So again contrary to my usual attention to detail, I post this with little else info other then I was conducting a test using boujou 5 for mac in conjuction with cinema 4d r11.5 . I know it is not perfect but still, it was pretty bloody satisfying to do this.
:)
As I start all my posts recently... sorry i haven't posted in a while.
I haven't had anything worth posting. Funny how this is something I want to post but I guess satisfaction comes from things that actually make a difference. In this case I made a mic disappear! Was it magic? Not really. Maybe movie magic?
Through a quick series of maneuvers and a series of rotoscoped masks, voila!
FYI, this is from a feature I have been doing color grading for but before I can grade some of the shots, there are a few 'fix it in post' events that have to occur.
A little while back, I came across an opportunity to work in 3d on a spot for something called thrill. I guess it is supposed to be a thriller/horror channel airing out in asia. The basically wanted to come up with different ways to kill their logo.
In this post, I am going to touch quickly on 3 pieces of software. Blender, RealFlow and Cinema 4D.
Previous to this I had been experimenting with trying to create fluid, mostly water, and had some success using this free software called "Blender".
Blender is primarily 3d software for creating characters and environments for video games. It is pretty good in that area I must say, emphasis on "good" because above anything, it is free. Free is good! Blender also has a slew of fluid particle generating features that include liquid, smoke, clouds and fire (not sure about the fire). However, even though it has these abilities, they are somewhat limited on customizing. When the Thrill project came my way, I jumped at the chance to make blood because they wanted me to kill the logo :) I created the 3d environment using cinema 4d and had it all set up in about half a day. I then set on the blood. 4 days later, after much frustration, I had something that looked ok but the blood just wasn't right. It kept quivering. No matter what I did, it would quiver. To make matters worse, I wasn't able to get my blood back into Cinema 4d without an exhaustive 25 step process taking about 2 hours to complete. Once in C4D, it looked like ass and would take quite a while to render. I have an example of the quivering blood below.After a few more days of exhaustive experimenting and numerous posts to forums, I threw in the towel in regards to blender. I know when I am beat. I swapped Blender for some software called RealFlow. RealFlow is awesome! It is an amazing liquid dynamics software that plays nicely with all the different 3D apps out there. I quickly fell in love and in about 4 hours, realized I was back on track to making this damn logo bloody!
Here is an example of the fluid dynamics between Blender and RealFlow in a similar side by side comparison
The real difficulty in creating liquid comes down to properly constructing the model. The scale of the model is directly related to the scale of the fluid. Think of those 80's movies and B movies where they use scale models to simulate a flood or a damn breaks. They use miniatures and then have real water running through the set. It looks fake because the scale of the water is obviously not in relation to the scale of the model. My scale is obviously off. Thankfully, my blood work has improved a lot since creating this first version so the newer ones don't look so hokey.
This is a quick video showing the RealFlow fluid wireframe and a few frame renders of what it looks like in Cinema 4D.
Will be back with more details but I have to finish setting up for tonights shoot. Tonight is the action scene and I am bit worried cuz there is quite a few kicks, punches and bodies flying. Here are some pictures from the past two nights, there is a lot going on so I wasn't able to get to much coverage.
Trying really hard to work here but this view is killing me! This is why they don't put windows in edit suites, editors wouldnt get any work done. I can't stop staring out this damn window!
The end shot of this piece has requires that our main character stops walking and at that moment, he see's himself walk into frame. The main character faces himself and then an action ensues. This would be a very easy thing to accomplish if the final shot was locked off on a tripod but because this piece is shot on a steadicam, the final shot actually is a slow drifting shot, that being because it is virtually impossible for the steadicam to stay completely motionless. so what this means is I have to do several things in order to compile this last shot. The first being that i would have to do an initial stabilization of the final approach. I then have to go in a rotoscope the second main character. Once that is done, I have to go back to the final shot and track a portion of the frame to get the spatial data. Once I have done this, I have to pin the rotoscoped figure to that data to give the illusion of both characters being shot at the same time. This in effect will match the camera moves with the second character thus creating the effect that both where shot simultaneously.
Tracking video can be touch and go especially depending on which software I use. For the initial track, I used the built in affter effects tracker to do a two point track tracking the position and the rotation. This would stabalize it enough to allow me to do a rotoscoping. Then I used mocha to go back and motion track a portion of the scene so that i could pin the second character to match the slight drifting of the camera. But below is some shots of roto heaven.
Below is a little timelapse of a portion of the roto. I don't know why I bother to document this process, I guess I do it just to remind myself what a pain in the ass it is and just how I can actually do something really difficult if I just put my mind to it.
FYI the project is done but I am going to wait a bit before I put it up for viewing, the project has to screen first and a few feathers have to be unruffled. Plus I have yet to post on the motion tracking of the background for inserting the morphing trippy graphic smorgasbord... or not. FUN STUFF!
