Warpdrive effect on logo

[tjherr]

I'm trying to get a StarTrek warpdrive like effect on a flying logo. Any tips on how it's done? I'm using a Mac G4 OS Tiger 10.4.8. I have AM 12.0u. I like the elongated looks of the stars also.

 

Thomas

[Rodney]

For the stars I suggest using particles but there are other methods discussed here in the forum.

 

To set up the particle effect one way might be to:

 

- Set up a Choreography with a Camera pointing straight upward

- Create a patch

- Place it in the Chor above the Camera

- Create a Material and change its attribute to Particles

- Apply that Material to the Patch

- Adjust the Materials settings in the PWS within the Chor shortcut to the Material (You will have to toggle on the 'Show more than Drivers' setting). Pay attention particularly to the Preroll and Gravitational elements.

 

Ajust in realtime (with minimal particles) until you see something you like.

Turn up the Particles

Render from Camera view

Rinse and Repeat

 

I've had one example that looks pretty good in realtime HAMR view.

I'll see if I can track it down before JohnL3D can post. Gotta be quick to out-project that guy!

[tjherr]

For the stars I suggest using particles but there are other methods discussed here in the forum.

 

To set up the particle effect one way might be to:

 

- Set up a Choreography with a Camera pointing straight upward

- Create a patch

- Place it in the Chor above the Camera

- Create a Material and change its attribute to Particles

- Apply that Material to the Patch

- Adjust the Materials settings in the PWS within the Chor shortcut to the Material (You will have to toggle on the 'Show more than Drivers' setting). Pay attention particularly to the Preroll and Gravitational elements.

 

Ajust in realtime (with minimal particles) until you see something you like.

Turn up the Particles

Render from Camera view

Rinse and Repeat

 

I've had one example that looks pretty good in realtime HAMR view.

I'll see if I can track it down before JohnL3D can post. Gotta be quick to out-project that guy!

 

Thanks for the info. I'll give it a shot. He hasn't posted yet. You might beat him.

 

 

Thomas

[Bruce Del Porte]

There is a free model called Starsphere on one of the free model sites, it may even be on the extras disk. It does a pretty good job as a star background.

 

 

edit: found it here http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=10528

[C-grid]

Star Trek has a rerun at the moment in Holland, I also think it's 'hyperdrive' and 'warpengine' but that aside.

 

To make the best of the 'Enterprise goto warp'-shot, they placed a shot before that.

 

The first shot is the camera at speed of Enterprise this make the stars have motion blur.

The next shot, the cam is at 'speed' of the stars, now the viewer has the illusion(of gigantic speed), then Enterprise even moves faster with a motion blur-trail till it vanished out of sight.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Niels

 

 

ps.

Maybe layering and add ghost-trail videoFX will do the trick, try-out.

[tjherr]

Star Trek has a rerun at the moment in Holland, I also think it's 'hyperdrive' and 'warpengine' but that aside.

 

To make the best of the 'Enterprise goto warp'-shot, they placed a shot before that.

 

The first shot is the camera at speed of Enterprise this make the stars have motion blur.

The next shot, the cam is at 'speed' of the stars, now the viewer has the illusion(of gigantic speed), then Enterprise even moves faster with a motion blur-trail till it vanished out of sight.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Niels

 

 

ps.

Maybe layering and add ghost-trail videoFX will do the trick, try-out.

 

 

Thanks for the info.

I tried going to particles but I wasn't sure if the attribute should be sprite, stream or what.

After that I got lost. I want to get the effect on the letters and not the background.

So far I've got the letter to look blurry in motion but that's all.

 

Thomas

[johnl3d]

Hey where is Rodney's post?

 

I am not sure what you effect you are looking to produce is there a still available of the effect

[robcat2075]

I believe the original star trek warp drive effect was created by moving the motion controlled model in front of the camera while the shutter was open . the computer motion control moved the model precisely over varying distances during each frame to create the streak effect .

