Its that time again where we check out what’s going on with our “sister” site, AEtuts+ and seeing what new tutorials they have posted over on the main tutorial front. If you haven’t checked out AEtuts+ in a while, well you will be happy to know that Plus Content is up and running strong, and that means materials, project files, images, and full tutorials available for download!
Every couple weeks we will showcase the tutorials from the past weeks so you can brush up and hone your After Effects skills to learn some new tricks and broaden your horizons when it comes to our favorite application.
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I am continually trying to pimp out my home office, in any which way I can (when my bank account permits), and there are just so many cool accents and gadgets that you can get nowadays to either bump up productivity, or possibly lessen it, but overall make your working environment a little more enjoyable. In this monthly Awesomeness for the Officeness series I will be showcasing some of the awesome stuff I find throughout the net, and stuff that you guys send me to spread the word to other fellow office nerds to decorate our sanctuaries.
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Our “sister” site, AETuts+ has been hard at work the last month or so with the launch of Plus content to the site, more Plus tutorials, and just more content in general. If you haven’t been to AETuts+ yet, and you work in After Effects… well my friend, what are you waiting for? Get over there and check out the multitude of tutorials and articles loaded with inspiration (a lot by me, actually) to get your brain working.
Every couple weeks we will showcase the tutorials from the past weeks so you can brush up and hone your After Effects skills to learn some new tricks and broaden your horizons when it comes to our favorite application.
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Everyone knows what Particular is, and how to use it in some way. There are virtually billions of different ways to manipulate this insanely robust particle generator, and some people find ways to express its power in ways we would have never thought possible. These people stand out above the rest in their amazing, and sometimes breathtaking pieces of motion graphic artistry.
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There are always free tutorials to fall back on, but for some applications such as Houdini, RealFlow, XSI or Massive, there just isn’t enough free material on the internet to get a thorough understanding of the application you want, or quite possibly need to learn. When all else fails you are going to probably have to pay for some training DVDs to get the education you need. While it is kind of a pain to pay, you always have to remember, it’s a lot better than a few years of college.
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Panasonic recently stepped into the ring with their take on a 1080p DSLR. I have to admit, I’m pretty impressed with the footage I’ve seen come out of this puppy. Shooting 1080p at 24fps, and 720p at 60fps, it provides users with a few options to play with when creating their own video masterpiece.
The one thing I really love about this camera is its price point. It’s in the range that I like to call obtainable by the masses. Of course $1,500 is not a drop in the bucket, by any means. But when compared to some higher end cameras the price of the new Lumix makes the purchase a bit easier to swallow. Including a pretty well-rounded, solid lens to the standard package doesn’t hurt either.
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Finding freelance work is always a difficult task, but with the economy in the crapper work is more scarce than ever these days. I find myself taking anything I can get, whether it be a compositing job or some random slideshow that someone needs for an anniversary celebration (just wrapped that today). Thing is, if you don’t have a steady clientele that comes to you, you need to seek it out for yourself and take some initiative. Some people don’t know where to look, and some are absolute detectives when it comes down to it. Check out some of these resources that I use continually and maybe you can find some quick gigs, and score yourself some cash flow.
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Every indie filmmaker is looking for the cheap alternatives to making their movies better. In an ongoing series of articles, I am going to showcase some of the low to mid level options for new filmmakers looking for gear to add to their arsenal. We are going to be looking at steadicams today exploring the different options from DIY to a couple hundred dollars, depending on how serious you may be. Everyone has a budget, there is most certainly a tool catered to yours.
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There are a lot of compositing applications out there, but one that seems to be taking the lead lately is The Foundry’s Nuke. If you are an After Effects user, you have probably heard The Foundry’s name from the keying plug-in Keylight or their other Tinderbox plug-in packages, but that isn’t the only thing they are famous for. Industrial Light & Magic a couple weeks ago purchased a site license for the popular compositing platform, along with Weta Digital just the other day. Two of the big dogs in to post world have converted, and many small shops are already on the bandwagon, and this could possibly be the next big app to know since Shake. With the news of Nuke gaining so much steam I thought it would be worth a post to let you guys in on where you can learn you some Nuke skills and possibly prep yourself for a career aboard this killer compositing application.
