Cheap Macs! Really ?!

If you are in the market for a new Mac but on a limited budget, here's a solution. We all know how expensive Apple machines are, but now there's a way to get really cheap brand new Macs with fracture of the price. All you have to do is check this website. I must admit I did not order anything from them yet, but it's nice to know it's there. click here to visit the website

Cheers.

Image source: http://store.psystar.com

How to do Basic Motion in Flash?

http://www.flashperfection.com/tutorials/Adobe-flash-cs4-basics-Motion-Editor-05697.html

How to write Blood-Stained Graffiti in After Effects? Alex Costaris-102156184

http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorial/graffiti_writing/ 

Bullet Time Effect

Friends, this is a great video for Matrix fans and other movies that use the Bullet Time effect. Enjoy watching this one and learn how it's done.

how to do a cloning effect

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVykGpr-SZw (here is the link form where i got this)


1. plan out your two shots...make sure the main image/character isn't overlapping each other (shoot the two shots in the same lightning too!)

2. now you have two different takes...drag your first clip into the video track

3. add another video track and drag the second clip into the second track superimposing it onto the first track

4. double click the second clip so it is in the viewer window

5. click the motion tab

6. use the crop button to crop your image (using the left or right tabs it depends what you want to cut off)

this will make more sense if you watch the video...lol

Applying Slow Motion & Fast Motion Effects in Final Cut

1. Go to the timeline.
2. Select the clip of your choice and click on it.
3. Go to the Modify menu and go down to Speed.
4. Choose a speed below 100 to get slow-motion or
5. Choose a speed above 100 to get fast-motion.

Hey Guys,

Here's a link to Heather Steven's blog.

http://filmaholicextraordinaire.blogspot.com

I recommend checking it out, she's got some great stuff!

Spliting a timeline clip in FCP

For those who want to make fast edits on a clip without:

1- Clicking on the Razor Blade tool
2- Pressing the "B" key on the keyboard
3- Aligning the blade line with the head player line (which is not fast at all)
4- Clicking on the exact location of the two lines combined.

You can achieve all that by just pressing a combo of two keys on your KBO

CONTROL + V

This will make an instant and accurate split in your clip.This is very useful and fast if you use your laptop or your keyboard for editing most of the times. I found out about it today and thought I'd share it with you all.

Here's also a link to a comprehensive list of FCP keyboard shortcuts I also found online. Click here

Happy Editing.

Sound in Final Cut Pro

Hey guys!

These are such great blog posts!

Since you are going to start getting in sound, I thought I would blog about it, specifically in Final Cut Pro.

Now remember, Final cut is primarily for video editing, therefore the sound filters available are not optimal for perfecting your sound-- for that you need a sound specific program.

But FCP might be able to do the trick assuming you don't have haneous sound issues.

FCP should be able to fix the following sound issues:

* A low frequency rumble ( the subway, general traffic etc)

* hissing

* It just might help with to much background noise, although that is a big "might"

*Electronic ground hum (most of this type of sound is generated from AC ground loops)

* mechanical hum (camera motor, camera mounted mics)

* buzzes from wireless mics

* humming or buzzing from bad cable connectors

* Uneven dialogue levels (However a sound overdrives the signal output, your out of luck! you cannot fix distortion)

* muffled or harsh narration

How to fix an excessive hiss

1. Apply the 3 band equalizer filter. This filter allows you to adjust portions of the audio spectrum separately. Through trial and error, (as is the FCP mantra) you should be able to eliminate the hiss.

Dialogue or music is to dynamic

1. Apply the compression filter. Dynamic range is the area between the softest sound to the loudest sound.

2. Set your keyframes at the most

 dynamic points of the sound and change the threshold depending on the sound.

3. You might also have to play around with the ratio to achieve a smooth sound

4. Click on the "preserve" checkbox to keep the overall volume levels similar to the original unaffected clip. (This may not be necessary)

I think I will start a "Watchmen" countdown. I am usually not one for superhero movies, but this one seems far more advanced intellectually than others. 

1: More day till the Watchmen comes out. 

(Sorry it wasn't a more epic countdown I googled the release date after I dramatically professed my desire for a countdown)

Plus I like the costuming.

