Category Archives: Blog
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Plot Device wins the Webby!
1 commentYou may have heard that the short film I executive produced and co-wrote with Director Seth Worley, won a Webby for “Best Editing.” Other than finding Seth to direct the film, I really had nothing to do with it. It was all his talent once the shoot began. Still, I’m feeling pretty good about it, [...]
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Plot Device Was Nominated for a Webby!
1 commentI’m on vacation, and then heading out to NAB, so I won’t belabor this… Plot Device was nominated for a Webby award. The award is for Best Editing, and so, the nomination really goes to Seth Worley. Read more about it HERE in my post at the Red Room Blog. It’s all in that post, [...]
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My Schedule at NAB 2012
2 commentsHey folks – if your coming out to NAB, I’ll be there on Monday and Tuesday, working at the Red Giant Booth in the South Lower Hall – Booth # SL2124. Please stop by and say hello. Here’s my schedule: Monday 4/16 10 AM -12 PM 1 PM – 2 PM IMPORTANT: I’ll be giving [...]
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Ruin – Go Watch This Now!
3 commentsSome of the best 3D work I’ve ever seen. Great action and fantastic virtual cinematography. Just wow. Do me a favor, after watching this, check out all of the extras at the film’s site and then head over to Wes Ball’s site and learn more about him and his work.
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Oh Crap… I Forgot to Hit the Render Button!
3 commentsHave you ever been on the bus/train home and said the above, knowing you would either have to go back to work, or accept hours of lost time? Recently, my wife called me and said that she couldn’t be home on time, and asked me to pick up the kids from a birthday party. I [...]
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Time for Life
6 commentsWe get pretty caught up in our motion graphics and VFX. It’s hard to find the satisfaction we get from our work, from anything else in life. But I’m here to tell you, there’s a lot more out there. I’m blessed to be a husband and father, but only because a few years back I [...]
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Talk to Red Giant
17 commentsNext week, the entire Red Giant team will be getting together for our annual company meeting. We’re a virtual company with people in NY, Utah, Ottawa, Halifax, Oregon, California, the UK and more. We regularly communicate with each other, via Skype, iChat, gotomeeting.com and through some older tech called the telephone. But there is no [...]
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Old School vs. CGI
No commentsThis amazing short film made me sad. I don’t find most CGI creatures to be all that realistic or scary, but as a kid, I remember those rubber mask monsters being terrifying, even when I could see the zipper going up it’s back. End of a Scarer from Chris O'Hara on Vimeo. Animated graduate film [...]
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When it comes to Genres, Embrace What You Love
1 commentLast week, thanks to Josh Diamond, I saw this fantastic video, called Space Stallions on YouTube: What’s so great about it is that it feels authentic from a storytelling perspective – at least within the aesthetic of 80′s cartoons. Visually, the characters were a little to obviously 3D with toon shading, but outside that, it [...]
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Good Robot
1 commentPart of my job at Red Giant has me looking through the content on Vimeo to see what people are working on. It’s how I find great user stories and great people to work with. But also how I find inspiration – often from people who are still in school, working on student projects. Students [...]
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Free Textures (not from me)
No commentsYesterday, Angie Taylor tweeted out these cool bokeh textures from JenniStock on deviant art: Lot’s of cool things you can do with this, such as applying and animating After Effects’ Turbulent Displace. Or you can use them as displacement maps. Or as textures for VideoCopilot’s Optical Flares. Be creative. JenniStock’s got a lot of great [...]
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Digital and Analog Inspiration
No commentsJust saw both of these videos this morning and felt inspired. One is done with camera angles and well planned concept, prop and set design, the other is entirely digital and abstract. NatGeo ID’s 2012 from Lumbre on Vimeo. 2012 – National Geographic Channels International commissioned LUMBRE to create four new ID’s. Plexus Test from [...]
