I can’t wait for the new version to come out. AE CS6 along with Premiere CS6 are fantastic leaps forward. I love what Adobe is doing with their programs. Still I have been thinking of and playing with some different art forms. More to come on that soon hopefully but until then here is just one of the loops I have been working on in AE. Still needs more work but I kinda like the clean feel so I am posting this now.
 

So with the realisation that I need to start focussing on video a bit more I have created a vimeo page. I have been doing some more video work over the last year or so with some of it requiring heavy vfx work. So I am going to start adding some videos on slider shots as well as vfx breakdowns and maybe even a tutorial or two later on. I think the quality of vimeo will be better than youtube and I should be able to just embed these videos strait into posts when they are made.
 
Cheers,
Ben

This was the first time using my new 35mm 1.4L lens. It is fantastic! The close up details have come out really well but you can’t really tell from these lower resolution pics. I used it on Friday also for a promo video for the upcoming church camp. I may post an example of that soon. It was also my first time trying the new konova slider. I must say it adds a lot to the video side of things.
 

So I have have been wanting to do more video and vfx work lately. I also saw that we have a gap in the church that could be helped with media. So I decided it would be a good idea to start doing a church news segment. We have called this DCC Update and the first of at least 12 videos has just gone online. The thinking was to do one per month for the next 12 months and then see where we should go from there. This is a good chance for me to try my hand at doing skits and some vfx work that I really want practice at. Already in the first edition I have started to use cinema 4d for the titles and I am getting more use out of my video tripod.
 
The other news that I am excited about is the arrival of my new GoPro camera. This camera is waterproof, small and shoots 1080P. Also coming in over the next few days should be my new Konova slider and a new Canon 35mm 1.4L lens. The combo of the Konova and 35mm is perfect and a new chance to get some movement happening in my clips as well as some time lapse perhaps. All in all I am excited and can’t wait to try some new techniques.
 

So a little while ago our church put on a family fun day. We decided that amongst the games we were going to do one involving our pastor Seka. We called this Celebrity Seka Heads. This was to be an experiment for me in motion tracking as well as morphing. I felt that I learned a lot about light wrap, mocha and lighting just by doing this video (the video will be up shortly at the DCC Youtube page). It is quite dodgey and most of the time saving techniques I learnt for this happened at the last minute. So I wasn’t able to make it look as good as I wanted. At least it was a learning experience.
 
So in this video we took Seka’s head and replaced her face with that of Lance (her son) and Mel. As she talked her face would morph into one of these other faces making for an interesting effect. Of course hearing a blokes voice come from a woman’s body makes it even more unsettling. Thanks to those that helped out.
 
Here is a quick still frame taken from after effects.
 

I think I am leaning more towards video rather than photography these days, but not because I don’t want to get out and do more photography. It just seems that with church there is much more requirement to make videos although this week I will be taking photos of the staff. I am about to prep for our family fun day. Last year I got the MasterChef videos done and I think they really went well. I hope that this year we can do something much better. But with Skyrim and Uncharted 3 coming out in November it is going to be hard for me to devote a large chunk of time to the videos. I am hoping to get away during this time and perhaps photograph some of Victoria. Even if I just go for some long drives I think I will be happy.
 
I am also looking forward to doing something really big next year. We never really did a Maad morning this year so it will be exciting to put a heap of time into that. I really want to push the boundaries of what is possible with visual fx. I am also spending more time learning Nuke so that is exciting. I’ll also be buying some upgrades for my computer soon. I need a really good psu and a high end video card with cuda.
 
So that is what is happening at the moment. Still excited about the future!

So after many hours of work I have finally finished (sort of) this clip for church. It was used today for a filler to get people hyped up for the songs to come. General feedback so far is that it accomplished that goal. I used After Effects, Premiere and Sony Vegas (for sound) to complete this project. Now that I have done this I feel confident I can do something bigger and more complex for the next film. Thanks to Chungy, Rox, Rick, Colleen and Calvin for making this possible and probably feeling really silly holding a green board in front of a camera.
 
You can view the video in HD at the DCC Youtube Channel
 

So I have been working hard on a new short “filler” for church. Hopefully this will go beyond my church and be distributed through the web. The challenges have been different in this project. I am learning heaps about tracking and Mocha for After Effects. Hopefully the full version will be up in a couple of weeks.