Leap Motion

This technology is very cool.  Supposedly it is 100 time more accurate than “Kinect” for Microsoft's game system, Xbox.  With this new technology, there is a system of cameras, sensors, and inferred light emitting diodes that all interact to make this possible.  Also unlike other existing systems, such as “Kinect,” Leap Motion can track up to ten fingers all at once in a three-dimensional area of about eight cubic feet!  The largest difference between this technology and others, is that this device is placed below that tracking area, whereas many others are placed in front of it, looking straight on.  It is compatible with Apple and PC and just plugs into the computer.  There are also countless applications for the technology including gaming, modeling and numerous others.  The product will me available in the market on May 13th, which makes things all the better!

Chromatte

     After our work in class on green screen I thought that I would do some research on a new technology in the keying world.  The base of the new technology is a new fabric that is made up of thousands of small glass balls, that are coated in aluminum, called Chromatte.  This creates a retro-reflective material that reflects light in the same plane that it receives light.  The second part of the technology is an LED ring that goes around the lens of a camera.  This green or blue light ring hits the fabric with colored light that is then reflected back into the lens, creating green screen effect.   The LED's do not cast colored light onto the subject however because they are not strong enough.  This technology allows for a really clean key with no spill or issues with reflected light and shadows, and the subject can be close to the wall.  Another benefit is that you can light the subject  in any way without needing to worry about getting the background light even and flat.  The fabric is expensive, but it creates a lot of opportunities for creativity that were previously impossible.
 

Film Riot - Helicopter!

Although this effect itself isn’t all that complicated (or at least seemingly not too complicated), I find it to be very impressive.  The way the production team put this piece together is pretty spectacular!  I love the fact that they didn’t only show you what their (final) product was, but also how to do it.  This group, “filmriot” appear to have countless videos for how to add things to your production.  What makes this even nicer is that they show people who are ‘amateur’ film makers, aka low budget productions or the at home movie maker type of person.  On a side note, their intro sequence is phenomenal as well!  I love everything that they have going on.  I feel that they found a very good balance of too much vs too little, making it just right!  I really like this filmriot page!

Dragon Baby

The thing that impressed me the most about this piece is the fact that even though the viewer knows it is fake, it is nearly impossible to catch any flaws in the animation.  This looks soo real and and so well done that its production personal must have an extremely experienced background.  It is one thing to fight on the green screen and then make it look like they are in a miniature environment.  But the fact that they were able to put the child’s head on the actor with such an apparently flawless execution is absolutely stunning.  They were even able to achieve all the head movements and various expressions necessary from the baby with the correct orientation of his head.  The editing that must have gone into this must be remarkable.  I realize that this level of animation mostly likely won’t be able to be achieved from just this class alone, but it would be very interesting to know how they did this.  I am in awe.  

Star Wars Green Screen

Below is a short video on the making of Star Wars: Episode 3 and the amount of green screen that they had to use to obtain some of the effects. At one point in the video they say that there was an effect on every scene in the movie and sometimes dozens. You have to appreciate how much work and effort these professionals put in when you are talking about a feature length film. It takes us hours of fine tuning for very short animations and it is hard to image how much time it takes to complete a film like Star Wars. 

I guess I never thought about it before, but I was impressed that basically the whole lava planet was put in through green screen. This means that Lucas had to have the idea in his head of what he wanted for every shot so that the set could be perfect. This just goes to show that you can never overlook preproduction and you can cut down on production times substantially if you have everything mapped out.