Archive for September, 2009

Thoughts: Should I go to school to study CG or VFX?

Sunday, September 27th, 2009

This question seems to come up quite a bit on various forums: “Should I go to school to study 3D computer graphics or visual fx”. The answer is yes. Or no. Or maybe. That’s not very definitive is it? Well, neither are the needs of newcomers and studios. I won’t go into which school you should go to, that is a whole kettle of fish and you are better off asking people like ex-students on the afore mentioned forums.

Goofy hat? Check!

Goofy hat? Check!

Maybe a better question to ask is: “Do I need to go to school”. And the answer is: it depends. At this point you might be wanting to stick a sharpened pencil in my ear while screaming “Well what’s the bloody point of you or you blog, eh Matt?” and you might be right. Here is my general view on *needing* to get a piece of paper for your qualifications. For the more art focused side of the industry, personally I don’t feel you need qualifications. You need to be able to show you have the chops to do the work. Being able to produce good work on time and on (or under) budget is more important than a degree. For the more technical sides, like TD’s (Technical Directors), scripters, programmers etc, the fact is that studios do often like to see some kind of accredited qualifications.

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Tips: K.I.S.S. – Keep It Simple Stupid

Sunday, September 20th, 2009

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I realise you have probably heard this pithy little acronymn before, but really, they are words to live by. Or an acronymn to live by. Or whatever.

If you are doing a small project, or more likely, a one man/woman project there is the temptation to think big. Sometimes a little too big. There is nothing wrong with having grand plans, and I am all about using our Mad Skillz to make low-budget look high budget, but there is something to be said for a simple, snappy idea well executed.

While it’s not compositing, check out this little short. Under 1 minute, tight like a drum and funny as all get out

Or perhaps you have heard of a little movie called District 9? If not, then shame on you and everything you stand for. If you have, I am assuming you have seen director Neill Blomkamp’a original short “Alive in Joburg” made a few years ago. 6m25sec and it got turned into a feature. A solid idea well executed with no extra fat.

For one more example, go back and check out that short vid I posted, Escape from City 17. Short, snappy, low budget but focused and done well.

K.I.S.S.

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Site News: Down time to try and fix Wordpress

Sunday, September 6th, 2009

Well, something has changed and I don’t know what it is.  The site template is out of wack and the pagination (being able to choose older pages) at the bottom of the site has completely disappeared.

To be honest, I am getting quite sick of Wordpress.  Yes it might be free, but it seems to have numerous bugs for even the most basic things you need to do.  I still can’t get the visual editor to do proper breaks between paragraphs without resorting to HTML hacks or doing in-depth edits of css stylesheets.  This should be able to be done in the control panel, not by coding.

In any event, I am too frustrated with it at the moment to battle trying to get a simple post up.

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Tips: Using match moving to extend your VFX budget and look

Sunday, September 6th, 2009

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Match moving.  That darkest of visual FX arts.  Well, apart from rigging and those boffins that code in Python, but I digress.

To my mind, one of the best ways to increase the production value of your project is to take advantage of the power of match moving for set extensions, integration of FX elements and insertion of your 3D CG.  It seems to me that the first primary “go to” for newcomers is greenscreen.  Students can’t wait to get the green bedsheets up or spraypaint some plywood and get some bad actors, or classmates at a pinch and shoot some truly horrible footage.

Why not use greenscreen? I am not saying don’t use it, but it’s not the be all and end all, and when you are at the low-budget end of things, frankly they can cause more issues than they solve.  Apart from people thinking that greenscreen is some magic panacea that can solve anything, you have to light them well.  Even then, you are probably shooting with a low-end handy-cam which is going to give you rubbish results.  Keying badly lit DV shot greenscreen is a guaranteed way for you to want to stab a pencil into your ear.

So why would you consider matchmoving.  Well, as with a lot of visual effects, less is often more.  As you probably know, creating photo-real environments is a tall ask, even for high-end studios let alone individuals.  Matchmoving or tracking to the rescue!  Why not consider shooting some cool locations for your short and then extending the backgrounds to give more depth/sci-fi buildings etc?  Being further away you can get away with less detail and more atmospherics.  Check out The Purchase Brothers fantastic “Escape from City 17″, a Half-Life 2 fan film.  I recall reading that the budget for this short was around $600 and that was mainly for costumes and props.  Checking out their website shows their other projects are equally impressive with regards to matchmoving.

Staying with the Half-Life 2 them, “What’s in the Box” was an amazing short shot live-action through a European city with some excellent match-moving of effects and heads up displays.

So where can you get software to practice?  As it happens, you can still get a copy of Icarus, the pre-cursor to PFTrack  on the net.  Colin Levy has a donwload link on his website and has kind made several video tutorials to get you started.

Films to check out: District 9 (love the mother ship shots), Cloverfield

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