WEEK 9 Matte Painting IN NUKE

-Develop a matte painting in Photoshop

-Build a 3d environment  to project on PSD

Techniques and tips

this is reference video_how to setup a matte painting in nuke

I tried keying in PS using the pen tool and combining them and finally exporting a psd file into nuke

I did the keying in ps and divided it into three different layers, but I imported it into nuke and realized that one layer was missing. I spent a long time, finally found the reason, because I can’t use the ortho stack in ps, so the effect can’t be applied to the nuke, so in the end can only show two layers in the nuke, in the future, or need to key each picture, in order to achieve the perfect effect.

Finally, I can create a “projected camera” and add “cards” to arrange the position of each layer to make the spatial effect more visible. matte painting is usually used to create large parts of a movie, and I think it’s very useful for me, and I’ll use it in my personal projects.

WEEK 8 Garage Final Assignment in NUKE

In this assignment, I followed the steps required by the instructor step by step, which helped me to understand how a complete synthesis process works.

For example,

1. I need to stabilize the lens and add “lens distortion” which is a very important step to reduce the distortion of the lens and make the composite image more professional.

2.clean the markers in the original video clip, by using “rotopaint” and “frame hold” together.


3.Modeling the mechanical model in Maya. At the beginning, gonzalo suggested us to find some reference images, which really helped us to understand the model. In particular, when I was modeling I would look at the reference drawings, which gave me more detail.

4.I used Houdini to create the lightning effect, this was a very challenging step. Houdini is a very difficult software in my opinion, I needed to combine it with some tutorials on the internet to realize my idea, especially the “line” node was very useful.

5.Last but not least I made some ice crunching effects in ue5 and imported them into nuke, but I rendered them without shadows, which made my effects look very fake. So I added another layer in nuke and changed the value of “grade” and added “blur”.

week 7 Shot script about zombie story

In the future world, humans and zombies have been coexisting with each other for many years. People’s attitudes towards zombies have gradually changed and they are beginning to accept them as part of society. On this day, an ordinary zombie decides to help a grandmother crossing the street, even though he doesn’t need to worry about the dangers of vehicles like humans do. The grandmother smiles at him gratefully and says thank you, and this action makes him late for an important interview.

When he finally made it to the interview, he felt panicked. His brain was no longer as flexible as it used to be, he stumbled over his answers, and he lost all confidence. He felt sure that he had lost his chance at the job; after all, he was an outlier in this human-dominated society.

However, he was wrong. The interviewer announced the result at the end of the interview and he was surprisingly hired! Everyone was very surprised and asked the interviewer why he had chosen a candidate who had performed so poorly.

The interviewer smiled and explained, “Because zombies don’t need to sleep.” He explained that since zombies don’t need to spend as much time sleeping each day as humans do, this zombie would be able to provide the company with more work time and energy. They believe that this potential productivity advantage far outweighs his poor performance in the interview.

Center shot:

When the main character decides to go and help the grandmother cross the street, the camera can follow him and capture his determination and kindness. (Dirty shot with Mr. Zombie’s shoulder in the foreground in relation to the back of the scene for an occlusion)

In the scene where the main character decides to go and help the grandmother cross the street, use a medium camera movement to follow his steps, the

Close-up shot:

When the interviewer announces the hiring of the protagonist, use a close-up close-up to capture the details of the protagonist’s shocked expression and the interviewer’s smile.

Close-ups of the time at the traffic light when the protagonist is helping the grandmother cross the street, highlighting the importance of time at this moment, which is also an important clue throughout the story.

Rapid editing photography:

In the scene where the protagonist is late for the interview, rapid editing is used to alternate between the scene where he is rushing and the scene where the interviewer is waiting, increasing the sense of rhythm and tension. For example, in the scene where the main character is in a hurry, I can use a series of rapid editing shots, including a close-up of the main character holding an alarm clock, a panoramic shot of the main character running down the street, a side shot of a pedestrian on the side of the road, a quick shot of a traffic vehicle, etc. These shots will alternate quickly between the main character holding an alarm clock and the interviewer waiting for him to arrive at the interview. These shots would alternate quickly to emphasize the urgency of the protagonist’s lateness and the challenges he faces.

