Lyric Videos

Hey Everyone, now that we covered working with Audio in AE,  I thought I would share this tutorial about creating lyric videos. I personally love working with music and making music videos and I found this to be very helpful, maybe you all will too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldsXqaGB7Ac

Live Visuals and Color.

I've recently been experimenting on syncing sounds and music with objects and shapes in After Effects. While I was looking on Vimeo for my daily inspiration I ran across these Live Tour Visuals and decided to share it with you all! I think the color choices and the silhouettes of people are amazing. I was wondering if these images were just sketched and then recorded into After Effects or Photoshop or just transferred in as .png files or something similar. What do you think?
 

                     

Nervo Style 1 / Live Tour Visuals from FutureDeluxe on Vimeo.

Marvel Sony Spiderman Deal

In the realm of CGI and animation lies a genre a movies that has gained a lot of popularity over the past decade, superhero movies. That being said, if one company had to be given credit for said rise in popularity it would have to be Marvel. Since creating the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2008 with Iron Man, Marvel has built an extremely successful franchise filled with individual movies for each character as well as The Avengers, where they all team up. However, not all Marvel movies were able to be part of this universe. The X-Men, Fantastic Four, and Spider-man movies, were all owned by different companies making it impossible for them to be a part of the MCU...or so we thought.

This past week, Marvel Studios and Sony struck a deal regarding Spider-man. According to the deal, a new Spider-man will first appear in a MCU movie and then Sony will release the next installment of the series. Unfortunately for Andrew Garfield this does mean another reboot of the Spider-man series. However, for everyone else, this is really exciting.

Cake Zoetrope

This video is a great example of how you can do pretty much anything that you can imagine, no matter how pointless. This is a zoetrope of a spinning chocolate cake and a strobe light. The strobe light flickers at a speed exactly equal to the speed at which the cake spins one unit. This creates the illusion of an animated scene where chocolate penguins jump out of alligators mouths. When the lights turn on, the magic is gone because the flickering light is not in sync with the spinning cake and the illusion is over. What this video shows is that you don't need a computer to create animation, just a very creative mind, and also a friend who has a passion for chocolate art. I can only imagine what this animation looks like in person because I know that the poor quality of the camera, and the fact that its shutter speed is slightly off from the frequency of the strobe light, is taking away from the experience. Still, the video is very cool.

Juno Title Sequence

The 2007 film, Juno, directed by Jason Reitman and starring Ellen Page, has an extremely memorable and fitting title sequence. The first scene of the film flows seamlessly into the credits, which are printed, hand-drawn, xeroxed, cut, and colored images. Over 900 of them. It focuses on the main character, Juno, as she walks through her neighborhood.

Designer Gareth Smith of Shadowplay Studio said it took "nearly supernatural patience."

Smith worked with Reitman to create an idea for the opening credits. "The music, the tone and originality of the screenplay, and the uniqueness of Juno's character, led us down the path toward creating a low-fi, hand-animated title sequence," Smith said.

Smith and his wife, Jenny Lee, flew up to Vancouver where they were shooting the film to shoot thousands of photos of Ellen walking with a high-speed camera from a number of angles.

The cut-outs of Juno were created from the photographs. They printed out every frame, outlined Juno, and photocopied the prints to degrade the quality. Then they cut out the frames with scissors and colored them in by hand.

Read the whole interview and the in depth process they did here.

WALL-E

It feels just like yesterday when I went to see WALL-E in theaters. The favorited animated movie originally came out in 2008, as a production by Pixar Animation Studios. Even though the film was released six years ago, it's message still holds true: we must take care of the Earth if we want to live there in the future. The story follows a robot named, WALL-E who's sole purpose is to scour the Earth and clean up the remaining waste.

