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What is Newton?

If you haven’t heard on newton yet, then where have you been? Newton was announced by Motion Boutique a few months ago and the motion graphics industry started getting excited.

Newton is essentially a 2D physics engine for Adobe After Effects users. It means we can have realistic physics in our 2d animations. The plugin does this by making each layer a rigid body, and then once you have a simulation completed, it converts it back into normal After Effects keyframes.

Newton for Adobe After Effects, first tech demo. from motionboutique on Vimeo.

How do you work with Newton?

To begin working with newton you have to first install the plugin. This is really simple though; it’s essentially a case of copying the Newton folder to your AE plugins folder. However, once you’ve opened After Effects it will actually appear as an extra option in the composition menu at the top instead of appearing where plugins usually appear.

Now we can start working with Newton. It’s actually fairly simple to start working with. First of all you have to get your composition imported/set up. It’s probably important here to start deciding what kind of physics animation your looking for as in the next step we’ll start assigning different properties to our different layers.

Once you’ve got your composition fully imported and ready, it’s time to assign Newton to it. To do this all you need to do is go up to the composition menu and click Newton. You’ll then be presented with the Newton settings window.

This is where all the action in Newton happens. There are 4 sections to this, the first is your simulation preview where you’ll see the results of the settings your about to assign to your different layers. The next key section here is bodies. This is where you select your layers and you assign what type of body they will be. For this you have a choice of Static, Kinematic, Dynamic, Dormant, AEmatic and Dead. Each one of these will mean give a layer or “body” differences in the way it affects or is affected by other layers. You also get some options for each layer here on how dense the body is, how much bounce it has and friction amongst some other things.

Once you’ve assigned all your layers the particular body top you would like, you can have a look at the global gravity section and make adjustments here. You can also adjust the solver and how many iterations it has.

Now you’ve assigned and changed all these settings it’s time to run the simulation preview to see how your simulation looks. Click solve and you will see how your simulation in action. If your not happy with how the simulation looks, you can go back and adjust your settings, restart your simulation and see if it looks better. You can keep doing this until your happy with how the simulation looks, and then it’s time to transfer this to your composition.

This is pretty simple too, click apply at the bottom of this window and you’ll get another set of options before you export.

Here you can that you get a couple of options such as the number of frames you want to export, whether you want to apply motion blur to your layers and then finally if you want to create a new composition out of your simulation instead of applying it to the original composition.

Once you’ve done that click OK and it’ll convert the simulation into keyframes in your composition. The basics of Newton are as simple as that.

A word of warning here, if your happy with your simulation, you have the option to save your settings in the Newton configuration window. I would suggest doing this as you each time newton is ran it essentially resets itself, and you don’t want to have to type all your settings in again.

So what can kind of things can Newton do?

I would show you some examples of what Newton can do myself, but i think Motion Boutique has got some great examples themselves, so here are some videos to show you how to work with Newton. The plugin also comes with a number of sample project files so you can see how some of these are done and give you a starting point for your own.

Newton Tutorial: 101 (part1) from motionboutique on Vimeo.

Newton Tutorial: 101 (part2) from motionboutique on Vimeo.

Newton Tutorial: 101 (part3) from motionboutique on Vimeo.

Is it worth buying?

After having a play around with Newton and seeing how easy it is to get going with it and start applying physics to your layers, i would definitely say it’s worth it. The quality of the animation and the extensive settings makes it worth the price tag and if you’re wanting to do alot of this kind of animation without having to resort to expensive applications for physics simulations then this is definitely the plugin in for you. I imagine that the longer the plugin is around the better the physics will get.

This is definitely something i would reccomend.

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When MovieType was first announced, I’ll admit I had mixed reactions. On one hand, a tool like this would allow me to easily and quickly create type animations saving me time to work on other (arguably) more important parts of a project, but presets have long been beat down for being the cause of everything looking the same. Does MovieType manage to break through this stereotype? And is the $79 price tag worth pulling out your credit card? Let’s take a look.

What is MovieType?

Created by the very talented John Dickinson and Brett Morris, MovieType allows the user to, at the very least, drop their MoGraph text or splines into a scene to quickly create a popular look for their text animation. In fact, this plugin allows you to add a whole slew of presets from the text animation to the camera movement to the background in order to create an entire scene. At it’s very best, however, MovieType allows the user a solid base to build their project upon with complete customization through slider menus to further adapt the scene to fit their project. In the end, it saves them a ton of time key framing text, cameras and lights, among many other options.

The number of presets available is surprisingly great. I was expecting a couple of text presets for cascading, exploding, shaking, etc. However, MovieType gives you over 100 text animation, 40 camera, 40 material, 20 lighting, 45 scene and 10 full scene presets to quickly create your project from. This was a lot more than I was expecting, and then I realized they put in an easy to use interface for each of the presets so that you can, for example, easily adjust the text speed, rotation, etc. through the use of sliders, and these are also available for the lights, cameras and other presets as well. To top it off, they included the tools to easily create your own presets as well, and this is where MovieType really shines.

John and Brett didn’t take the easy road when they created MovieType–creating a bunch of presets that allow the users to plug them into their projects and leave it at that. They have gone a step above and allowed the users to adjust these presets in order to make them fit their project, and then they gave them the tools to do it themselves. They encourage users to create their own presets and have even created a special forum on Motionworks where they can share their presets, comments, criticisms and get updates to the plugin. It’s this kind of customer satisfaction that makes MovieType a truly grade A product.

