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Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Heintje posted:

w00t I got accepted for an internship at SideFX in Toronto, I start in Feb!

I am going to freeze my nuts off...


e: This is not the post you are looking for.

Travakian fucked around with this message at 06:00 on Feb 24, 2011

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Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Slightly OT, but still on Houdini -- they're currently holding a contest; essentially best comp (most realistic as well as most entertaining) created entirely using Houdini Apprentice (free) wins a free copy of Houdini Master and PFTrack ($13.5k US value). Might want to consider it if you're learning; so far there are no entries, so may be a good push to keep going.

http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1442&Itemid=226

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Been working tonight on texturing this rhino (I didn't model it). Doing it for kicks, but still curious as per your thoughts.

Comping together photos of rhinos in Photoshop, projecting them onto Maya, then back to Photoshop to fix the UVs.

Right now, the place where the ear meets the head needs to be cleaned up, same with horn/head. Also a seam on the back of the ear.


Click here for the full 1280x720 image.


Click here for the full 1280x720 image.



Kirby posted:

After about 6 weeks of that I was given a crack at lighting and composting one of the episodes. They liked it, so I ended up doing the lighting TD and compositing for about half of the series.

What software are you compositing in?
Also, was wondering today -- if you need to relight an element, are you limited to working with the render passes they give you, or are you ever in a position in which you need to get your 3d team to re-render shots? Can you do that?


e: fastest way to make a face texture? http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3115752

Travakian fucked around with this message at 08:19 on Apr 11, 2009

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Kirby posted:

:words:

Ahh, thanks. It's more that I'm junior/student, so I'm still a bit iffy on what some of the titles are and what tasks they perform.

On that note, is there (or was there, at some point) a compositing/VFX thread in Creative Convention at any point? Or are there not enough of us to warrant one?

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Heintje posted:

And here is some noise moving through a bunch of planes:

Could you explain how you did this? I imagine it involves animating a mountain deform using some noise, but how would you go about putting this together?

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Odddzy posted:

http://www.viddler.com/explore/odddzy/videos/1/

Here is the demoreel, it's just a test and I've made it to show for an internship that I might apply to this week. Can I have some criticism?

"Kirby posted:

trash both animation bits, especially the pixar bit.

Yes. Unless you're really keen on animation, get rid of all the animation -- the two at the beginning, the Pixar bit, the little war scene at 0:25. Your modeling work is pretty good, your texturing as well -- the animations kill it. I've seen many a reel killed by adding in too much junk.

Really liking that city street render. If you've got time, consider adding a camera move into these stills. For your robot guy, do a turntable. For the city street, do a slow pan down it; just brings some life.

What is that scene at 0:32? Did you model a cave/water? It's pretty dark (compression, I warrant). Looks like a painting/Photoshop work. Maybe do a wipe between this and a wireframe of it.

Great texturing work -- you've got a solid base here. Most internships understand you're just starting out; while they are looking for people who know their stuff, they're not looking for gods of all things. Just show them your best stuff and let the work speak for itself.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Heintje posted:

I'm more tempted to just set things on fire. Isn't it great that I can do that without actually causing any real world damage. Yeeah.


Speaking of fire, there's a pretty decent CG Pyrotechnics contest running right now, caveat is you're only allowed to use After Effects. Some pretty good prizes.

http://vimeo.com/groups/17413

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Working on a motion graphic piece, mostly 3d. Going to be a bunch of polaroids falling into a pile. Here's current progress.

I want this to be as photo-real as possible, but I'm really not a 3d artist. Any suggestions?

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

If I had actual polaroids, I wouldn't be having these issues! And if I had a camera, I'd shoot it all practically. No time to rent one, either -- the challenge here is I'm trying to do all this without any actual reference.

But! Knowing the paper needs work does help, I'll get on that.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

ErIog posted:

You do realize that nobody ever does work that's supposed to be photorealistic without reference, right? That's a fool's errand.

I know; it's a pipe dream. It was going to be pure 2.5d, but the entire project changed at the last minute, leaving me, for lack of a better word, hosed.

They understand it won't be perfect, but I had might as well get it as good as I can.


wayfinder posted:

I have a polaroid here, I'll put up a scan in a minute.

Thanks a tonne, mate. Nabbed the texture, using that instead.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Here's the current version of it. I understand the whole 'you can't make something look real without looking at something real first' bit -- but looking at this image, can anyone give any constructive criticism?

I know the shadow between the top one and the lower seems to be awkward -- it's actually floating above it. This is a still from a sequence in which they're falling.

