Category Archives: Blog
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Creative Cloud
107 commentsLet me start off this post by saying that I do not work for Adobe. I have never been an Adobe Employee, and probably never will be one after this article goes out. I don’t owe Adobe anything… other than my career, as their software has allowed me to support myself and ultimately start a [...]
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Stepping out of After Effects New York
4 commentsHey folks – just a heads up that after our February meeting of After Effects New York with guest speaker Andrew Kramer, I am stepping out of a leadership role there. Over six years ago, I was approached by Dennis Radeke at Adobe about starting a New York After Effects user group. I sorta said [...]
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New Film – Tempo
No commentsRed Giant presents Tempo, a new short film from the creators of Plot Device. (I’m one of those guys) Description: In this sci-fi action thriller, a scientist must prevent a new, powerful technology from falling into the wrong hands. Learn more about filmmaking and visual effects at http://redgiant.com/films. Credits: Director: Seth Worley Executive Producer: Aharon [...]
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Some Fire Tests With Trapcode Particular
5 commentsUsing a single fire movie (one for each test) as the sprite for the particles, in conjunction with the time sampling method called Random Play Once, this effect can be achieved. This is a fairly simple particle system with no Aux particles. Just a good source video. ReelSmart Motion Blur, from RevisionFX, was used to [...]
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New Film: Form 17
1 commentThis has been a long time coming. Never got around to posting. Below you can find our latest film, Form 17, which I executive produced and co-wrote with Seth Worley (Director) and Neil Hoppe (Producer). This is our 3rd film working together, and in my opinion, the best, in terms of story and flow. Don’t [...]
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Free Shatter Object Presets for Element 3D
16 commentsHey folks – so I’ve been Playing around with Videocopilot’s Element 3D, and really enjoying breaking objects apart. Since I realize that so many of the people getting started with Element are new to 3D, I wanted to give you all some fun stuff to shatter. These are just some basic primitives that I have [...]
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Need for Speed
5 commentsThere’s a revolution in the After Effects world – a revolution of speed. Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you caught that VideoCopilot and Red Giant released some ridiculously fast OpenGL powered Plug-ins that promise to change the future for AE users. Moving from the CPU to the GPU is clearly the wave of [...]
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New Film – Order Up
1 commentHey folks – I’m proud to share ‘Order Up,’ a new short that I co-wrote with director Seth Worley. We also worked together on Plot Device and are working on a new film as well. The Plot: A pizza is delivered to a creepy, abandoned location. Then it gets weird. Made with Knoll Light Factory [...]
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The Webby’s
3 commentsSo I went to the Webby Awards this week, to celebrate Plot Device’s win for Best Editing. Yeah… I’m not an awards show kind of guy, but it was pretty fun. I walked the Red Carpet, which was just bizarre. Honestly, the part I most enjoyed was getting these great photos of my wife and [...]
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Plot Device wins the Webby!
2 commentsYou 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!
31 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