Made with After Effects

In what is become an annual tradition, the good folks over at motion.tv run a Made with After Effects competition. We participate in critiquing the entries, including pointing out the strong points as well as sharing our years of experience in suggesting ways to improve the work even further. The resulting discussion - as well as viewing the winners - is something we think is educational for all users looking to raise their game.

Adobe MAX 2011 Technology Sneak Peeks

Adobe’s big annual MAX conference finished a couple of weeks ago, and as part of it they included a series of technology sneak peeks. I’ve gone through the videos posted on AdobeTV and pulled out the ones of most interest to us video folks:

Stereoscopic 3D in After Effects CS5.5

You may remember our blog post on the “inherent” problems with stereoscopic 3D that famed film editor Walter Murch pointed out in an open letter to film critic Roger Ebert. We took Murch’s comments as inspiration to explore workflows in the latest release of After Effects that might work around some of Murch’s concerns: Namely, getting the eyes and brain to converge and focus on the same object (preferably one the same distance from the viewer as the screen).

Updated: Adobe Warp Stabilizer (P)Review

As noted earlier this week, Adobe TV posted a video - attached to the top of this post - that previews a new technology called the Warp Stabilizer. I’ve had a chance to work with a pre-release version of the Warp Stabilizer, and Adobe kindly gave me permission to pass along some of my experiences.

2+ Hours of Free Video Training on Shatter

Many After Effects users are familiar with Brian Maffitt, founder of Total Training. Brian also ran a plug-in company called Atomic Power for a couple of years. His Evolution plug-in set was distinguished by 1) deep controls, and 2) hours of video training that came free in the box. Adobe bought Atomic Power and integrated most of the plug-ins into After Effects, including Shatter, Card Dance, Card Wipe, Caustics, Wave World, and Colorama. Most of the controls in those plug-ins haven’t changed since AE version 4 (not CS4, but the 4 before there was CS).

What does that history lesson have to do with today? Brian has started diving into his archive of video training, with the intention of making available for free still-useful material that doesn’t fit into the current Total Training library anymore. He started by posting the 2+hours of training he originally created for the Shatter effect on Total Training’s YouTube channel. Below are all 6 parts:

“Why 3D Doesn’t Work and Never Will”

While a large portion of both the media creation and consumption industries gear up to produce and support 3D films and video, others are digging in their heels and asking about the fit and fabric of the emperor’s clothes. Much loved sound designer and film editor Walter Murch - as well as film curmudgeon critic Roger Ebert - are two of those questioners. This blog post by Ebert reprints a detailed letter from Murch about the inherent technical issues of stereoscopic films that detract from the esthetic appreciation of them as well. It’s quite meaty - I suggest you go read it all - but the central issue Murch brings up is what he refers to as the ‘convergence/focus’ issue: “3D films require us to focus at one distance and converge at another. And 600 million years of evolution has never presented this problem before.”

Your Daily After Effects Fix

I’ve mentioned previously that Todd Kopriva’s Region of Interest blog is one of the best sources of essential After Effects information. And it still is. But a few additional sources have really blossomed as constant fountains of After Effects goodness:

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2010 Motion Graphics Design Census

The unofficial, web-based Motion Graphics Design Census for 2010 is now available from their web site. It compiles over 5500 responses - distributed roughly evenly between the US and non-US - into a series of responses about age, software, and - primarily - income. Of course, it’s only a survey of those who responded rather than the industry as a whole. Also, not everyone responded to every question - for example, only 219 self-employed artists offered how much they charged per hour, and most of the charts are based just on US respondents. With those caveats, here’s what stuck out for us:

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