Edit: Looking at it, it looks as if the UVs on the paper are messed up. Texture seems stretched in some places, normal in others. Huh.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

SynthOrange posted:

I just checked out Ryan, an amazing animated short film. Amazing stuff in there.


Also check out The Spine, his latest short. Saw it a few weeks ago -- it's fantastic.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

EoinCannon posted:

I've used fusion for the first time on this project, split the image out into all it's constituent parts and put it all back together again with controls on everything. It was good fun learning how it all goes together. Of course I went a bit nuts...




It's more of a personal preference thing, but if you get into the habit of keeping your script organized, it makes everything easier. For something simple like this, keeping all the loaders even, mattes on the bottom (or something like this), everything snapped to grid -- it really does help. If you're using 5.3 (I think?) or higher, you can do underlays, so you can say 'THIS section is the shadow pass, THESE are diffuse,' etc. Maybe it's just me, but it looks way better that way.

To enable snap-to-grid: Right click the flow, go to 'Arrange Tools,' hit 'to grid.'

Travakian fucked around with this message at 06:02 on Feb 24, 2011

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

VFX goons may appreciate this; it's been making the rounds on Twitter with the VFX people -- it's some home footage shot at ILM during the making of the first Star Wars. Good times were had.

http://www.vimeo.com/5494280

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

ACanofPepsi posted:

http://vimeo.com/6004232



I had the ground part done for a while but I decided to try and bang out a basic energy blast/fireball. The idea is for the thing to fly and hit the car at the end, I've found a pretty nice Chevy Impala model online so that's a bonus. This is just a work in progress.


Understanding it's a WIP, but...
If the ground breaking is dynamic, tone it down a bunch. Looks like it's way too much.

Also, try to make the ball cast some light -- it should be making the floor light up / glow some. Andrew Kramer recently put up a tutorial for this, though I haven't seen it yet so I don't know how applicable it'll be for this. http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/3d_light_casting/

Assuming that car is 3d, it looks pretty good but the shadow seems too dark, and it gets too dark when it goes off the right side, looks a bit strange.

Otherwise, good job. The smoke looks a bit strange to me, but I can't specify why. Maybe it's too sharp / not noisy enough? Don't know.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Out of curiosity, do any of you VFX folks do the international/traveling freelancer bit? That is, six months in LA working on one show, a year in Vancouver on another, another six in London, etc -- I've heard of some people working solely contract-to-contract (as opposed to permanent employment at a studio); what is it like? Is it doable? I'm a compositor -- is it rare for compositors to shop around, as opposed to 3d?

Just asking as I've been working at a studio here for about a month and a half (after working on-set / freelancing design for a while) and although the pay is absolutely fantastic, I'm starting to see that if I'm not careful, I could end up at this studio for years. Or I could stay here for a bunch of years, go somewhere else for a few more -- I don't to look back and think, 'What the gently caress was I doing for so long?' (Hopefully moving around all the time would offset this.)

Thoughts?

Travakian fucked around with this message at 17:16 on Aug 19, 2009

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

e: Nevermind.

Travakian fucked around with this message at 06:03 on Feb 24, 2011

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Alan Smithee posted:

Or you could try not pissing off goons here :)

Seriously I have a vimeo account you can use if you want to send me the file (believe me if I was going to steal a reel, I would simply steal it from studio footage)

It turns out tinypic can also host video. The more you know, eh?

On both videos I've blurred out the title card. On the mograph/comp one I blurred out some names I'd rather not have floating around online as well as a name I do business as. If you somehow manage to get any of that info, I ask respectfully that you keep it to yourself. Paranoid, maybe, but I'm sure most of you understand.

I'd love to hear and comments/crit/feedback you folks may have.


Edit: Going to create a new post in CC for this just to get a varied set of eyes on it. If any higher-ups have an issue with this, let me know and I'll close the other thread.

Travakian fucked around with this message at 06:04 on Feb 24, 2011

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Ratmann posted:

I just felt like posting that I loving LOVE Nuke, this thing makes compositing fun again(except for Flame/Inferno, that poo poo is just fun)

Hm, really? I find it to be a pain. Used Nuke for a few weeks then started using Shake full-time at work -- I much prefer Shake to Nuke, though it may just be due to exposure. Tried using Fusion again (it's what I started with), and I absolutely can't stand that poo poo. Ugh. Eyeon needs to get their act together.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Ratmann posted:

heh, we're using Shake at work right now, I can see why some people like it, it's simple :-P , but good lord is it slow. I just find Nuke so much sleeker and faster.