How easy is it to use?

Very easy.

Anybody with any experience in Cinema 4D will be able to pick this up without any problem. Even if you didn’t have any training, through a series of well made video tutorials created by John Dickinson, everything from installation to controls and everything in between and after is explained in easy to follow steps.

Is It Worth It?

Ah! That’s the question, isn’t it?

In any purchase of this nature, the question ultimately comes up. Do the benefits outweigh the $79 price tag?

I must admit, there are presets here that I wouldn’t use or would use infrequently, but these presets are secondary to the main feature, which is the text animations. To elaborate, most of the scene backgrounds I don’t find appealing to the type of work I do. Also, some of the materials don’t appeal to me either. I’d much rather create these myself, but that might be just me. Of course, you are able to quickly and easily edit these setups to suit your needs as well, so that adds an almost infinite amount of possibilities to the setup. Regardless, to somebody who needs a quick setup, it does the job.

Anyone in broadcast production or those in a position where working with text is an everyday or very common occurrence, MovieType is well worth the money. Even to those who only occasionally work with text, I would say purchase this. The text animations alone make it so easy and fast to reach your desired goal without wasting a lot of time and effort.

The main reason you should purchase any plugin is if it can save you any time in your projects and, in the case of MovieType, it definitely can. Even if you use just the core of the plugin–the over 100 text animation presets–you’ll save yourself a ton of time reserved for keyframing scale, rotation and movement. Even if you have to adjust any movement, they have made it easy with a set of sliders. Most of the tedious work has already been done.

The bottom line

MovieType is so much more than a basic preset package. It actually encourages you to play and to learn through the various settings and setups. John Dickinson and Brett Morris have created a great tool to add to your bag that will save you time, but is flexible enough to allow you the freedom to explore and make it your own. With the addition of the forum where users are encouraged to share their setups and where future updates will be released, they have created a product that will stand on its own two feet and grow even larger over time with the MovieType community.

Just as the title suggests, MovieType truly is a dynamic tool for Cinema 4D, and over time it will only continue to become stronger.

MovieType can be downloaded directly from the MotionWorks store.
Requires Maxon Cinema 4.D Release 11.5 or 12
$79 for single license, $279 for the multi-user license

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If you are fresh bait in any video related field–whether you are shooting film with a DSLR for fun, rendering your motion graphics video final out for a client, or making a YouTube video explaining how much you love cats–there is always a giant road block in the way known as encoding. This process is never fully exposed information, and I have personally struggled with mastering it. I’m in not going to get to crazy with this, but I will present to you a beginners guide to encoding.

So, let’s talk about what a codec is and what the hell encoding/transcoding/decoding even is to begin with. Your computer cannot easily play back a hundred thousand jpg’s at 30 frames per second with audio just so you can watch the new season of Say Yes to the Dress. So, some very smart people came up with a way to get the file size down to a manageable size and provide a little capsule they could tuck it all in. These capsules are called “wrappers” and the method of coding and compressing/decompressing the video is called the “codec”. For example, you can have a .MOV file wrapper with an h.264 encoding. The wrapper is important for your end use goal, but often times your codec is just as important.

Here are a couple beginner options for encoding to some useful formats. I know that, natively, After Effects will encode to about everything and all compositions can be sent to Adobe Media Encoder, but often times a quicker route would be to render an uncompressed video from After Effects and pass it through these cheap software choices for your final deliverable.

Quicktime (Windows/Mac): http://www.apple.com/quicktime/extending/

Now we are not talking about the super stripped down Quicktime X (someone explain that mess to me), we are talking the actually useful Quicktime 7 Pro. It comes at a great price point of $29.99 and its extremely easy to pump out “.MOV” files. It does a fantastic job at encoding them. I render out quite a few h.264 files in a “.MOV” wrapper and they always seem to be smaller file size and look cleaner than other options.

Media Encoder (Windows/Mac): http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flash/quickstart/video_encoder.html

If you have Adobe Suite installed on your system, then you have Adobe Media Encoder hiding some where with it. This nifty little tool is expansive and expanding with each new CS update. Harry Frank of GreyMachine offers a great little tutorial on working with it, and its deep integration with Premiere and After Effects (http://www.graymachine.com/2011/03/rendering-ae-projects-with-adobe-media-encoder/)

SUPER (Windows): http://www.erightsoft.com/SUPER.html

SUPER is quite a gem of a program. While looking like your grandmother designed their site and user interface, if she programmed this handy application too, she deserves some serious internet cred. I have often times needed to output some sort of terrible .AVI file and I have found this program to be quite efficient at getting the work done.

So, you have learned a bit, rendered a bit, drank a bit because encoding can be frustrating, and you have your final files ready for the client to review before they ask you to change everything in the next round of revisions. Drink a bit more, and check out these quick tutorials on the best encoding for popular video hosting sites so you can show off your work…

Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/help/compression

Youtube: http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/topic.py?hl=en&topic=16612

Chime in if you guys know anything else, or if missed or messed anything up. After all I am still learning this whole process myself. Thanks!

