Post by Kit Fisto on May 12, 2006 23:41:11 GMT -5
This tutorial will guide you through the process of creating a basic lightsword in EffectsLab. For the purposes of this tutorial you can use your own movie clip, or download a short example file from FXhome.com fxhome.com/effectslab/tutorial_movies/lsclipmpeg4.mov[/url]
Filming
Stand-in props should be used for lightsword sequences. This makes placing the effect far easier, as you have a reference point. Animating a blade without such a reference can be extremely difficult.
Getting started
Load EffectsLab and select New Video Project from the welcome screen.
Select the bare lightsword clip as your background plate, and check the settings:
Drag a lightsword effect from the effects browser onto the timeline to begin.
Use the crop tool to alter the length of the effect as required. If you are using the example file, stretch the effect to the full length of the clip.
Lightsword types
There are two types of lightsword, each designed for different purposes. The Freehand lightsword can be used for many purposes, enabling you to place up to 180 points to create the shape. For actual lightswords, however, the 4-point system is almost always faster and easier to use.
Choose 'New 4-point' from the toolbox.
This will add a new shape to the list and automatically switch the toolbox to its attributes.
Drawing the shape
To draw a 4-point shape, click four times on the canvas. The first two clicks represent the hilt, and the last two clicks represent the tip of the blade.
It may be easier to zoom in on the blade for more accuracy, using the zoom slider at the top right of the canvas. The canvas can be repositioned by dragging it with the right mouse button.
Only work on a single blade at a time. Once you have completed one blade, you can place a new lightsword effect and work on the others.
Note: You can create several lightsword shapes within a single effect, by adding more shapes using the drop-down menu. This can be very useful for double-ended lightswords. All shapes within a single object share the same glow attributes.
Click two points on each side of the hilt:
You can drag the points using the mouse if you need to reposition them at all.
Click another two points on the tip of the blade. This will automatically close the shape:
The glow is activated by default. As you can see, this sometimes makes placing the blade shape difficult as it obscures the background plate.
Switch the glow off by clicking the green toggle on the timeline so that it turns red:
The glow can be turned back on once you have finished positioning the effect.
The next frame
Press the right arrow key to move to the next frame. The blade will have moved, but your shape will still be in the old position. You can move the shape by dragging the corner points if you like, but there is an easier method.
Click once on a blank area of the canvas. This will clear the shape.
Draw the shape again in its new position:
This method allows you to quickly move through the frames and easily reposition the effect.
Every SINGLE frame??
Lightsword effects are inevitably time-consuming, as they rely on manual rotoscoping. When the blade is moving swiftly, you will probably have to draw every single frame. If the blade is at rest, however (such as if the actor is holding it steady), you can often get away with only doing every 5 frames. EffectsLab will fill in the rest. Even for fast sequences, drawing only every second frame can work fine. As you get more practice, you will work out your own time-saving tricks.
Fine-tuning
The toolbox contains several sliders that can enhance the appearance of your blade shape.</p><p>The Hilt and Tip Curves introduce curvature to each end of the shape, which can help to match the angle and speed of the blade and hilt. These values can be altered over time, so you can make sure the curvature is correct on every frame.
The Feather blurs the edges of the shape, creating a softer edge between the core and the glow. This is very useful for lightsword masking (see below). For feathering the core normally you should use the core feather slider in the glow attributes.
The grading tools can also be extremely useful for lightswords. The Saturation tool in particular is vital for matching the colour intensity of your glow to the natural saturation of the background clip.
The glow
Once you have finished positioning the blade shape, you can turn the glow back on.
Simply click the red toggle on the timeline:
Double-click on the Blade Glow track name to change the toolbox attibutes.
There are many controls to alter the glow. The default settings provide a glow that is suitable for many shots.
Clicking on the green colour bar enables you to change the colour of your glow.
Click a tab on the colour gradient, then click the Colour square to display the palette:
Select a new colour and click OK.
Unusual glows can be created by clicking in a blank area of the colour gradient to create additional tabs:
Click OK to apply the new glow to the effect.
Masking
Sometimes a lightsword might pass behind your actor, or another object in the shot. You could use the normal masking controls, but this would also mask out the glow, which doesn't look very realistic. A slightly different technique masks the effect, but enables the glow to spill around the edges convincingly.
In this example, the red saber should be behind the actor's head:
To begin, add a new Freehand shape to the relevant lightsword effect using the drop-down menu. As before, turning off the glow can make the drawing process much easier.
Freehand shapes allow you to add up to 180 individual points, which is why they are ideal for masking purposes.
Draw the freehand shape around the part of the actor that should be obscuring the effect. The shape can be drawn by individually clicking each point, or by click-dragging with the left mouse button.
Drag the final point onto the first point to close the shape.
When the shape is successfully closed, it will turn blue:
Setting the Smooth Points slider to about 0.33 can help with soft, organic shapes such as this.
As you can see, the shape only needs to be accurate in the area that needs masking.
Click the animate tab in the toolbox to lock the shape. It will turn red.
This shape is currently still behaving as a normal lightsword – if you turned the glow back on now, you would have a globular lightsword over the actor's head! However, we want this shape to remove itself from the overall effect.
In the toolbox settings, change Opaque Shape to Transparent Shape:
Increasing the Feather to 5 can make the masking more subtle.
If you switch the glow back on now, you will see that the new shape has masked the main lightsword, while still allowing the glow to spill around the edges: It is often a subtle effect, but can make a big difference.
There you have it – fast and easy lightsabers that also look great!