Pencil (The free animation tool)

For anyone interested in animation and enhancing their skills in drawing cartoon characters they can use this amazing free software. This software works very well with Mac. It will let you export your work to MOV files whereas this function is not yet supported for PC. Here's the link so you can check it out yourselves.

http://www.pencil-animation.org/

Hey Y'all.

I am publishing while you all work so diligently behind me.

A friend of mine, who is a fellow graduate student has asked if I could do an animation for her thesis film project.

I thought I'd share how I am doing it, although I do warn for all you animation savants, it's pretty archaic and takes elements of the theatre to accomplish certain elements ans movements. (i.e. making waves in an ocean)

1. Using a tablet I draw all my scenes in photoshop. Draw all objects that will be mobile in the animation on a separate page with a transparent background. 

2. Open up Adobe After Effects, click on file and open a new project.

3. Import all the photoshop files and drag them onto the project folder.

4. Next to the "source name" is a little triangle that looks like a backwards play button. Click on that for your drop down menu.

5. Click on the arrow next to where it says transform for your transforming options.

6. Depending on how you want to transform your image be it changing the position, scale,   etc., click on the little icon next to it that looks like an alarm clock. That will automatically set your first keyframe.

7. Move the playhead to where you want the next movement or transformation to begin and adjust the movement accordingly on your viewer, This will automatically set another keyframe.

8. The action that occurs in between is your first animation.

Magic Realism

"For every action there is a reaction", this is one of Newton's three laws of physics but imagine if every action has multiple reactions. If these reactions in turn proliferate and produce different outcomes, the possibilities would be endless and mind boggling, just like choosing numbers for your lotto ticket where millions of combinations may or may not lead to the jackpot. This video titled "Spin" or "God is a DJ" on YouTube, could be a simple explanation of that artistic/philosophical idea of Magic Realism where the line between what is real and what might have happened in different time or place is always blurred.

Simple 3D text in Photoshop

So I figured it's about time I add some sort of tutorial to this. For those of you who don't know who this is, it's Andrzej. I apologize for the nickname used, but I've had this account active for a while, and thought it's easier to keep it than make a new one just for this.

Anyway, I have a tutorial that'll give you a simple 3D text effect in Photoshop, and with techniques that'll save you time so that you don't have to do certain things manually. 'Cause if it's one thing everyone hates, it's doing things manually.

(Note: You can click on any of the pictures to get a bigger example.)

1. The first thing you do is to create a new image in Photoshop. It doesn't matter if the background is white or transparent or whatever. But for ease of looking, I've gone with white.



2. Write in your text. I decided to use the sample text of '3D text' but with an exclamation mark, because of my affinity for the various faux-3D sketches from SCTV. I've bolded it because thicker fonts work best, and I stuck with Times New Roman for its simplicity. You can experiment with other fonts, and see what works. But I'm warning you now, some fonts will look like absolute crap.

I've also moved the text off-centre: to the bottom-left, so I can add the 3D part to the bottom-left, but you can do it in any perspective.

3. Select the Move tool and the text layer



Now, in the words of Mona (Homer's mom) Simpson: here comes the tricky part. If you don't do the next steps right, you'll screw it up and have to start all over again. And you don't want that to happen, now, do you? If you don't feel like paying attention, you can skip what I'm about to say and just duplicate every layer by hand, but again, I assume you don't want to do this manually.

You have to go in the opposite direction in which you want your shadow to go. If I want it to go to the bottom-left, I have to make sure that the new layers go to the top-right.

4. Press alt+up and then hit right. Repeat this about 5 or 6 times, until you get the desired thickness of the text. The alt+up part creates a new layer from the layer you have selected, but nudged one pixel up, and hitting it right has nudged the new layer to the right, so you have the diagonal effect. Since the new layer is selected, pressing alt+up again duplicates the duplicate, so you don't have to duplicate the initial layer and double-move it.

Now, I've created five duplicate layers (not including the original duplicate). Unfortunately for me, this looks like a bit of a mess, so I have to tweak it.

Since the newest layer on top is selected, I'll go with that, since that is now the front of the 3D text. You can select a different colour, or a different pre-set style. I went with a preset style, since I'm lazy and don't want to do anything from scratch, yet still get a nicer look than just a simple colour.

