RGB layers

Autodesk smoke tips & tricks - RGB layers

This is an old trick that i used in my old quantel editbox,


Here's the original image, now put it in the media three times with 'matte off' of a full white as matte (3 medias). And put the 3 medias in the composite. Go into the cc,
Media1 Gain G100, B&R 0
Media2 Gain B100, G&R 0
Media3 Gain R100, G&B 0
Set the 3 layers blend mode to 'Simple ADD'. The picture now should look the same as the original, nothing special.

Now, go to each layer and move the position a bit, you will get this old TV gun miss-alignment look. Animate it from original to offset, then back to original.
You can also blur the individual layer with different values to create old film look or soft look, or color spread out.

With individual channel separated at their own layer, you have more option to play around.

Wipe With Borders

Autodesk Smoke Tips & Tricks - Wipe with Borders

The first time i using smoke, i was very surprised that it can't do wipe with border. Border wipe is a very basic tool, even adobe premiere ver1 10 years ago can do that. Of course you can do it in DVE, but why not a preset one.

Since it can't do it, we have to DIY. Here's how to do the border wipe in timeline, it quite easy and flexible. First, do a normal wipe in timeline.

After that, create an empty layer above.
Copy the 'to clip' together with the wipe to the empty layer.
Then create 1 frame color clip (if you not sure what color to use, just use grey, and change it in cc later), and select the 'to clip' at below layer, hit 'Replace'.
To see the border wipe, push the above layer together with the wipe a bit later in timeline. You can ON the 'link transition' and 'link cut', then just drag the top layer to right to control the width of ther border.
Now, you can add the softness, change the pattern, twist it easily in timeline.
Using the same techniques, you can add multiple borders with different color or fill, even different wipe pattern, just add more layers and delay each layer a bit to the right.

Keying - Moving Video Field

Autodesk Smoke Tips & Tricks

If you are keying with interlace video (not progressive), when there's some fast movement in your video, most of the time, the key look awful during the movement.

One easy way to deal with this is, Deinterlace you chromakey footage first, then do your key. Remember to Deinterlace your background clip and other layers as well. If the other sources is progressive, just repeat each frame to 2 frames. After the compositing done, Interlace it back to normal.

This technique can be used in any machines like FCP, eQ, AF, Shake, Digifusion, Avid, as long as they can do DeInterlace, it works.

Black & White Image

My Autodesk Smoke Tips & Tricks - Balck & White Image

When you turn an image to Black & White, normally you just turn off the saturation, then do some adjustment with gain, gamma, offset, luma curve to get a good Black & White look. But then there are time that the Black & White picture just don't look good, either the skin tone is too bright, and the hair is to dark, the sky is burn, the contrast of face and hair is not enough...... And you wish you can have more control.

Here's a trick borrow from Photoshop. Put your image in timeline, then add an empty cc soft effect layer above. In the empty soft effect layer, set the saturation to zero.
Remember to set your view option to 'Preview FX' and your playhead should be on empty cc layer in order to see the effect.
Then, add a cc soft effect to your image layer, and go into the cc.

Now, the whole controls is at your dispose, you can use the individual R,G,B control - gain, gamma, curve to adjust your image to your satisfaction. You can use the individual RGB control to bring out the skin detail, blue sky, hair .... Now your option has been increased by 100% more.

FX Filter (Part I)

Autodesk Smoke tips & tricks - FX Filter (Part I)

Ever wonder what this Fx Filter is doing ? If you are maths genius, you might able to come out with something genius.Here's the picture of a superstar before apply any magic filter numbers.

Go in the filter, and lets start with 3x3, you need to turn on the 'Enable' button first. Now you got a 3x3 matrix box.Each pixel of the picture will need to go through this matrix transformation. Note that each pixel has 1 R , 1 G , 1 B (RGB) component. The filter will put each pixel into the hot seat (the middle box), and apply some maths to it. The middle seat is the current pixel, and the other 8 boxes around is the pixel around the current pixel.

