Question about Special FX

This might be a silly question but I have been trying to figure this out, and before I ask I would like to say that I Really do understand that it will take alot time and or skill. But I don't give up and will make myself learn it.

Ok here is the Question.

I understnd the basics of Green/blue screen. but never done it or used.

what program will allow professional type editing special Fx as below

Example ( The chase sequence on the bridge in Bad Boys 2 )

Watching the making of the movie ( many times ) they added extra cars on the bridge but they were REAL cars, they said that they filmed a car doing the same moves (blocking) but all by itself on the bridge , and at another location, and then they just repeated that with some of the other added cars, then in post they layered the cars (not sure if that is the right term) all together so it looked like they were all on the bridge at the same time.

I guess they best way to discribe it is that they cut and paste (moving) objects to make look like one scene.

If you have watched the making of bad boys 2 , you should know what I'm talking about
like with the cop car , or with Will's car

I have plans on buying the Complete Adobe Colection Pro, but before I buy anything MAjor I want to know that it's gonna do what I want.

Any help with this area ? or maybe a lead in the Right Direction?

Thanks Everyone
 
You would need a lot of money to do a scene like the one in Bad Boys 2. A big chunk of that movie's $130,000,000 budget probably went into doing that scene. If you want to add extra cars to a street, Adobe AfterEffects and Adobe Photoshop can do the job. It can even do some matchmoving and color correction. If you want more power, I would recommend a program like Discreet's Combustion. Combustion has a better rotoscoper and color corrector, and will give you more options for doing complex special effects scenes.
 
cinematography said:
You would need a lot of money to do a scene like the one in Bad Boys 2. A big chunk of that movie's $130,000,000 budget probably went into doing that scene. If you want to add extra cars to a street, Adobe AfterEffects and Adobe Photoshop can do the job. It can even do some matchmoving and color correction. If you want more power, I would recommend a program like Discreet's Combustion. Combustion has a better rotoscoper and color corrector, and will give you more options for doing complex special effects scenes.

I understand that sequence took a big chuck on there budget, but I wasn't planning on fliping cars off a truck and wrecking everything in site,
I just was using that as a example,

Becasue I have , not bought any program , what would you recommend in complete should i mix and match ? also you said that the adobe after effects and photoshop can add extra cars , are you talking about computer generated images or are you saying that I could film an car in another location and add it in on my main shot with aftereffects and photoshop, on and if so on a scale of 1-10 ten being best (providing the the artist is good) how good can it so it, would it adobe aftereffects and photoshop do the job to make it pass as all objects ( cars ) where shot at the same time in the same place?

also if I should go with Discreet Combustion, would this replace both after effects and photoshop or just one of them., Sorry for all the questions , LOL I am new
 
johnny: the wonderous magic of computer editing allows you to use any kind of car you want, real, computer generated, scale model, illustrated (like hand drawn animation, ie; a cartoon car... think Roger Rabbit), etc... You can do all that with our without the use of blue/green screens, but they make generating a travelling matte much simpler (assuming they're lit correctly).

Other things you might want to look into are matchmoving programs, here's two very good ones that I know of:

Matchmover Pro from RealViz
Boujou (bullet or 3) from 2d3

Boujou is probably the most widely used in the states, and the one from Realviz is probably the most widely used in Europe. Both sites have got demo videos and stuff and essentially both programs do the same thing. Neither are terribly cheap though.

Another nifty program 2d3 has is 'steadymove' for stabilizing shaky footage... there's a few others available from various vendors as well, I've used the one from dynapel (SteadyHand) before with decent results, it can be found for under $100. It doesn't appear to be available directly through dynapel anymore, or at least it's not listed on their site... but here's a link for that too.

I primarily use after effects for my compositing work, I took a look at a demo of Combustion but didn't spend any time to try and learn how to use it.

(By the way, the 2004 demo reel for boujou on the 2d3 website it really impressive, and showcases a lot of highly recognizable things from films and TV commercials... And they've got some really killer looking apps coming out sometime in the future too.. I'm psyched about "Pixeldust")
 
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johnnyReb said:
This might be a silly question but I have been trying to figure this out, and before I ask I would like to say that I Really do understand that it will take alot time and or skill. But I don't give up and will make myself learn it.

Ok here is the Question.

