I hope everyone has a good weekend. I leave you with this:
Frank Rueter writing for nukepedia.com:
In my day to day job I’m mainly involved in the product side of things, rather than engineering. J_Ops is a way to dust off the uni programming skills in my own time (yes, I am that sad!), as well as play with tools which are more driven by what I want, than by what clients specifically say to the Foundry they want.
Frank, thanks for putting that together.
Fxphd live: practical effects digital integration
Ian Failes writing for fxguide.com:
You’ll be shooting explosions, pyro elements, in-camera effects, smoke, greenscreen, cloud tanks and more on 32TEN’s stages – all high speed – with these leading practitioners from the special and visual effects industry. You’ll learn how to rig effects and light them practically for the best results, and you’ll see how to combine live action with digital.
More of you should get out there and shoot stuff. You'll learn a lot. It will inspire you, trust me
End of an era: Matte World Digital and Fuel
Ian Failes writing for fxguide.com:
The challenging visual effects climate has again become reality for two leading players in the industry, with announcements today that Matte World Digital is closing its doors and that Fuel VFX has gone into voluntary administration.
Sorry to all involved.
Turn on
Fear envelops visual effects biz
Karen Idelson, David S. Cohen writing to variety.com:
The Siggraph computer graphics conference earlier this month should have found the visual-effects biz on top of the world: Visual effects blockbusters and CG-animated family pics dominate the annual box office, and vfx have become the strongest marketing hook for the majors' biggest pictures.
But beneath its justifiable pride, the business is full of fear.
Everyone's feeling squeezed. Vfx companies say the major studios are shaving their margins down to nothing, but fear retaliation if they try to form a trade organization. Artists, who receive no health or retirement benefits, say salaries are falling though demand for their craft increases, but worry that vfx companies would retaliate if they try to unionize.
OTS
I had a client over my shoulder all day today. I'd like to share some take aways.
Know your script. Don't fumble about.
Only make suggestions when you are not getting the feedback you need. Sometimes that jump starts the clients ideas.
Never make suggestions that cant be done. No jokes.
Stay with what you know.
Be ready to translate plain English into a group of nodes.
Last a tip of the hat to all the commercial artists, client based compositors, colorist. It exhausting.
J Ops 2.0 →
If you follow the Nuke list you have been reading all the JOps 2.0 chatter. Jack Binks has once again brought us a incredible set of tools.
Check out J Ops v2.0 here [nukepedia]. Here is the link to the introduction video. Here is also a A show case Nuke script.
Nuke is an amazing piece of software. Thanks Jack for pushing the bounds and showing all of us what is possible. I learned something today, I'm off to bed.
This is a companion to the 2012 Siggraph Course, Cinematic Color: From Your Monitor to the Big Screen, presenting an introduction to the color pipelines behind modern feature-film visual-effects and animation.
It's always a good idea to stay up on this topic.
Via: Tahl Niran
Wayne Robson:
It's that time of year again... The time when I look at my current reel through finger covered eyes and cringe. That's mainly as each year, like every artist your older work doesn't live up to your current stuff. It's also means trying to get footage etc out of this last 12 months clients that I can use in my reel. now if that goes the way it usually does, then by the time they actually clear me to use it, it'll either be too late, or I'll have better stuff to use by then.