I went with this one







It gives us a bit of a drop shadow, but that's fine for this. Just make sure it's not one that alters the size of the layer on top, so that the 3D part is somehow smaller than the rest.

And that's it! You have your own new 3D text image, that's ready to be dragged into a new Photoshop project that you're working on. Just remember to merge all the layers (minus the background), so that you don't end up bringing over just one flat layer.

And you can experiment by customizing the look of the text on top, and by even applying the style of text to the beginning, before you duplicate the layer

The Changeling

It is so good that you guys are blogging, there are so many fantastic effects so far, I cannot wait to try some of them up myself.

Just to break things up a bit I thought I would comment on a recent film I had watched: The Changeling.

As you can tell I did not chose to go with a still from the actual Clint Eastwood film, instead I went with the first image that came up when I did a google image search. Although this still has nothing to do with the movie, I thought it was much more striking than Ms. Jolie. (no not really--sarcasm just doesn't translate so well digitally).

Anyways, it was a pretty good film I must say. However, I say this as someone who normally would not pick this out myself to watch. (This was a product of family movie night).I say it as a feminist who often gets fired up when reminded of the past (It was a true story), and not as someone who's usual film tastes were appeased.

It was shot pretty safely and statically, it had good pacing and keeps you engaged, so I would recommend watching it for entertainment, 1920's fashion, and to acquire knowledge on this moment in history but not for inspiration as a student filmmaker.

Inspiration is in the short film Sam just posted.

The Black Hole

Hello classmates,

This video is one of the few inspiring shorts that every aspiring filmmaker might have to think about just because of its simple idea and elaborate execution.,two things that can be easily achieved even with a small budge and yet might lead to a higher level of recognition in this industry. I'll be posting more shorts like this one later.

Old Western/35mm Film Effect

To use this effect make sure you download this filter.
You remember the old westerns you would see on TV? Well this is how you get that look.

I recorded this tutorial on my mac using a program called Snapz Pro-X.  It's a great tool for Mac users.

The Bleach Bypass Look

The bleach bypass look is a high contrast, often under saturated looked used in more dramatic films such as Se7en and Saving Private Ryan. This technique was originally performed on the film stock itself, but can now be inexpensively replicated with digital editing software.

Step 1) The first thing to do is select the clip in your timeline which you want to alter and apply a 3-way colour correction filter to it. This is done through Effects -> Video Filters -> Color Correction -> Color Corrector 3-way.

Step 2) The next thing to do is duplicate the selected clip and so the same clip is appears in track 1 and track 2 (both with the color corrector filter)

Step 3) Next, double click on the clip in track 2 so it appears in the viewer, then click on the Colour Correction tab in the viewer.

Step 4) From here, you want to bring the saturation down completely which will make the clip appear black and white. To fix this, right click on the clip in track 2, select Composite Mode -> Overlay. This will bring the colour back into the image with much more contrast

Step 5) Now double click on the clip in track 1 to get it into the viewer, which should already be in the Color Correction tab, and slightly lower the saturation. The amount you want to lower it really depends on preference.

Step 6) While still in the Color Corrections tab, you want to raise both the Blacks and the Whites slightly, again based on preference, to achieve the final look

Note: You can change the clip in track 2 from Overlay to Soft Light it will lessen the contrast, which may be done for preference or because the contrast may be too extreme on Overlay.

And that’s all you need to do to achieve the Bleach Bypass look in Final Cut.

Multiple techniques in one

The fade in and fade out effect.

1. Open your project and select the sequence you want faded in or out, by clicking on it with your mouse.
2. Expand the sequence track by clicking the triangle to the left of the track’s name.
3. Open the Effects panel by clicking on the Effects bin. Expand the options in each bin by clicking the arrow next to each sub-folder.
4. To fade in the sequence, drag a transition from the Effects panel to the Timeline panel. Drop it directly at the In point of the sequence clip. You may also Double-click on the transition from within Effects Controls, and choose “Start at Cut.” 5. To fade out in the sequence, drag the transition directly to the Out point of the clip. You may Double-click the transition from within Effect Controls and pick “End at Cut.”

I'm also thinking about putting an emphasis on color when the fade is in effect to emphasize the emotions.

Simple Pleasantville Effect

You guys know that effect where they turn the video black&white except for one colour. Well it's known as the 'Pleasantville Effect', which was made famous in a movie that shares that name.
I used a program called Snapz Pro-X to record this tutorial I made. Check er out.

