Francis’ Weblog

Hey guys & girls,
Escape have just put up an online questionnaire and if you fill it out you are put into the pot to win ANY escape studios course!

I copied and pasted this from their site…

“Escape Studios are offering you a chance to win a course.

The winner, who will be announced in one week’s time on Monday 9th July,
will be offered the course of their choice at Escape Studios absolutley free!

That doesn’t leave much time so if you’re interested you’d better get a move on!

To enter the prize draw all you need to do is fill out the questionnaire that can be found on the
following link.”

http://www.escapestudios.com/news_07.php?id=36

Great week compositing! each morning we have been looking at and movie history and how certain films pushed digital compositing up a noch. This morning we saw the great train robbery from 1905 which has one of the first composits, really dodgy but amazing to see. It was basically the inside of a station office with a window with a composited view of a train coming into the platform, for a 1905 silent black and white film it looked quite good! filming then went to simple colour correction a few years later with ‘Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves’, having each frame coloured in by hand.

Anyway I finished the the first animation piece today but forgot to upload it, so heres the one from end of play thursday, i’ve retimed the camera shake, got rid of the pulsing sun and added a cloud, shadow and a bit of colour correction

Ok its getting a little more complicated now, were looking at issues when artifacts or errors start appearing within the composition due to maths functions being put in the wrong way around or mattes not working correctly. I’ve improved the vanilla animation too today, getting rid of the throbing sun (it really didnt look right), adding a shadow under the girl and gun, I added a cloud which comes in when she gets mad and did some colour correction and bluring/motion bluring on a couple of artifacts. I Should have it finished tommorow so i’ll upload the new one then.

Well here it is … the first compostion… its a bit dodgy as i’ve only had half a day on it. The sun jiggles around a bit too much and the camera jerk is at the wrong time but hey! getting there This composition was made up of 6 elements: Vanilla (the girl), the tree and grass, the smoke, the background hill, the sky and finally the sun. Also if you notice there are a couple of blades of grass infront of her, these were originally on the background plate (the tree and grass) but I brought them to the front so that she walked behing them.

Been a while since i’ve posted an entry. Well I got back all in one piece. After the Rookies myself and Mikal travelled around South island and up to north island for a couple of weeks to see the sights, originally were we not going to do it but things change :). Mike wanted to stop off in Wellington and Auckland to see what it was like and maybe find work. He did have a bit of a hunt for work but in the end came back so he could get a perm NZ visa. He came back to Ireland and got a interview for a job out in Auckland. The interview was in Guildford so he popped over and stayed with my parents while he had the interview. Anyway cut a long story short he got the job and he starts working in Auckland in January, he’s just waiting on his NZ visa.

Since i’ve been back i’ve been working on the rookieacademy.com website and producing some promo vids for them using the footage that I got while I was in NZ. I also setup a discussion board for them, which so far hasn’t been used that much, I think mainly because all the ex-rookies from this year have been communicating via mass emails… hey ho, give it time Also been getting back into Maya and creating a space station, should have some piccies soon.

I’ve also been working on a Travel website bit like Expedia.co.uk but a bit simpler hopefully that will be complete mid-january. I’m also getting a mate to help me out on it.

Just after I came back to the UK, and signed up to a Digital Compositing course at Escape Studios in Shepherds Bush. Now for all those who don’t know what Digital Compositing is… here’s the dictionary definition:

“The digital blending together of a background plate and one or more foreground elements to create one seamless, well-integrated film image”

It starts on January 9th and goes on for 8 weeks, part of which you work on your show reel which ends up being your CV really on how good you are at digital compositing and giving pointers on what to and not to put in your show reel too. I’ve been wanting to get into a more media role for some time to get out of doing constant programming. When I look back on the stuff i’ve done so far i’ve found working for media companies like the BBC or print/design companies more fun! Hense doing film & video work over the past couple of years.

Well after 3.5 weeks of filming ‘Harry Potter Goblet of Fire’ they managed to compress my bit into 2minutes… maybe which even for a multi $$$ movie is quite amazing, yes they were very tech shots but hey! well I supposed i’d better get used to it.

Well Christmas is a coming! so HAPPY CRIMBO EVERYONE!, have a great new year if I don’t see you!