The existence of humans is referenced for a brief amount of time, but the main focus is on the journey of robots within a new universe stemming from environmental unconsciousness. Ironically, it seems as though humans have gravitated to a seemingly "robotic" and repetitive lifestyle: lack of exercise, processed foods, and constant media consumption. While on the other hand, robots have been tasked with the daunting goal of cleansing the world while humanity lives in a starship planet. What makes this animated film standout from all of the rest, is that the robots are designed to model physical human traits (eyes, hands, feet, etc.) and display emotions, rather than words to express themselves. As the movie progresses, it becomes evident that the robots understand the full meaning of free will.

It would behoove us to take a page out of WALL-E's book and do our part to preserve our home: the planet Earth.

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

I watched this film a year ago and was blown away by the animations and special effects. Now getting a slight insight on creating animations and special effects like this, I am really impressed with this film. Not only is it a strong and funny story that appeals to the gamer in all of us but it's simply fun to watch. In reality, this film doesn't entirely even have to have a great storyline because it's so entertaining to the eye. They have a lot of over the top animations in the film that maintain it's game-like feel.

I can't even imagine the amount of green screen, tracking, and hours of sitting on a computer that went into this film. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed this film and would recommend it to anyone looking for something fun and easy to watch. Also Michael Cera is great in this and really fits the roll perfectly.

Machinima

Last week I mentioned the production company RoosterTeeth, a company responsible for a number of popular web series over the last several years. One of their most popular and well known series, Red vs. Blue, makes use of a technique known as machinima. Machinima refers to the use of real-time graphic engines to create cinematic productions. Most often, the engines used come from video games, effectively connecting machinima to video gaming culture. Many people consider this kind of production as animation because the creators are essentially using computer graphics. What makes machinima different from more traditional animation is that the animators are controlling each character and acting out the necessary movements in real-time. To get an idea of what that might look like, check this episode of Red vs. Blue that RoosterTeeth made using the game Halo: Reach.  

The Halo series is very popular among machinima makers, given their numerous multiplayer maps and the Forge Mode, a game mode that allows players to create their own structures within maps. Other popular video games for machinima include World of Warcraft, The Sims, as well as Half Life 2 with its numerous third party generated mods. Machinma is a cool way for video game fans to make exciting ideas and bring their fan fiction to life.

Attack On Titan

Attack on Titian is a is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Hajime Isayama. It was created back in 2009 in Japan and shortly after its realize became very popular. It even became popular enough in western culture that they decided to dub over the audio so that subtitles were no longer necessary.

 What is Manga? Manga is a style of Japanese comic books and graphic novels, typically aimed at adults as well as children. These are commonly turned into television series now days.

This particular story is aimed at older audiences because it is extremely graphic and also deep. The story contains many characters with very complex pasts. The show also likes to keep the audience in the dark to keep the story suspenseful. 

The premise of the show is that humanity has been pushed to the brink of extinction and the only place they are safe is within the walls of a huge castle divided into 3 sections. The antagonists are huge humanoid creatures that are very hard to kill. 

I personally find the show to be a little to graphic at points. It is extremely violent and oftentimes as soon as you become attached to a character they get killed off. The story is written extremely well and the animation is beautiful. I often don't like watching these shows because the action is too slow for me but this show has a very fast pace and great fight scenes. 

I would recommend that people looking for an in-depth story give Attack on Titan a chance even if "you don't like anime".  

It surprised me. 

True Detective Title Sequence

Buzz about True Detective season 2 is starting to pick up, so I thought it would be appropriate to comment on the opening title sequence from season 1.  Lasting roughly a minute and a half, this title sequence is easily one of the most symbolic and beautiful openings to any television show I have ever seen.  It does a tremendous job of incorporating different elements of the show, including incredible shots of the setting in Louisiana, as well as foreshadowing the main characters as broken and cynical people.  The design is truly a work of art that incorporates this hazy and transparent like feel that really adds a nice touch.  As far as the music goes, I think it complements the artistic design wonderfully and adds a nice depth to the overall feel.

