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Jun 2011 29

Posting here for those that are interested in learning VFX at Escape or Gnomon Workshop, I posted this question on Escape’s facebook page as I’m thinking about studying at one of these colleges;

John Chen posted to Escape Studios

So, I’m sure a lot of prospective students are thinking about this question, but too scared to ask.

- What sets Escape Studio LA apart from Gnomon School of Visual Effects? and why should we choose to goto Escape, over a more established school such as Gnomon?

I’m just curious, don’t want to step on anyone’s toes. :)

And received a response from Escape
Hi John

Thanks very much for your comment, and no need to worry about asking such questions. As you say, many people may well be asking the same thing, and it’s important that you ask as many questions as possible before choosing which school and course to pursue.

In many ways Gnomon and Escape are very similar; we are both private post secondary schools, who offer custom built courses rather than diplomas or degrees, although I believe Gnomon do offer a degree program now. We both use industry experts to teach our courses and have strong connections with the industry. What makes Escape different is our curriculum, and specific focus on production based skills and professional pipelines, with a very strong emphasis towards visual effects. Through the help of an extremely experienced advisory board we can match our courses exactly with the requirements of the industry, in the areas of CG asset creation, camera tracking, advanced lighting and rendering, compositing and technical effects. All training is based around technical knowledge and professional execution. We don’t go into the more art based subjects that Gnomon and other schools teach, such as character design and concept art, because we want to ensure you have the exact skills required to secure a junior visual effects job. Courses are delivered like a production assignment, in short and intensive sessions, and your instructor is present throughout to ensure you always have top level assistance. It’s all about making sure you can walk straight into a production environment and thrive, and so many of our students have and continue to.

To add to this, we have a dedicated recruitment team working solely towards helping you secure your first position in the industry. We provide demo reel and CV advice, and regularly arrange for leading companies to mentor courses and provide feedback on your work throughout. This all helps to ensure you get the best possible chance to land a junior position, and we believe our recruitment services are second to none. Our aim is not to make you a better artist, but to make you a professional.

Am I right in thinking you are based in Australia? We have courses both in classroom and online and either myself or my colleagues in the UK would be more than happy to give you a call to chat further if you wish? My direct email is joseph@escapestudios.com, please feel free to drop me a line at any time, and I hope my response was helpful :)

Joe
Admissions Advisor (Escape LA)

There you have it, quiet a nice answer :)
Jun 2011 29

Here are some good resources to learn about creating light fogs in Maya,

I’ve only been using the standard light fog function with a spot light, but will be testing the mental ray method shortly, as it seems to produce much more realistic results.

Light Rays In Maya & MentalRay – ( using env par ) http://vimeo.com/18319188
Create light fog using mental ray for Maya sample workflow – Link using mib_light_spot
Light Fog – ye old faithful method but with better results by controlling coneshape’s volume samples and using mental ray depth map overides – http://vimeo.com/15009370

tick “auto volume” in mental ray render features.

Using Parti_volume method – http://cgnotebook.com/wiki/Mental_ray_for_Maya_parti_volume and http://cgnotebook.com/wiki/Mental_ray_volumetric_shadows_with_parti_volume_in_Maya

discussion on parti_voume – http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=87&t=812857

Nice tut on environment fog with parti_volume = http://www.andrewklein.net/bh/texturing_fog.html

Jun 2011 27

I’m happy to announce my short Sci-fi horror film “Anomaly” is finished!

The next step will be to enter a few festivals with it so depending on the entry conditions I might not be able to show the complete film until than. But we are planning a private screening in August, hope you will be able to make it!

In the mean time, I will be cutting a short trailer and uploading a few more photos from Anomaly as part of the press pack, this is the latest poster featuring our beloved demon hellspawn.

If you haven’t already check out the facebook page for Anomaly, where release and screening details will be posted.

Thank you to all my friends for their support the last 6 months!

Anomaly Creature Poster promo

Anomaly Creature Poster promo

May 2011 24


Anomaly Movie Poster - Click for Large Size

Anomaly Movie Poster - Click for Large Size

Anomaly Facebook Page

Dec 2010 02

I can’t believe the year is drawing to an end, the last 10 months has been truly one of the most rewarding periods in my life so far. Dropping out of a 9 – 5 job to pursue a passion that has always been with me has been difficult but I am loving every minute of it.

I remember there were moments where I was seriously doubting my abilities and my decision to go back to study 3D, I was so very close to dropping out of class but thanks to my mother, close friends and excellent study environment, I managed to get back on track. I am just a little proud of my achievements so far and very humbled by the long journey ahead. I believe the last 12 months has given me the foundation and affirmation of my passion for 3d computer graphics. The last 10 years of my life I’ve jumped from job to job ( sales person, business owner, IT call centre, network admin, web designer, graphic design and SEO. All of which I could have settled for long term, but was never passionate about it enough to justify the 9 – 5 grind.

I might be coming across a little arrogant in this post, thats not it at all. I just believe I have found something that I am willing to sacrifice a lot for and have never been so passionate and committed to. Those of you that know me well, will hopefully understand why I have been a hermit.

3D computer graphics is not easy, but with the technology we have at our disposal it does present a great opportunity for students to produce higher quality renders / results in a shorter amount of time. In retrospect I also think that the learning curve is steeper & harder, because of all the different choices of technology and the utterly insane benchmark set by studios like WETA and Pixar to just name a few.

So whats next? Well, there is no question that I need and want to further my study in 3D CG, the foundation has been set and I need to build on that knowledge, that would be my honest self critic.

I have enrolled at MSIT for another 6 months in 2011 for the advance Diploma in screen and media. I am very much looking forward to it, as I will be able to put knowledge into practical pieces.

And after that? well I think I will let fate decide :) for the meantime I am thankful for the life I lived and the knowledge I gained in the last 10 months. I am grateful for the health and support of my family, friends and tutors.

End touchy feely post and on with moar CG! check out these motion capture tests!

Aug 2010 30

here is a short workflow / write up on my experience working with image based lighting and final gather, hopefully you might find something useful out of it.

It all started when I created this image.

The cg was rendered with mental ray’s final gather and a dodgy image based lighting setup by mapping a 8bit image onto a sphere all in the one pass. There are obvious problems with the lighting and also there was no alpha matte which captured final gathers ambient shadows. The image was very roughly comped in photoshop and I had to manually mask in the ambient shadows, if you look closely at the hi-res image you will see what I mean when I say it was dodgy.

So it was decided that I should fix this image with a realistic lighting setup and to be able to get an alpha matte straight from maya which included all the shadow information.

Here is the final result with color & level correction, beauty pass rendered with Mental Rays IBL node using a 32 bit HDRI + an occlusion pass using final gather.

In my opinion the result is a much better composite with realistic lighting that matched the background plate. So onto how I did this;

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