Recently on Twitter I asked followers which After Effects plug-ins they own but no longer used. I received some interesting responses and thought it would be worthwhile opening up the forum here on Motionworks. Are there plug-ins in your toolkit that have fallen out of favour, perhaps you used to love them but the “look” is old? Maybe another plug-in or application has taken it’s place? Are there plug-ins you’ve purchased but not even used!? Personally I have found fewer reasons to fire up Zaxwerks 3D Invigorator, with Cinema 4D taking it’s place in my tool kit; and effects like 3D Stroke, which was once all the rage, are gathering dust. How about you?

Guest host Florian Füger jumps ahead in the After Effects Effects A-Z series with a revealing look at CC Flo Motion.

Jesse Rosten came to my attention last week via his popular Fotoshop by Adobé spot. Jesse is skillful yet modest, with a great eye, loads of heart and a passion for film and motion graphics. In this fun episode of Unplugged discover how Jesse transitioned from the Makeup counter at Walgreens to become a talented, in-demand filmmaker and commercial director.

The Pixel Lab continues the Cinema 4D model pack collection with  Music Pack, 21 music-themed Cinema 4D models.

This breakdown of the Ministry of Sound Headphones spot, created in Cinema 4D by @paulclementstv is truly mind-blowing.

Fotoshop, the worlds’ best beauty product! A terrific spoof by @JesseRosten.

The Pixel Lab has launched Financial Pack, 20 finance-themed Cinema 4D models, for the usual bargain price.

Brainstorm Digital has posted an impressive breakdown of shots from the hit HBO series Boardwalk Empire.

The Pixel Lab has launched City Pack, a huge new Cinema 4D pack with over 20 city themed models, 3 full 3D environments, 16 graffiti C4D textures and 40 image textures.

Digieffects® (www.digieffects.com) announced the immediate availability of Delirium v2.5, Damage v2.5 and Buena Depth Cue v2.5.

This new release now delivers native Final Cut Pro support through FxPlug, Apple’s plug-in architecture, and as a result, available immediately are full support for Final Cut Pro 6, Final Cut Pro 7, Motion 4, Motion 5 and Final Cut Express for the Delirium Phenomena and Damage sets of plug-ins, as well as native support for Final Cut Pro X.  Digieffects has also strengthened support for OS X Lion and Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 across its entire product line.

Also as part of the 2.5 launch, Digieffects has enhanced usability features for all of its plug-ins, with single installers for entire suites and automatic installation of the hundreds of popular presets available to all customers.

The 2.5 versions of Delirium, Damage and Buena Depth Cue are currently available, and are offered as free upgrades to customers who own v2.0 of Delirium, Damage or Buena Depth Cue.

Robert Sharp, the president of Digieffects, was quoted as saying, “The entire team at Digieffects has poured themselves into this release to ensure every plug-in across the entire family is rock solid, stable, and ready to integrate into our customers’ workflow. It took a little longer than we’d prefer, but we can proudly stand behind this release.”

“When we first announced our release, I told you that these products are a quantum leap in technological innovation, with significant under-the-hood improvements.  The steps we’ve taken these past couple of weeks ensure each product will literally slipstream into users’ editing timelines and VFX workflow – regardless of if they’re a freelancer or running a large post facility. For Final Cut Pro editors working in FCP X, FCP 6 or 7; or if Premiere Pro editors on CS5.5, Digieffects plug-ins will integrate seamlessly, delivering stunning results every time.”

The Digieffects Line-Up: FCP, CS5.5 Support, Ideal for Editors, VFX Artists

The new Digieffects v2.5 product line up not only provides its community of VFX artists with a breadth of tools to enhance their work, it also provides its community of video editors with access to VFX tools that are affordable, easy to use, and accessible from within their editing applications.

Delirium v2.5: Delirium v2.5, a comprehensive suite of 44 plug-ins designed for editors, visual effects and digital media artists looking to add high quality, affordable and visually stunning effects to their digital media projects. Today, 11 Delirium plug-ins provide full support for FCP X, and more will be added in the near future. The 11 plug-ins supporting FCP X include Bubbles, Electrical Arcs, Fairy Dust, Fire, Fireworks, Fog Factory, Muzzle Flash, Rainfall, Smoke, Snowstorm, and Sparks.

Damage v2.5: Damage v2.5 now fully supports Final Cut Pro 6 and 7 through FxPlug and includes 7 effects to artistically degrade footage, including Aged Film, Archive, Blockade, Destabilizer, Interference, Overexpose and Skew. Single installers are now included to simplify installation for multi-seat environments.

Buena Depth Cue v2.5: Buena Depth Cue v2.5 provides Adobe CS5.5 and After Effects artists with an innovative workflow for creating visual depth in their projects. Using composition-based effects, such as Rack Focus, Falloff Lighting or Atmosphere, digital media artists can mimic Z depth in a unique way that cannot be replicated using practical depth of field. Buena Depth Cue v2.5 includes 6 powerful plug-ins for creating depth, including:

• Depth: Displays the depth of each layer in grayscale for use as a gradient map with other plug-ins or applications;
• Falloff Lighting: Adds realistic lighting effects to layers;
• Atmosphere: Shrouds layers in a light haze or a deep, murky mist;
• Rack Focus: Produces realistic depth of field effects and focus pulls, including simulating boke and anamorphic lens effects;
• Camera Mapper: Turns 2D stills and footage into 3D scenes directly in After Effects;
• Flipside: Maps one layer onto the backside of another layer, enabling artists to flip front layers over to reveal back layers.