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If one thing can be said about Adobe Kuler it’s that it has made colors cool again, if they ever were out of style. Forget the old days of using your paper color wheel to find your complimentary, triadic, split complimentary and tetradic colors; with Kuler, you can do it all online, without taking your eyes off your computer and to a greater degree than ever before. While Photoshop, Illustrator and inDesign users had the ability to use Kuler within their programs from the start, After Effects users were left in the dark as to how to implement this great asset within their program of choice. Well, thanks to the hard work of a few people, it’s now possible.

Adobe Kuler, for those who don’t know, gives anyone and everyone a place to easily create color schemes and share them amongst the Kuler community. Your color schemes can easily follow analogous, monochromatic, triadic, complementary, compound or shade relationships, or you can go out on your own and create your own custom color relationships. If you are working with an image, Kuler also lets you upload and match the colors using a few settings: colorful, bright, muted, deep, dark and custom. Yes, it is that easy and brilliant to use.

To make things easier, Adobe has even created a desktop application that you can download for free that allows you to see what the Kuler community is offering by searching for the highest rated, most popular or random color schemes, or by choosing from a list of your favorites. It also allows you to save the color scheme for use easy use in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator and inDesign. It doesn’t allow you to create your own colors (for that, you have to visit the website), but it does allow you to do one important thing–download a color swatch file–and this is one of the most important factors for using Kuler in After Effects.

That said, let’s see the ways we can actually use Kuler within Adobe After Effects.

Cut & Paste Method

This is the simplest idea and forgoes all of the (slightly) confusing steps of copying of swatch files, creating presets, downloading special files and so on (which we’ll see in a minute). It is simply achieved by taking a screen capture of the Adobe Kuler file, importing the image into After Effects and using it on its own layer so you can easily select the color you want with they eyedropper tool. For more information on this, watch Maltaannon’s tutorial which comes up later in this article.

Swatch You Want

After you install this free preset created by Jeff Almasol, Swatch You Want allows you to select a downloaded .ase file and opens it in a small window for you to easily select colors you want. Really basic and really easy to use.

Chameleon

An upgrade from the previous preset, Chameleon is a “pay what you want” script created by Mathias Möhl that allows you to not only use .ase files within After Effects but swatch values as well. In addition, it gives you a few handy options to make linking colors to different layers a bit easier.

Kuler Preset

Jorrit Schulte over at Aetuts+ has another option for you if you want to forgo using these other plugins and just create one yourself. It’s a little bit of setup initially, but the outcome is definitely worth the work for a simple Kuler preset.

The Maltaannon Method

Jerzy Drozda Jr has a great option for all of us After Effects users who don’t want to do any of the above methods. In fact, his method only has you download a simple project file that you can use as the base of your project–just paste in your favorite Adobe Kuler swatch value and it does the rest giving you a layer containing your colors. It really is that simple and easy to use!

Any of these methods will have you easily enjoying Kuler color schemes in your projects; most of them in no time flat. All of them you can use for free, but keep in mind that people put a lot of hard work and effort into these files. Pay them back accordingly if they ask for it, because they are the ones that are allowing you to finally make your After Effects colors a little bit Kuler.

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We all want the latest and greatest equipment, and I know we all dream of owning really expensive equipment–we’d all love a Red One Camera, the latest version of Cinema 4D or the latest iMac or Mac Pro–but with prices going up in general, budgets being squeezed or if your just starting out in the industry and haven’t got a lot of money to spend, why not consider buying second hand or refurbished items. I know we all get excited when Adobe or Apple announce their next product or some great new feature but do you need that feature? Will it speed up your workflow? Will the benefits outweigh the cost?

At the end of the day, the items we use are just tools to help us to create; older equipment still works well the majority of the time, but sometimes it just takes a little longer to do things. Also, just because you have the most expensive equipment or the latest software doesn’t mean that it’s automatically going to make you great. Our industry is as much about craft and skill as it is about having the newest or best equipment.

Let’s take a look at some of the options we have for getting or buying used or refurbished equipment.

Software

When it comes to software, I think we all get excited when we hear new features announced in the latest upgrade, but, as we’ve discussed previously, we don’t always need that latest feature. If we’re on a budget why not consider buying a previous version of the software and saving yourself a few bucks. You can usually pick up the previous version of the software at a significant reduction of the latest version, and, for the most part, this previous version will do the majority of what the newer version does. You just need to ask yourself if you need that latest feature. Good places to find software bargains include:

• eBay
• Amazon
• Toolfarm (This quite often has deals on on various software)

Hardware

The same goes with hardware. Do you really need that brand new Mac that Apple announced last week? Most computers bought in the past few years will be capable of running either the latest software or, at least, a version not too far away from it. As long as you factor in the slower rendering time on these machines you’ll be fine.

Sometimes larger companies (who can afford to upgrade the equipment more often) will sell their older equipment which isn’t even that old–sometimes only a couple of years old–which means you can grab a bargain if you find a place doing that.

Some hardware manufacturers also have refurbished departments or sections on their online store where you can buy refurbished computers or peripherals at a reduction from the new price, and the equipment is pretty much as new. So, next time your going to purchase a new piece of hardware, have a look to see if the manufacturer has a refurbished store.

Some places to look for used or refurbished hardware include:

• eBay
• Craigslist
• Apple Refurbished Store
• DELL Outlet

Equipment

Some of the things we discussed for hardware are very much true for normal equipment too such as cameras, lighting and so on. Instead of buying brand new, try and pick up equipment second hand. As long as it’s been kept in good condition by the previous owner you’ll get a number of years out of your equipment. You can probably get twice as much kit for your money if you buy most of your kit second hand. Even if you buy slightly more inexpensive equipment brand new, this can still give you very professional results. Again, as with hardware, try and look for film or media companies upgrading their equipment, you might be able to get some pretty decent equipment for a small amount.