Now, look at the above matrix box, the middle seat is 1, and the surronding boxes is zero. This mean no transformation. Say if the current pixel RGB value is 100,150,200, this mean :

R100 * 1 = 100, G150 * 1 = 150, B200 * 1 = 200

This matrix formula will apply to every pixel. So, nothing is changed, no transformation.


Now if you change the 1 to 2 in the middle seat, this mean double up the value.

R100 * 2 = 200, G150 * 2 = 300, B200 *2 = 400

If you replace the middle sit number to 0.5, it will be darker then.

R100 * 0.5 = 50, so get the idea?


Now look at the below matrix, can you guess what it does ?

Say, if the hot sit pixel (current pixel) is R100, G150, B200. And the pixel just above the current pixel is R10, G20, B30. This matrix mean:

R100 * 0, G150 * 0, B200 * 0, RGB =0 : no value is taken from current pixel, but it borrow the value from the above pixel. R10*1, G20*1, B30*1 = RGB10,20,30. So the final output will be the same picture but move down 1 pixel compare to the original picture.

Say, now you give the hot sit (middle box) value 0.5

R100*0.5, G150*0.5, B200 *0.5 = RGB50,75,100 and plus the value borrow from box above:

RGB50,75,100 + RGB10,20,30 = RGB60,95,130. Get the idea ?

The whole image will be a bit blur because it has been mixed with pixel above.

Now look at this, do you know what will it does to the picture?This matrix, only take 20% from the original pixel, and it borrow 10% from each pixel around it. The final picture will be a bit blur because the pixel has been mixed with pixel around it. This is an example of Box Blur Effect. Of course, you can modify around, change the numbers, say borrow 10% from top 3 boxes, 5% from bottom 3 boxes, and 20% from left and right, and you created your own blur formula.

If you have understand this basic, we will go a bit further next time on this matrix.

Autodesk Smoke Tips & Tricks, http://mysmoke.blogspot.com/

History - Re-edit

One thing i don't like to do re-edit in history is,

Say, you have a 1 minute composite, you need to edit just portion of it ,in the middle of the composite.
I splice out the portion that need re-edit.

Then go into the history to re-edit, but the history will still render to the original end point, not the new end point. If this is a very complex composite, it will waste a lot of your time to render thing that you don't need render.
Worst, you can't stop halfway. If you want to go out of history to do other thing, you have to render the whole thing or exit with 'Cancel', and every change you make so far gone.

One way to cope with this is, after you recall the history, exit the history by 'Cancel'.

Then, you enter back into DVE with 'S'. Now you can set your new duration. When you want to start render, just part you playhead at where you want it to start render (The new inpoint).

But this technique won't work if all your materials is not on the desk area, it will take a long long.. time to load, and some medias will be missing.

The better way is, after recall the history, save Multitrack, then exit with 'Cancel'

Then, enter empty DVE (Alt click DVE), and load multitrack, and you won't have the problem of missing media. Now you can set your new duration. When you want to start render, just part you playhead at where you want it to start render (The new inpoint).



Autodesk SmokeTips & Tricks
http://mysmoke.blogspot.com/

Extend History Duration

Say, your original DVE is 56 frames, you render it and put it in timeline.

Later, you want to extend it to 100 frames, you call up the history, and set it to 100 in duration field. But when you render it again, it still render only 56 frames.


This happened, because the outpoint is locked to 56 frame. To render the new duration, you can ctrl and drag the outpoint bar to frame 100.

There are still a better way, see my next mail "History : Re-edit"

Autodesk SmokeTips & Tricks
http://mysmoke.blogspot.com/

Different resolution matte and fill

I hate this, say you have a matte, and you want to fill in pictures inside the matte, you need to make dozens of this matte/fill in the composite.
And when you done dozens of setting and layers, now's the showtime of the matte/fill pictures!!
Suddenly, it gives you an error message, say 'Different resolution'!! And you find that all the pictures fill are in different resolution. You can choice to exit the comp (~) now, and do resize module on all pictures first, then back into the comp.