Binoculars Effect

If anyone intends to use binoculars in their current or future film/video production, this short tutorial may come in handy for those of you who don’t know how to achieve the effect of overlaying the binoculars famous circles over their footage. I worked on this effect after a trip from Niagara Falls and it worked great on my video. This effect is very easy to make and in just twelve steps you’ll be able to achieve it using Photoshop Cs3.

Here goes:

1- Open a new file: 720 x 480 for DV NTSC with Transparent Background

2- Use the Paint Bucket Tool to paint your canvas BLACK

3- Switch to White color by clicking on the double headed arrow over the black & white squares.

4- Go to “View” click “Show” click “Grid”

5- Use Eclipse tool to draw a circle (the size depends on you. Notice it’s white now)

6- Position it to the left and make sure it’s edges are within the screen safe margins.

7- Press “Alt” (In PC) and move the cursor to the right to duplicate the same circle (should be the same size and shape)

8- Position it to the right (The two circles should now converge – if not, try moving them so the left and right edges of the two circles meet)

9- Go to “Layer” click “Merge Visible” (All three layers should turn to one layer now)

10- Get the “Magic Wand” tool and select the white circles then press DELETE. (Transparent Background should appear now)

11- Go to “Filters” click “Blur” click “Gaussian Blur”, Set Radius to 2.0 Pixels.

12- Save file either in “PNG” format for high resolution (recommended) or in (GIF).

Now you should be able to import the file to your APr or FCP/FCE. Remember to keep it over a higher video track. The footage you use should be placed on a lower video track for this effect to work properly.

That’s it. Hope you could use this tutorial well and make a good impression on your audience.

Cheers.

Written by Sam Meddaka for Lab 310 and copied from iBlogs. To visit my blogspot click here

310 Class is cancelled Wednesday, February 11th at 11:30 due to illness.

Reminder your midterm is the first class back after reading break, February 25th at 11:30. It will cover what we covered in class thus far and your assigned readings (Not readings from Color manual).

Morphing in After Effects

Have you guys seen Michael Jackson's "Black or White" video? there is this really cool morphing tool, that morphs images together. Sort of like the image above, but done in real time.

Here's how you do it in After Effects:

1.Open After Effects and open the source footage that will be morphed. (open them as uncompressed quicktime files). In the project window drag one of the source footage items on the composition icons in the bottom window, creating a new composition that is the same size and frame rate. The composition should be 320X320 pixels at 24 fps.

2. Set the composition for a duration of 6 seconds and drag other footage file onto the composition.

3. Place the item you want to morph (morphee) at the bottom beginning at frame 0 and the top layer what the bottom layer will morph into (morpher), place it at the 3 second mark. (There should be a 1 second overlap, this is where the morph will happen).

4. Create a mask around the "morphee" while turning of the "morpher". GO to the 3 second mark where the morphee begins." Using the pen tool, draw the mask, making sure it is closed.

5. Because the morphee moves on the one second mark, the mask has to be animated to match this movement. Press M to reveal the mask properties and click on the stop watch to create a key frame.

6. We only need masks to define the shape we are going to morph. Where it says "add" in the morph menu click "none," turning off the mask. Press "o" to get to the outpoint of the morphee layer (3:24) using the selection tool move it to match the morphee's position in the frame. After effects will automatically add a keyframe here. (Scrub the timeline to see if the mask matches the morphee).

7. Repeat these steps with the morpher layer. However, unlike the morphee layer, the morpher layer does not match it's mask quite as nicely. To alleviate this tweak the mask to match the morpher's movement at the 3:10 and 3:20 mark.

8. Now the morphing can actually begin. Copy and paste each mask on to the other layer, so both masks have both layers. Rename these layers and and turn them off by selecting "none" from the mask menu. In the composition window, you should seethe shapes of the two masks overlapping the footage items.

9. turn off the visibility of the morpher layer, select the morphee layer and apply the "reshape effect" in the "distort menu." Here you need to change the default settings, here you define which parts you want to morph.

10. Change the "destination" mask to "morphee shape." This will allow everything inside the morphee shape to conform to the morpher shape. Change the boundary mask to "none." The percent slide is what we animate to control the morph.

