So as a completely serendipitous turn of events, what started out as an animation experiment suddenly turned out to be an unexpected hit amongst the vimeo community.

You can watch the video here:

What was fun about this project was that it was personal. No deadlines. No direction.
The only restrictions I had imposed on myself was

• It had to be completely done using the After Effects Shapes tool
• I had to use Duik ( a script allowing you to do IK rigs in After Effects. Frecklin Awesome)

I finished it at midnight a few days ago and thought it would be kind of fun to upload to the web and see if I could get a few giggles from my friends and showcase some of the new animation techniques. Within a few minutes of uploading I got some of the giggles I needed from some good friends and then went to bed.

Next morning I woke up to half a dozen emails notifying me of my film being added to various groups. One of which was the vimeo staff picks. For a second I was scratching my head. Was this THE Vimeo Staff picks? Or was there some other group with the same name. Sure enough I checked the staff picks group and mine had suddenly gotten to the top of the list! Surely this was a mistake…

Needless to say I was flippin out! What the frick!?! This video isn’t good enough to get on staff picks!!!

Anyways, I am humbled (humble bragging!) that anyone found this funny or at least shared in my sense of humour. And to everyone to enjoyed the vid, thanks for sharing the laughs with me.

Now for a sequel…

Check out the Duik site on how to do IK rigging in After Effects:

http://ik.duduf.com/

And this awesome tutorial on how to use it:

Or something to that effect. I don’t really blame my tools, I generally blame ppl

That being said, a question I get asked a lot is what software  I use. So I thought I’d share a little of that with you today.

EDITING : My current program of choice is Apple’s Final Cut Pro. Mostly because I find the Mac platform really stable and lets face it, it’s a brilliant program. Robust and has a lot of brilliant features.

However if you are not on the mac platform, I would suggest Sony’s Vegas. Why not Adobe’s premiere pro you ask? Well to be honest I haven’t been happy with premiere since 6.5. And historically 6.5 was the worst, but it scarred me so bad that every time I have revisited the program, it just brings back bad memories. Plus Vegas is waaaaay more stable. Even on PC it doesn’t crash nearly as much as premiere. But the Vegas editing workflow is pretty different than most PLUS it doesn’t port across to other Adobe apps as seamlessly as Premiere. But perhaps the price tag could convince you otherwise (Vegas is significantly cheaper than Premiere!)

COMPOSITING : Adobe After effects. Well there is no other app I have used for compositing other than Combustion 2 (but that was way back in the late 90s!). Not exactly nodal based like the rest of the other compositing programs out there, but it can do a surprising amount more than it looks like it can do. Videocopilot.net anyone? It’s probbably the cheapest of the compositing programs out on the market anyways and in the right hands, can give you the extra “oomf” your video needs.  (BTW if you don’t know what compositing is, check it out here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compositing) PLUS these are the list of plugins I currently use:

• Trapcode Particular 2

• Knoll Light Factory

• Automatic Duck (converts the FCP project in After Effects)

• Trapcode Horizon

SOUND MIXING AND MASTERING : I personally don’t do the sound mixing, I just design the layout and timing of sequences in Final cut and then OMF them to ProTools. But the sound guys swear by this and honestly, it really comes down to the engineer more than the program. But the plugins and hardware you can get for protools is pretty sick.

GRAPHICS : Adobe Photoshop. Nuff said.

3D : I actually use Blender cause I can’t be stuffed buying Maya and learning it. But the other boys here use a mixture of Maya and 3D studio Max ( of which 3D studio Max has a slightly easier learning curve).  But if you can’t be buggered buying software for 3D cause you’re too cheap like me, check out www.blender.org . You might be surprised at what you can do with this app. Surprised me!

Ok now for the list of programs I will never use (cause I am a snob and if I catch you using them, I’ll smash you!)

• Premiere Pro – I’m sorry have I made it clear how much I hate this program?

• Livetype – it’s kinda fun when you start out, but it’s pretty bad.

• Apple Color – Slow as molasses and not quite getting the results I want. Has a lot of potential though.

• Windows Movie Maker – tragic tragic program.

But seriously, everything I have listed here is nothing without good creativity. Like the guys from Pixar say, let the art challenge the technology and the technology challenge the art.  Have a good balance of both and you should be in a good place

The pervasiveness of the internet has meant that now information is completely and utterly available to anyone and everyone. which is not to say is a bad thing. When I started doing videos when I was sixteen, the internet was ridiculously expensive to have at home and editing on computers was something that cost in the tens of thousands of dollars.

But nowadays it seems everyone has the freedom to express their ideas in a digital format in one way or the other and this has leveled the playing field for a lot of people. No longer are creative people limited by their cash flows, they can use powerful tools that even the big guns in Hollywood and major design studios use. Powerful tools at the grasp of mere mortals.

But like all powerful tools, there are many who use it for evil…

Now I must preface this next section saying I am not in any way having a dig at Andrew Kramer or Videocopilot (which is an awesome place for video tutorials and general video workflow stuff), but I must say that in a lot of ways Andrew Kramer (and lots of other tutorial sites) is giving rise to a lot of video hacks which annoys me no end. I define a hack as someone who comes along and takes someone’s existing project, changes some colours and titles and then shows it to a client and says “that’ll be $500 please”. Now granted that client probably had no idea where the project came from, or would be able to create it, but the reality is, they stole someone else’s hardwork, and sold it!

Not cool…

I implore you, as a designer, motion graphics specialist or video editor, if you’re gonna take someone else’s work, please, PLEASE, make it your own and don’t try and pass it off as you’re own work. You’re better than that. And if you think it’s fine that you are selling someone else’s hardwork, let me warn you now, hacks will be found out.

Sounds harsh. It should be. PEACE!