[Stephen Pickering]

Hey Mark, thanks for your input!

I like the idea of the “belt-and-suspenders” approach. The project files themselves can sometimes be pretty hefty, but most often are fairly small in size, so cloud is a very easy solution on that front. So in this event, maybe it would be adventurous to have the actual project files in one location or one drive that is automatically synced to the cloud. My fear was that I would get too messy with too many different locations for projects and assets- but if I were in a better routine and more disciplined I imagine it would be easy (and consistent).

Setting up a semi-automated non-cloud backup would be really helpful. Bob Zelin mentioned a few software solutions that sound perfect, but it appears they are Mac only- I’m on a PC. But surely a google search will give me some ideas for this. I’ll look into this.

Thanks for the thoughts about the worst case scenarios. I actually chose RAID1 instead of 5 because I wanted to ability to pull a drive from the enclosure in the event the actual RAID box died (which has happened). It put me a few hours behind, but I was able to transfer the footage pretty quickly to another box and resume the project (then set the RAID drives aside) while awaiting a RAID box replacement. If there was a catastrophic hardware RAID crash (and both mirrored drives were lost) I would then have to grab the backup from off-site. This sounds like the reason you mention having more than one backup (and to keep one on site)?

Unfortunately cloud is not an option for any kind of footage, simply because of limited internet speed.

Remote access has never been a consideration, except to access files or assets when on the road- but never to edit. I wonder if I should consider this…

“If you’re doing incremental back-ups, what’s the maximum loss you’re comfortable with, in terms of how often the backups are made? Can you stand to lose the last hour of edits? The last three? A day’s worth?”

To be honest, a full day would be bad, but would not be detrimental. So even a nightly backup of editing projects would be acceptable, I think.

“Then there’s the “U-Boat” clients: they surface sporadically, without warning, asking for cr@p you did for them two years ago, pronto. How fast should you need to be able to restore/dub files for these guys? Is a day all right?”

Yes, these clients… I don’t mind at all telling these clients that it will be at least a day or two, which is why I think archiving to a few redundant hard drives would be fine. I could then plug the drives in to search for the client (or I could create an excel sheet that tells me what’s on each drive that is archived. But this is also where I would love some advice from you all who have been down this road already. I don’t mind buying some additional RAID boxes and a handful of harddrives that get plugged in once every month to archive. I used to use a bunch of external drives that I backed up to, but then if I ever needed to update one drive for some reason I would have to make sure to update the mirror as well.

So, I have a lot to think over. As I said, I know for sure there is discipline and routine that I need to just get the hang of- and I’m fine with that- I’m just hoping for some guidance so I don’t reinvent the wheel (when I know I’ll get it wrong anyways!). That’s why I’m wondering about how others organize their projects/assets. I also know that there must be a better software/hardware infrastructure that I can employ, and I understand that there will be extra costs. I don’t have money burning holes in my pockets, that’s for sure, but if there’s software that will make my life easier (for syncing or cataloging) I would love to know more. Or if additional RAID boxes are the way to go, I might just need to budget for it to make it happen. But since I don’t REALLY know the right way to do this, I hate spending money on boxes and enterprise drives, if there is a more cost-effective or future-proof/expandable solution I should be investing in.

Thank you again for your input- it’s given me some clues on what to start looking into!

[Stephen Pickering]

“try to uncheck “Import sequences natively” in AME preferences!”

This ^ fixed it for me! Thank you!
-Stephen

[Stephen Pickering]

So, here’s what I ended up going with. I’m still not totally happy with it, but it got the effect close enough… and I learned some new tools that I have to justify using in the future (using Mir and Shine and a few other stock effects).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMRqApf8cuY&feature=youtu.be

Thank you all again for your help with this!

-Stephen

[Stephen Pickering]

I’ve got the same problem here!

[Stephen Pickering]

This works really well. Thank you again. Now that I’ve been playing around with Mir, I’m really intrigued with what it can do. If you happen to have a few moments again and wouldn’t mind showing me how (or directing me to a tutorial that explains) how Mir works with masks, I would love to see how that works. I’m guessing it’s just a combination of “fabric” or liquid effect (I found a few tuts about that) combined with the a “texture” layer.

Your example has helped a ton. I might purchase shine, but might also play around with a glow effect combined with radial blur.

Thank you again!
-Stephen

[Stephen Pickering]

Thanks so much! I’ll look at it right now.

[Stephen Pickering]

Trapcode Mir looks pretty neat, and I imagine I would use it in the future, so I downloaded the trial and would be happy to purchase it. However, I can’t seam to get it to affect a matte of any kind. I found a million tutorials on creating mountains and abstract objects with Mir, but nothing leading me to understand how to contain it within a matte or shape (but I’m guessing my terminology is off too). Since I installed the trial of Mir, I also installed Shine. I’m hoping to just use RG Universe Glow instead of buying shine, but I’m so tired of this project!

So, if anyone gets a moment to give some input, I ready to buy these and get the project done 🙂

Thank you again for your time!

-Stephen

[Stephen Pickering]

Thank you! I’m actually so burned out on this project (it’s a “passion project” for a non-profit that wasn’t supposed to take this much time), that I just might buy some plugins to get this thing done. I’ll check those out.

I tried the turbulence noise on the keyed layer, but I can’t get the edges to distort.

I assume it’s a displacement of sorts, but I also can’t grasp how I could do that. Yours also has the upward flow/movement that I’ve been trying to replicate for a few days now!

Thank you again,

-Stephen

[Stephen Pickering]

Also, when you say to use the keyed layer as a matte, do you mean a Track Matte, or are you just using the term generally (I know some effects have “matte” options that allow us to select layers).

Thanks!

[Stephen Pickering]

Ok… so I spent HOURS last night trying to do that. Literally, I was up until 4 am. We’re using this in a “haunted tour” which we have rehearsals for today.

Each project I learn a new technique, but this one I just can’t grasp. I’m going to play around with it right now. Do you mind telling me which of the techniques you used so that I know what I can achieve with what I have? I do see some rays coming from the highlights. But I don’t own Shine and would prefer not to purchase it just for this, if there’s a way to simulate.

Is the top layer set with a blend mode to allow the turbulence layer below show through?

Is there any chance you would be willing to upload your project file for me to see how you’re doing each of the layers?

You’ve helped me out tremendously already with the suggestions. Thank you!

-Stephen