Jake's Production Notes

In conjunction with my 2010 motion graphics demo reel, I did an overhaul of my online motion graphics portfolio.  Here’s the link

http://www.vfxjake.com/mograph.html

This is part of the annual overhaul of my portfolio sub-sites that I plan on completing in the next few months in an effort to simplify my website by making the subsites all one page portfolios to reduce the clutter of multi-page mini-sites.  I used jQuery for the first time with this one and found it surprisingly robust and easy to work with.  More to come!

Just recently, I put together this current demo reel of highlights from my motion graphics work from the past year.  All projects completed with After Effects, Cinema 4D, Photoshop, Illustrator, Final Cut Pro, and Audition.

For those interested here is the breakdown.

SHOT 01      DARKFILM ENTERTAINMENT

I designed and animated this logo with Illustrator, Photoshop, and After Effects.

SHOT 02      ETSU PRESENTS – INTRO ANIMATION

Utilizing the provided logo of the university, I modeled, animated, and rendered the logo with Cinema 4D and enhanced the shot in After Effects with a stock footage background.

SHOT 03      WHY INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS SHOULD CHOOSE ETSU – DEGREE ANIMATION

Utilizing various scripting techniques in After Effects, I created this animation from a list of degrees offered at the university.

SHOT 04      WORLD SERIES CHAMPS – ANIMATION TEST

I created this animation utilizing Video Copilot’s Optical Flares and After Effects.

SHOT 05      CARTER LEGACY – J.P. MORGAN ANIMATION

Using Photoshop and After Effects, I created this animation for the Carter Legacy project with supplied photos.

SHOT 06      CHOICES THE FILM – MAIN TITLES

Utilizing a logo I created in Illustrator, I created this animation in After Effects with a photo of a brick wall.

SHOT 07      HUNGRY SCORPION FILMS  - LOGO ANIMATION

Utilizing a logo I created in Illustrator and Photoshop, I created this animation in After Effects.

SHOT 08      GEORGE L. CARTER TRAIN MUSEUM PROMO – TICKET ANIMATION

I designed this vintage style train ticket in Photoshop and animated the ticket, itself, as well as the individual layers.

SHOT 09      ETSU INTERANTIONAL STUDENTS SCHOLARSHIPS

With a stock footage background, I created this animation in After Effects.

SHOT 10      ETSU RN TO BSN PROMO – MOTION TITLES

I created this motion title as part of a motion graphics package for the RN to BSN promo using After Effects.

SHOT 11      ETSU GOLDEN FIFTIES CLUB PROMO – OPENING ANIMATION

Using an original logo created in Illustrator and supplied photos from the university archives, I created this opening animation for the ETSU Alumni Office with After Effects.

SHOT 12      HUT TV BUMPER

Utilizing a pair of supplied logos from the client that I vectorized in Illustrator, I modeled, textured, animated, and rendered this animation in Cinema 4D and composited and enhanced the final shot in After Effects with other vector elements created in Illustrator.

SHOT 13      AFRICAN ANGELZ FASHION SHOW – OPENING TITLES 01

After being supplied with a logo by the client which I vectorized in Illustrator, I modeled, textured, animated, and rendered this animation in Cinema 4D and composited and enhanced the final shot in After Effects.

SHOT 14      AFRICAN ANGELZ FASHION SHOW – OPENING TITLES 02

Utilizing the aforementioned logo in Shot 13, I created a second variation on the logo and modeled, textured, animated, and rendered this animation in Cinema 4D and composited and enhanced the final shot in After Effects.

SHOT 15      ETSU GOLDEN FIFTIES CLUB PROMO – CLOSING ANIMATION

Using supplied footage, I created this animation with Photoshop and After Effects.

SHOT 16      GET WITH IT PROMO – TRANSITION ANIMATION

After being supplied with a logo by the client, I subsequently vectorized it in Illustrator; modeled, textured, animated, and rendered this animation in Cinema 4D; and composited and enhanced the final shot in After Effects.

SHOT 17      GEORGE L. CARTER TRAIN MUSEUM PROMO – HIGHLIGHT REEL

Using footage of the museum I edited in Final Cut Pro as well as a ticket design I created in Photoshop, I animated and enhanced the assets to create the highlight reel in After Effects.

SHOT 18      WHY INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS SHOULD CHOOSE ETSU – ANIMATED MAP

Utilizing an image from Google Maps as a guide, I created a custom vector map in Illustrator and animated and enhanced it to create this shot.

