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Sunday, October 6, 2013

Compositing Basics: Part 4

I have got on to basic chroma-keying. The files below are just stills, so it could have been done in photoshop. However, the workflow used here applies to video files as well. The footage here was shot in 4:2:0, so I have blurred the green and blue channels to minimise the errors. Other than that, it is just very basic chroma keying, using the Keylight node.

All the assets and plates used on this output are from PL studios Inc., who operate the Digital Tutors website. 

The output:


Getting started with chroma-keying
The node graph for this file:

Node Graph
I also tried out another file. The screen on this was not very clean and it was a bit harder to integrate her into the backplate. Also, as the plate extended from foreground to background, I had to mimic the depth of field accordingly. For this I created several different roto masks and then added different level of blurs on them.

Practising on a relatively harder plate
The node graph for this file:

The node graph
 Well that's it on that one. Things are heating up here with compositing. More posts coming up soon :)


Friday, October 4, 2013

Compositing Basics: Part 3

This one is from Digital Tutors. It is from the tutorial titled Getting Started with Nuke. This is a quiet nice tutorial which helped me consolidate the stuff I learned from the NCCA notes.

All the assets and plates used on this output are from PL studios Inc., who operate the Digital Tutors website. 

This is the final output:

The final Comp output
This is the node graph for this comp:

Robot Comp Node Graph
 So this comp had four components.
  • The BG plate
  • The Robot
  • Robot Shadow
  • Gun heat
The Robot

The Shadow

BG Plate

Gun Heat Ring
 I started off by merging all the layers together to have a working comp.

Thursday, October 3, 2013

Compositing Basics: Part 2

This was the second exercise I undertook. While still very basic in nature, it has some more elements of compositing. This is the final result:

The final result
You can watch the video HERE!!!

This project has four parts:
  1. The spaceship
  2. The smoke
  3. Spaceship shadow
  4. Backplate
I cannot show the node graph here as this belongs to the NCCA, Bournemouth University.

This was, as you can see, still very basic in nature still, but I got to work with a few more nodes such as blur, invert, time offset, shuffle, multiply and rotopaint. 

Compositing Basics: Part 1

I have started off with the "Introduction to Nuke" and I am actually finding it very interesting. There were quiet a few things I learned in this lesson. I got used to the interface, which is just like any other graphics software. It is easy to use and intuitive. I just find the "Save" dialogue box a bit annoying in Nuke and I kept overwriting my files for a bit.

This set of nodes started with an exercise where I was supposed to slap comp 3 layers on top of each other. This mainly showed me the use of the Merge(over) operation. In the end there was also a blur added onto it.

Final comp made out of 3 parts
The image above had 3 parts:
The BG wall, The Table and The Flower.

Assets courtesy NCCA, Bournemouth University.


Nuke Time!!! Or should I say compositing time!

So, after years of wanting to do it, I have got around to starting to learn compositing and I am doing it on Nuke. I have given myself around 8 months to become reasonably proficient in it. I am using several different resources for the purpose. Most important ones are:
  • NCCA Digital Effects notes
  • Digital Tutors
  • fxphd
  • cmivfx
Apart from these organised and targeted sources, I am also looking at several blogs and am following several artists who share their work-flow on-line.

I also have some books that I am planning to follow. From the top of my head I can think of the following:
  • The art and science of digital compositing: Ron Brinkman
  • The VES Handbook
  • Fix it in Post: Jack James
  • Rotoscoping: Benjamin Bratt
  • Matchmoving: Dobbert