Pricing and Availability

Digieffects Delirium, Damage and Buena Depth Cue v2.5 are priced as follows:

Delirium v2.5: $299.00 for new customers; $149.00 for users migrating from v1.0; and is a free upgrade for v2.0 customers.

Damage v2.5: $99.00 for new customers; $79.00 for users migrating from v1.0; and is a free upgrade for v2.0 customers.

Buena Depth Cue v2.5: $199.00 for new customers; $99.00 for users migrating from v1.0; and is a free upgrade for v2.0 customers.

In this walkthrough tutorial learn some of the techniques and workflow used to create a battle-scared Captain America Shield using Cinema 4D, Photoshop and After Effects.

Watch Example (Captain America)  |  Watch Example (Chris Evans)

Guest host Jerzy Drozda Jr (Maltaannon) is back with another After Effects: Effects A-Z series tutorial, this time explaining the basics of the Channel Blur effect. Watch Tip (flv) | Watch Tip (mp4)

Have you ever created an animation you were happy with only to realise you needed to extend the length? In this short tip learn a technique for extending an animation quickly and easily while maintaining the velocity.

Motion graphic artist Pierre Magnol’s latest work Chemistry comprises beautifully shot imagery with fine graphics. I asked Pierre to give us some insights into his approach to this spot and his workflow in general.

Where did the idea come from?

Anthony Filipe, a friend of mine, who is working next to my office, is about to launch a new blog about Music and Art, so we decided to make a video, a kind of teaser to help him promote the website. He wanted to call the project “Chemistry”.

We decided to find a way to make the logo melt and then it in reverse. It’s not a new idea, but I really loved the challenge in finding a way on how to achieve it effectively and also keep a very organic look. So the main idea was to create a mini laboratory with a logo melting inside. We considered different ways and ended up creating the logo in WAX and melting it with a little blowtorch, simple as that. I think if we weren’t able to find a way to make it we’d have done another movie.

The logo mould, wax cast and blow torch

Logo moulds with blow torch

How much was done in-camera and how much is CG?

Everything was done in-camera except the type effects of course, which were created in Adobe After Effects. I initially considered using Maxon Cinema 4D but was able to source all of the elements to build the background. There also wasn’t enough time to build something very realistic in 3D.

How long did the shoot take?

The actual shoot only took a few hours, but we took 5 days to plan the stages beforehand. With the new cameras such as the panasonic GH2 and the Voigtlander, for example, it’s very easy to shoot with low light, making setting up each stage very easy.

Tell us a little about what you did in After Effects.

I used After Effects for color correction using Red Giant Software’s Magic Bullet Mojo and Denoiser. I also used After Effects for the type animation.  After Effects is so cool and flexible to make those kind of shaking effects, allowing me to experiment with many different ways of making the text move.

Your work often features text as graphical elements. Tell us your thoughts about using text in that way.

I have no specific plans on how to approach it. I create all of the elements of the design in Adobe Photoshop, then try several ways to give the type an organic feeling in the way they move. I wanted to capture the sensation that someone was trying to re-arrange their order.

Raw image

Colour graded using Mojo and Denoiser

Do you cut first and do the graphics afterwards or is it a back and forth process?

It’s a back and forth process and for that I use the Automatic Duck plug-in to keep the edits correct throughout the project. I cut a draft edit based on the music, then place it into After Effects for color correction. I follow that with another round of fine tuning the edit and finally back into After Effects to animate the Photoshop elements.

Your work also heavily features depth of field effects… why is that?

I really don’t know why exactly… Depth of field is so extraordinary for me…  it’s like if you go through matter itself and discover a new universe, as if you were “Buckaroo Banzai”, I really like the end titles of that movie!

What did you use to create the liquid effects on the Alchemy logo and other text?

I used Digital Juice stock footage to add the liquid effect to the Alchemy logo and Plexus with some OBJ 2D objects to add some organic 2D effects over the text. With plug-ins like Plexus and Trapcode Form 2, I guess we could play for hours to invent new uses, but there are only 24 hours in a day!

Raw image

Final colour graded shot with graphics

Is the music original? Was it written for this spot?

No, it’s a mix based upon Miss You, a Trentmöller track.

Any other interesting information you think is worthwhile?

Yes, I would like a big render farm for Christmas!

I asked Boris FX Product Manager Dirk De Jong for his thoughts on how BCC Particle Emitter 3D compared with Trapcode Particular. Here’s Dirks response:

“My sense is that BCC Particle Emitter 3D matches up well with Trapcode Particular. With this effect we are basically upgrading the BCC particles to have better AE integration, adding support of After Effects lights, cameras, masks, etc. The Evolution graphs and Gradient controls give a better level of control than what could be found in the old Particle System for particle size, color and opacity over the life of the particle. There is now support for some true 3D particle shapes with 3D lighting etc. In many cases the OpenGL rendering allows BCC Particle Emitter 3D to use bigger size particle images without slowing down as much as a software rendering Particle effects such as Particular might.”