Quba HQ

January 12, 2012
In Featured, Games, imago, Motion, Video Bits
2 comments

AE64

Similarly to my 2005 piece entitled Demographix, AE64 is a tribute to the demoscene and to the legacy of world’s most popular microcomputer: Commodore 64.

While this video was created using the typical contemporary arsenal of tools (mainly After Effects and Cinema 4D), it conforms to most of the basic graphical limitations of the C64 such as a limited 16-color palette, low resolution, use of the overscan area etc. To maintain the spirit of the demo, I also created most of the effects using various scripts and code snippets, procedurally automating many of the tasks typically animated using keyframes.

Morhipo ads and how MovieType saved my skin

I remember the first time John from Motionworks shown me a beta version of MovieType. Pretty cool – I remember saying – I’m sure it will be useful to the people who do lots of 3D text, but not really something I would use in my projects.

While I was certainly impressed with both the idea and the implementation of MovieType, I really did not think I’d ever have any need for it. My motion pieces rarely, if ever, use 3D typography. I may throw an After Effects 3D text layer here and there, but that’s pretty much it.

And then came the Morhipo.com gig.

June 5, 2011
In Motion, Video Bits
4 comments

Liquid Lifeforms

Liquid Lifeforms is a short experiment in Cinema 4D softbody dynamics. Visuals were inspired and edited to the audio track Beazt, created by disconnectuser (Alan Pring).

After countless commercial productions, where the result needs to feel pretty and appealing to the viewer, I felt an urge to create something a bit more disturbing. I wanted to approach the animation in the same way I would approach a live animatronic shoot. To achieve that, I constructed two rigid body robots, controlled by a bunch of randomized motors and set them lose in C4D’s dynamics engine. I then wrapped the resulting animation in a softbody, latex-like skin and run a second level simulation.

The process resulted in a creepy, realistic motion – part mechanical and part organic. I cut everything together in After Effects with some extra color correction and distortions. Enjoy!

May 28, 2011
In Motion, Telesine
No comments yet

Fiat 500

I told you I was busy :)

This project started its life as a simple storyboard for a 2D piece based on photographs, delivered to us by the agency. The main brief was to show off different customization options for Fiat 500 using series of cuts. Right from the beginning I knew that the key to making the car look attractive in the commercial was in adding that one extra dimension, so we decided to upgrade the ad to a full 3D.

While the team was working on the car models, I rigged up yet another of my patented After Effects expression rigs (basically my own version of Trapcode Echospace) in order to easily create and animate the flower designs originally designed by the agency. The rest was a pretty standard editing, compositing and beautifying process, resulting in the ad you can see below.

January 17, 2011
In Motion, Tutorials&Presets
19 comments

iDoF Camera Rig: Community Update 1.1

You simply got to love the Internet, and the motion graphics community. Less than a day has passed since the release of our Cinema 4D Camera Rig and we already have an update!

Mdhamiri a Nkemi, one of the site’s visitors decided to clean up the rig a little bit and add some new functionality. I liked it so much, I decided to share it with all of you as an official community update 1.1.

Preset+Tutorial: C4D DoF Camera Rig

A program of choice to many motion artists, Cinema 4D has a rather counter-intuitive method of producing depth of field. Both the camera controls and the way in which C4D handles depth maps can be a cause of major headache, especially for the newcomers to this program.

With the coding support from German motion artist and art director, Derya Ozturk, we have been able to construct an improved camera rig for Cinema 4D that should help you eliminate needless frustration, and get the results you need with just a few clicks.

Please note that while the tutorial will teach you how to use the preset, it will not show you how to construct the demo scene seen in the preview video.

As much as I would like to credit the awesome flute player who provided the audio for this preview, I was unable to locate the “patient zero” among dozens of videos around the net using this jingle. Whoever you are, kudos and don’t ever stop trying!

Code by Derya Ozturk
Concept and math logic by Quba Michalski

Running time: 46min
Difficulty: Easy
Required tools: Cinema 4D
Optional software: After Effects, Frischluft Lenscare plug-in

August 13, 2010
In Motion, Video Bits
9 comments

Good Times with Xbreaker

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.

Tutorial+Preset: Light Wall

Hello everyone! Yes, it is here – a long-delayed new tutorial from the June series. It’s been around 6 weeks since the previous tutorial, but I have been incredibly busy building a new kick-ass hi-tech intro for the tutorials… No. Not really. The truth is I have been working on multiple commercial projects and could not find any time off for neither leisure nor tutorials. As for the intro – I knocked it together in a few minutes at 4:00AM last night.

This tutorial is a hybrid between the Automated Light Rig and Scrolling LED Text. We will be building an animated image map driven light array that can be used for for either cool light effects or easily controlled particle emission.

While the entire project can be completed within After Effects, I will also jump into Cinema 4D every now and then and show you a very easy way for creating quite complex light arrays and importing them back into AE.

Music used in the trailer comes from Beck’s Cellphone’s Dead from the album The Information. Music in the intro comes from… here.

Running time: 73min
Difficulty: Easy-Advanced (depending how much you want to learn :)
Required tools: After Effects
Optional software and plug-ins: Cinema 4D, Trapcode Particular, VC Optical Flares (or similar)

February 18, 2010
In imago, Motion
3 comments

Wings: Destinations

Destinations was the first advertisement commissioned to us by Rafineri agency.

Originally planned as a simple 2.5D animation, the project was soon moved into a 3D format to enhance the feeling of flight and the depth of the world we constructed. We placed flat photographic images of world’s famous landmarks in a 3D landscape divided into four sections – representing the four seasons.

January 23, 2010
In Doodles&Noodles
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Global Illumination + Sketch

Playing around with Cinema 4D – trying out how Global Illumination would mix with wiggly vector outlines… not really sure if I like it or not. It’s confusing.