^^^^ Shake is just very simple in the way it works, it's very into the whole fundamentals of compositing operations, over, gamma, color correct, invert, all these operations which are pretty much the basis for compositing.

While Fusion is more compressed down with it's nodes, merge is pretty much all the layering operations into one, where as Shake has them separate in Over, Add, Subtract, Multiply, and so forth.

Though Nuke also has 'Merge' with a drop-down, or you can choose an Add ("Plus")/Mult etc command which is the exact same as the aforementioned 'Merge' except it's already chosen for you.

Is Shake slow? I've never used Nuke in a production pipeline, just on my own. I can definitely see how it'd make the comp cleaner, what with channel support, but all the more complicated too.

I agree with the sleek bit. I went from Fusion to Nuke to Shake, and now looking back at Fusion it's a dinosaur. It's so.. clunky. Pain in the rear end to do anything. Nuke is gorgeous -- smooth, flowing, everything right at your fingertips. (Love the 'tab search' node creation feature, a la Houdini. All comp programs should have that.)


EoinCannon posted:

I'm just getting into compositing a bit at the moment and I'm enjoying Fusion

What are the main differences with Shake?

As stated before, I personally find Fusion to clunk along very slowly compared to Shake (or Nuke). The attributes menus don't 'flow' as well...

I understand I'm being vague. I can't really describe what it is about Fusion I don't like. I was perfectly fine with it before I started using anything else, but now I can't go back to it. Maybe it has something to do with bearing a strong personal grudge against somebody I know at Eyeon, that may be it.

Eoin - if you're using a Mac, look into Shake or Nuke. If PC, check Nuke out.

Don't worry about software differences, it takes but a few hours to figure out another comp program once you're settled into one. Went from never using Shake before to doing full comps the next day - easy transitions.


Edit: I know I brought this up before, but does anyone else think we should split this into two threads? 3d & Comp/VFX?

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

No mention of Colin's Bear?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiARsQSlzDc

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Yip Yips posted:

This has always cracked me up and my name is Colin too. I love that there are spoofs of it now. Check out the giraffe one.

Haha I've seen them all -- I've known Colin for years. He's working these days at Koei Canada as a game designer, but he's also a composer on the side. Has a website and all.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

AuntJemima posted:

What do you guys think is the best tutorial site for Maya? I'm pretty new to it right now and would like the basics then get into modeling and animating simple things.
3dBuzz has been very good to me so far. Whats your opinion on that site and any others? Thanks!


I'm not specifically a 3d guy, but I think maybe checking out 3d generals first is better than jumping right into a specific app; keeps it theory first, application second. Check out Guerrilla CG -- http://www.guerrillacg.org/ -- scroll down a bit, start at first and just work your way down. Good stuff.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

I'm working on a new project, and I'm wondering if there's any sort of way to make what I'm trying to do more procedural.

I'm working in Maya right now, not really all that willing to move to Houdini even though it may be way simpler there.

Anyway.

Let's say I've got a grid of identical cubes, all right next to one another forming a plane. I'm trying to set it up so that as a null/locator passes above them, the cubes move down (-y) based on how close the null is; think of somebody pushing their finger on a cushion; it depresses the most right where the finger is, then lesser around it, and that deforms as their finger moves.

I've been hand-animating it for my test pieces, but for the final this just won't do.

Does anybody have any thoughts / ideas on how to make this more procedural?

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

I've been working on this some. Here's what I've got so far.

code:
string $objName;

string $xPos;
string $yPos;
string $zPos;

float $xDist;
float $yDist;
float $zDist;

float $dist;
float $range;

$objName = "pCube14";
$range = 6;

$xPos = ($objName + ".translateX");
$yPos = ($objName + ".translateY");
$zPos = ($objName + ".translateZ");

$xDist = MAIN_LOCATOR.translateX - $xPos;
$yDist = MAIN_LOCATOR.translateY - $yPos;
$zDist = MAIN_LOCATOR.translateZ - $zPos;

$dist = sqrt(pow($xd,2) + pow($yd,2) + pow ($zd,2));

if ($dist < $range)
 $yVar = $range - $dist;
else
 $yVar = 0;
Now, theoretically, this would mean all I'd have to do is type in the name of the object at the top there (see 'pCube14') and I could just put in this code and it'd all be hunky-dory. Hell, I could even make this so that it goes through every obj in the scene.

