Season Greetings
Have some nice holidays!
Here is a small animation our team at Effects Garden did as season greetings. Enjoy!
Camera Work
One thing that many CG artists don’t get right at first is camera movement. It’s all too easy to do things with the camera that is not possible in the real world. Moves that defy inertia and gravity – or even space as it moves through obstacles.
One great way to learn about camera work is Hollywood Camera Work Master Class. They now also released an add-on Hot Moves for those trailer-worthy shots. The master class is a great resource on learning how to block out shots – especially character driven ones. Hot moves is more about those “wow” moments.
Luckily, all those moves are relatively easy to do in CG at no cost. Once you start to move in the physical realm it really gets expensive and complicated. So enjoy what you can do in CG 
Oh, and pay close attention to your frame rates, exposure and shutter speeds while you are at it. It is equally important to the way you move your camera to get a great result.
Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with Hollywood Camera Work. I just happen to find their training videos a great resource that I like to recommend to you.
Industry News (2010#28)
OptiTrack Insight Virutal Camera System looks like an affordable solution for a virtual camera system as used on films like Ironman 2 (see Cinefex issue 122, pg.59 showing ILM’s real-time virtual camera system) or Avatar.
RED and Camera (2010#27)
RED News
It has been a busy week over at RED and it seems that Jim Jannard still is vocal:
- earlier this week, Jim Jannard answered a lot of questions in an open FAQ session at reduser.net. A summary of his answers can be found here.
- RED released REDCINE-X build 256 and REDline build 256
- The RED Bomb EVF is now shipping. Backorders are served first and are expected to be fullfilled by the end of August.
- Jim Jannard put the RED Pro Zoom 17-50mm and 18-85mm on an EPIC Tattoo. Looks good, just some slight vignetting below 19mm as the 5K sensor area is larger.
- RED and DSC Labs have created the RED Cambook, a 8×11.5″ wire bound book that includes a custom calibrated ChromaDuMonde and two framing charts (priced at $425 in the RED Store).
- Jim Jannard also announced a major improvement in image quality coming up. This should also apply to existing footage.
Other News
Stu Maschwitz posted an insightful article over at prolost.com: Seven Fetishists and why they should relax. Fun and interesting read.
Industry News (2010#27)
Free MoCap data (thanks to tweets from Manuel Casasola Merkle @aixmnu from Aix Sponza):
- Carnegie Mellon University Graphics Lab Motion Capture Database
- Advanced Computing Center for the Arts and Design (ACCAD) Open Motion Project
- mocapdata.com
- MocapClub.com
Lucas Martell released a new episode of his Pigeon Impossible podcast on Youtube:
Cinema 4D (2010#27)
Update
Update 11.532 has been released. Bug fixes include:
- improved stability (MoGraph caching)
- spline Mask fixes
- fixes for Tracer with Thinking Particles
- enhanced Collada .dae support and VRML2 fixes
- Quicktime problem (especially with NET Render) fixed
- fixed Sun expression
- COFFEE evaluate() with pre-11.5 behavior
- and more fixes …
Again, on Windows don’t update running the 64-bit version but update from the 32-bit version as there could be an issues with a service not stopping correctly that gets started with the 64-bit version (I suspect its the 32-bit Quicktime compatibility layer).
Plugins
- Catus Dan has a new plugin HPB View that shows the HPB rotational values through guides.
- Morph Mill is a set of plugin designed to assist in the creation and editing of morph meshes.
Assets
- Dave Davidson is selling his Living Room Scene over @ RenderPimp.
Training
- Training Video on Slow-Mo with Cloth for Soft-Body Simulation by Tim Clapham @ HelloLuxx
- Robert Leger’s video HowTo #9 Part 2 on Range Mapper, Layer Shader and more.