolly. That’s really our only CYA scenario. Do that and then just scale up if at all possible.

We’re going to have art dept pull open the jacket. Even if it looks a bit contrived, it’s better than having the arms fighting the jacket on the way open. The jacket will have to lead the arms even if “magically” doing so like ladybug wings.

There’s a number of things I’m trying to prepare for. Tracking the 2nd set is a huge deal otherwise the revealing arms will look like they’re floating. At some point I might have to track the roto’d elements frame by frame. It’s rather Max Fleischer but I got myself into this mess. I am going to do everything at 15 fps though as the normal speed, so hopefully that will cut down on editing time.

For tracking, I’m going to have to marker track the actress on the takes with the 2nd set and use that take as the index, key out the arms and composite it with the master 1st arms (main) shot. Then do a ton of roto, shading, and grading to combine them.

I’m probably going to want a layer or node above the arms as well as below for depth.

All I have is Mocha in After Effects for any kind of faux 3D tracking. I’m not sure if I can afford renting Nuke though having something like that would be really nice.

Another concern I have is making sure there’s a sense of depth between the arms and the jacket body, dolly or not.

Thanks Walter,
-m

[Max Jackson]

CAMERA MOTION – That’s a great question about shot matching. The dolly track is on decline. Some form of heavy weight and release so the gravity and ramp up easing is the same every time would be awesome. Right now I’m still trying to figure out whatever I can to make every shot as uniform as possible.

PRECISION – I know, I’m nervous believe me. But the shoot’s become backed into this scenario unless I have some major script change last minute. I’ve done storyboards and gone over and over the shot in my head. In all the challenge of the roto is the arms coming out from underneath the jacket. The rest is a basic dolly shot. The challenge is re-pasting/rotoscoping the arms from underneath. Aside from very accurate tracking a few things have to happen.

1) The second set of arms have to be isolated, most preferably with a green screen. Then re-mapped, re-located, and re-sized in conjugation with the rig.
2) The jacket of the previous shot has to open
3) The arms can’t overlap

1 and 2 are the most difficult mostly because they need to happen at the same time.

[Max Jackson]

Yeah my cameraman got back to me about RED. He told me not to even get him started on how much hassle they are (not to mention $$$). He said that and both RED and DSLR cameras skew like mad when panning. I told him they’re all pretty much still shots, but anyway…Trying different options.

I saw the tutorial by Andrew Kramer taking a raw image into AE and pulling more value out of a bright sky. Fascinating stuff.

Thanks Jim!