Meanwhile, at the interview location, I could alternate scenes showing the interviewer waiting with close-ups of his impatient fingers tapping on the desk, side shots of him frowning, close-ups of him looking at his watch, and so on. The quick editing of these shots will increase the tension and anxiety of the audience, making them more engaged in the story and looking forward to the final result.

Finally, when the interviewer explains the reason for the hiring, rapid editing is used to alternately show the interviewer’s words and the protagonist’s facial reactions, increasing the tension and suspense of the plot.

Dynamic camera shooting:

During the interview, the slight shaking of the camera to show the protagonist’s nervousness and uneasiness can convey his inner anxiety more vividly.

WEEK 7 COLLABORATE WITH OUR GROUP

reference video

I referred to the above YouTube tutorial video on making an undersea effect and it was very useful to me.

Referring to the steps he gave,

1. I first installed the “Water Plugin” and added the water form in my scene.

2. In order to be able to show the colors under the water and simulate the sunlight underwater, I need to add a “box” and add a “post process”, it can be used to adjust the blue color of the whole scene.

3. If I want to make the sea water a little green, I can adjust the “gamma curve”.

This was my first attempt, but it wasn’t very difficult for me because Emily taught us how to create a water material in the first semester.

underwater effects

WEEK 6 Lumminance_channels IN NUKE

I tried to tweak the green screen background with the nodes given by gonzalo. Regarding the treatment of the hair, I had to select an “IBK Color” node and choose dark and light colors of G (green) to show as much detail as possible in the hair. I can also use the “Filter erode” to eliminate noise. It’s worth noting that it looks very realistic and I used the Luminance node to subtract the snowflake from the background and place it in the foreground so it looks great.

WEEK 6 COLLABORATE WITH OUR GROUP

This week I’m going to look for a lot of reference images of coral models and go with c4d to create the base model and then import it into zbrush to achieve some texture.

First of all, I tried to use c4d to make the base model, using the “volume modeling” in c4d to better simulate the random growth of the coral. Due to some problems with the number of faces, I had to import the model into zbrush to remesh it, which was a very useful way to do it. This was a very useful way to remesh the model, and added a lot of subdivision to add a lot of texture and detail to the surface of the coral.

I tried to use a variety of ways to make different forms of coral. For example, I used zbrush brushes to make the tentacles of the coral and then added textures to them. Also, I used c4d to create the base model and then painted the model with zbrush. Another way is that I use alpha channel and download some alpha maps from the website and use it on the coral model. This gives me very distinctive corals that surprise me.

For terrain, I still use a program called “world creator”. This software is very helpful, I only need to adjust the terrain in the software, and select the terrain features to help me create beautiful terrain details, and finally I export the FBX file to MAYA, which saves a lot of time to create the terrain.

Finally, I put the models all together in maya and added lighting and made a test video using the Arnold renderer. Next I imported them into UE5 to test the undersea filters and lighting to simulate the ocean environment as much as possible.

video of test

WEEK 6 Key light node IN NUKE

Green Screen Extraction:

– Correct workflows for Green screen extraction

– Key light node

– Despill techniques

– IBK workflow

– Learn about different techniques for key

– De-grain shots

– Despill the shots

– Lumma key

Luminance Key

we can used the keyer to changed the space of colour.

add: can adjust the data of value to change the dark or white in the picture.

Add Channels:

Key light: it can change the background of video or picture. ( it would be green or other colour )

Primate :

week 5 personal project concept

This week I’m talking to Klaus about an idea for my final project. The theme I was thinking about for my personal project was about urban zombies. I wanted to make some videos about cities and then create a scene of an abandoned city and put zombie models in it. But after talking with Klaus I thought that my story could have many possibilities and his ideas helped me a lot.

In the beginning, I only envisioned the horror side of zombies, but Klaus taught me how to think about things from multiple perspectives, how to tell a funny “joke”, and I had to create an eye-catching video in a short period of time, which was a huge challenge for me.

I needed to do more than just show my zombies and my scenes, I needed to organize my beginning, middle and end. For example, I could design a scene of a gentleman zombie walking in a ruined city with a tie on, he meets the zombie lady who makes him fall in love at first sight, he likes the way the zombie lady has only one eyeball and the other hand is about to drop, and the way he shows his love is by parting a little bit of his own brain to the zombie lady.

