29 March 2013

Even the Rubber Ducks Are Leaving...

Here's another snowy video.......



Even the rubber ducks are trying to find somewhere warmer to be this spring!!

I made this as a quick compositing exercise. It was interesting to experiment with ways to get the ducks floating and in the end I opted to use the Maya ocean tool and I turned each duck into a boat object which constrained the X and Z rotation as well as the translate Y but still allowed me to animate the X and Z translation and Y rotation of the ducks enabling me to make them appear to float in the right direction with a fairly natural bobbing motion.

I like the effect, it's not perfect in this video but I've created a neat workflow for myself now which I will be able to apply much more effectively in the future.

23 March 2013

Snow Joke, It's Spring!!

It's March 23rd, spring is officially here so what better way to spend the morning than to traipse around the valley in 8 inches of unexpected snow?

I went out with an idea to shoot some footage for a project that I'd like to make but it was so cold and the fact that my camera was getting wet (note to self, get some sort of camera umbrella!) made me cut the excursion short but not without grabbing a few scenes to play with today.....



I figured that walking backwards and then playing the video forwards would make for a pretty neat effect... and it does. This video is what I was able to create with a few minutes of impromptu shooting and I reckon that with a chunk of pre-production planning I'll be able to come up with something pretty nice.

Maybe when the weather gets a bit better eh!!


4 March 2013

Kinetica-tastic

Apologies for how quiet it's been around here since December.

Amongst other things an operation on my knee stopped me from sitting at my computer for a few weeks but things are better now and the creative juices are flowing!

So, I went to Kinetica Art Fair last weekend and shot this video......



I used my trusty Nex 5N but only took the 18-55 kit lens which is a good all rounder but, at f2.8, was no where near fast enough to deal with the poor lighting conditions. In future I'll have to make sure to take at least one fast prime lens with me on any trip that I intend to record.

The main reason for going to Kinetica was to meet up with a Dutch artist called Rob Hermans who goes by the name IEOIE. For the past 7 years or so, I have acted as technical director for all of his 3D video work and we were presenting a collaborative piece on the Musion stage at the fair.

Musion Systems are a modern take on the peppers ghost illusion that has regained popularity in recent years at entertainment events through the impression that it gives of holographic projection. It was really great to see our creation effectively floating in space on their stage and it has certainly inspired ideas for future projects of my own and with Rob.