The only problem is this doesn't work. The $xPos is a string; it's a line of text saying "pCube14.translateY" as opposed to a variable containing what pCube14.translateY actually equals. This means when I try to subtract it from the locator's position, it gives me an error ("Cannot mix string and numeric data types in arithmetic expressions").

How can I refer to the object by a variable but get the data it holds, without capturing it as a string?

Also, I know square roots are taxing and it's going to be a bitch to run in real-time once I get more than a couple dozen objects, but that's not the point. Sort-of.

---

And what if I wanted to do rotation instead of translation? Say I wanted an object to rotate between 0 and 90 -- if the locator is behind it, rotation = 0, but as it gets a certain distance away, rotate to 90 and stop. Hmm...

Edit: Nevermind. Code below untested, but should work. The dist/range play is there so that when the locator's closer to the object, it rotates more than the rest for the same effect as above, the amount-by-proximity thing. This was all typed here, so if it's wrong please do correct it - just working in my mind at this.

Assuming we care about rotating in X when the locator is in front (again, in X) of the object...
code:
if (($xDist >= 0) && (obj.xRotation <= 90) && ($dist <= $range))
 obj.xRotation = $xDist + ($range - $dist);

Travakian fucked around with this message at 10:35 on Nov 1, 2009

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Ratmann posted:

I myself have my contract ending in December 18th, poo poo timing indeed.

Hey, how about a high-five for Dec 18th contract-enders? Also, last week, the PM sent an email to many of the staff saying that they'll be giving everyone two weeks paid vacation til the 4th.

I lose my job (along with most of layout), everybody else gets to chill out on the company's dime for a couple of weeks. Good times.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

This post never existed. Woah.

Travakian fucked around with this message at 06:05 on Feb 24, 2011

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Hinchu posted:

What do you mean by using an image sequence inside After Effects? I'm confused on how this relates to editing a final project down in Premiere.

Open your footage in After Effects and render each piece out as an image sequence, then load that into Premiere. No lag / stutters, you can choose the fps without any weirdness and you don't risk corrupting a massive file (should your hard drive decide to die when processing the shot)

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

A few pages ago I asked about (in Maya/MEL) using a locator to manipulate y-positions to 'dip' things; I got that sorted, but I'm looking at the next stage of what I want to do and I really can't get it sussed.

I've got a grid of cubes, and as the locator passes them I want them to rotate 90°; this is simple enough, but I want them to stay rotated as the locator passes by.

Here's the code I've got for this, so far. What this should do (in my mind), is look at where the locator is in correlation to each object, and if the qualifiers work out (and it evaluates into it just fine), set a keyframe at the current time with rotation = 0 and another one 20 frames from now with rotation = 90.

Problems with this:
a) It doesn't actually set any keyframes.
b) This will only run once; how can I set this up so that it always evaluates? I tried setting rotation using expression -alwaysEvaluate 1 but Maya won't accept the expression I'm giving, as it's too long/complicated.

Can anyone give any thoughts / tips / advice on this? I know I'll also need a 'reset' script to set things back to their initial values (as I want them to hold 'flipped' afterwards), but that ought to be easy enough to set up.

code:
string $pushObject = "MAIN_LOCATOR"; //name of the influence transform
string $moveGroup = "moveGroup";    //name of the group with the objects you want to move
float $range2 = 10.0;                //influence range

string $ddNodeName;
float $restPos[];
string $object;
string $objectList[] = `listRelatives -children -type transform $moveGroup`;

for($object in $objectList)
{
	//create measure node
	$ddNodeName = `createNode -n ($object+"_dd") distanceDimShape`;
	setAttr ($ddNodeName+".visibility") 0;

	//connect measure node to locator and objects starting position
	connectAttr -f ($pushObject+".translate") ($ddNodeName+".startPoint");
	$restPos = `xform -q -ws -t $object`;
	setAttr -type float3 ($ddNodeName+".endPoint") $restPos[0] $restPos[1] $restPos[2];
	

	if ( (getAttr ($pushObject+".translateZ")) >= (getAttr ($object+".translateZ")) ){
         if ( (getAttr ($ddNodeName+".distance")) <= $range2 ) {
          float $frame = `currentTime -q`;
          setKeyframe -time $frame -v 0 -at rotateZ;
          setKeyframe -time ($frame+20) -v 90 -at rotateZ;
         }
        }
}
Would appreciate any help you can give!

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Flex Mentallo posted:

Lots of code.


Ahh, I see what you did. As aforementioned, MEL isn't my strong point, just trying to figure out a better way to get this sussed (as opposed to hand-animating it all). This worked -- going to try to refine it for better results. Hope to post something soon!