I understnd the basics of Green/blue screen. but never done it or used.

what program will allow professional type editing special Fx as below

Example ( The chase sequence on the bridge in Bad Boys 2 )

Watching the making of the movie ( many times ) they added extra cars on the bridge but they were REAL cars, they said that they filmed a car doing the same moves (blocking) but all by itself on the bridge , and at another location, and then they just repeated that with some of the other added cars, then in post they layered the cars (not sure if that is the right term) all together so it looked like they were all on the bridge at the same time.

I guess they best way to discribe it is that they cut and paste (moving) objects to make look like one scene.

If you have watched the making of bad boys 2 , you should know what I'm talking about
like with the cop car , or with Will's car

I have plans on buying the Complete Adobe Colection Pro, but before I buy anything MAjor I want to know that it's gonna do what I want.

Any help with this area ? or maybe a lead in the Right Direction?

Thanks Everyone


i am just starting out like you, but i have some basic experience in 3D Studio Max and I just purchased Max7 for 2000 bucks. Its online list price is 3800 USD. but you can purchase XSI (Soft Image) for around 600 bucks I understand. And though it will take about a year or so to perfect your skills in Box Modeling a car or even a higher polygon count method You could purchase 3D Models to use in your software to do the special effects for the background scene of cars moving. Just add some motion blur and maybe some debth blur to the background and focus more on the foreground character in front of the screen. I saw a 10x16 foot screen online for 129 bucks. Considering I almost paid that in materials just trying to seam together my own fabric, I might just save up for it and purchase it instead. Also, The guy who sales it told me to use Field depth blur for the screen and it will make your composit alot easier to key out with chromo key.

Vegas is a nice and easy software to use for Chroma Keying. Its just basicly drop and load into the scene and adjust the color map to the same color as the background with the eye dropper tool. then you just feather it out.
 
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flint combustion fusion

I would suggest using Vegas to edit and Combustion to composit. It's funny because there's a competition about this same thing on another site.

there is footage of a guy running across a street. There is also separate footage of cars. Then you composit them together.

One thing that Bad Boys 2 probably did was match the footage. meaning that they did the same camera movement in each take. What I suggest you do, is shoot the footage with the 1 car solo.. . then without moving the cam, have the other cars drive on the same street at close to the same time.

It's important to check all the details. for example, the shadow of the guy in the contest is on the ground, BUT it should be on the car as it passes right behind him. These little details makes it more realistic. One thing that they seem to reccomend to N00B's is to get Digital Fusion. I've never used it but thought I'd pass it along.

I use Combustion because I use 3D MAX. Also, I'd like to move on to a Flint system as well.
 
A very basic obseration (VERY basic, but just in case), Cars tend to be highly reflective, and highly reflective anything can be a nightmare in blue/greenscreen (yes, they do it in larger films, but they often have small armies sweating the deadlines, too). With something as prosaic as cars, I'd see if weilding the magic of montage and general direction and editing can't be made to give the proper impression. Sometimes larger films just obsess over certain angles which in the larger scheme of things are kind-of uneccessary, but they apparently do it because they have a small army to make it happen (a mindset I'll never understand), and keying things like reflective cars - and this includes knowing how to shoot them properly in terms of matching field of view, focal length distortion/perspective compression and the like - is usually for people who have done it for some time. Now, if the car has to go OFF the bridge, that's a different story (and may be, because I haven't seen the film you're referring to).

Re CGI cars, this might be an easier solution on a smaller budget if you have the cgi skill, but the thing to remember with that is that the more common the object, the more people know what the real thing looks like and the more difficult it is to pull it off successfully. This, in my opinion, for what its worth, can't be underestimated, really.

I'm not trying to be negative here by any means, but if you haven't worked much with some of the techniques being discussed, if nothing else shoot alternative angles (according, persumably, to an alternative set of storyboards) which uses editing as the primary tool to create the impression you're looking for.

Two cents worth of precaution in the event it saves a million dollars worth of cure, from the peanut gallery.
 
Actually, keying around a reflective surface isn't all that bad, given the right plugin for keying, and the right lighting. The biggest ally you have when blue/greenscreening is your backlight when it comes to people or reflective objects. Also keeping the screen evenly lit and a bit DARKER than the rest of the shot is a grand idea too.

Suppose you're shooting someone sitting in a car, in front of a blue screen.. you've got their reflection on the window... will that cause a problem for the keying? Not with the right plugin, as I said before. If done correctly that reflection actually ADDS to the effect, because you still see the reflection of the person in the window with all the keyed in stuff whizzing by in the background.