Good places to find second hand equipment can be:

• Amazon
• eBay
• Craiglist
• Gumtree
• B & H Photo Used Page

Even if you aren’t buying used or refurbished, make sure you check out price comparison sites like Price Grabber and New Egg to make sure you’re getting the best deals, and shop around to make sure you get the best price.

Where do you get your equipment bargains from ? (That is if you want to reveal your trade secrets!)

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When the first generation iPad was announced on January 27th, 2010, I, along with many others around the globe, had visions of the creative field changing for the better. No longer would I be tied to my desk or laptop in order to use my programs; soon, I would have the iPad to bring my programs with me or, at the very least, be a clever assistant to all of the programs I use on a daily basis. The future we have seen in the movies would finally be at our fingertips.

Sadly, months after its release, I was still waiting for a company to make my dreams a reality. The iPad was a solid device with great functionality and the backing of a lot of large and small software companies (and individuals). It was a device that stood on its own perfectly well, but it was still the awkward rookie on a team of professionals. It didn’t know how to play well with its team mates. Even when Apple released Pages and their other line of iWorks software, one of the biggest complaints was that the consumer had to connect the iPad to iTunes and awkwardly transfer files through a tacked on interface. There was always the wi-fi connection, but that just meant you were stuck to a computer again. There was, of course, the 3G network but its not strong or secure enough (or is it?). Nothing really felt right.

As time went on, companies started creating “lighter” versions of their software for the iPad such as Adobe Photoshop Express and iMovie. They were both great products, but they lacked great features that their bigger counterparts had. Photoshop, for example, is really just a basic photo editor. Sure, there were a ton of really cool creative drawing/painting apps such as SketchBook. Coupled with a stylus (if you are no good with your hands) and you have yourself a winner for best drawing/painting app for sure. Then there was the Air Display app that allowed you to use your iPad like a second monitor which was getting closer to what I had envisioned, but not quite there. There were, of course, all the truly helpful productivity apps such as Evernote, Penultimate and Celtx, but these only helped the writing/note-taking side of things. Where were the apps that were going to actually help me use the programs that I use on my computer?

I envisioned turning my iPad in a faux Wacom Cintiq tablet, and why not? You had a beautiful screen that could be used for drawing. They make iPad styluses (styli) if you don’t want to use your fingers. All that would have to be made is an app that would connect to some sort of plugin on the computer that would communicate between the two. I know there’s no pressure sensitivity settings on the iPad and Apple is holding close to some secrets that would allow a work around on this, but isn’t there a hardware solution to pressure sensitivity? I’m no programming or hardware genius, but the creative blood in me yearns for something like this to be true.

What about making a app that would hold all of my tools or effects so that for programs like After Effects or Cinema 4D so that I can easily access them with little trouble when I’m working with that program on my computer. Or give me extra controls that usually are only accessible when you buy another controller. Well, it seems the future is finally inching closer, over one year later, and it cooler than you think.

WACOM BAMBOO STYLUS

Back around the middle of April, Wacom announced they were working on the Bamboo Stylus for the iPad and immediately my ears perked. I associate Wacom with their extremely popular line of tablets, and if they are announcing a stylus, apps can’t be that far off that will allow me to use the iPad like an actual Wacom tablet!

Well, my dreams are sort of in limbo right now. Though I haven’t used it, I know the stylus looks very professional. The tip seems small as that of the PenGo, but it looks like the real strength of this stylus is in the size, weight and balance of the pen. I don’t know if it has any kind of hardware based pressure sensitivity, but I can always hope.

Another thing Wacom began working on around this time were Bamboo Apps. Sadly, these apps weren’t meant for the iPad, rather for use with your Wacom Tablet on your computer (PC or Mac). Although there are a few creatively charged apps mixed in with the games and other apps, they failed to deliver that experience to your iPad.

Hopefully, in the coming months, they will release information that they were really just getting their feet wet in the iPad department and soon they are releasing Cintiq for iPad. One can dream.

ADOBE NAV

Adobe announced three apps for the iPad around the middle of April, and each one offers an interesting experience. One of the most exciting and exceptional Adobe iPad apps is Adobe Nav. John Nack wrote this about the apps in his article Brief Thoughts on the Photoshop CS5 Touchscreen Apps which really gets me excited for the future of Adobe’s apps (my thoughts are highlighted).

• Please remember that these efforts are just part of a bigger picture that has yet to be revealed. I’ve seen comments along the lines of “Nice, but I want Lightroom for tablets”; “Why are you doing these apps instead of making improvement X to Photoshop?”; “I’d like to see more support for Android”; etc. The feedback is welcome, and none of these things are mutually exclusive.
• “Nav is one of the most exciting of our three new applications IF you think beyond Nav itself,” writes Photoshop PM Bryan O’Neil Hughes. “We’re showcasing one of the most powerful pieces of the new Photoshop SDK – the ability to drive Photoshop from a device.” See the rest of his comment for more perspective.

Indeed, Adobe Nav is one of the most exciting apps they are releasing because this little app allows you to connect to Photoshop CS5 on your computer and use all your favorite tools, rearrange them, view and open documents on your computer and more. Now this, is what I’m talking about! If we can get a few more apps like this for After Effects, Premiere and the rest of the Creative Suite, we’ll be on our way to greatness.