11. TO get the morphee's features to match the morpher's features we have to use "correspondence points" to tell After Effects which parts of the mask around the morphee correspond to the mask around the morpher. For this to look really good we will need to add more correspondence points, and by default the reshape tool only gives one pair of points.

12. To add correspondence points, turn off the reshape effect by clicking the "f" in the effect window ( the effect doesn't need to be turned on to alter it's settings). Turn the layer's visibility off.

13. Under the "view" menu, in the view options, tun off the visibility of masks--as we adjust the reshape filter, after effects will show us the outlines anyway and turning off the masks will help visibility.

14. Select the reshape filter in the effects window, even though it is turned off, selecting it will allow us to adjust it. In the composition window the two outlines are in different colours. Red represents the source and yellow the destination. The squares represent the correspondence points. the line indicates the direction that the source shape will take when being warped into the destination shape.

15. To add new correspondence points hold down the option key while holding the pointer over one of the outlines. The mouse pointer will change into a "+" and when you click the mask outline a new pair of correspondence points is created.

16. Keep playing around to match the shapes well. Set keyframes for the percent slider from 0%  at 3:00 to 200% at 3:24 this will animate the morphee over time. Preview the animation.

17. Now, do the exact same thing for the morpher layer as you have done for the morphee layer. Apply the reshape filter to the morpher layer and change the source shape to the mrpher shape and the destination to the morphee shape, set the boundary mask to none.

18. When you are happy with your correspondence points add keyframes to the reshape effect so the morpher warps from 100% at 3:00 to 0% at 3:24.

19. Render each layer and save as a quicktime movie separately. Import the files back into the program. Place the morpher layer atop of the morphee layer. Select the morpher layer and apply the "gradient wipe" from the "transitions menu." Set the "transition softness" to about 50%. 

How to create basic motion in after effects using a still image?

Our Photoshop Image
Alex Costaris-102156184

http://www.adobe.com/ap/motion/tips/aftbdrop/page2.html



Step 1:
Create a layered Photoshop image.
Put each element you want to animate on its own layer. Design each layer so that its left and right edges meet seamlessly when the image is offset (repeated horizontally). Make the image the same size as the After Effects composition.
In After Effects, you'll be using the Offset effect to repeat and animate each image horizontally.

Step 2:
Import the Photoshop file into After Effects.
Choose File > Import > File, select the Photoshop file, choose Composition from the Import As menu, and click Import. After Effects imports the layered Photoshop file as a layered composition in the Project window, along with a folder of the individual footage items that make up the composition's layers.
Double-click the composition in the Project window to open the Timeline and Composition windows containing the Photoshop layers.








Step 3:
Adjust the duration of your composition.
Choose Composition > Composition Settings. Change the Duration to the desired amount, and then click OK. This example project is 30 seconds.
This is a good time to check the composition's frame rate. This project has a frame rate of 30 frames per second.





Step 4:



Increase the duration of the still images to match the new duration of the composition.
You can increase the duration of multiple still images in the Timeline window.
In the Timeline window, drag the blue current-time marker to the end of the composition, or press the End key. Next, click the first layer and Shift-click the last layer to select all the layers. Press Alt+] (Windows) or Option+] (Mac OS) to trim the layer durations to the current-time marker.
Note: You can lengthen a still image to any length, but you can lengthen video footage only to its original duration, unless you time-stretch it.





Step 5:



Use the Offset effect to both tile and animate the cloud layers in one step.
Set the current time to 00:00; then, in the Timeline window, Ctrl-Click (Windows) or Command-Click (Mac OS) to select the layers that you want to animate. This key modifier allows for noncontiguous selection of layers. Activate the Composition window and choose Effect > Distort > Offset. The Effect Controls window appears with an Offset effect tab for each layer you selected.
Offset effect: This effect repeats a layer, lining up the layer copies edge to edge. When you animate this effect, the repeating layer slides across the Composition window as if the image copies were wrapped around behind it in a continuous strip.





Step 6:



Set beginning keyframes.
In the Effect Controls window, click the tab and select the Shift Center To stopwatch for each layer you are animating. Leave the default values, which are the current position coordinates for the layers.
In the Timeline window, select each layer you want to animate and press the U key to display the animated properties in the Timeline window for all selected layers.

