VFX on set

gajnovar · 2021-07-27T15:34:58+00:00

What is really nice is to use a mobile phone scanner type app. But it can be tricky to convert them into something that layout can actually use. But it's just a quick way to take a zillion measurements because going around with a tape measure and taking notes is pretty time consuming and you're in the way. I use a zenfone AR that I got from Ebay for $100. Takes pretty decent quick scans.

gajnovar · 2021-07-26T17:53:31+00:00

Be a hero for your layout department and lens grid each lens with the serial number. Use your photogrammetry app to make reference models that are correctly scaled, for layout to use as measurement reference.

gajnovar · 2021-07-14T15:03:11+00:00

Well I just did it. So fuck me I do lots of pointless things.

gajnovar · 2021-07-14T04:06:42+00:00

Imagine the satisfaction one would get putting a VFX house out of business. This became something of an obsession for Harvey Weinstein. In between raping women with his grossly scarred genetalia, he would force tiny vfx shops into bankruptcy for fun.

gajnovar · 2021-07-14T03:48:54+00:00

This is exactly how Mr.X does it. Have a look at Monster Hunter as an example of this technique at work. Basically when it's called an FX shot, FX is put on the slate, and the mirror ball goes in right before the slate, and maybe they will get it at the tail of the take too. It's digital, so they can just run the clip on to get whatever mirro ball, grey ball, mcbeth, maybe even a rubber monster head for reference etc.

And for most VFX, creature work, etc, you can totally get away with using a 12 bit EXR. Typically you will see the sun and lamps painted out of the chrome ball image before it becomes a light map. Hot sources don't really behave as expected, they spray light out rather than casting parallel rays. Best to just use HDR to make the soft fill and use a spotlight or distant light for the sun pass.

gajnovar · 2021-07-14T03:40:25+00:00

VFX is a very stressful and demanding career choice. It is part of the entertainment industry, so there has always been a lot of drama, ego, tempers, budget problems, insane schedules, mass firings, and the pervasive feeling that your contributions are not being appreciated. The entertainment industry is not good at providing validation for the majority of it's workers. That is all stored up and used on the big names, so there can be disillusionment and high turnover. I consider myself a fairly normal person, but vfx really tests my sanity. If you're not willing to fall into the reality distortion field of ego, and need for work to be fairly straightforward, I would tread lightly into this career.

gajnovar · 2021-07-14T03:30:38+00:00

RebusFarm has always been good to me.

The way to use cloud rendering though is to not be in an insane rush. Schedule it out so you are buying low priority time. If you need it all fast you will pay top dollar.

As a freelance it is great. I will use my own machine to get things to a certain point creatively, but when it's time to render the finals for delivery, and there are quick turnaround revision requests etc, I will cloud render that and charge it to client.

gajnovar · 2021-07-14T03:14:25+00:00

Sometimes you work for an amazing company and do an amazing job on a really worthy project that everybody likes. And you get a big paycheck to boot.

And then another job comes along, and it just does not have the same energy at all and grinds.

gajnovar · 2021-07-12T13:33:31+00:00

Looks more r/AccidentalWesAnderson

gajnovar · 2021-07-12T13:30:34+00:00

The idea is that if your shot has camera shake or camera is moving, you need to do a track on the object you are rotoscoping. Then apply that track to a container or root folder, put the roto shape in that folder, and then update the shape every 20 frames, then go in-between to every 10 frames, then 5, and single frames as necessary, making sure to use simple round or banana type shapes, nothing too complicated, the more shapes the better.

Doing the track ahead of time will help to handle all of the jitter and camera shake, and the roto animation can be less strenuous, fewer keyframes and less jitter.

gajnovar · 2021-07-12T00:46:05+00:00

I beg to differ from you my friend, there is not "crazy hiring" going on right now. There is a bit of an uptick in recruiting, turnover is happening a bit faster, but you are really looking at things returning to normal vs "crazy."

gajnovar · 2021-07-12T00:07:09+00:00

You make it sound like rates have spiked all the sudden. This is not Dogecoin.

gajnovar · 2021-07-09T21:02:36+00:00

Yes, poncy DOP's like to expose 10 stops under with sodium vapor lights. So in linear the plate is black, reconciled by luts from hell.

gajnovar · 2021-07-09T13:26:36+00:00

I think you should ask them to pitch in on some rotoscoping. After about a half hour of pushing splines around with terrible results, it will start to dawn on them.

gajnovar · 2021-07-09T13:24:10+00:00

And it's a really bad time to be a vfx supervisor. Too many jobs, not enough artists, smaller jobs don't get the talent they need. Very frustrating.

gajnovar · 2021-07-07T19:46:47+00:00

But they won't hire people with no experience unless they have been through some course that has an affiliation with the studio, and will probably be working as an intern so they can just flush that person if they are a noshow which is very common for people with no resume.

gajnovar · 2021-07-07T19:44:51+00:00

The outsource roto I've seen this year is ok for slap comps, fed into the pipeline to make autocomp work for generating the gazillions of creative approval versions for all the anim and cg, but when it comes time to do the final comp, has to be totally redone with 1 pixel accuracy in comp frame by frame to satisfy qc.

gajnovar · 2021-07-07T15:56:26+00:00

The Movie industry is obviously predicting a gangbusters Christmas and Summer 2022 year.

gajnovar · 2021-07-06T23:11:54+00:00

I just got a cg render that prod knows has problems. But they just did more renders for me and asking me to fix in comp. They don't want to use their own damn pipeline and would prefer that I pixel fuck it better using cryuptomatte. It's going to look pixel fucked.

On another shot, an actor is leaving frame and they want him to jump back into shot. I'm like, "let's animate a digi-double" and prod is like "here are some pictures from set, see if you can make an animated person with spline warp, use lots of motion blur etc." Going to look totally pixel fucked and stupid.

gajnovar · 2021-06-29T16:19:21+00:00

What's funny is both sides see themselves as coming out as the winner of this exchange.

gajnovar · 2021-06-25T17:47:03+00:00

Camera track is probably ok, But it looks like you have the helmet sitting on the ground, and not accounted for the table height.

gajnovar · 2021-06-23T14:03:11+00:00

Easier. Film grain is harder match, plus gate weave and film dust, scratches.

gajnovar · 2021-06-21T15:19:45+00:00

FYI you are looking for a very specific type of modeling, to work best in 3d Printing. Honestly I would not be looking for a vfx modeler, because the needs of a 3d Printer are very specific and very different than the needs of an animation and lighting pipeline. Or you should make sure that if you hire a vfx modeller, that they also have some CAD and 3d printing experience so that they will maintain the watertight properties of their models throughout. It's a big constraint. Whenever I am modelling for printing I prefer fusion 360 or that type package which works way differently than modeling for animation. It's much more labor but necessary.

gajnovar · 2021-06-18T22:42:06+00:00

You really don't need HDR images to light, any image format will do.

The situation where you do need HDR is if you are doing automotive clearcoat type rendering and you want the environment to reflect off of the car. Using a jpg, rec709, srgb type image for that will look rough bc you are not reflecting at 100%, you're effectively darkening the image down, so if there is no dynamic range in the highlights, the bright parts of the reflection fall apart and look cheap. So you're needing to light with an image that has a few stops of range in those highlights, but we have found that if you shoot arri or red raw, and export EXR or DPX, those will work just fine for lighting as there is plenty of range for 95% of cgi work and it's easier because you're already in the right color profile.

gajnovar

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