Watch Adobe Nav in Action

Read more about this app on the Adobe Nav website.

vWave-Lite

vWave-Lite is an interesting app that’s been out for some time now, but has gotten mixed reviews. The app allows you to control the Primary In, Secondaries and Primary Out in Apple Color from the luxury of your iPad. Some people love it as they feel it’s a step in the right direction; others dislike it because it loses the tactile feedback of a control surface. However, this was also said about the iPhone when it first came out with its virtual keyboard, and look where it is now. Besides, the app is free so it’s worth checking out if you already own an iPad!

Gradiest Cineform First Light

Coming soon is this prototype for Cineform First Light called Gradiest. It works in a similar fashion to the previous app except it adds some functionality with individual controls for exposure, tint, contrast, etc. plus some cool multi-touch control as well.

NukeControl

Another prototype, NukeControl is an iPad app coming soon for, what else, Nuke. This app contains individual color and saturation controls as well as a master saturation control, timeline slider and multi-touch controls.

On One DSLR Camera Remote

Now this is a cool idea. The On One DSLR Camera Remote allows you to control your DSLR camera (view supported cameras here) from you iPad in both camera and video mode (when applicable). You can adjust the focus, shutter speed, aperture, ISO, white balance, and more all while away from your camera with your iPad. You can, of course, also shoot, review and save/send a low-res copy of your photo as well.

REDmote iPad Controller

Red cameras are becoming more and more popular these days (James Cameron just ordered 50 for his next movie), it comes as no surprise that Red is working on an iPad camcorder controller. The big surprise here is the amazing amount of functionality that they have included in their app. You can control tint, shadow, color grading, curves, compression ratio, exposure and so much more. Watch the video and be amazed.

Air Pad + Ingenuity

If all of these apps are too much for you or your camera/camcorder are not supported, you always have the option of using the AirDisplay app and the software from your computer to operate your equipment. Though this is technically just a workaround, it still gives you most of the functionality of your camera or camcorder.

There You Have It

The future is now. These apps are hopefully just a stepping stone to bigger and brighter things (and I think they are), but only time will tell what developers come up with for your iPad and you.

Did I miss a really cool app? Did you try one of these apps and have an opinion on it? Let me know in the comments below!

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In the wake of the now defunct Adobe Shortcut App, people have been looking for shortcuts for their favorite products with little to no success. There’s always the option of looking through the online help files for the shortcuts, but this clutters up the screen and isn’t quite as sophisticated as people may have liked. Well, the search is over, for iPhone/iPod users anyway, with Keybox.

Keybox is an iPhone/iPod app that can be downloaded from the Apple AppStore for a measly $.99 that puts all the keyboard commands for your favorite software at your fingertips. Right now, they only have apps for Maxon Cinema 4D and Adobe After Effects, but they say this is just the start.

The apps contain all the keyboard shortcuts for the latest versions of your software and list them for you in a variety of ways: alphabetically, categorically, search and by exploring commands through the virtual keyboard.

The virtual keyboard is a delight if you want to see what a key or a combination of key commands does. The apps itself guides you as to which commands are available once you make a selection. For example, if you were to select the “S” key, it would gray out the rest of the keys except the “Alt” and “Cmd” keys (on the Mac side). Once you make another selection, “Cmd”, for example, it will open up some keys, such as the “Shift” key in this instance.

Of course, if you don’t know what key commands to hit, you can always look through the list of commands in alphabetical order. Every command is listed here, and you can fast scroll through the commands using the alphabet on the right side of the screen making it very easy to find the command you need.

If you are working with a certain tool–pain tool, masks, motion trackers, etc.–you can view the commands in the category view which sorts the commands into categories based on the tool that uses them. This makes it very easy to find only the commands you need without the extra clutter.

Keybox is available right now for both After Effects and Cinema 4D for $.99 and contain the commands for both the PC and Mac. The next time you are searching for commands, give Keybox a try and follow them on Twitter for news on future apps, quick tips and more.

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As I’m sure some of you might know, when diving into the world of camera tracking and matching, it could be quite an intense experience. Depending on the type of shot and how much character and object movement you’ve got in the shot, it can quickly get from a simple few click solution to an all day event simply to mask out objects you don’t want to add to the camera solution. There are a number of solutions out there that range from cheap to downright crazy expensive. Today, I’m going to take just a couple of minutes and talk about the cheap side of the world.

You may have heard of this wonderful little UK company called The Pixel Farm. They have created a number of different applications, but the one I would like to point out and address is their “cheap” camera tracking app called PFHoe-Pro ($99-$199). When I first heard about PFHoe it was also introduced to me as a “cheap solution”. Right away I was a little weary about it because of that classification, but, after test driving it, I realized that for once that word only applied to what you wanted it to apply to: money. The app itself doesn’t have a ton of power or features to mess around with. Instead it does a few things, but it does those few things well.

