Hey everyone! I post this originy in another forum, but i think will be nice put this here too! U guys are great!

After some years think “i need learn 3d” i’m start doing this time! i have a few months ahead with a lot of freetime and i think learn 3d and anothers stuff will be a nice investiment with this free time! : )

After some reseachers i choose XSI to be my first 3d app to learn, the xsi visual effects its blowing mind!! But i completed lost! I already watch something about 30h of tutoriais (both theorical and practices) i starting to get a idea about how the stuff works. But still far away of completed a full work on XSI. (And i start to see that will be impossible learning 3d withour learn a little bit of anothers packages like Maya and Max)

Im not want make 3d animations or 3d for games, i want use on visual effects for movies and ad. : )
(This reel show some tecs that im on porsuit to know and understand (for start)

)

So, i have this idea about make a video to exercice and put together all this information. But i’m completed lost, i never done any of this before and i really need a help in that, of course, not a step by step, but direction to have this work done. : )

I have this nice footage from a 5d mark, that i want use for this.

[B]frame #101 / 336[/B]

[B]frame #170 / 336[/B]

[B]frame #326 / 336[/B]

[B]Total Length:[/B] 14 second
[B]Lens:[/B] 50mm (EF)
Movements:  The cat head move and the camera move a little bit together
Shake: A câmera shake a little bit, but i think that its good in this way, no need to stabilized.

How to make:
On second 6 or 7, a 3d Camera will fly to the left eye and show a really beatifull eye on macro on slowmotion!
(Trick: Macro or not, the camera still follow the eye, i have no clue about how to make)
Not like that

I thing more closer and with a texture and render more like that:

The frame more like that:

But instead of the sun, the black hole on the center eye (i forgot the name of that in english) and instead of the stars, will be the crazy-sun-texture-look

The camera move again quick jumping to the black hole, inside crazy stuff with ice, emFlock, Momentum and anothers motionworks.

After a while the camera back to the normal footage. Like a timewarp or something, some blur to give a sensation of a really quick camera movement.

I think will be nice do that and will make me pass throug differents elements on vsf workflow!
i have a idea about how to make, but i never did any of this before!

1. I need do a 3d track of the eye cat and export to xsi.
2. On XSI i will somehow put this track information and recreat the eye.
3. Somehow do the camera animation
4. Render with mentalray to have a incredibule hyper realistic look
5. Composit? Where? I can make everything on xsi?

As u can see, i not identifed a lot of steps to finished this work! : /

(Audio workflow, is possible synch the audio with ice elements?)

I hope can finished this work in 1 month, its possible? or too optimistic?

How can i improve my workflow for this task?

Cheers!

(this is a non commercial work and i dont want a step by step, not at all!, already exist thons of information, im just need a north cuz im lost on all this information)

"Life is just a ride”

Hello modopolis, welcome to the forums.

Thx man! Better repply than yours its impossibible! : )

Right, as i understand, your shot would have 3 distinct parts. A footage of the cat, camera movement to the detail of the eye and than all the effects on the iris of the eye.

Yeap, exactly!

Now, im not sure how you imagined this exactly, so bare with me for a moment.

Your plan is to track the elements of the shot and recreate them in virtual space by projecting them on the geometry, right? Then you’ll have animated camera to take care of the transition to the close up and so on. Right off the bat, this could land you in all sorts of troubles. Judging from your frames and described movements, 3D tracking might prove very hard since there aren’t many clear reference points for the tracker to grab onto… And the cat being furry is additional complication…

3d tracking might be hard? as i think about the contrast between the black fur and the white sheet will make this tracking really easy. humm.
But deffinily if i recreat the entire cat on virtual space, will be hard, i want stay away from complex modelling and rigging. Still dont exist any kind of scan or something than can make this more automatic?

On the other hand, if your plan is to simply track the pupil, have the effects only inside the eye, and than transition into the close up in a more 2 dimensional manner, that is a more realistic goal. In that case you would create your effects and a whole close up part of the shot in 3d (or a composting package like after effects), render it all out and use this abrupt movement of the camera to transition between the footage and the render thus simplifying the whole process immensely.

This is great, i use after for a couple years now, but i want use Fusion or Nuke, its time to move to some nod based compositing package. A question is, Fusion and Nuke have the own 3d tracker tools build, the difference between pftrack or syntheyes is really huge?

The workflow would be:
1. stabilize the camera
2. track the eye
3. create the close up of the pupil (easier said then done considering your plan is to make it look like the surface of the star which, to look like on your ref pic, would require some serious particle work and render power/knowledge - advanced or pro level, im afraid)
4. render it out
---- from this point on, you’re either gonna move the work to a composting package or continue with xsi built in compositor which im not familiar with and cant comment on its abilities
5. get your track info and create a convex plane over the eye
6. project the render onto the plane
7. now you should have everything lined up looking from the tracked camera, so only thing left is to do masks and similar corrections
8. destabilize the footage (reverse the action from step 1)

1 and 2 - Nice! Thx!
3 - Thats a thing that i really want construct a really solid knowlogde, its about make renders and particles, i like this much more than modelling or rigging. Right now im study the materials elemments (cuz for me Lumpert, Phong, etc, start to mind something now! I found a great library in Blender wiki. (parallel to other courses for sure)
4 - i dont found anything about xsi compositor! : / thats is sad! is really so bad that no one use?
5 - I dont get! On part 3, to creat a close up, i need model the eye right? its not the same? can u explain more about? 
8 - I have no ideia this need about stabilize and destabilize the footage! Great, great! But like, when u stabilize a footage, normally appear some black frame, and u need scale up the image to still fit the size of the footage! But scaling up will make me trouble to make the anothers steps right?

The transition part i would suggest doing in composite and keeping it simple and out of 3d.

Last part would be the eye and that’s basically a step 3 of the above described workflow.

To answer some of your questions:
- ICE is not an audio editor
- ICE can register audio waves and use the information but i think you’ll need a plugin and a couple of compounds for that
- If you’re a beginner, and still learning most of this stuff, i think it might take a little longer than you think.
Being enthusiastic and optimistic is not bad, tho
- You could improve your workflow by relying more on composite as its a lot cheaper/faster
- Do the tests on a smaller scale first!

NooO!! u get me wrong! Definily ICE is not an audio editor, i was think make the particles from ice synch with the audio! A rufuless exemple is a Sound Keys from Red Giant, with i can hook up some audiofrequencys and put on X particle.

This is a exemple: (not so good tho)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9VomishxxU

Sorry for the long post but, hopefully, you’ve got something useful out of it.


Cheers

No man, u replly was perfect! And forum arent a 140 caracter twitter! : ) Thx a lot! Really!

"Life is just a ride”