The Foundry’s Official Site
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Plugins can be expensive, especially for students and people who just like to make Youtube videos, but just like if you were to be fixing a car instead of making motion graphics, you need the right tools to get the job done. A little bit ago, Toolfarm had a poll on their website and AEFreemart.com as to what your favorite plugins were for After Effects. Over 1500 voted and the list is out… and I got the explanations for those of you who don’t have a clue what some of these are.
- Trapcode Particular – Trapcode Particular is one of the most widely used plugins in the business. If you haven’t heard of it, get out from underneath that rock you’ve been living under and smell the particles. Particular is the one of the most versatile particle generators on the market, and gives you more control, precision, and options than After Effects’ built in CC Particle effects. Particular has been the subject of many tutorials here on AEtuts as well as around the web, and if you are serious about becoming a skilled motion graphics artist, this is an absolute must have.
- Red Giant Magic Bullet Looks – Developed by Stu Maschwitz of the late post house The Orphanage, and now the Creative Director for Red Giant Software’s Magic Bullet division. This plugin creates pre-graded looks to your shots, as well as gives you the creative freedom to create your own looks, while still giving you all the features of a high-end color grading application. Also available is Magic Bullet LooksPack: Indie Film, which gives you more pre-made looks based on popular looks on on some favorite indie films.
- Trapcode Shine - Shine is another must-have from Trapcode for its ease in creating light ray shines fast and easy. There are ways to create the effects that this plugin generates natively, but it takes a lot of time, workarounds and effects on top of effects. From title design to logo reveal, visual effects to suns in the skies, this plugin can really streamline your productivity, and help you unleash the light! Haha… lame… I know.
- The Foundry Keylight – Keylight is an effect that comes shipped with After Effects 7+, but is probably one of the best keying effects out there. Keylight is very versatile offering lots of different ways to control your keys, mattes, lightwrap, and spill. The best thing about Keylight though is that it is free, and it is a very powerful effect. Toolfarm actaully has Keylight training available from Angie Mistretta.
- Red Giant Knoll Light Factory – Developed by John Knoll of Industrial Light & Magic, Knoll Light Factory is a lens flare and lighting effect generator. There are many different pieces to choose from to build your own custom flares as well such as spikeballs, glowing cores and so on. Also worth noting is this package actually has a free extra little filter called Unmult, which you can find online for free, and basically knocks the black out of your image, leaving only light.
- Trapcode Form – One of Trapcode’s latest creations is quite the effect in itself. Working the same way as Particular, Form actually creates layers of particles, sheets if you will, in which you can animate, affect, distort, set custom particle size, opacity and anything else you might want. Form has been spawning some amazing videos lately found on Motionographer and the Trapcode official site.
- Video Copilot Twitch – Andrew Kramer’s only actual plugin to date, Twitch is an awesome distortion generator, that gives you control on “twitching” light, position, RGB channels, scale, time, and even color. The package actually comes with a bunch of sound effects and training from Andrew himself on how to use the plugin effectively, and ways to use it in your productions.
- GenArts Sapphire – The Sapphire collection is pricy, but is a huge batch of over 200 plugins to increase your films and capability of doing things within After Effects, Shake, Avid, Final Cut, or Combustion. Windows and Mac compatable, this collection of killer visual effects based plugins have been used on movies such as X-Men, commercials for Budweiser, Coke, GMC, and tons more. The package includes effects such as glows, lens flares, glints and glares, film effects, compositing and distortion, and more advanced lightning, and time effects as well. If you are looking to enhance your visual effects workstation, this might be a package you have to get.
- Boris Continuum Complete – The greatest thing in my opinion about BCC is the 3D OpenGL extruded text generators and deformers. You can warp, twist, and materialize your 3D text right inside of After Effects, and that’s not all it comes with. There are generators like sparks and comets, keying and compositing tools such as Motion Key and Wire Remover, as well as basic, yet more advanced than stock AE effects such as Drop Shadow, Film Grain and Deinterlacing. This is another huge collection like Sapphire’s, except a little cheaper. You could always try checking out the other items in the Boris product line as well.
- Trapcode Starglow – Our last one… Trapcode Starglow. Although I don’t use this effect too much, it is really handy when you are trying to make something really stand out in your motion graphics peice, such as water, dust particles in the air or just some good old titling. Starglow works on Mac as well as Windows, as do all of the Trapcode product line, and is a great little tool to have by your side, because you never know when you might need it.
