3D Max Media Sync With After Effects

jeckert — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 13:34:41 +0000

3D Max Media Sync With After Effects

Joel Eckert | Apr 3, 2012

by Chris Harkins

Software evolves. Useless, outdated features fade away and newer features make the application stronger, even if it takes some time to work out the kinks. Applications are more powerful than the year before because our industry is in perpetual change to keep up with higher client expectations - the applications we use have to keep up. There are several applications to choose from as they compete for power, flexibility and above all, market share. We use Autodesk 3ds Max because we've found it to fit our needs moreso than Autodesk Maya, NewTek LightWave or even the free, yet robust, application Blender. But there is not one application that does everything perfectly. The trick is using the right tool for the job at hand. We have a powerful arsenal of hardware and software at our finger tips, but merely having the right tools does not keep us on top of the competition and delivering superior quality to our clients. Among other things, it's important to be informed on emergent technologies and even participate in their crafting when given the opportunity.

I was granted an opportunity to create a sneak peek video for a new feature in 3ds Max utilizing "Media Sync", a new interoperability between 3ds Max and Adobe After Effects, two of the tools in our arsenal. This new feature enables us to send rendered passes and some scene data from 3ds Max into After Effects to finish up the product in a motion graphics environment. With both applications, we're able to deliver a product that neither application could do alone, using each application to its strengths. The challenge has always been, "How?" How do you share the data between two different applications? And how do you do so in such a way that's easy and efficient? Let's explore this with a recent job.

Recently, I was asked to produce about two dozen 3D-animated graphs for an iPad app. These were all very similar in style and format, differing mostly in scales and text. Though technically simple, it appeared it was going to take a long time to go through the motions for all of them - changing this, changing that, rerender, recomposite, output, rinse and repeat. Just recently the new interoperability feature was released and this was the perfect testing grounds.

In short, I animated the scene in Max, rendered out the bars as they animated upward. I placed helper objects in the general locations where I wanted to add my text and exported everything I wanted in After Effects. Within After Effects I loaded the "link" and a basic composition built itself. My rendered passes and helper objects came in perfect. Now I was working with Max data in After Effect's 3D environment, so I could easily add text and graphics that would track flawlessly as the graph rotates and builds up.

The real power of this workflow comes in ensuring consistency with speed. I could easily adjust font style and placement, which would render immediately, whereas if I had to make a change in 3ds Max, it would require much more time to make a change and rerender. Adding text and formatting for motion graphics is best done in After Effects. We were able to accommodate color, text/font and graphic changes quickly. This new feature helps to bridge the gap between 3D content and motion graphics.

As artists and technicians, we rely on these tools. Likewise, developers rely on their customers to tell them what we need or what needs improvement. Not every new feature is profound, or even works as advertised, but it's all a part of the process moving forward, developing stronger tools for greater challenges.

My sneak peek video can be found here: http://area.autodesk.com/blogs/ken/mediasync_best_interop_with_adobe_after_effects_gets_better/

Topics: 3D Max, After Effects, Media Sync

Halloween Dissection....

jeckert — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 15:22:01 +0000

Halloween Dissection....

Joel Eckert | Oct 28, 2011

Halloween Dissection, by Chris Harkins.

Halloween is one of the most fun holidays we have in the year. For artists, it gives us an opportunity to explore creative avenues not often traveled. So when brainstorming for this year's Halloween greeting, it only seemed appropriate to feature zombies. Zombies are in!

View Finished Project on our youtube channel here!

This little project had all of the components of a full-sized production, just miniature in scale. Even at a mere 20-second play time, a lot of resources can be wasted without first deciding on how to frame everything. It all starts with pencil and paper. Once I established the framing, I modeled, surfaced and placed each prop into the environment. Organic objects like the grass and trees were created using GrowFX for 3DS Max. This fantastic plugin gives you loads of options, but is still simple enough to use efficiently. Experimentation was fun. The trees basically consist of a trunk segment, a few levels of branches and leaves - all with various modifiers for twist, noise and wind.

One particularly exciting part of the micro-project was to utilize interoperability between 3 Autodesk applications: 3DS Max, Softimage and Mudbox. There is not one application that does everything the best - all applications have their strengths and weaknesses. The key is using the strongest tool for the job, whatever that may be. The challenge is then doing so efficiently, making sure the data shared between them crosses over correctly. For example, the undead hand was a hand I pulled from an old character of mine - an old Softimage project. I made some adjustments to the fingers to bjeckerte boney and longer in Max, then exported that hand into Mudbox to paint on some textures to make the hand look undead - basic projection painting. I rigged and animated the hand in Softimage, because I'm more familiar with Softimage rigging/animation and find it to be superior to Max's solution - at least for my purposes. I exported the tombstone, ground plane and camera into Softimage (via interoperability feature) for reference. Once animated in Softimage, I exported the animation as pointcache and applied that data to the hand back in 3DS Max.

The more challenging part of this short was breaking the hand through the dirt. My initial approach was to simulate a dynamic breakup using Softimage ICE/Lagoa, but for time and ease, I ended up with a very simple solution of creating an animated broken dirt object animate around the hand via shape animation. I also added some simple pflow particles to explode from the impact as the hand pushes through. This treatment might not hold up under a sunny day, but the moonlight haze of an zombie apocalyptic eve is very forgiving.

Compositing all of the render layers together was fairly straight forward. I wanted the environment to be thick and creepy, so I rendered out 2 separate vray environment fog passes; one for low fog and one for a larger, thinner air fog. Both passes were animated with a fractal noise offset, to give the impression the fog slowly rolls by. The VRay renderer is powerful and pleasant to use. It's fast, consistent and easy to understand. On top of that, I was able to easily output render elements for aiding the compositing stage. For example, I wanted to tweak the color of the hand and was able to do so with a matte layer of just the hand. In post, I could quickly tweak most anything after hours of rendering. The composition is combination of color corrections, fog adjustment layers and some other fancy effects.

For the final touches, music and sound effects were created by Joel E. This was intentionally kept this a little bit cheesy to fit with the 50's horror movie style. Little animations like this are great excursions because you can bundle research/development and play time into one product, without tight restrictions on time or budget. Below are some screen grabs from the different apps used for those who are interested. Happy Halloween Everyone!

Files:

Topics: 3D, grow fx, Halloween, zombie

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3D Max Media Sync With After Effects