 

If you are willing to animate on the sub frame level , you can get similar effects with multipass in animation master .

 

the ball in this animation is moved varying distances forward and back within each frame.

 

[attachmentid=22754]

 

the project with sub-frame animation

 

[attachmentid=22755]

 

however, multi pass averages all the sub frames together resulting in a somewhat darker blur than one would get on film. it's possible that animation master's high dynamic range rendering might enable a more authentic effect with multi pass , but I'm not familiar with HD rendering yet .

warpblur3H.mov

warpblur.zip

[tjherr]

Thanks for the sample. My sample is in my original post.

I'm thinking of the way the warp engines brighten and stretch just before it takes off.

Hope that makes sense.

I like that way that ball moved.

I couldn't open the second project though.

 

 

Thomas

[robcat2075]

Thanks for the sample. My sample is in my original post.

I'm thinking of the way the warp engines brighten and stretch just before it takes off.

Hope that makes sense.

 

The ball is just a demonstration of the core concept of the stretching motion blur. You'll need to adapt the technique to your very specific needs. it will take much tinkering, just as the people at who made the original effect had to spend much time getting it just right.

 

Want something to brighten? animate it brightening. change it's color, change it's ambient color... there are different ways.

 

however, multi pass averages all the sub frames together resulting in a somewhat darker blur than one would get on film. it's possible that animation master's high dynamic range rendering might enable a more authentic effect with multi pass , but I'm not familiar with HD rendering yet .

 

I couldn't open the second project though.

it's in V13. You need V13 to open it.

[C-grid]

Although a simplex representation, I hope this will help you get going.

 

Niels

shots_1.wmv

example_shot1.prj

[tjherr]

I tried to download your sample, but Firefox wouldn't open it. I'm using a MAc G4.

 

 

Thomas

[C-grid]

The quicktime-plugin(version) probably doesn't support .wma, you could try downloading the .wma and play it in the quicktime-player, make sure you have the latest... if it still doesn't play, let me know, I make a quicktime.

 

The project-file is for v13(n), that's the version I used and have installed.

[tjherr]

I tried downloading it. It still won't open. All I get is a big question mark over it.

 

 

Thomas

[C-grid]

I have the uncompressed .AVI at home, so I converted the .WMA to a .MPG

 

Niels.

 

[EDIT] I deleted the .MPG version

[Rodney]

Hey Niels.

 

That was pretty good. I like!

Great (yet simple!) demonstration of the effect.

[tjherr]

Well... I couldn't see it. The bar below moved but there wasn't any animation.

 

Here's my updated animation at www.tjhartstudio.com.

 

Thomas

[C-grid]

Thanks Rodney.

 

Thomas, I notice that some mediaplayers won't play the .MPG version this probably due the different or just wrong header caused by the converterprogram.

 

Since you have v12 and the project-file is v13, let me know if you want a summarized explanation of what I did, this was also the reason I tried to post another version of the example-video.

 

Vaguely I remember there's a Windows MediaPlayer for Apple available.

 

Niels.

[tjherr]

Okay... hopefully this will get to my sample. I'll have to upgrade to v13 but I am using Quicktime to see animations. I do have WM for apple.

Click below to see my 3D.

 

TJH Art Studio

[C-grid]

another try...

shots.mov

[tjherr]

YES! That I like.

Give it up. How'd you do it?

When it took off I was expecting that stretchy look, but it still looked good to me.

 

 

Thomas

[C-grid]

When it took off I was expecting that stretchy look, but it still looked good to me.

 

If your goal is mostly the warp-trail:

 

Setting up your cam with 100% Motionblur before building the scene is the large part of the trick.

Now you can exactly determine the amount of trail you want through shifting the keyframes on the timeline.

 

Make sure your scene has relative-depth(how large is one matchbox on-screen) and relative-speed(if (a=this speed && b=faster) wow what a (natural)speed).

 

Niels

[tjherr]

Thanks. I'll give it a try and report back the results.

 

 

Thomas