Oops , sorry , i think i posted my question in the wrong section earlier today xqs me.
here’s another one:
(@ rick barrett)
Am I right to say that the external composer does not parse Look at Cam orientation to it’s Null or Solid?
The same happens with Set Drive -Set Driven data and also on a plane that has an Align to Spline tag.
(the composited Null or Solid stay put in AE)
I wanted to make a carroussel Rig with screens that always look in he camera direction, then composit it to sent to AE Cineware and then be able to feed it in after effects with fresh daily video footage.
Hi Sassi thanks for the reply and file. But sorry this is not what i meant. I can do that.
The trouble is that when you now use the Extenal Composer tag to send it to Cineware (even after making it editable and e.g using the look at cam tag ...all information on the objects like look at cam, align to spline , set drive/driven etc. are neglected.
After effects Cineware receives and shows the Nulls (or Solids if checked) but these nulls do not follow the correct orientation anymore.
I did not caht with Rick I adressed him in my former mail because he did that great Party compositing tutorial in 2013.
I have put together some information. Not the external Compositing tag, for that I need your scene file, or you might contact the support—if the suspicion is that something doesn’t work. I’m not really clear how you use things in Ae. Why not leave things readable to C4D, which means use the parts already available before using the “external”?
Just to get a base what works, here are three files (in one archive) and a one minute clip how it works here. Newest MacOS, freshly downloaded the latest Ae CC and all done just a few minutes ago. Again, I try to duplicate where the problem could be, not a suggestion how it should be done.
I will test your request more, and hope to share something that makes it visible, so we can talk about details. Details that will lead to solve the problems you have.
The second part of this tries to get closer to the problem I suspect from your initial post, again—I advocate baking of data, as mentioned above. Let’s go a little bit more in detail about that. I tried her to find the problem that you encounter, not to say that this is the best workflow. (See the Cineware Help Content for details otherwise)
Again, I have too little information from your side, but I try anyway; Sorry if it doesn’t match the problem.
I assume you use as well the aec, if not let me know.
Any animation based on a curve interpolation is dependent on the formulas used inside. To bring Ae and C4D in sync, I would always just bake the stuff, which is easy to do in C4D. Of course, only if a problem shows up. I have used some moves with the camera that produces nice smooth curves, but also some extreme edge points. In the clip here, https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/KK7PF3Sc0luhe0Qn9DsNyFFEgP3EZUHgtomDyXFv54G?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy
(download it if you like)
I explore these extreme points, and you might find an error of 1-2+% in it, which normally might be hidden in fast motion and in the resulting blur there of.
The more key-frames the camera as well anything in the scene has, the less likely it shows up that strong. So, again, I pushed it to make a point, no “biggy”, until it shows—and then a simple bake is all there is to fix it. I hope you can live with it.
Let me know if that is what you like to have fixed.
Hi Sassi , thanks for thinking along with me ( while i was sleeping here in the Netherlands).
The best method is indeed to bake the objects.
The file you sent me here (https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/uAF8RCc4MFZrWjXJzUaRvtovOl0zQ9UnvwooWSMKTcN?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy) is essentially
the same method as the one i use here, except that i do not use the Target Effector to turn the planes
but set a LookatCam tag on the clones instead.
In the cloner i deselect the Fix Clones and Align options.
The individual clones now follow the camera.
This is the moment to animate the camera.
When this is done i make the cloner editable, all individual clones (I set the cloner to 5)automaticly get their own LookatCam Tag.
This is the moment where i bake the animated object’s position and rotation.
When i now assign External Compositing tags to the baked objects everthing works fine.
All Nulls (or defined Solids) now follow the rotation and position in After Effects.
So baking the objects is a nice solution for this matter. Problem solved.
But the thing is that i have to do this over and over again as soon as i want to change the camera
movement, or the number of clones on which i want to project video in After Effects.
I guess i’ll have to live with that and prepare a few prebuilt rigs with 5, 6, 7 -n planes
and soem variations in camera movement. For now I’m satisfied. Again : thanks for thinking along !
Here’s the concept file i was working on, eventually i baked the screens before compositing. http://adobe.ly/1kFYqBI
Here’s a short render in LowRes (much to fast , so don’t look at the speed) http://adobe.ly/1MuMk9f
Now i can swap all the video’s in the carousselscreens in After Effects.
