■My Adobe After Effects Movies

■6. Special Effects Study - "Rick Vs. Enrique"

Date: 1/05/07

Song: "Orochimaru ~Fight~", Naruto

Features used: Masking, solids, hue/saturation, levels, color key, blending modes, type tool, text animation presetts, time stretch, tweening, color key, 3D layers, 3D camera

3rd party plugins used: CC_Rain, S_Clouds Perspective, S_Clouds Psycho, S_Clouds Vortex, S_Zap (lightning), S_Rays, S_Warp Bubble

Ramblings: My goodness, it's almost been a year since my last one. This vid didn't take me too long. I just wanted to do a warm-up to help resurface my After Effects skillz. My friend Rick has a handful of alter egoes. This vid is poking fun of his complex between Rick (his new self) and Enrique (his original name and old self). I put the most emphasis on experimenting with the third party plugins I've installed. "CC" is a bunch of plugins a friend gave me and "S" is for the famous thousand-dollar Sapphire Plugins. Of course, just because I have the Sapphire Plugins doesn't automatically mean I'm going to produce award-winning material. Using them properly takes lots of practice. And with this study I learned After Effects likes to take a crap during rendering if the vid is heavy with filters. I've had to restart it like three times to fully render this mere 36-second vid. Lol, and I'm sure you noticed the Getty Images watermark on the explosion animation. I got the sound effects from freesound.

■5. Masking Study - "Silent Hill parody trailer"

Date: 1/25/06

Original video: Silent Hill trailer

Features used: Masking, solids, brightness & contrast, hue/saturation, channel mixer, invert, box blur, color key, blending modes, track matte, reverb, time remapping, clone stamp, brush tool, type tool, time stretch

Ramblings: This took me three days to make. My "JAMMIN" vid got me interested in seeing how far I can go with inserting & animating images onto an existing movie. I learned a lot with this project; I used several features I've never used before. So I butchered the clip and made it as if Michael Jackson is the child-abducting villain and the town is his Neverland Ranch. It includes used condoms, Richard Simmons, Sarah Jessica Parker, Oprah, Dr. Phil, and more! Just know beforehand that its jokes are a bit dirty.

■4. Eraser/3D Study - "Dryad"

Date: 1/23/06

Song: "From Western Woods to
Beaversdam", Narnia

Features used: Eraser, solids, masking, blur, color key, blending modes, gradient wipe, 3D layers, 3D cameras, reverse, time stretch

Ramblings: This one took me a long time to make. I wanted to experiment making a (very short) cartoon. The title and swirlies were made in Adobe Illustrator and the Dryad animation was made in Flash. This is the first time I've used the eraser tool; I used it to make the swirlies appear as if being drawn. And since AE 3D is so sexy, I couldn't help but add the 3D 'swirly forest' sequence. I love how this came out. I just feel I could've done a better job animating & drawing the dryad, but I didn't want to spend too much time in Flash.

■3. Time Remapping Study - "JAMMIN!"

Date: 1/21/06

Song: "Boss" (Remix), Romancing SaGa

Original video: Video blog test - 00:15, 478 KB

Features used: Posterize, channel mixer, tweening, masking, solids, blending modes, bulge, time remapping, grain, time stretch

Ramblings: One of my online friends is contemplating making a video blog. I saw clip-butchering potential in his test clip and decided to turn it into a music video. I heavily used time remapping. Time remapping is one of AE's most powerful features. It allows you to alter a movie's time in any way you wish; kinda like how a DJ mixes music in real-time. One thing I'm particularly proud of is my masking techniques in the vid. In one part, I had the stuffed cat thrown in the background behind his head.

■2. 3D Study - "Oompa Heads"

Date: 12/10/05

Song: "Qu's Marsh", Final Fantasy 9

Features used: 3D layers, 3D camera, color key, reverse, brightness

Ramblings: Somehow the word 'Oompa' came to mind when I contemplated what to call these things. The bobbing heads were created in Flash. In the first half of this movie I just simply have the heads pop up in synch with the song. In the second half is where I used AE's sexy 3D features for the first time. AE's 3D features works by giving you the ability to place 2D images/movies in 3D space, then you can animate the camera to go anywhere you want in it.

■1. Multimedia Study - "Horror!"

Date: 10/9/05

Song: "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm",
Crash Test Dummies

Features used: Glow, find edges, noise, equalize, liquify, bulge, solids, blending modes

Ramblings: I had fun with this study. I went around my house with the digital camera and captured seven short movies. Then I went buck wild with several of AE's nifty video filters. I heavily altered the colors, purposely making most of the scenes various shades of dark brown. I used an audio editor to cut up the "Mmm mmm" song and slowed it down. I love how "glow" can make lights and bright colors glow much brighter. I also liked how "bulge" can distort the screen as if I was using a fisheye lens. It was a spur of the moment idea to capture my dog and make him appear sinister.