Jedi Council Forums - Opening Crawl template?

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Author	Topic: Opening Crawl template?
TaunTaunHerder Registered: Oct '07	Date Posted: 8/18 12:22pm Subject: Opening Crawl template?
	I am making an opening crawl in After Effects. Is there a template out there in Freeville that keeps the text vertically aligned along the right sides of the paragraph? I make the text files in Photoshop. What is the secret to making the opening crawl look right?
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Vidina Registered: Jan '06	Date Posted: 8/18 12:30pm Subject: Opening Crawl template?
	Calling PixelMagic to this thread, Calling PIXELMAGIC to the thread. He's the one who made that specific project for AE. However, if you're on a mac, I suggest looking for an app called "Star Wars title generator". It's awesome. -----signature----- http://vidina.wordpress.com - Awesome! http://twitter.com/Vidina - Follow me! http://www.youtube.com/tomellingsen - My stuff! http://www.aurellia.net - Video tutorials and more!
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FX_guy Registered: Jun '02	Date Posted: 8/18 12:36pm Subject: Opening Crawl template?
	Look in your Photoshop help files for how to "justify" blocks of text. -----signature----- http://www.pinkfive.com Morbid and creepifyin' I got no problem with.
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AdamBertocci Title: Manager: Fan Films Registered: Feb '02	Date Posted: 8/18 12:50pm Subject: Opening Crawl template?
	… that keeps the text vertically aligned along the right sides of the paragraph? What is the secret to making the opening crawl look right? Hee hee hee. Anyway, in your text settings window, make sure your Paragraphs are aligned like this: ---------- ---------- ---------- ---- and not ---------- ----- -------- ------ The buttons totally look just like that. Rick McCallum loves you! -----signature----- "Run Leia Run", "The Chopped-Off Hands of Star Wars" and "The Fan Film Menace"... ... and now the award-winning "Brooklyn Force". Check 'em out. http://www.runleiarun.com
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Ryan_W Title: Fan Films: Emmy-Winning Lightsaber Geek Registered: Aug '01	Date Posted: 8/18 2:14pm Subject: Opening Crawl template?
	Didn't somebody make a program to do these for people? -----signature----- http://www.RyanVsDorkman.com http://www.twitter.com/RyanWieber
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DVeditor Title: Fan Films Evil Overlord (manager) Registered: Dec '01	Date Posted: 8/18 3:29pm Subject: Opening Crawl template?
	Yep. Plus there's several guides in the sticky under "Opening Crawl" as well. -----signature----- CK Hicks http://www.ckhicks.com http://dveditor.deviantart.com TFN on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2202937735
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DarthRicmu Registered: Jul '05	Date Posted: 8/18 3:52pm Subject: Opening Crawl template?
	oh c'mon guys!!! just hit ALT+ left/Right wherever you need the words or characters have a bit more space between them (when text editing in PS)... You see it in the real scrolls too... the spacing between the words (and characters) differs in each line -----signature----- http://www.ricardo-musch.com Need Visual Effects???? Mail/PM me!!! Visual Effects artist on Agents of the Force II: Retribution Visual Effects artist on Star Wars Threads of Destiny
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Jedsithor Registered: Oct '05	Date Posted: 8/20 4:26am Subject: Opening Crawl template?
	Ryan_W posted: Didn't somebody make a program to do these for people? Yeah but the timing is a little off and the crawl begins off-screen, even on a 16:9 render. As for the whole justify issue, I actually type the crawl in MS word, format it and then copy it into Illustrator. I found that doing all the formatting in a word processor gives me more control over character spacing and alignments. Yes I know I could just do the whole thing in Photoshop but I've gotten better results using Illustrator files, especially if I need to resize them in AE. Given that, if I take my time, I can do a movie-perfect opening crawl (especially compared to the likes of LucasArts...that Force Unleashed crawl was abysmal), I may post a tutorial. I keep meaning to do a video tutorial but I never get around to it. Opening crawls for me are what lighsaber effects are for...um...everyone else. -----signature----- KOTOR Movie Trilogy Forums: http://z11.invisionfree.com/KOTOR_Movies
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Ryan_W Title: Fan Films: Emmy-Winning Lightsaber Geek Registered: Aug '01	Date Posted: 8/20 4:12pm Subject: Opening Crawl template?
	Why wouldn't you just do your text in AE, if that's where it's getting animated? It'll always raster correctly and justify itself the way it should. -----signature----- http://www.RyanVsDorkman.com http://www.twitter.com/RyanWieber
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PixelMagic Registered: Oct '01	Date Posted: 8/20 5:50pm Subject: Opening Crawl template?
	Vidina posted: Calling PixelMagic to this thread, Calling PIXELMAGIC to the thread. He's the one who made that specific project for AE. You must have me confused with someone else. I never made anything like that. -----signature----- http://danielbroadway.blogspot.com "A wise man tastes good, but a dumb man is easier to catch" -Codepoet
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Jedsithor Registered: Oct '05	Date Posted: 8/20 6:19pm Subject: Opening Crawl template?
	I've always had trouble just using AE. Dunno why. I just found it easier to bring it in through Illustrator, rotate it 90 degrees on the...god...x or y...I think x...don't have AE open right now...one of them, anyways, rotate it 90 degrees on the X axis, facing up, then add a camera, change the Y position on the camera (make sure the crawl is a 3d layer) to get the angle, then change the crawl position on the Z axis to get the crawl. For the STAR WARS logo, I do that in Photoshop, import and from there it's a simple exponential scale. Other than that it's just a matter of resizing the crawl to fit the width of the comp as it appears on screen, working out the timing and then copying the starfield background and creating a mask to create the effect of the crawl fading away as it disappears into infinity. The thing is, I know the way I do it is a bit messy. I know there is a more streamlined way to do it. But what I do works for me, I get good results. Heck my youtube account is full of crawls that I've done over the last few years, each one an improvement over the last. This is the closest I've come to actually perfecting the crawl: Revenge of the Sith Opening Crawl recreation It's a recreation of the opening crawl from Revenge of the Sith. I used a different colour because I felt the ROTS crawl wasn't vibrant enough, but other than that, I think it's pretty close (a couple of character size issues maybe) though if it seems a little fast it's because that's how it is in the movie. I've seen some good crawls in Blender and I know John Knoll used Illustrator and then some other program (it's name escapes me...not AE). By the way, speaking of the opening crawl, uh I'd just like to point out that the links to the custom crawl fonts on the tutorial page for crawls doesn't work anymore. They can be found online easily enough though for anyone looking for the actual fonts used in the movies, news gothic for the main body and "Episode" and Univers Light Ultra Condensed for the Title. I do think the most important thing about the crawl though is spacing. On my youtube page, there is a crawl recreation I did that was supposed to be a recreation of the original Star Wars crawl, before it became "Episode IV: A New Hope" but I forgot to space out the characters and words correctly so it look horrible. -----signature----- KOTOR Movie Trilogy Forums: http://z11.invisionfree.com/KOTOR_Movies
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