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MGMT – All We Ever Wanted Was Everything
1 commentIt’s been a while since I’ve blogged, but today, I caught this on Photoshop product manager John Nack’s Blog, and I wanted to make sure more After Effects users saw this. MGMT – All We Ever Wanted Was Everything from oneedo on Vimeo. Taken from the album Late Night Tales – MGMT Info at www.latenighttales.co.uk [...]
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Plot Device is Online!
28 commentsMany of you may have caught that I was working on a film with Seth Worley for Red Giant. I’ve not been able to say much until now, but today, the film has been released online as a part of the Magic Bullet Suite 11 Launch. Here it is: I am truly blessed to be [...]
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Hang Out with Red Giant (and me, if your in NYC)
No commentsWhat’s new, cool & delicious? Find out in NYC, SF and Portland Ever wonder how certain people always know things before you do? That’s ’cause they go where the buzz, big shots and booze are. On Monday, June 27, you can be the first to know about something really cool. Join us for a fun [...]
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Where’s Ralph Waldo Emerson?
4 commentsJust a moment of cheesy randomness this morning… “What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Dear L.A. Times: Motion Capture is Animation
11 commentsHey folks – I know I’ve been silent lately – I’ve just been quite busy and under water (or as I prefer to say, “creatively engaged”) but I read an article by Steven Paul Leiva in the LA Times on the subject of how motion capture is not animation, and it made me surface. This [...]
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Video Blog: February 2011 Update
18 commentsIn this video, with some help, I give a very quick update on my goings on. Filmed in high quality iPhone 4 (lo-res front facing camera), and cleaned up with Magic Bullet Denoiser and Looks:
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Happy Holidays!
18 commentsFirst off, just wanted to wish all of you a happy holiday! Here’s a special song for you (yeah – it’s me singing – sorry): Listen to We Wish you a Happy Holiday Thanks so much for a great year, everyone. Looking forward to a great 2011. For those that asked, yes – we did [...]
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Off the Grid for a Bit (sort of)
22 commentsHey folks – I had a bunch of stuff well planned for the site through the end of the year, so naturally, my son (name TBD) decided to come into this world, 3 weeks early. He was born on Saturday, December 4th weighing it at only 6 lbs, and 19″ tall.We’re all excited and exhausted. [...]
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Film Flash: New FREE Preset For After Effects
- By Aharon Rabinowitz Dec 01, 2010
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Views: 20988
18 commentsPlain and simple, Film Flash is an automated, dynamic preset for After Effects that bumps up the exposure of the footage to create a cool transition effects between two video clips. All you have to do is add a layer marker right at the point of transition, and Film Flash does the rest. The effect [...]
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Do you choose the people you work with?
3 commentsHey folks – I’m at the point in may career where I get to choose a lot of the people I work with on projects, but that wasn’t always the case. I’m interested in finding out your situation. It will really help me in creating some new content for my site, and may even allow [...]
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Spy Photo: New FREE Presets For After Effects
- By Aharon Rabinowitz Nov 21, 2010
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Views: 16976
25 commentsIntroducing Spy Photo, a new set of FREE presets for Adobe After Effects that makes it easy to create the look of snapshots taken by a spy or private investigator, as seen in film and TV. The presets are dynamic, and require no keyframes. Just marks where you want the effect to happen. After Effects [...]
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FREE Template Project: Movie Magic
- By Aharon Rabinowitz Nov 09, 2010
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Views: 10781
13 commentsA template project I’ve been working on with 3D text and cool light-based transitions. Has a bit of a movie theater messaging vibe (like “please turn your cell phones off” and “Buy Popcorn”), or maybe a futuristic holiday feel. Uses Trapcode Form, Knoll Light Factory and Magic Bullet Looks. Get it for FREE at Red [...]
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How to Start a Software User Group (or Die Trying)
7 commentsGiven that I co-founded After Effects New York, the worlds largest software user group, I get asked this question a lot: How does one start a user group? In the interest of full disclosure, I need to say that it didn’t hurt that by the time I co-founded AENY with Denis Radeke, I’d already put [...]