The app itself is so simple to use. When you first open it you might be somewhat underwhelmed by its appearance and the lack of eight million buttons and options to press and customize. There in lies the beauty of this application. Simply load in your shot, add pre-made mask if you’ve got character or object movement, track the features, estimate the scene orientation, solve for the camera, and export. Done. Simple. The UI is set up in such a way that you’ll literally click the buttons from left to right as the progress goes on. It really does take the guess work out of getting a solid track from your footage. Of course, there is more to it than that if your shot calls for a little more love and care, but if your shot is something simple, the steps I just laid out are perfect. There are of course shots that are just “too complex” for PFHoe to handle and figure out. For that The Pixel Farm as another app call PFTrack. It’s basically PFHoe’s older more jacked up brother.

So if you need a (financially) cheap application with some power to get you a solid camera track go take PFHoe for a test drive. Along side their applications they’ve got a great community of users and developers to answer questions, and contests every now and then with great prizes. I kinda feel like this whole thing was in some way a plug…. Totally not the case! I’m actually doing a project now with a lot of steady cam and jib shots so this is something that hits close to home for me. Let me know if you’ve got any questions, I’m more than happy to talk it out with you guys and girls.

Be good.
Timmy.

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There comes a time in every motionographers life when you reach the limit of what After Effects can do or want a faster, easier way of doing a certain thing within AE whether it is playing with particles or applying certain looks to your projects. This is where plug-ins and presets come in.

Yes, much like everything else, Adobe has thought of everything. From the graph editor to expressions to scripts, After Effects gives you multiple ways to improve your projects and your workflow, and two of the best, and simplest, ways of doing this is by using plug-ins and presets.

Plugins

What Are Plug-ins

Plug-ins are software that extend the usability of After Effects by adding additional functionality to After Effects. These plug-ins can vary from an effect similar to what’s currently in AE but with improved functionality or an effect that’s not currently in After Effects at all to a plug-in that adds support for file extensions that AE doesn’t natively support. One popular example of a plug-in is Particular, created by Red Giant Software, which works much like the native particle system in After Effects, but gives you many more options and much more freedom and control over the way the particles emit and move in 3d space.

Create a Plug-in

So, what happens when you can’t find a plug-in that you need or you have an idea for a plug-in that isn’t currently on the market? Well, one road you could go down is creating your own plug-in. That’s right, even you can create a plug-in for After Effects. It isn’t an easy road to go down, and I’m not going to tackle it here, but I want you to know that the path is there if you want to take it. The best place to begin learning is directly from the After Effects Development Center.

Presets

What Are Presets?

Presets are simply saved effects, settings and/or keyframes that can be loaded onto any project. Do you have a specific look you nailed in one project that you want to apply to another project? Save that look as a preset and then you are able to load it into any project you create from that point on. Do you not know what you want to do with your project. Well, there are already a bunch of presets already loaded into After Effects under the Animation > Apply Animation Preset… menu

Creating Presets

Adobe has a great video over at their website detailing how to save and load presets, how to use Brainstorm, how to view presets in Adobe Bridge and much more.

Where To Get Them

There are many places to get these plug-ins and presets all across the web, and they vary in price from being free or “pay what you want” to the upwards of a couple of hundred dollars. However, before you renounce the people and companies charging for these small pieces of software, remember that a lot of time, effort and though went into creating these. Also, the more expensive plug-ins tend to be the better plug-ins. By this, I mean they usually have the widest feature set, the most timely updates and the most stable releases.

Adobe has a great list of plug-in developers on their website for both the current 64-bit version (CS5) and the older 32-bit versions. Definitely check out this list to find plug-ins of all different kinds.

Plug-in Developers | Plug-ins | Presets

Red Giant Software is one of the leading companies in creating plug-ins for After Effects (among other platforms). Their Trapcode plug-ins are considered by many in the industry must-haves for any motion graphics designer. Not only that, but they have jumped into creating presets that utilize their plug-ins to their fullest. To top it off, they have set up a community centered around their products and presets, to be exact, at RedGiantPeople.com.

Plug-ins | Presets

Video Copilot has a few plug-ins and presets they have created. One in particular you may have heard of is highly touted as great and powerful plug-ins to have in your arsenal. So much, in fact, that it made a much noticed cameo in the last Star Trek film. No, not Leonard Nimoy, I’m talking about their Optical Flares plug-in. Check them out along with all their other products.

Plug-ins | Presets

RE: Vision Effect is a company that is creating some truly interesting plug-ins for After Effects. One of those, ReelSmart Motion Blur, is one that our very own contributing writer, Timmy Allen, highly touts as a must have for any motinographer.

Plug-ins

AEScripts.com is another great resource for individual plug-ins and is one of my recent picks for After Effects Scripts. They have a short but nice list of plug-ins that you should check out when in search of building blocks for your plug-in library.

Plug-ins

Toolfarm is a website that contains a wide list of plug-ins, much like Adobe’s website, but they have a storefront where you are able to actually purchase these plug-ins, much of the time at a lower cost. Absolutely check out this website when you are searching for a good plug-in, or even after you found a plug-in you want. You could be saving yourself some money.

Plug-ins | Presets

That should be enough plug-ins and presets to keep you busy for a while. Have I missed your favorite spot to get some of these goodies? Leave me a comment below.

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If you are one of the many people who have been eagerly awaiting the addition of Mental Ray for Cinema 4D, your wait is finally over! Just announced this Wednesday, Cinema 4D users will finally have all the capabilities of Mental Ray in C4D through the addition of a plug-in from at2 called, aptly enough, M4D.

What Is M4D?

The M4D plug-in actually contains two separate render engines: Mental Ray and IRay.