Another story is that a zombie was walking down the road while he saw a dog and he was happy to see the dog sitting nicely on the side of the road. He walks up to the dog, pets it, and gives the dog a bone of his own. However after the dog eats it, he excitedly chases the zombie and proceeds to rip off his other arm, scaring the zombie into running away.

Next I want to create a story about “Zombies at Work”, which is many years from now, when zombies and humans live together in this world. One day, a zombie goes to help a grandmother crossing the street and delays the interview and stumbles over the questions, but in the end he wins the interview. The answer given by the interviewer is: “Because zombies don’t need to sleep.”

WEEK 5 VFX WORKSHOP ABOUT 3D EQUALIZER

  • When I use F2 and F5 I can check the camera distortion.
  • Step 01 :Using the helmet project as an example, when I finished tracking the first scene, I needed to continue tracking the character’s head. However, this time I need to create another new folder inside “points” and I will be able to use a completely new tracking point to complete the tracking.
F5 2D view / F6 3D view
open the transform,which can change the position of the helmet.
  • Step 02 : When I finish the FBX import of the helmet, I need to move it around and see if it’s accurate. In this case, I can use “Open New Window” in “Window” to show both 2D and 3D interface. Then click on “project point in 3D models” to match the tracking points I made earlier to the helmet, creating a simulation of the helmet and following the movement of the character’s head. And click “alt + c” to create result.
  • Step 03 : After I have tracked the head of the character, I will use the “export file as maya” and import it into maya, I can clearly see the position of the simulated helmet, so I can import the FBX model to match the simulated helmet. Note: Always use symmetrical tracking points when tracking a character’s head.
  • Important thing:click image controls enabled can adjust data of image. otherwise you can’t see the change of color.

WEEK 4 COLLABORATE WITH OUR GROUP

We’ve had two meetings this week and it was decided that our theme should be more realistic, so I’m not going to go with my previous proposal. And after a lot of discussion, we’ve decided to focus on the “visual poetry” of modeling the scenes and animating the renderings.

the process of project in MIRO ↓

Here’s what Poppy(she from the 2D animation) wrote about the poem that we’ll be focusing on to animate the scene.

Our beating heart

Many of us
Do not know
What’s inside our sea
90 per cent still
remains a mystery

For example did you know
That our world is mostly ocean?
And that its water is always moving
Constantly in motion

That its floor has many levels
And that it is many shades of blue
That most of it is dark
And that it holds the most life too

From the largest to the smallest
Creatures you will find
Some of them extraordinary
Some will blow your mind

Like the Manta Ray
The smartest of them all
Or the Giant Squid
Or Octupi that crawl

But it is not only creatures
That are living in the deep
There is so much more to ocean life
That we need to keep

It is like our beating heart
Or the blood beneath our skin
We cannot live without it
And all it holds within

After the third meeting, we will draw our own version of the story. Below are the content of the shots and story sketches I’ve conceptualized.

  • A vertical shot showing multiple layers of the ocean from top to bottom, divided into three layers: the sunlit zone, the twilight zone, and the abyssal zone (This part, I’m going to I create part of the 3D model and finally put it into nuke for compositing).
  • 01/ Sunlit Zone: The area is alive with vivid turquoise and azure hues. Coral reefs thrive in this area, filled with colorful fish and other marine life.
  • 02/ Twilight Zone:The sunlight diminishes and the ocean takes on a deeper blue and indigo color. Unique and often bizarre organisms, and some glowing creatures, illuminate the darkness with a mesmerizing glow.
  • 03/ Abyssal Zone:The colors here are muted and life is sparse. However, even in this extreme environment, certain organisms, such as lamellipods and extreme microorganisms, have adapted to the high pressures and cold temperatures of the seabed, and yet here emerges a fantastical underwater city

After a fourth meeting to discuss this, we agreed that the last storyboard would be modified to be more realistic. However, I’m working with another 3D animation student called Negin, and together we’re going to finish the modeling and rendering part of the scene, starting with a basic square in MAYA to show the structure of the scene and the camera movement. Next week I will focus on modeling the coral and cliff part and find some pictures for reference.