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watch UFO Test Footage

FrankLad

FrankLad

Hey guys!

I wanted to share a couple of quick UFO clips.

The first was a tracking test, as well as match lighting, keying, and overall just trying to make the object look like it was naturally there. The tracking was done in SynthEyes and exported to trueSpace 6, where the object was lit and rendered. Color-correction, keying and grain were done in After Effects 5.

http://www.vimeo.com/16548606


This one was done at night and was much easier since I was able to track the one star and export the 2D motion data into an After Effects null (to which all the other dots were parented). ...and there was no concern about matching color, grain, etc.

http://www.vimeo.com/16578969

An idea on night footage... If I were to use an object like that in the first clip - not just a light speck - I'd capture camera noise with the lens cap on, at the same ISO... then overlay that on the footage + CG object comp.

These were fun to make.

P.S. The quirky text at the end was an attempt to down-play the "seriousness" of the clips. My goal was to see how realistic I could get these, but not have them taken as fo-real. ;)
 
These are pretty good, I especially like how realistic you've got the footage...

The one thing I'd say is that in the day times ones, the UFOs look more like small objects, not very high up than large objects, very high up...

But that's my only real criticism.
 
The first one's pretty good. I was actually thinking, "Hmm, that could be a bar of soap" when the text appeared at the end. :lol:

The night footage one not so interesting. Small white dots on a black background didn't say much to me.
 
Hey, Wheatgrinder! Thanks!

This was the workflow on the daytime footage:

- Firstly, I converted the original MOV file from the 7D into a lossless AVI file.

- SynthEyes: Tracked the original footage. Surprisingly, I didn't have to do any manual/assisted tracking. SynthEyes did a great job on full automatic.

- trueSpace 6.6 (3D app): This is where I dropped in the "UFO" object, using the 3D track points from SynthEyes as reference for placement. I also dropped in a couple of lights to illuminate the object based on the light colors in the footage. So I had a warm light coming from the direction of the sun and a cooler/blue toward the opposite and underside. Viewing from the virtual/tracked camera, I rendered the object to a 32-bit (alpha channel) TGA sequence.

- AfterEffects 5: The 3D sequence was dropped on top of the original footage. Then I duplicated the footage and placed it on top of the 3D sequence and keyed out the blue sky. (Really easy since it was a totally cloudless day.) So I had: Footage(keyed) + CGI + Footage.

On the 3D sequence, I added a bit of blur (a value of "2" or so) to take the sharpness down a bit.

I turned all this into a new comp (pre comp'd) and did color correcting, added a bit of diffusion, dropped in some subtle grain, and rendered.

Hope that makes sense!
 
sure does.

The trick I think is in getting the syntheyes data into the 3d app.. if you can point to a tutorial on that, Ill be golden.

Thanks
 
I can't see the day shot. Nothing happens, no video loads. The curiosity is killing me!

EDIT: Nevermind, finally loaded. Pretty good.
 
Well, it really depends on the 3D app.

For instance... in trueSpace it's via a Python script. BUT, I believe it's even more straightforward if you're using a more industry-standard App like Maya.

Which app are you using? I'll do my best to help.
 
Yeah, Caligari closed down. Or... rather, they were bought out by Microsoft and not long after the product was "dropped". So trueSpace 7.x is essentially free.

I like some of the stuff folks have accomplished in Blender, though I just can't wrap my mind around that interface.

If you don't own SynthEyes, there is a free tracker here:
http://www.digilab.uni-hannover.de/docs/manual.html#download

It's not nearly as good as a commercial package (SynthEyes, Boujou, etc.) but it's FREE. :)
...and I've written a converter to take the VooDoo file into trueSpace. I can get you the link if you decide to go that route.
 
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