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Somewhat off-topic. Again. Most of my posts seem to be.

Does anyone have any resources/info pertaining to on-set vfx supervision? Books, sites, anything?

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

BigKOfJustice posted:

Mostly the school of hard knocks. Typically you work long enough to figure out what's needed and what doesn't work in shots, issues with lighting, tracking, camera settings. You need a mix of technical troubleshooting mixed with working with people and some production savy. Eventually you'll get elevated into a position where you are helping out production bidding time and people needed to do sequences.

After a few shows you'll be promoted to that position to go on set, after doing that for a few years, you can ditch the vendor side [vfx studios] and work for the studio/production company as the show vfx supervisor directly.

Generally you won't find too much on the subject since a very small segment of people get into that position, and are generally too busy to write about it.

Most of the VFX supervisors I know were rank and file animators, FX TD's, lighters, that were working for years before moving up. Depends on the size of the company as well. A small studio with a dozen or so people, it would be faster to move up. Someplace with a few hundred people? It may take a decade, and even then that depends on if an existing supervisor drops dead and there's a spot available and if you are in a good enough position to be placed in it.

Thanks! Good to know.

Travakian fucked around with this message at 06:07 on Feb 24, 2011

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Would you guys say there's any point in learning Flame this late in the game? I haven't been able to find anybody willing to teach, but I figure I could install Smack on one of the computers at work (being Macs, my home machine being PC) and learn the basics there. A few people I've mentioned this to say that I'd may as well just stick to learning the newer stuff (Nuke and the like), as they're more powerful and far cheaper than Flame systems/artists. Thoughts?

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Ratmann posted:

I don't think you understand the correct purpose of Flame.

It's not really a "sit down and work" thing, it's more of a "sit down with clients" system. Usually you work with it with clients and you have to manage and work on giving them what they want, so mainly it's used in commercials kind of work.

If you want to work in a more commercial client environment, then yeah i'd say it's a good idea to learn it, if not, then Nuke is your friend.

No, no, I understand that. It's still something that one would have to sit down and learn first, though, then look into specializing. The main argument I heard was that they're so bloody expensive these days that most studios would rather hire standard employees to do the work and go through revisions like anything else, effectively rendering Flame artists obsolete.

Simply, I was asking more along the lines of whether or not there's still a market for new, fresh Flame artists, or if they've dwindled in popularity to the point of obsolescence.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Ratmann posted:

I'm hearing rumours that CORE shut down...

This is flying around Twitter, too. I knew they weren't doing so hot, but drat.
The project my studio is working on is shutting down, so all but a few employees are staying after next Friday -- about half a dozen were in talks to move to CORE. Huh.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Sigma-X posted:

CORE is the guys who used to do the Tomb Raider games before Eidos told them to get hosed, gave the IP to Crystal Dynamics, and then they got bought by Rebellion, right?

or is CORE some movie thing and what I'm thinking of is like CORE SECONDWORD that I can't recall?

http://www.coredp.com/

VFX for Splice, Tudors, Silent Hill, Harold & Kumar, Lucky Number Slevin and more, as well as a bunch of cartoon stuff.

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Applebee123 posted:

So I watched Clash of the Titans in 3D and I was wondering how do you go about turning a 2D film into 3D in post production? If you record with two cameras in 3D from the start thats fine, but how do they turn a pre-recorded flat 2D image of live action into 3D after it has been filmed?

I'm not sure about huge-budget ones, but for an IMAX 3d conversion, people spend many, many hours splitting the fore/background elements into different layers, offsetting them in z-space then repainting anything in the background that would be covered from the new camera angle -- think After Effects 2.5D...

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

SPACE WEED posted:



http://www.vimeo.com/11040816

Did you hand-animate this or is it script-driven?

Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

Had a promising interview at a television studio using C4D, so I've been spending my spare time picking it up. Question, though -- is there any way to just render out, say, an AO pass? I know you can enable it in multi-layer, but then it will render out the beauty as well as the AO. I'd rather not waste the time or processing power on the beauty.

Also, let's say I wanted to render out the main beauty pass as well as another render with 'effects' added (such as the Cel Renderer), so that I can produce two passes from one render. Is this possible?

Thanks in advance!

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Travakian
Oct 9, 2008

cubicle gangster posted:

In other news... I finished my showreel!


Small comment, but not about the work itself -- don't apologize for your reel. Your work is your work and you ought to stand by it to the end; nobody would know there were pieces missing if you didn't mention it, and with a reel this strong there's no need to bring it up.

Good work!

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