Phantom Video Link

I'm not sure why the embedded video in my last post isn't working, so here's the link. Sorry about that. :/

If anyone knows of any tutorials that talk about making flickering lights in AfterEffects or goes in-depth about the Stroke effect when making titles, let me know. :)

Phantom of the Opera- Titles Project

So I'm currently trying to come up with an outline for how I want to do the Phantom of the Opera opening titles. The movie (the 2004 version) doesn't have full titles, just the title of the movie and a zoom into a picture as they start the film. Here's the actual opening for the movie.

I really like the candle/flickering light theme that have going on, and I'd like to expand that at least for part of my opening titles. I'm using part of the music that's played over the final scrolling credits for the movie, which is about 2:20 in length. Now I'm just trying to figure out what I want to have appear at what time and what names to put in the credits (after I get through the main cast members, director, etc). I'm also a little worried that I face a big learning curve when it comes to making the names show up and making that light flicker. I'm currently trying to look for Video Copilot tutorials that fit what I'm looking for, but I can't find any great ones at the moment. I think I'll be using a lot of Write-On/Stroke effects and playing around with keyframes on the lights.

I'm hoping I can get through the outlining process soon so I can start putting elements together and seeing if this will actually work. We'll see how it goes...

Stock Footage Resources

So I was looking around for sites that had free downloadable stock footage for the final project, and I came across this blog post that compiled a bunch of different sites that have different kinds of stock footage. While a lot of the sites this guy mentions sells their footage, there are a few on there (like Umesh and Stock Footage for Free) that have free downloads. Others send you free downloads occasionally if you register with them, which is pretty cool- so if you think you're going to need to buy stock footage in the future, I would go with one of the sites that sends weekly/monthly free clips to its users.

If you're willing to look through Umesh's blog, I think that could be your best bet (along with Stock Footage for Free and Internet Archives) if you want free stuff. I'm going to keep looking for other stock footage sites because I don't know quite yet what I need. I'm thinking about doing opening titles for Phantom of the Opera (the 2004 version), because they don't really have anything else other than the title appear before they go straight into the film.

Hope some of the links on the post help!