Check out the intro below:

HBO's True Detective - Main Title Sequence from Patrick Clair on Vimeo.

Lego Movie Directors bitter as Fathers walking through toy-rooms

One could say the directors of the Lego Movie wish the Board of directors at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences would step on as much lego as it took to create the movie for the slap in the face they gave the movie for not nominating it.  The Lego Movie, directed by Chris Miller and Phil Lord, was not nominated for best animated film for this year's oscars, but did however win the BAFTA award for best animated feature.

(Directors of Lego Movie holding their awards)

Usually the British Academy Film and Television Arts awards are spot on in picking the films that later win American Oscars, but this year was not the case.     For their acceptance speech, Miller and Lord parted with "You guys win the award for best Academy.  This is the end of the awards road for us, so we can say whatever we want.  There's no one left to impress," effectively making a stab at the Oscars.  I support the directors in their views because their movie was better than any animated films Disney produced that oscar season; there was no reason why it should not have been nominated.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

As you all all ready know the newest installment of the critically acclaimed Star Wars series is set to release at the end of this year. A couple of months ago, a very short preview for the film was released and gave the world a glimpse of the kinds of animations that were going to be used throughout the film. Here is the teaser to get you all excited for the movie, and the rest of this post.

Now the most obvious use of animation is with the newest lightsaber form. This shows something about a lightsaber that has never been seen before, a hand guard. Also unlike most lightsabers, the actual light being emitted is not solid and more unstable. The animators must have had to make the edges of the saber rougher to create the effect of being more unstable than a regular lightsaber. Another instance of animation used in this teaser is the entire star ship chase towards the ends. This must have been incredibly difficult because of the sheer volume of the shoot. With the camera movements and the vehicles moving through space a lot needs to be taken into account. Starting with the lasers being shot from the enemies, to the backgrounds, and finally to simply having the spacecrafts fly by and look as good as they did. The animations used in the original Star Wars trilogy were extremely cutting edge for the time they were produced, and Episode 7 appears to be continuing to hold the graphics to a very high standard.

TAPE Production and Postproduction Reel

In the midst of my daily adventure to find inspiration via the internet and the physical world around me. I came across a video today that was filled with motion graphics and animation that could do easily (being that we already discussed this in class.) The TAPE production and postproduction reel visually illustrates the use of particles, color correction, expressions, and green screens (or green people). Either way the video is pretty short but is enough to ignite your imagination with tons and tons of ideas.

TAPE | Production & Postproduction Reel from TAPE on Vimeo.

Creating Star Trek Credits

Hey everyone, so last class Arturo brought up Andrew Kramer, and he's a name that everyone getting into Motion Graphics should know. He works with Video Copilot, a website that builds plugins and creates tutorials. Here is a video on Andrew Kramer's Vimeo channel of him going through the process (abridged) of creating the credits for Star Trek Into Darkness. He talks about using some of the things we've been doing in class using randomize and particle creators, and also talks about using the plugins Video Copilot creates. Here is a link to the video, and below a link to video copilot.

https://vimeo.com/74184382

video copilot:
http://www.videocopilot.net/

Fan Created Superhero Media

I'm a big fan of the superhero genre. I watch all the films, I read the comics, and I binge all the superhero TV shows. As I often peruse comic book websites, a big thing that they feature is fan created videos. Most of these are videos are mashups of various movies, cut to look like two characters exist in the same universe and, usually, fight each other. Although they're never spectacularly well-made, they can certainly be entertaining.

Every once in a while, there some really brilliant videos that play on the superhero genre and have some really decent animation and visual effects. The effects are cool and are fairly easy to do, I've found upon looking up various how-to videos. These videos just go to show how the market is drastically expanding, and how anyone can be a content creator. Here's my favorite one: It's Batman vs. Darth Vader.

