Project Reality Forums

Hello there fellow soldiers/movie lovers/movie makers!

I was working on some new ideas and VFX for the sequel to our machinima minimovie "A day in squad foxtrot" I loved this shot so i thot i can share it with you guys

Maybe you'll learn something or atleast get some inspiration from this little testmovie.
Btw i would really like some feedback and criticism, what did you like? and what was bad? All this info is very very good for future improvements

Very nice video, and nice tips too, makes me want to try finishing a little project I had going for 0.95

Also made me appreciate the British snow dpm geometries!
Good choice of music too from Inception right?

13DarkWolf wrote:Very nice video, and nice tips too, makes me want to try finishing a little project I had going for 0.95

Also made me appreciate the British snow dpm geometries!
Good choice of music too from Inception right?

hell yea, inception FTW

I want PR to look like that.

hey dude, some effects are looking really nice... i most like the depth of field effect and the colour corrector.. so you are only using after effects for those effects? i missed them in sony vegas... guess i have to purchase after effects now.. great inspirations, thanks!

Matzejo wrote:hey dude, some effects are looking really nice... i most like the depth of field effect and the colour corrector.. so you are only using after effects for those effects? i missed them in sony vegas... guess i have to purchase after effects now.. great inspirations, thanks!

Yea this test is After Effects only used vegas just for transition (i like to do final cuts in vegas its faster and smoother )

Btw thanks for the feedback

oh P.S. srry if I made it look like after effects make those effect automatically, you can achieve the same results in sony vegas.
Depth of field is made with a simple "Gaussian blur" effect (that is present in vegas too) with a mask, that covers half the screen, the soldier and the tree.
And for color corrention I used "Curves" (that effect is in vegas too) + saturation decrease

You DONT need to buy after fx just for that, its a waste of money IMO! you can achieve the same thing with vegas only

Looking good, the only thing I can spot is that the lateral movement of the snowflakes is faster then the speed they drop to the ground which should most likely be the other way around. Also the flash could be more spectacular, think about adding a little distortion in there..

Lordas wrote:Yea this test is After Effects only used vegas just for transition (i like to do final cuts in vegas its faster and smoother )

Btw thanks for the feedback

oh P.S. srry if I made it look like after effects make those effect automatically, you can achieve the same results in sony vegas.
Depth of field is made with a simple "Gaussian blur" effect (that is present in vegas too) with a mask, that covers half the screen, the soldier and the tree.
And for color corrention I used "Curves" (that effect is in vegas too) + saturation decrease

You DONT need to buy after fx just for that, its a waste of money IMO! you can achieve the same thing with vegas only

aah great, thanks for your help!
so how you do that exactly with that mask? is there any link for a tutorial, which describes that? it looks great!

Just follow any tutorial about masking and you're good to go really .

Pretty cool indeed. Thats going to be a nice project if you want to do that for all the frames

The added snow is pretty hefty btw

Quick rundown for Matze for the blur, theres prolly better methods but this is the easiest to explain.

Duplicate the video layer. Fastblur the duplicated layer. Select the layer, click the pen tool to draw a mask around the subject you want to unblurr. And it should be good. If not, select the Blurred layer, hit M on your keyboard and select inverse behind the mask. Now it should be good. Thats a simple mask in AE.

pretty cool vid, I really like the muzzle flash and light effect you gave it.
I just have to note two things though:
you used a filter that made the brit's skin colour...ehm... unlikely, at best (for those that look greyish, not by facial hair but by skintone, no offense intended).
also the in the endresult the uniform seems very white(light effects make it more greyish), no details or strong shadows come forward, this makes it look a little cartoony, especially the helmet.
this may be because of a hasty skinjob by the author of that snowcamo, the contrast with the other kitgeom, especially on the helmet, makes this more likely.

don't let this all put you down, it really looks kind of cool!

That was cool...

Woot! You guys made me happy! Finally some feedback I thot this thread will be pushed down with no comments what so ever Yes it needs polish and thats why I ask you guys to point out the things that are wrong (This is a proven fact that when you work on a thing for too long your eyes will get used to it and you wont see the imperfections!!).

Btw that greyish look on the skin is not an accident I wanted it to look like that, dunno bout you guys but I love that new contrasty washed out look in some movies

Thankyou again

thx cyberzomby! i tried it out and it works! short tut but very useful