I come back to you now, at the turn of the tide...

Ok maybe not, but it has been a while. What have I been up to? Part searching for work, part decompressing after graduating, part studying.

I am now voyaging into 3D Studio Max territory, in the hopes of using it for Dynamic Effects, such as Fire, Smoke, Fog, whatever. You can of course do Dynamic Effects in Maya, but there are certain plugins that are only for 3DS Max, that I am very interested in.

Examples will follow right after I get a better grasp. I plan on integrating it into live footage somehow. We shall see...

The Quick and The Dirty...

Here is a little quick test I cooked up yesterday. Just felt like doing an easy matchmove. I also did a light probe for IBL (Image Based Lighting) and Reflections. It worked fine for the lighting, but for some reason, something with the reflections is baffling me. I've done it successfully before too, so it's a little extra baffling that it didn't work this time. Will have to open up the project file again today and take a little gander up its skirt.

Anywho, the matchmove turned out pretty well. I did it rather quick, and was not quite as through as I should have been, so it's not perfect, but for something fun and simple I happy with it.

HDRI oh my!

You've perhaps already seen this, but in case you haven't, here it is. :)

So I'm trying to learn methods of Image Based Lighting (IBL) to aid in the ease of CG to live footage integration. I've only really done one so far (still image), as I just finally got a mirrored ball which is necessary to the process.



So this is the result.

The process: First, an HDR photo was taken of a mirrored garden ball. What this means, is that successive pictures were taken, on a tripod, at incremental shutter speeds of the ball. These images were then combined into a HDR image. This is done to better represent the large values of lightness and darkness that we can see with our eyes, and serves to make the lighting more realistic. A second photo was taken with no sphere in it, so I would have a blank area to try and add the CG to.

The first image was turned into a spherical map for use in maya (or Cinema 4D). The resulting map was placed on two separate spheres, one for lighting, and one for reflections. I won't bore you with technical specificity, but suffice it to say that this whole thing is a rather lengthy procedure.

I then created three 3D spheres and assigned to them different textures. Hit render, and shabam! You have the resulting image! I can't wait to try it out on some video...soon!

What now?

Well, I finally graduated.  My degree you say?  Good question!  It's either: a BFA in Digital Film and Video, or a BS in Digital Media Production, I haven't a clue.  They changed the name of the program on me about halfway in, and I'm not sure what I'm getting.  I rather think it will be the BS, and that's fine with me.  Something about "Digital Film and Video" seems redundant doesn't it?

Anyway, this post will have to serve as foundation for future blogs to come, so lets throw in some video huh?!

This was my first time using PFtrack, a matchmoving (camera/object tracking) application.  I didn't have any footage of my own to use, so I just "borrowed" some footage from Lord of the Rings.  The footage was tracked in PFtrack, and then imported into Maya.  In maya, I made some primitives and lights and then rendered it out.

It's incredibly short, but I don't think too bad for a first go at matchmoving and 3D integration.  I think this was when I got stung by the matchmoving bug, as pulling this off seemed like magic to me.

p.s. I forgot that the name of the post is "What now?"  Seems like a question I'm getting a lot currently, and one that I should perhaps address.  So basically my plan is thus: Continue learning as much as I can regarding the various disciplines I am passionate about (matchmoving, compositing, Editing, 3D modeling etc.) and update my reel with the resulting projects.  Other than that, I will of course be seeking gainful employment!  :)