Mental Ray “combines physically correct light simulation with full programmability that allows for the creation of any imaginable visual effect.” Not only that, but you get MetaSL shader language, MIA Materials, motion blur and depth of field, optical illumination and shadow effects with Final Gathering, and more. All the realistic shading and light effects you come to expect from Mental Ray.

IRay is “the world’s first interactive and physically correct, photorealistic rendering solution.” This means, as you move your camera and adjust the attributes of your objects, IRay will update to show you a fully rendered, real-time preview of your scene. A very handy tool to have.

If you’ve never used Mental Ray or IRay with other 3D programs, mainly Autodesk products such as 3DS Max and Maya, they are very detailed render engines that give you more realistic light and shading effects that, honestly, haven’t been matched elsewhere. It’s this reason exactly that Mental Ray has been used in Hollywood feature films including Hulk, The Matrix Reloaded & Revolutions, Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, The Day After Tomorrow and Poseidon.

M4D is currently available for Cinema 4D R11 and R12 on both on PC an Mac 32Bit and 64Bit. You can purchase it from the at2 website.

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The process of colour grading is something that is used in almost every piece of professional video.  Colour grading can take the form of simple colour correction such as correcting white balance, or can be used to give a particular look, e.g., making a scene look warm or cold.

Whilst it is mostly associated with recorded video, it is also something that’s important in motion graphics too.  First we’ll take a look at exactly what colour grading is then we’ll look at some of tools you can use to grade your videos.

What is colour grading ?

Wikipedia defines colour grading as

“Color grading is the process of altering and enhancing the color of a motion picture or television image, either electronically, photo-chemically or digitally”.

These days almost all colour grading is done digitally using various systems or applications.  Colour grading can consist of one or all of the following: changing brightness; changing contrast; adjusting white point; adding or removing red, green and blue; or applying filters.

What can i use colour grading for?

Colour grading in it’s most basic form is usually used to either correct shots, i.e., white balance or to match one shot with the next one, but can also be used to give a piece a look, or, for example, to make the sky more blue or someones skin look more flesh coloured.

So how does this relate to motion graphics?  Well imagine the scene, you’ve rendered out something from your 3D package, it’s took 9 hours to render, and now the client has decided he wants that blue to be stronger and more vibrant. Do you go back to to your 3D package adjust that blue and wait another 9 hours for it to render? No! Because the client wants it ASAP, with colour grading you can adjust the blue in a fraction of the time that it would take to render out.  That’s just one example, but there are many more scenarios were colour grading can be your friend.

What software do i need for colour grading?

Most video editing software and motion graphics software contains some form of tolls to allow for colour correction and grading.  I’ll run through some of the most common ones.

Final Cut Pro

Final cut pro contains some good colour correction tools; not the most extensive or the best sometimes, but it’ll certainly do the job alot of the time!

Color

If your serious about colour correction and intend to do alot of it, Color is part of Final Cut Studio and is very good at colour grading providing lots of tools for correcting problems or giving a scene a look. Integrates very well with it’s Final Cut Studio brother ‘Final Cut Pro’

After Effects

After Effects is another program that has some great inbuilt colour grading tools, there are also a number of plug-ins available to extend it’s capabilities such as Red Giant’s Colourista II, this plug-in is also available for Final Cut too.

Premiere Pro

Premiere pro has a similar toolset for colour grading to Final Cut, not the best but certainly more than capable for most jobs.

Avid

Avid is another video editing programme that can be used to colour grade, with a very robust set of tools.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this introduction to colour grading and let me know in the comments if you want to know more.

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Hello, everyone!

Consider this article a personal gift from me to you. In this article I will be giving you both the gift of time and money. And for those of you who are already privy to this little bit of informational goodness I’m about to share, than feel free to help me welcome those who didn’t into our delightful little club.

I was speaking with a good friend and fellow motionographer the other day about a piece I had recently finished. He had told me how great the motion blur came out on the piece and that he assumed it was a bear to render and guessed it was a 6 hour render. With that assumption he was also assuming I was rendering the 3D footage with motion blur. Which I did not! For those of us who deal with 3D we all know that we can render out footage with motion blur built into the project, but this is a process that will consist of multiple passes and calculations resulting in crazy out of hand render times (at least in my experiences).

So, here is where I share a bit of information that I thought was common knowledge, but apparently is not. And again, this is something that will save you tons of time and money if you haven’t been using it.

Side note; I feel like I should be wearing a goofy mask and prancing around on stage with a propsicle (real term for an attractive female magician’s assistant.) for this reveal. I guess Fuel Your Motionography will just have to do. But I digress.

An After Effects plug-in that was brought to my attention a while ago is called “ReelSmart Motion Blur” by RE: Vision Effects. This is a truly invaluable plug-in that I believe everyone who does any type of 3D motion work should purchase! The best part about it is that it is so simple to use, and it hardly adds any render time to your AE render.

Here is how it works. Simply bring your plain footage into After Effect and add the footage to a comp. Select the layer, and add RSMB to it. The end! In the Effects Control pane there are a few things you can tweak and adjust, but honestly, simply putting the plug-in on the footage will give you a near perfect result just about every time. When I think about how much time I spent watching the same frame render 15 times over to calculate motion blur out of C4D I could cry. This is the best solution to that problem that I’ve found anywhere. So, for a meager $89.95 you could be saving yourself hours of render time, and thus putting some extra cash into your pocket.