What i usually do is, just add the matte as the fill as well.

Then, i load the pictures as media, and use it as top layer for front source.
Now, i can do my adjustment inside the composite, is more flexible than do outside with resize module.


Autodesk SmokeTips & Tricks
http://mysmoke.blogspot.com

Delay or Advance Keyframes

If you want to move your keyframes a bit early or later in DVE, beside using the bar view to push the keyframes, you can also use the TranslateX.

Just select your keyframes or channels, then say to push 10 frame forward, enter 10 and press add in the calculator, done. You can also just drag the blue numbers box to move the keyframes.

Autodesk SmokeTips & Tricks
http://mysmoke.blogspot.com

Use Gray Color for Fill

Say, if you have a bw graphic and not sure what color to use, or you want to do some trial & error color in your composite, just use gray as fill.
Then in color correction DVE, just use the color wheel to change color. A neutral gray is RGB100,100,100 or for 10bit RGB401,401,401.


Autodesk SmokeTips & Tricks
http://mysmoke.blogspot.com

Hidden credit roll

Do you know that there's a hidden credit roll inside your smoke?
In timeline just pull the vertical gray border to the right,

Here they are ! Sorry, i can't read french

Autodesk SmokeTips & Tricks
http://mysmoke.blogspot.com

Front Source - Beware !!

One short of Front Source that user should be aware of, is that it's calculated before the composite, not inside the composite. Here's what i mean,


Say, below here, the cyan frame is the graphic, and the bw box is the matte for you to fill in the guy.

By normal way, you can add the matte to the guy, then use the front source to shrink the guy inside the box, like below:

Now, add a axis to control the whole graphic.Say, you graphic will start with small, then zoom into the guy. Now, the problem comes, because the front source is calculated first (you shrink the picture), you are actually zooming into a small picture source (the one you shrink, not the original one), so the picture became blurred. To overcome this, instead of moving axis2, you need to move inside the Front & Matte Source (using duplicate), and leave axis2 alone.
Now, the picture is sharped because you no more zoom into a small pictures (Small Front Source).
Because the pictures resolution is low here, you won't see much different, but just look at the eyes sharpness, you will see the different.

Another way is, to do it reverse. First, size up the whole composite (cyan frame & bw matte above), then in Front Source, adjust the guy to fit in the matte. Since the image inside front source need no shrink down to fit inside the matte (cos the matte is size up instead), then we won't have the problem of blow up small picture.

well, since i'm not smoke expert, i might be wrong here, but that's how my experiment came out. Of course, like always, there's many ways to do the same thing in Smoke.

Autodesk SmokeTips & Tricks
http://mysmoke.blogspot.com

Screen, Multiply, Transparent

When you using some blend mode(screen, multiply, spotlight blend), the transparent setting won't work. There are few ways to deal with this, for me, i like to use Front Source Node.

For blend mode like screen, spotling blend and max, just add the Front Source, and set the transparent inside the Front Source Image to fade in/out.


For blend mode like multiply & min, just add the Front Source, and add a white frame to the Front Source, then to fade in/out, just adjust the transparent of the white frame inside Front Source. (note: the image2(2) is image, just like the above picture. It appear as white because we have attach a white frame into the Front Source Node)
Of course, you can just add the background clip back in front of the 2 blend clips, then just fade it in/out. But this won't work if you under layers is not just 2 blend clips, say 4 blend clips each with different blend mode.

By the way, Front Source do has some limitation..., next mail.


Autodesk SmokeTips & Tricks
http://mysmoke.blogspot.com

Raining

This is an old photoshop technique, probably already here for 20 years.

1. Create a noise clip.
2. In DVE, scale it Y axis. 3. In color, adjust gain, gamma, contrast.

4. Blur it, more blur on y than x

5. Done, screen it over you background footages. Do a few layers with different size & blur, sandwich it between your foreground objects.

Autodesk SmokeTips & Tricks
http://mysmoke.blogspot.com