By keeping your screen lit a bit darker than the rest of the shot not only is it easier to keep it evenly lit, but it also helps to cut down on the radiosity of the screen onto reflective things (like cars and human skin)
 
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All this info is great , I understand that most of the people on the bigger budget films have lots of people that have been doing this for years.
IF there is one thing I know it's that not one person is born knowing how to do special Fx's , They learn how, by either school, trial and error, and or time on the job. Bottom Line most everyone starts from the bottom, That is where I'm and I want to learn , and I will learn , I like the challenge, becasue if it was easy anyone would do it. I also am a VERY opened minded and I listen very well, I feel if you want to get anywhere in life you have to listen becasue there is always someone out there that knows more and can teach us a thing or two. With that in mind I advanced in auto mechanics so much faster then people that were closed minded and ( acted like they knew everything) hahah. I know that was off the subject, but I just wanted to let you know how I think.

But I do like EVERYONES advice , and it has open some new doors for me.
 
oh yeah I for got to say that , the project that I'm working on, I will not be doing heavy special FX's but I would like learn it for some of the projects that I want to do in the future, also I can always do some test footage and play around with it on what ever program I get, so Far that Combustion 3 looks good, but has a high price tag.
 
Will,

I think we may be talking about different definitions of the word "reflection". I suppose I wasn't clear; I didn't mean reflections of actors in glass and so forth. I meant exterior portions of the car reflecting in true, bright duplication (usually along some terribly inconventiently placed edge) of the the color of the greenscreen or bluescreen, which can also be eliminated with lots of surpression and garbage mattes and so forth, but I didn't mean a glass reflection. Obviously backlighting won't help a green reflection off the hood of a car one bit.

I'd also throw in that while software can give you good keying on transulcent areas such as glass reflections and light smoke, it cannot do it if the original material shot isn't of very high grade (you often see people online showing impressive looking shots from lower-end formats, and then you see the animated fringe and bleeding once the shot is actually rolling. Big difference). So unless someone is going pretty high end not only on decent comping software, but also on the images they're comping, you'd agree I'm sure that transulcent areas and so forth are going to be a big problem. I'd just shy away from the whole issue when it comes to something as common as cars unless there is just no other choice. They are so common, and there's always some way to shoot them, unless, of course, a car is going OFF a bridge.

So, again, I think we're talking different definitions of the word "reflection" but I understand and agree with your take according to your definition.

Johnny Reb,

Learning FX can be a help in Independant production, BUT it can also slow you down to a snail pace in terms of finishing films; FX - to do properly - is really a very demanding multi-disciplined art in any aspect, much less across the board. Not saying you should or you shouldn't, but my mantra, which many people hate because it sort of bursts a particular bubble, is that there isn't a software in the world which does good FX. The FX artist may do good FX with great software, or he may do it with the most basic tools with a clever eye and imagination. Some epople are born to it, just like artists who pick up a paintbrush and do a masterpiece the first time or others who can play Chopin by ear the first time they sit at a piano. This is a very basic observation often lost in a world of software manufacturers who post tiny jpegs of their best capabilities and talk of stunning work if only you'll buy this tool on spacial sale for only X hundreds or thousands of dollars, which they claim will make any person an expert in no time. Baloney. A guy might get LUCKY the first time, but the software, like the brush of piano, is only a tool of art. It *software* will never *do* the good effect (unless one has VERY low standards!), So do beware the hyperbolic promises of the average FX software manufacturer and retailer. It's usually a bunch of malarky (and if anyone out there is fluent in irish slang, I'd love to know, speaking of defintions, what malarky actually means).

Hope this cynical bit of advice helps.
 
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It's usually a bunch of malarky (and if anyone out there is fluent in irish slang, I'd love to know, speaking of defintions, what malarky actually means).

DR, I think it's derived from an Irish surname. Probably some personality who exhibited nonsensical traits and happened to be named Mallarky or Mullarky or some variation.
 
It is originally American slang, meaning humbug, foolishness or nonsense. Nobody is sure where it comes from: it just appeared out of the blue in the 1920s. Some say it derives from the Irish word mullachan for a strongly built boy, hence a ruffian. However, based on one of the early spellings, it may have come from the Irish surname Mullarkey, much like the origin of the word hooligan.
 
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