I know it has been quite some time since my last post. To be honest things have been very very VERY slow this past year. At times I found myself wondering if I would have to demote myself back to "starving artist" status and I have so been there and done that and to be honest..... IT SUCKS!!!!
But then as if someone flipped a switch, this past month and a half has turned out to be quite interesting. The work started trickling in, first with this projecta and then in the past few days, my phone has rung more than it has over the entire past 9 months combined and I am not exagerating. I am thanking my post production gods that is has as to be honest, I was starting to loose it. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU !!!!
The job I am currently working had an interesting set of guidlines and end goals. It is called called "Archrival" and is directed by Dan Pak and produced by Whitespace Studios. To start with, this particular piece involved 1 minute constant take incorporating 15 + characters to happen in procession over a space of 150 meters. The director wanted the playback to appear in slowmotion in regards to the Main character but for the background characters to appear in real time. This presented numerous challenges.
First off the theory behind accomplishing something like this we mean we would have to shoot at a high frame rate. By doing this, you capture more information, then when it is played back at normal speed you will be able to see a nice and smooth slow motion play back. For ppl have difficulty imagining this, think about recording your voice on a tape recorder while the tape recorder is is moving at a fast speed. Then play back the tape at normally speed, the result is a voice that is being played real l y sss looooooow.
The second request was that the content shot was shot smooth. Using tracks and a dolley was not an option as we could no close down the street at our location to lay down a track, which meant steady cam.
Third, we had set budget to operate in which pretty much dictated what equipment we would have to use.
Fourth, the one minute take using steady cam and being shot at a high framerate would have to occur while cueing 15+ actors who all had to perform in sync (the sync issues will be explained later) and we had 4 hours to do it.
To use quote from scotty in the new star trek movie, "it would be like trying to hit a bullet with a smaller bullet wearing a blindfold while riding a horse", that is in terms doing everything right and getting the take. The odds wear not in our favor but with enough planning and rehearsal combined with best equipment we could find in our given budget (which turned out to be a nightmare in itself) and using the most experienced ppl I could find to work that equipment.
Because of the fact we where using a steadicam, we had to find a large format camera that could provide enough weight to counterbalance the steadicam rig. Although there are smaller rigs designed for lighter cameras, it decided on to go with the full sized steadicam rig because it offers the smoothest shot when operated properly. The smaller rigs like movecam and glidecam tend to put out more drifting when being used which in this case would mean the shot would not wor k. Because we had to go with a larger camera, plus the lack of availability of cameras (with in the budget) that shoot at a variable frame rate, in the end we had to go with the Panasonic AJ-HDC27F, which is a rather old camera which only shoots to tape. It uses those big monster DV format tapes.
There were a few comprimises we had to make in order to shoot variable frame rate, this camera doesn't shoot high speed in the traditional sense, not like a film camera or a RED camera, instead of shooting at a higher speed, it actually doubles up on frames or something fancy like that, but in fact plays back in realtime so it is impossible to see what the final footage will look like. Plus as a result of this format, it requires a specialized deck which, at least out here, was very hard to find a facility that provided the transfer service. Perhaps in a later post, I will touch on the difficulties I have faced as a result of using this camera's variable frame rate.
Here are some shots of Grant Douglas, the DP for the shoot setting up the steadicam rig. It really is a monster, and after all the necessary attachments, the rig weighed in excess of 70 pounds / 30 kilos . Now imagine carrying that and trying to do a 1 minute take while walking and operating the camera. Not so easy! Then in order to make sure everyone was moving at an appropriate speed during the recording we constructed a click track that we were comfortable with at both its record speed of 96bpms and its play back speed of 48 bpms. The trickiest thing about it was to make sure that at record speed, it wasn't too fast so that the DP could not keep up walking along side, but still keeping it fast enough so when played back in slow motion, things were not too slow. Not as easy as it sounds I tell you. This was played live during the takes to make sure everyone nailed their speeds.
btw It's great to be back !!!! :)
Here it is! The trailer is done and director Elissa Rosati is shopping it in Cannes. MAKE ME RICH! Below is the poster designed by Ben Robinson and of course the trailer. ENJOY :)
If you can't see it, it could be cuz you need to update to flash 10
Trailer Title: Y4 The Death Loop
Director: Elissa Rosati
Producer/Sound Designer: Ben Robinson
Assistant Director: Billy Lau
Director of Post Production: mrvix
Director of Photography: Ross Clarkson
Y4 is also being done in conjunction with Focus On Film which was assisting production with it's Apprentice Program, a program which allows the kids enrolled to assist and learn the ropes on a real film set. A special thanks to all of them for their excellent work and tireless efforts :)