But the next sequence i have to do has 8 nominies instead of 5 ...
I had hoped just to add clones would do the trick. but unfortunelely i have to bake it all again.
So now I consider to build some rigs and put them in different takes for use in other occasions..
If you have five or eight objects, pretty much any number can be baked at once.
In the moment you drag the keyframe less objects into the Timeline, you can select them all, and bake them.
I would copy your MoGraph set up, make it editable, bake the new parts and delete anything you don’t like to have.
Set up the next with the original Cloner, and repeat the step above. In this way you keep the original set up and create set ups that you need, which means the Layer browser will come in handy.
As long as we talk about a workflow that leaves everything “hot” in Ae, in terms of video and C4D light and materials for example.
My best wishes for your project, and thanks again for the information.
Use the option “Save Project for Melange” in the File menu, or enable Save Polygons for Melange and Save Animation for Melange in the General Preferences - Files tab.
Saving for Melange will store the complete scene cache in the C4D file, rather than just the ‘instruction set’ to rebuild the scene. It’s necessary when you’re loading a C4D file in another application because C4D isn’t available to rebuild the scene based on the instructions.
Be aware though that because the whole scene cache is stored, files save ‘for Melange’ will be dramatically bigger than ordinary C4D files. For that reason, I prefer to leave the prefs unchecked and use the File menu option only when I need the Melange information in the file.
This is certainly a great way, Rick, this should be in the tutorial library with some details about file size and what to include or not. The manual just mentioned it, but leaves out details, there I wish we would have your insight.
In many cases when you try to find a solution a situation pops up that has the Best of Both status.
At least, in the workflow i was looking for this appears to be the case.
In my ‘procedural’ videocaroussel effort i have now ended up in a hybrid workflow that suits me well.
It is presented in this zip:
So what i do now is open a separate C4D file and set the (N) number of clones in my ‘mastercloner’
After that i ‘fill’ the cloner with as many individual (N)copies of the clones.
All copies get their own External Compositing Tag, Object Buffer and Look at Cam Tag.
This can all come along with the copy and paste action except that the Object Buffers
should have their own unique number of course.
In the External Compositing Tags i now check te solids, give them their own color ( to later locate them easier in AE)
and resize them to match the plane that needs to be replaced.
In the Render settings the correct numbers and group-ID’s of the objectbuffers(N) are set.
After that the animations and camera moves are defined. (or are allready imported from a main file)
Now the file can be output to a Melange Project.
In AE the melange project imports without problems. Object buffers and Solids match perfect
and the solids have their own color, as mentioned , to locate them easier.
To make it even easier i give the corresponding ObjectBuffer layers the same color
before i start to fill in my videocontent.
So it took us a few days to find out, but from now on we’re only gaining time !
Greetz and thanks a bunch for the support.
And now i’m going to have a beer..Cheers!
Henk Visser DigiEmotion
Yes, it is possible to color code them and have so an visual feedback about which one is which one. Which makes a lot easier to go from your Cinema 4D set up to Ae. Very nice idea.
In the moment you have only one child under the Cloner in the C4D, they all have the same color after they have been extracted. Lots of work if that needs to be done many times. Besides that one couldn’t set up individual Object Buffers, which might be critical in some cases. I will certainly memorize this. Thanks a lot. Even after 9.5 years MoGraph I learn new things based on workflow improvements. Wonderful. :o)
I have explored your C4D scene and the use in Ae. I have saved it as Melange and rendered it, all works fine. What I miss is currently the User Data problem you mentioned and the Align to Spline set up. Perhaps that is not needed anymore? If you have problems with it, please provide a scene file. Thanks.
No thanks ! All is fine! The Align to Spline was just another way to try to find a workaround.
At that time I wanted to prevent from the use of Look at Cam.
But I noticed that the same problem occured: The Exernal Composition solids don’t follow along the path , but stay in place.
The same thing happens when you make use of the set Drive - Set Driven combinations.
But : saving to Melange solves it all. So i skipped this issue.
Thanks for diving so deep in the matter. Funny to know you learned something after 9.5 years!
