-
Midweek Motivations: US Marine Corps Commercial – Battles Won: Anthem (2017)
Gunnery Sgt. Justin Kronenberg created this animated photorealistic diorama ad for the Marine Corps Recruiting Command, with VFX by The Mill. This was part of a rebrand for the Marines that also included a revamp of their website.
-
Midweek Motivations: Daniel Thiger – Signature Materials Designer
Daniel Thiger, currently Lead Environment Artist at Bungie, in Seattle, is an accomplished designer with many years of experience in the video game industry. “For Substance Source, Daniel produced a selection of 15 fully procedural ground materials, so detailed that they are virtually indistinguishable from scanned materials.”
-
Midweek Motivation; The Pixel Lab Steampunk Modeling Contest Results
The results are in for the The Pixel Lab’s Steampunk modeling contest and the entries are stunning. Everybody’s a winner!
-
Big Screen Effects: Claymation & Stop Motion in Early Man
Early Man is a stop-motion film, directed by Nick Park with his Oscar-winning animation studio Aardman Animations. You may know Park and Aardman from Wallace and Gromit. I saw it last month and it’s a fun ride! I highly recommend it. Plus, Eddie Redmayne, Tom Hiddleston, Maisie Williams doing voices… the cast is top notch!
-
Midweek Motivation: Allegorithmic Best of Substance 2017
Allegorithmic has compiled a list of their favorite Substance-related VFX-focused stories. They include work from The Mill and Rising Sun Pictures, and touch on many different genres including major motion pictures, TV shows, student films, commercials and more.
-
Big Screen Effects: Black Panther
Black Panther is one of the best films I’ve seen, with stunning visual effects, superb acting and a wonderful story line. Go behind the scenes of this blockbuster movie with VFX breakdowns, interviews, the crazy car chase and more, to learn what it took to bring Black Panther to the big screen. Warning: spoilers.
-
MIdweek Motivations: School of Motion Cinema 4D Basecamp
This animation from the London-based, award-winning Animade animation studio for School of Motion is adorable and clever. If you’re a Cinema 4D user, you’re sure to agree!
-
Midweek Motivation: Fracture FX Client Reel 2017
Check out the Fracture FX 2017 Client Reel showcasing some of the chaos and destruction created using Fracture FX for Autodesk Maya. It’s smashing good fun.
-
Sneak Peek: Video Copilot Stretchy Glitch Tutorial
Andrew Kramer of Video Copilot has posted a teaser at VideoCopilot.net about a new tutorial that will come out next Monday and uses only plug-ins that ship with After Effects.
-
Midweek Motivation: Co-nundrum Title Sequence
Designer and art director Tiber Ergür created the Co-nundrum title sequence as a self-practice project. The stunning visuals in this piece, along with the beautiful music, made me think it was for a real film. Too bad it isn’t, because this is amazing work. Software used: Cinema 4D, Octane Render, X-particles, and After Effects.
-
Big Screen Effects: The Shape of Water
The Shape of Water is my personal pick for Best Picture for the Academy Awards, and I’ve seen all of the nominated films. It’s so beautifully shot and the story is compelling. Without giving away any spoilers, The Shape of Water is the story of a mute woman who works in custodial services at a lab in 1962’s Baltimore during the Cold War. Scientists bring in an amphibious creature and love happens. Of course, the evil lab manager has other ideas. This is a roundup of the visual effects in the film, created by Mr. X and others.
-
Midweek Motivations: Series Titles from Elastic.
Here are some beautifully designed main titles for a few series. The Design Studio, Elastic, seems to be killing it with every new title designs. Get inspired with these gorgeous titles.
-
Midweek Motivation: Catching up with Andrew Kramer & Video Copilot
Andrew Kramer and the folks at Video Copilot have been rather quiet these past few months, busy working on cool creative tools. But Andrew recently went live on TheFutur to talk about what he’s been doing. Plus he’s added a bonus interview with his friend Andrew Price about how to succeed in the VFX industry.
-
Big Screen Effects: The Magic Behind Coco
Coco was possibly my favorite film of 2017, and that is saying a lot because I saw a lot of movies! It’s visually stunning and gorgeously animated and tells a compelling story of a boy named Miguel who visits the world of the dead. Coco won Best Edited Animated at the American Cinema Editors’ Eddie Awards, and won Outstanding Animated Character in an Animated Feature. Coco; Hèctor the VES Awards.
Coco has been nominated for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Song by the 2018 Academy Awards. -
Midweek Motivation: Quixel: Making of American Gods with Megascans
Learn how Quixel Megascans was instrumental in the making of episode 5 (Lemon Scented You) from the Starz original TV series ‘American Gods.’ There’s even a tutorial on how it was done.