I hope that was helpful, and please feel free to ask any questions you’ve got about the plug-in. I swear by this little piece of heaven and will sing its praises for all time.

Be good.
Timmy.

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Hot off the presses, Maxon announced today they are immediately unleashing Release 12 of their highly successful and popular 3d modeling and rendering software, Cinema 4d.

Today’s release marks a significant milestone in the development of MAXON‘s professional 3D software and is a testament to more than two decades of programming excellence,” remarked Harald Schneider, CEO and co-founder of MAXON Computer. “Our development team made every effort to bring customer requested features that are easy to use, stable and powerful. Creative professionals from all industries will find unparalleled solutions to help them meet the challenges of today’s fast-paced production environments and create award-winning content.

There are a ton of new features in this release including a powerful new dynamics system, enhanced lighting, added render queue, new character tools and deformers, linear workflow and much more. Read the official Maxon announcement to find out more, then check out Nick Campell’s blog, Greyscalegorilla.com, to see a bunch of these features in action.

Maxon Cinema 4D can be ordered directly from the Maxon Store.

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This application is no longer being developed. Please check out the Keybox app for your iPhone/iPod, or use the Adobe Online Help files.

We all know that shortcuts save you time when working on a project (they are called shortcuts for a reason, after all), but keeping multiple key combinations in your head for all the software you use can be a daunting task. Let me introduce you to the Adobe Shortcut App.

It’s been around since August of 2009, but this little beauty is still worth mentioning. It contains all the shortcuts you will need to know for the entire Adobe Creative Suite from After Effects to SoundBooth, even Acrobat. All the shortcuts are updated to the latest release (CS5), and it contains shortcuts for both the PC and Mac versions. If you feel the need, there are links to download the PDF versions so you can take them with you where ever you go. Save yourself the headaches and download this app. It’s free, saves you time searching the help menus or Google and couldn’t be easier!

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Making its debut at NAB 2010, Imagineer Systems is announcing the release of version 2.0 of mocha, their flagship planar tracking and roto station, on April 12th. Although I wasn’t lucky enough to be at NAB, I was lucky enough to get a hands on test of this reengineered system, and I can tell you, with all honesty, that I am very impressed.

Since its initial release in 2007, mocha quickly earned a reputation in Hollywood and the VFX industry as a must-have solution for complex and difficult tracking and roto shots with over 20,000 registered users worldwide, and v2 builds upon that system with a slew of new enhancements including 64-bit support, a streamlined user interface, improved liscensing activation and support for Nuke 6.0, Nuke X and Apple Motion.

What’s New in mocha v2

• 64 bit Architecture: Re-engineered for 64-bit operating system support

• Improved User Interface: New icons and streamlined interface make mocha even easier to learn and master

• Improved Licensing Activation: mocha users can now easily activate and deactivate licenses for use on multiple systems

• Stabilize and Smooth Module: Smooth jittery camera footage or lock down shots for effects plates

• OpenGL Acceleration: Hardware rendering of mattes with motion blur

• Nuke 6.0 & Nuke X support: Copy and paste RotoPaint and CornerPin nodes from mocha directly into Nuke

• Apple Motion support

The streamlined mocha v2 user interface

I can tell you that with the new 64-bit integration that software moves along at blazing speed. I tested it out with various footage shot in different conditions–low light, camera shake, motion blur, etc.–and not only did it track and stabilize each shot with ease, but it was extremely accurate and required a lot less input from me even when the object i was tracking went off screen. This software is as intelligent as it ever was, and now that they have streamlined the interface, it is even easier to navigate which frees up a lot more of my time to worry about other things. Time is money, after all. As in the original, exporting to your preferred file format is a breeze, and paired with one of the Mocha Shape plugins you can export it directly into After Effects or Final Cut. It doesn’t get much easier than this.

In fact, it’s this ease of use that has garnered the attention of many major vfx studios in Hollywood. In-Three, the company behind the 2D to 3D conversion of the Lionsgate and Universal logos and the G-Force and Space Command movies, went straight to mocha when working on the conversion of their latest project, Alice in Wonderland. Mocha’s advanced roto and tracking capabilities enabled them to tackle even the most difficult 3D conversion they came across with ease.

John-Paul Smith, chief 
executive officer of Imagineer Systems:

mocha v2 is the culmination of tremendous effort from our development 
team and was completed in lock step with our customers and beta 
users. As mocha has grown significantly in popularity over the past 
year, it’s given us a unique and valuable opportunity to hear from a 
wider swath of users and learn what’s most important to them. That’s 
exactly what went into mocha v2. We’re also pleased with the 
support we’ve received from our valued partners at Adobe Systems. In 
working closely together, we’ve been able to re-engineer mocha for 
After Effects as a 64-bit solution, just in time for the release of 
Adobe CS5. That’s another big win for users.

Probably one of the biggest wins every user has is the price. If you are attending NAB 201o you can take advantage of a special promotion available to attendees that will knock the price of mocha v2 down to $399 to current customers of any Imagineer Systems product. For the rest of us, a nodelocked license for Mocha v2 will be priced at a mere $499 for existing users who are upgrading, and $1095 for a new nodelocked license. It’s available for Mac OS X, Windows and Linux operating systems.

Delivering feature film quality results at this low of a price is a welcome gift to anybody in the industry, and Imagineer Systems keeps on giving with mocha v2.