Re-Editing Genres with a Twist

Hey Everyone!

Thursday's lab-- to refresh your memories, this post pertains to your second lab assignment:"re-editing genres." The examples I gave of "re-editing genres" in lab were re-editing The Shinning into a comedy or Black Christmas into a holiday family film.

Wednesday's lab-- This will make a bit more sense after we have lab tomorrow and I explain in greater detail the nature of your second lab assignment.

Here's a great youtube link of a "re-edited" genre, however, the twist here is the genre is re-edited based on a particular style of a specific film director.

This clip involves a very popular Generation Y film entitled, A Goof Troop Movie with the re-edit done in the spirit of David Lynch. (For those of you who don't know who David Lynch is, his work is very artistic, disturbing, psychological etc. I am also going to show a clip of his film Eraserhead, in lab this week. )

So I do encourage mimicking specific directors within this project as well.

For all those Scorsese fans in the Thursday lab, why not try re-editing a Disney Classic, Hannah Montana, Dora the explorer etc. Scorsese style.

Street Spirit Effects

Many advanced visual effects were pretty obvious in Radioheads’ Street spirit video clip although it was released on 1996. From the first glance you would think these effects were accomplished using After Effects or similar post production suite. But I don’t think such programs were powerful to such degree back then. However, after some research using the director’s name “Jonathan Glaze” I found some interesting things regarding that particular video.

Final cut is the deepest

Improvised on the spot or months in the planning, a great promo can give a song life after the charts. Sam Delaney talks to directors about their favourite clips

I'd had this idea for ages that I'd seen in nature programmes, where they'd film an eagle flying at 1,200 frames per second then cut frames out to slow it down. It's a technique you see in every second ice-cream commercial nowadays but back then it was new.
(Jonathan Glazer on Radiohead's Street Spirit (1996))

Article by Sam Delaney
The Guardia, Sat 24 Sep 2005 click here
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2005/sep/24/popandrock1

From Wikipedia

Street Spirit Music Video

Several scenes in the video are shot using different frame frequencies, thus making different subjects in the same scene move at different speeds. A special ultra-high speed camera, normally used to photograph high speed projectiles for scientific purposes, was used to create the extreme slow motion effects.

Click here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk_Show_Host#Music_video

Personally, to recreate the effect where you see the lead singer moving in normal speed while others in the back ground move in a slower speed, I would theoretically utilize the following steps:

1- Two different subjects in two different positions on the same set within the same camera frame.

2- Two different subjects filmed doing two different routines

3- One and same Background with not moving fixtures

4- One fixed in position camera

5- Overlapping the two images in post production

6- Merging the two images at the centre point and adjusting the middle zone opacity to blend in or just cropping the converging edges of the two images to equal 50/50.

Time Warp

This is another interesting link that shows high speed cameras in action. I also wanted to note that in BBC's major documentary "Planet Earth" they used the same type of camera to capture High Def motion pictures.

Written by Sam Meddaka click here to go to my blog

Welcome!

Hey everyone,

Welcome to our lab blogspot! There will be an assignment based on blogging, but I do welcome you guys to blog about anything your hearts desire related to film, art, music etc. I wanted us to have a forum outside of our lab where we can discuss a variety of things. Now that you guys have entered the advanced level of production, you'll see how vital it is to interact with your peers and make friends (if you haven't already!)

Also, we all know as filmmakers, we are the toughest people to try and sit through a movie with, because we are constantly critiquing. Therefore I want our blog to also operate as a forum where you guys can praise or condemn a film you've seen to your heart's content, without the visual cues to be quiet from our non-filmmaking friends we are all so often use too!

I only have two rules for the blog: 

1. Try to keep it film, art, music related. As much as I would love to know about your residual strike anger, or to watch  Joaquin Phoenix's disastrous attempt at rap music some more ( I guess that could qualify), for the purpose of the blog let's keep it somewhat narrowly focused.

2. No drunk blogging! I have seen way too many posts in my day with the infamous drunk blogging; this is unsavoury because extra spaces and jumbled letters mess with my equilibrium.

I think that is everything—I really looking forward to meeting all of you, we are going to have a fun, productive, inspiring semester, I promise!

Sincerely,

Danielle (Your GA)