VFX in The Wolf of Wall Street: More Than You Think

This video shows how much CGI was really used in The Wolf of Wall Street, and what it was used for. It is amazing how much CGI they used in the film and it is amazing how well it was done. People only notice bad CGI; the greatest work is never appreciated because people believe it to be reality. The film used CGI to mainly enhance the backgrounds and manipulate the sets they filmed on. I was very surprised to see how everything was changed, I'm glad I came across this video. Everyone should take the time to watch this, you will be surprised. It really shows how powerful and effective CGI can be to compliment a scene, other than to make huge exploding action sequences.


The Wolf of Wall Street VFX Highlights from Brainstorm Digital on Vimeo.

Leika Art From Coraline Released

Leika is the production company behind Oscar Nomination Box Trolls as well as Paranorman and Coraline. The company has recently decided to put some of the art behind their films up for auction. While this doesn't necessarily mean as much for Box Trolls and ParaNorman, since their art has long been released to the public in the form of artbook companions, Coraline's concept art is shown for the first time.

Some of it is really interesting and beautiful, and because of the nature of Leika's stop-motion animation style, the art encompasses not only handdrawn and painted illustrations, but also puppets and animation maquettes.

The auction is only live for about four more days, and while the prices are rising quickly out of the typical college students' range, they're definitely worth looking at.

Animating a Still Photograph

Have you ever seen a show or documentary where there is a still image that has been animated to look 3D? That is called the parallax effect, and can be done using Photoshop and After Effects. It is surprisingly simple as well. Using the skills we have already learned in class we could easily create the effect by following this tutorial I found on YouTube. By singling out individual subjects in the photo, making them each their own layer, and putting them into 3D space in After Effects, a beautiful looking 3D animation can be created.

Floor Projectors

After Katy Perry's performance, the Sochi and Beijing opening ceremonies it was clear to me that floor projectors have become a high end and impressive part of live performances. We can change stadium floors to oceans, cliffs, or lava all in a matter of seconds. It is bringing animating and special digital effects to the brim of interacting with reality. They did an impressive job with all of the mapping at the halftime show but the only downfall is that they are hard to film.

How ever, I was fortunate enough to experience these mapping projectors at the opening ceremonies in Sochi. The projector and Katy Perry flying around literally as a firework reminded me a lot of the opening ceremonies. seeing it all first hand was really breathtaking. When the floor turned to water, you started to feel a little sea sick and it really sucked you into this virtual reality. And stories transitioned so much smoother and could tell so much more depth. In a matter of seconds a scene in the middle of an ocean would turn into a dance hall and then space. This combination of creating 2D images interacting with them in a 3D world is incredible fascinating to me and I can't wait to see how it is expanded upon in the future.

Sports Graphics

Seeing as last Sunday was the Superbowl, I figured this week would be an appropriate time to talk about motion graphics in terms of sports. With lower thirds, wipes, bugs, and boards, sports is consistently paving the way with innovative motion graphics and animation.

As part of my internship last summer, I worked on broadcasts of the Cape Cod Baseball League for Fox College Sports. Before the first game, one of my responsibilities was to export the alpha transitions they would use to go to replay for our switcher in our truck. However what I found the most interesting about the graphics was how they did the score bug. There are many different ways to do score bugs. Here at Ithaca College on our football and basketball broadcasts for Bombers Live, we use a channel of our Chyron, a two channel character generator. However, this is not really ideal since it then takes away a channel that could be used for other things like lower thirds. At my internship, Fox actually sent us their own proprietary system called a FoxBox. This was a computer with software that would let you type in the score and the would output a key and fill channel to the switcher. The machine is also smart enough to know that three strikes make an out and other rules of the game. But what I think was probably the coolest thing about it was the fact that it had a serial data input that would read data from a radar gun and output the speed of the pitches. Fox isn't the only network with systems like these. Most others have similar things. Daktronics, the major company who manufacturers scoreboards also has equipment that allow you to take a feed from the scoreboard and use that in your broadcast.