SHOT 19      GEORGE L. CARTER TRAIN MUSEUM – LOGO TEST RENDER

I vectorized a logo provided by the museum in Illustrator; modeled, textured, animated, and rendered this animation in Cinema 4D; and composited and enhanced the final shot in After Effects with a stock footage background.

SHOT 20      CHOICES THE FILM TEASER TRAILER – FRENETIC TEXT ANIMATION

Utilizing various scripting techniques in After Effects, I created this animation for the Choices Teaser Trailer with a photo of a brick wall.

SHOT 21      CARTER LEGACY – GEORGE L. CARTER TEST RENDER

Using footage provided by the university archives, I created this test render with Photoshop and After Effects.

Just completed this project last week and it went live on the website earlier this weekend.  This video was created for the ETSU Office of Rural and Community Health and Community Partnerships in conjunction with ETSU Digital Media Services to promote local medical professionals in their efforts to provide quality services and innovative strategies that make a difference in their respective rural communities.  Theis promo, in particualr, focuses on the Pro Strength and Speed program created by Dr. Chris Calendine in Hawkins County, TN.  Pro Strength and Speed seeks to instill healthy habits, exercise, and personal responsibility in local youth in an effort to create a lifetime commitment to exercise and wellness for its participants.

All footage and preliminary edits were provided by Dr. Michele Gourley of the ETSU Office of Rural and Community Health and Community Partnerships and the talent includes ProStrength participants, staff, and local supporters of the program.  I performed all post-production duties including motion graphics, voiceovers, and final edits utilizing Final Cut, Premiere, After Effects, Photoshop, Soundtrack Pro, and Audition.

This project has been live on my website for a little over two weeks now, so I thought it might be high time that I said a few words about it.  The project was envisioned as a companion piece to one that I put together earlier this year to promote International Student Scholarships now available at ETSU.  This time around the scope was broader in an attempt to advertise not just the scholarships available, but to promote the university, itself, to all prospective international students.  Being that the two pieces were directly related and the new promo would directly reference its predecessor, I wanted to create a sense of continuity without simply replicating the look and feel of the Scholarship video.

In the development phase, I was informed that a voiceover would be required this time in favor of footage of a sitting speaker, so, immediately, I saw an opportunity to incorporate more animation and motion graphic elements into this video.  I decided to keep the shiny black frame from the original video, but, as previously stated, I really wanted to give this video its own identity as well as broadening the visual scope of this project to parallel the expansion in scope of this project’s content.  The core elements of the new motion graphics and animation package that I developed for this video included revisiting an expanding upon the expression-based animation that I explored in the Choices teaser trailer for the titles (with the intent of stripping some of their frenetic nature in favor of a sleeker, more modern look), a floating cloud of degree titles in 3d space that could be flown through, a lazy susan style twisting video frame that could be deployed randomly in 3d space, and a map line animation that traced the routes to the major cities within a day’s drive of the campus.

After a little initial editing to the expressions (mainly removing the wiggles and restraining the randomness), I was able to strip the frenetic energy of the original Choices titles to create a more modern and sleek look that incorporated a little bit of the old school 1980′s Superman titles.

The wall of degrees was modeled from a Lloyd Alvarez tutorial on AETutes that utilized several scripts from AEScripts to simplify the creation, animation, and 3d space distribution of the over 100 different degree programs available at the university (more info available here).

The lazy susan effect was easy enough as I merely animated position and rotation on a precomposed video frame and placeholder and then replaced the placeholder with the corresponding animated slideshow or footage and I reused Alvarez’s 3D Layer Distributor Script to randomly distribute and then manually adjust positioning on the floating video panels.

Finally, for the animated map lines,  I used a simple stroke with a border and no fill that had an animated starting offset along with a custom vector map that I created over the top of a detailed map image sample from Google Earth.  Once everything was edited together along with the voiceover (record and edit the voiceover first as you can set the timing of your animations once and be done with it!) the client was pleased and here we are today!

As to the credits, the voiceover was provided by Rob Nelson, Director of Distance Education at ETSU; footage was filmed by David Currie of the ETSU Office of eLearning; photography was provided by Charles Warden, ETSU Photographer; the onscreen talent includes various international and domestic students at ETSU at various events and around campus; and, last but not least, I performed all post-production duties with After Effects, Final Cut, Photoshop, Illustrator, Soundtrack Pro, and Audition.