The project I am working on at the moment kept me out of the studio for most of the time recently. While I was away though, I did not want the computers to stay idle, so I set up some calculation-intensive experiments to render during my absence. Here’s one of them.

I have come across a fantastic Cinema 4D plugin called Xbreaker created by pariah Studios. It allows you to shatter pretty much any geometry into tiny pieces with just a few clicks. Add some physics, shaders, a bit of post in After Effects – and you got yourself a nice little visual experiment.

The thing took forever-and-then-some to render, mainly due to my lack of knowledge in render optimization. Still, I think it was better than having the computers off.

Good Times with Xbreaker (click to play)

Music by Nine Inch Nails (Track 9 from the album Ghosts I).

Download Xbreaker (32 and 64 bit):
http://www.pariahstudios.co.uk/xbreaker/

The video is also available at Vimeo and YouTube.

I am currently working on the new reel for imago and while digging in the project archives I came across this this test render for One Man Show – a piece I made back in 2008. Using Trapcode Particular and three Photoshop layers I created a large scale meadow that, honestly speaking, didn’t get enough exposure in the finished piece.

Grass Field with Trapcode Particular (click to play)

If you were hoping for the new QubaHQ tutorial this weekend, you will need to wait just a bit more. I am bit busy with the projects at the moment, plus it’s over 32°C and humid in here at the moment, making my brain melt from the heat.

I have big plans for QubaHQ Tutorials in June. Over the course of the last few days I thought up and implemented four new techniques that I will share with you over the course of the coming month. Well, at least I hope to be able to push all the content out in a span of 30 days.

Check the rest of this post for the teaser trailer, as well as a short explanation of things to come.

QubaHQ Tutorials: June Trailer (click to play)

So, what will you see here in June?

Automated, synchronized 3D lights color control
An expression driven After Effects rig allowing you to quickly and easily create 3D scene lighting using pre-defined color map. You will be able to either maintain full manual control, or set it to automate the changes in lighting.

3D light arrays driven by animated texture maps
Derived from the previous rig, this setup will let you control large arrays of lights (110 in the trailer) using animated color/intensity map, similarly to the much simpler effect seen in Scrolling LED Text tutorial.

Pixel-perfect procedural layer disintegration
Who does not like breaking stuff into tiny-tiny pieces (or using time-reverse, creating animation elements from particles)? I am going to show you a very cool technique letting you turn your layers into sand, smoke or any other type of particle, while maintaining very high level of precision and control.

100% accurate floor reflection rig
Reflecting simple elements is quite easy. You can do it manually or use any of the plugins available for AE. How about reflecting more complex scenes, such as a particle simulation? Yes, it is possible and yes, it is quite easy once you see it done once.

Download the QubaHQ: June Trailer (30MB MP4)
http://video.qubahq.com/tutorials/QubaHQ_JuneTrailer.mp4

Music used in this trailer was composed by Joel Nielsen for the upcoming Black Mesa Half-Life 2 mod.

The QubaHQ: June Trailer can also be watched at Vimeo and YouTube.

A few days ago I published a post entitled Volumetric Clouds? Yes We Can! featuring the screenshot of the After Effects timeline containing over 550 layers used in creating (among other things) fake volumetric fog/clouds.

The project is now complete, but since it is still not cleared for air, I have another teaser for you all – a video of the entire animation in wireframe mode.

The final composition clocks at 933 layers (excluding a whole bunch of pre-composed material).

In case you wonder – no, I did not manage to find a way to render After Effects wireframe mode. I simply programmed a simple macro on my keyboard that advances the frame by one, takes, saves the screenshot and then loops to repeat the steps again.

Music by Kult (Nie żyję ponad stan from the album Poligono Industrial).

I have been messing around with creating “painterly” look for a still image and came up with this one.

It is created through a combination of Photoshop’s Artistic Brush tool, After Effect’s Twixtor and a whole bunch of loops and nested comps to get the whole thing as smooth as possible.

As an unexpected side effect I also figured out how to make pretty convincing fake hand-drawn text in AE.

Music by Otograph “Dive into PixelJunk Monsters”
On the picture: Honda Jazz (a.k.a. Fit)

I’ve always had a soft spot for the 3D metaballs. It may come from the fact that as a teenager I watched way too many Amiga demos, where the metaball rendering was nearly always present.

The setup for this piece is fairly simple: a ball, bunch of array repeaters driven by a random movement – everything enveloped with metaball and smoothing modifiers. The pearl shader and HDRI lighting give the whole render a nice, shiny look (don’t we just love these specular reflections?)

Edited to the hip breakbeat tune “Pulsar” by Little Bitchard.

The tutorial for Image Enhancement (Hollywood Style) is ready. As announced last week, this video will teach you how to create your own HolOS (Hollywood Operating System) image enhancement effect using After Effects.

Go and watch it now at:
http://ae.tutsplus.com/tutorials/ae-plus/enhance-your-images-with-holos-ae-plus/

Enhance Your Images With HolOS is a “plus” tutorial and requires a $9 membership fee to be viewed. It is well worth it, though, as you will gain access to the source files, samples and many other “plus” tutorials… as well as support yours truly.

Here is the preview again, if you missed it the last time:

Image Enhancement (Hollywood Style)

Enhance Your Images With HolOS:
http://ae.tutsplus.com/tutorials/ae-plus/enhance-your-images-with-holos-ae-plus/

I have been messing around with Cinema 4D again. This time I built a setup with a number of semi-translucent curtains and a projector rig casting a video on them. The video was pre-processed in After Effects in order to produce a low-res RBG grid typical in the low grade projectors.

I did not really have a good concept for a piece when working on this effect, so after producing this short sample I saved it in my presets depository. Hopefully I will have a chance to use it when a suitable project comes along.

Here is a sample video and some stills from this test:

It seems that computers running HolOS (Hollywood Operating System) always have the capability to almost infinitely zoom in and enhance bad photographs to reveal crucial details (faces, car plate numbers, tattoos, etc.). I have decided to build my own image enhancement tool in After Effects.

The “tool” of course is nothing else than a composition that first pixelates the image and then animates the “miraculous” enhancement. Check the video below to see a demo of the effect.

Image Enhancement (Hollywood Style)

I am currently working on a tutorial explaining how to build this effect. Watch Quba HQ in the following week for its release.

Messing about with cloth simulation in version 11 of Cinema 4D, while waiting for my copy of R11.5. So far I learned that C4D cloth likes to intersect with itself much more than the nCloth in Maya.