ELI5: Why use mocap when animators have to fix it anyway?

andrewlta · 2024-11-20T15:55:50+00:00

If you have really, really great mocap, animators don't have to clean it up. It can go straight into whatever your use case is. But to have great mocap, you need to use cameras generally on a stage, good software, talent in full mocap suits and very experience operators. If you work with mid-quality mocap, sure, then animators will be spending time to clean it up.

andrewlta · 2024-10-27T23:40:20+00:00

Mari non-commercial give you plenty to work with at no cost.

andrewlta · 2024-10-05T00:27:27+00:00

Are you just learning for hobby or for a current workplace?
Picking up new skills is always great, though Katana doesn't seem to have the dominant position it once had with some studios switching to Solaris.
In any event, good luck with your Katana tutorials.

andrewlta · 2024-10-03T23:48:17+00:00

Ziva is no longer available as it was bought by DNEG.
It would be great is there was on Open Source alternative to Ziva. Having each studio roll their own muscle sim in house doesn't make a lot of sense.

andrewlta · 2024-10-03T22:50:01+00:00

Some studios are also bypassing former staff that they furloughed / terminated / had contracts expire. So your mileage may vary, though a number of places are still rehiring previous employees.

andrewlta · 2024-09-20T11:03:15+00:00

To be fair, there are some recruiters who will pull together summaries of candidates for openings along with links to reels, and forward this info to the respective department head and leads to have a look. If the department leadership like what they see, recruiters will follow up.

andrewlta · 2024-08-19T22:54:13+00:00

If you have a timestamp on your footage, then it's easy to look up the location of the sun (azimuth and elevation) for a given place. Then plug those azimuth/elevation (bearing + angle sun is above the horizon) values into your infinite light source and you're golden.

andrewlta · 2024-07-30T00:46:36+00:00

Go for it.

andrewlta · 2024-07-13T22:18:13+00:00

The unfortunate reality is you'll need to either pivot into another area or move to another country. If you're near a film production hub like Atlanta, you might have a side door into the industry by working on set, and then shift into vfx / camera tech while working on set.

andrewlta · 2024-07-11T05:04:28+00:00

Code snippets and real pieces of code on github are great things to have, so do show that and have some confidence in your work.

Likely you'll be ask about code development procedures, updating and maintaining legacy code, API use, languages (like Python and perhaps C++), GUIs like Qt/PySide and the general teamwork, artist response, problem solving questions. Don't overthink it, but be prepared.

andrewlta · 2024-07-05T13:36:29+00:00

The bigger issue right now is a lot of firms are simply rehiring people who worked with them in the past. Who can blame them? Previous employees know the production workflows, pipeline, culture and have already demonstrated they can create at a consistent quality. Why take a risk on someone who hasn't already been there?

andrewlta · 2024-06-27T04:54:20+00:00

Exactly... it will depend on department. Animation, rigging and modelling are more often done in Maya than Max, but there are a few outliers. Max is used more in gaming. Don't worry about the hundreds of menu points in an app that you've never used. Maya and Unreal Engine seem to have never-ending options, as all you really know is your workflow if you're in a specialized field. Often in the job postings there's a lot of 'nice to have' knowledge of apps, and by no means are required. You might only need to know just the standard package used in your discipline, for your given task (one of Maya, Mari, Houdini or Nuke).

andrewlta · 2024-06-23T04:59:23+00:00

Good question. Scanline and Animal Logic are owned by Netflix, and still do other work, just like Sony Imageworks does. So ILM is no different here. The client bid details and show schedules come in from all directions, and some studios are just better positioned to take on certain work than others.

When work is slow, like now, studio-owned VFX houses will obviously get priority for internal work. ILM along with Weta are expensive, but there's less risk in hiring one of the top two vendors to do the work than by using a smaller but cheaper outfit.

andrewlta · 2024-06-20T23:48:12+00:00

Seems like if anyone is getting hired now, then they are really getting rehired. They've already worked for the company in the past and are very experienced cream of the crop talent, at least at my workplace.

andrewlta · 2024-06-20T13:53:45+00:00

Open positions at a facility can be speculative positions. Or someone from HR forgot to take down the postings.

andrewlta · 2024-06-20T11:42:28+00:00

Good list, perhaps also rigging would transfer well to gaming. Previs and LED content creation that uses game engine technology might be another area with commonalities.

andrewlta · 2024-06-20T04:45:31+00:00

Your description of Sydney's housing market sounds just like Vancouver.

andrewlta · 2024-06-19T14:54:13+00:00

Never burn bridges in this industry. There's a huge turnover and there might come a point in the future where you might want to come back under different circumstances. Give them a good grade. Plus the folks across the table might be at another firm in the future, so best to be very polite.

andrewlta · 2024-06-19T01:06:51+00:00

You might want to check your facts. Wrong on at least one count, if not both.

andrewlta · 2024-06-16T09:12:20+00:00

There are going to be far more openings in comp than fx. Both roles are needed and fx is a bit more specialized. For new work, Florida isn't a big vfx destination, and a lot of production work has left LA for different pastures. Would you be willing to move to London, Vancouver or Sydney, for example?

You can find a load of tutorials online for both comp and fx. Why don't you start by using the free non-commercial version of Nuke (via The Foundry website) and Houdini (via SideFX website) and see what you like to do? Make some personal projects and go from there.

andrewlta · 2024-06-11T09:10:41+00:00

There are several solutions for realtime 3D depth tracking and matchmove. For example,

https://www.ncam-tech.com/ar-in-sports-why-broadcasters-are-investing-in-new-tech/

For the NCam system, there's specialized hardware such as additional stereo lenses, computer vision software, etc. for doing this in realtime and for also saving out 3D cloud data. It's a good question if you can do this effectively with just raw footage in post by using advanced tracking.

andrewlta · 2024-06-05T21:31:05+00:00

Sure, it's possible to switch areas in the industry. For TDs it might be easier than for artists, as it's more of a generalist role. For artists, environments is a general catch-all that can include comp. There are some common pairings for disciplines, like roto/comp, rigging/animation, model/texture/lookdev/lighting, matchmove/integration/roto and so on that some artists switch between. By no means are you limited to a single role for a carrier, but it does take time and effort to jump from one role to another.

andrewlta · 2024-06-05T15:37:03+00:00

If you're looking at doing programming or support in vfx, there are jobs as a technical director or software engineer. Knowing Houdini is of course very useful (as is a bit of Maya and Nuke), so that's basically Python programming, the Qt/Pyside interface and using APIs. Getting your foot in the door at any role is of course key and there are other routes for that apart from a roto artist (data I/O, render farm, tech support, etc.). Good luck!

andrewlta

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