help on learning cinematic special effects
 

hello everyone!

i've done work before in maya and am at a pretty decent level for the local crop of maya users in my school. i've added some visual effects so real-life pictures using compositing in applications like photoshop, and have now decided to try and take it to the next level... video compositing with 3d special effects.

what i mean by 3d special effects can be anything from simply adding a few objects into a video scene that weren't there before to a full-on Lord of the Rings or Matrix-esque battle sequence. something i have in mind at the moment is to create a robot that walks around a hallway. of course i'll be digitally adding in the robot later on, to a video i've taken of a school corridor. next i might try to add protruding mechanical parts to real moving human arm.

the question is, where do i start to learn this stuff? what tools do i need? are there any primers out there for people like me? can't really go to a school for that right now since (a) i'm still finishing up my Computer Science degree, and (b) there are little to no schools for that here in the Philippines.

thanks for reading this, everyone. i'd appreciate any help you could give me. :)

Dude! What do you know, a fellow Filipino. :cool:

If you actually have MAYA as a class, ask your teacher, s/he should know what to do. But off hand, you'd need MAYA LIVE or some other tracking software if you want to shoot your video with a camera move. Otherwise just keep the camera stationary :)

You'll also need a compositing package, After Effects, Combustion, Fusion and the like.

ei dude. wow.. you're from the philippines too huh? do u study maya in class form or independently like myself? if so, where? i'm looking for a good place to study it after finishing up my college degree.

anyway, i've got After Effects 5.5 for compositing. my biggest problem in compositing is getting the angle of the 3d object to match the perspective of the picture. for example if i plan to add a flying ship to a scene, how can i be sure it's turned to the correct angle so as to look "right" in the scene? what makes it even harder is the animation. since the location of the object changes, i have to really make sure that the perspective and lighting is correct. how do i do this?

lighting for still images is easy, since i can modify the shadows and lights in photoshop when i composite. but how about for video?

thanks! :)

The best thing you can do is take measurements on set while shooting. Decide what system you want (inches, CM, feet) and measure camera height, distance from camera to subject, what focal length your camer is at... (If anyone else has anything to add please feel free to jump in :) )

Take notes of all the light sources etc. There's a whole slew of tutorials about this on the net.

hmmm would you able to suggest any tutorials and/or links i may be able to use? i'm sorta lost and would like to make some test files soon. :)