Sin City/Matrix Agent FX Test

That's a pretty darn good idea.

can make rain in standard after effects? no way ive tried every filter, i've seen plugins you can buy, but i just wana know how jon did it, so if i can get the job done cheaper why not aye.

I told you already: In this case, it looks like Particle Playground with some motion blur. Read the manual and toy with it.

 

By the way - if you want to make those kinds of glasses/bandages effects easier, get a black light, and paint the lenses with fluorescent matieral.
Aaah, that seems a much easier way of doing it.

In this case the rain was a plug-in. CC Rain which comes with Cycore Effects FX 1.0 (which came with AE). Funk-E is right though, you can make a similar effect using the particle playground. I've only quickly tried this, so mess around with it to get the look you're after...

Create black solid, set mode to screen
Add Paticle Playground effect, change to white
Move the position to the top of your composition and rotate it so the particles are falling down. Change Direction Random Spread to 0 (you should have a straight line down)
Drag barrel radius so it reaches the edge of your comp
Turn on motion blur (the 'M' in the timeline)

After that you can change the position/angle/speed as you like. Not perfect, but a start.

 

Word, I wouldnt have use for this effect as well, sure its pleasing to the eye, but honostly what would you use it for besides a Sin City fanfilm?
Thrice

 

Jon that is cool! And I don't use exclaimation points very often. I would love to see a full film. Give me a bell if you want a script.

 

I think Jon will need a bodygaurd now.

 

Well not every black-and-white film has to be a Sin City fanfilm. This is just another visual style, not necessarily the "Sin City style".

 

Its amazing what we have to say about Sin City and rain.

 

yea man, i think sin city is definatley a step in the right direction with the visual fx's imo, cgi backgrounds, cgi rain, when i think about it, it must be quite boring for the actors compared to acting on a proper scene.

but im definatley going to try this effect... soon.

 

I've just written up a walkthrough of the video, I hope it's a bit more helpful than my description earlier on.

 

ah thank you jon!

 

Sin City has a VERY distinct visual style. It's more than just black and white. The Sin City style is much higher contrast, much more stylistic. And pretty well-achieved here.

For the record, if you're going to do Sin City, don't just put things in color arbitrarily. All of the color in Sin City was there for a specific reason -- for example, the girl's name is Goldie. It's important we see her golden hair. The Yellow Bastard needs to be yellow. Etc. Though they did wind up allowing just a little bit of color washing in regular skin tones occasionally to break up the harshness of the look.

The only critiques I can give besides the obvious about the matte lines and other things that have already been mentioned, is you need to achieve a stronger separation between foreground and background. Everything kind of blends together trying to achieve the contrast. Let the rain add a little mist and force the far background into tones of grey, maybe.

M. Scott

 

No problem bullet, how did you do your rain in the end?

Thanks for the critique Dorkman, I'm hoping to try something similar soon so I'll bear what you said in mind.

 

i used the particle playground, but it eats cpu usage like mad and rendering it takes the piss.

i tried your setting for the rain but it didnt look the same for some reason, your rain actually looks wet, how'd you get that?

from what dorkman just said my movie may just looks like a black n white movie then lol, i mean getting perfect lighting outdoors will be difficult, im using big torches for harse lighting, will have to plant them carefully though.

 

You could also fake the harshness a bit with judicious use of the Curves filter.

 

oh yea! good thinking man, wicked, thats good stuff.

is it the same as you do it in photoshop btw?

 

Hey, love your stuff! I'm just wondering, how many hours do you put for the effects, on average?

 

woah! very cool!

 

Dude, that was really cool. My applause

This is one of the ways they did Marv's glasses.

Kevin was the one with the glasses, not Marv btw.

 

When i was watching a behind the scenes of sin city on MTV, they showed a clip of Marv acting with greenscreen.

And all his bandaids etc where sumwhere along a bright Flouresent *can't spell* pink/purple

but i imagined this is when, they convert to BnW, they would show up as brillant white?

 

Which indeed they did.

M. Scott

 

I'M NOT WORTHY! I'M NOT WORTHY! I'M NOT WORTHY!

God I really need to do some more testing

 

your rain actually looks wet, how'd you get that?
I'm not sure what you mean, it might be a combination of actually being wet during filming and the sound effect (garden sprinkler)? Do you have CCRain now?, because as it is in the walkthrough is all I did. Desaturated, and altered levels.

how many hours do you put for the effects, on average?
It depends on the effect and free time - I know I did this one over a weekend, project I'm working on now has taken nearly over a month so far. I suppose a little bit every night when I can afford to.

Thanks for the replies!

 

ah i just realised why mine wasnt looking like yours, i was working on a much better comp think it was 1024 x 438 or something (16:9)

 

Wow, that's a great work Jon, I loved camera tricks too, I hope i can do them someday