Cineversity

Hello,
I’m using Projection Man for the first time on a project. I’ve followed some tutorials and feel like I understand it reasonably well. I’ve projected most of my layers on to 2D polys and it’s working great, however, when I use a 3D object, it’s not utilizing the alpha like expected. I’ve attached some screenshots and wonder if anyone can point me in a direction as to how to resolve this.

Thanks,
Mike

p.s. Having issues uploading images. Editing posts is painfully slow. It’s only occurring with attaching files.

Hi Mike,

As I have no file here, just some thoughts on that, please let me know if that is useable for you. If not, we might define the problem a little bit better then.

Materials should be set to “Front”, not to “Both” for any kind of camera projection. I have no idea why that is not a default in the Camera Projection. (I assume that the “Normals” are facing outwards.)

I use more than often of the most left side (Object Manager—Tag area) a 100% transparent object, with all other channels off.

Black in “Transparent” or “Alpha” areas is sometimes related to a insufficient number of rays (Render Settings/Options). I exclude this here, as I believe you have only a few cubes installed in the scene. However. IF time during a production is given, I try to delete anything that is not needed. Yes, an alpha channel should do the trick, but there are always cases where you can make this visible again—worse case of course.

IF you can supply a simplified version, I’m happy to explore this!

Have a great weekend

Sassi

Uploading issues. I found that images are limited to a specify size (800pixel?) and that files with two periods in it might cause trouble as well—“like trouble file.c4d.zip”.

Sassi,
Thanks for your help. I can see very clearly in the viewport that the alpha is handling properly. It is when render time comes that the alpha does not perform properly. I have checked the texture tag and it is set to frontal. Everything is in the luminance channel, since I do not want the scene lighting to affect the textures. I have reduced the scene significantly and attached it. Hopefully this will work for you and you might be able to provide further insight.

Thanks,
Mike

p.s. The forum is not letting me upload a zipped folder. I get, “Error Message:  The file you are attempting to upload has invalid content for its MIME type.”

p.p.s. I have attempted to attached my zipped scene several different ways and through several browsers. For a paid service, this forum needs some serious attention.

p.p.p.s. https://www.dropbox.com/sh/emhx0owt5c0lbl3/KSEfxSQJwg This should allow access to download the problem scene, since the forum attachment system is performing rather poorly at the moment. Not meaning to be rude, but the last thing I need when seeking help on Maxon’s forum is having to troubleshoot the attachment system on their site. :\ Regardless, I sincerely appreciate the help.

Hi Mike,

Yes the file attachment is not OK and it should work for you, thanks a lot for your patience with that. I’m not the tech/admin in charge for that, but let me say sorry about that experience.

Here is your file in the way I work. I just placed an Alpha Material/Text (Side>both) to the object, most right sided.

Yes that sounds like a workaround. But if it set to both, the projection shines through. If set to front the alpha is not reaching the back sides of course. This is my way of working with it.

BTW. I have some L.A. Skylines in my newest work, which will be premiered on Sunday and I hope to have it online on Monday (YouTube/Vimeo/G+) It is a music-video and mostly done all by myself (visually of course) shot mainly with my RED and all Camera Projection done in CINEMA 4D anything else done with Adobe this time.

I have already produced new tutorials around this, but more making of will follow.

All the best

Sassi

https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share?s=rvGd8IBUTn4lJx5VYyP2gQ

No luck either with the upload, :o( so I hope that URL will work for you.

Sassi,
Yes, I figured you weren’t in charge of networking. That was just me sounding off in the event that a techie was roaming the forums.

Thanks for your help! I see what you did, which is creating a second texture for the alpha. It is certainly a work around, but not ideal for what i have to do. Unfortunately, it seems like my only option right now. I wonder if this is worth me sending this directly to the Maxon folks to look at, since it seems to defeat the purpose of having the alphas built in to the document (I wonder if it has anything to do with PS CS6).

As the side note — your latest project sounds interesting! You’re welcome to add me on vimeo or send a link to your account so I can check it out when it’s up!!
https://vimeo.com/koboldstudios

Hey Mike,

I just retured from your website. Nice work. My first study was Architecture as well, and I worked there for 2 decades as lead designer. Fun time, but Film was always my first love, hehe.

If you can live with polygons, I would recommend to delete all faces that are not needed at all, It might not help the render time, but keeps things nice and neat.

I can’t really tell from the camera move if that is your final. You might have other ideas for this project. But what I try to supply in my Camera mapping classes since 2006, is that we always should consider if it is fore, middle or back ground. If real background, the parallax will be mostly so minimal that any projection might be too much work. More often a panorama is sufficient, well, always project depended. Middle ground and in certain cases the fore ground is ideal for camera mapping. CU or even ECU (Close ups) should be modeled and composed (e.g., Light Wrap) should be done very detailed and full 3D.

I will post the link here , as I have created this project mainly as production training :o)

All the best

Sassi

Sassi,
Thanks for the kind words. I love architecture and miss it. Unfortunately, the US housing market was a pretty major factor in the global economic meltdown, which occurred right in the middle of my graduate program. Needless to say, it hasn’t been the best industry to try and find employment in. Besides, motion design and 3D work pays much better than architecture at this point. I’ll always have a place in my heart for the field, but they pay their unlicensed architect interns quite poorly in the US. Do you have your work up on a site at the moment?

I’ll consider your suggestions. Perhaps keeping everything 2D is best. This way, I at least don’t have to duplicate materials. The camera move is 180º. so the cityscape just needs to provide enough detail and parallax to be convincing and all the detail will be actual geometry and nicely modeled for the foreground. Perhaps I over-thought this one.

Hey Mike,

Architecture is a great skill-set to “own”, in terms of knowledge, it contains a lot of art, management and other valuable things, and has helped me a lot to do Set-Design, to get my “foot into the door” of feature films in the late ‘80s.
I had a great time to work in architecture, but I felt it was over for me (20 large projects in a single decade alone), and I’m happy with what I’m doing now. I have six degrees, so changing course is something natural to me. Having said that, I put my previous website down, as I found it old and no time to fix that. I’m in debate mode if I use my URLs in the future. As an independent film-maker I do not look out for work of course, and people I know—connect with my current work on FaceBook or G+. In that way everything is up-to-date. It is way more alive and old stuff slides out of the focus, which I like, to make space for new stuff. But yes, I need to make for each project at least one information part. Well, there is always so much to do and so little time.

You might have considered all of that, and sorry if I double here anything, but as we are in a forum, other might be interested in it. S here we go. To your 180º move, if possible use or create this with HDRI (It looked like a night shot. A camera that pans that fast will create a lot of Motion Blur. If done with low dynamic range, the Motion Blur might look boring and takes away a good impression.  Values way over 100% are typically for night shots (Windows) if you have the facades correctly captured. The illuminated windows will dominate then the scene.

I do not think that you over thought this, as we all want to do it right, well, what counts is what is in the footage on the end. The more time we save in setting things up, the more time we might have to make artistic decisions. Again, forums talk, as I do not know anything about your expertise in detail.  If you try several different approaches, you might add certainty to your project—to have done it adequately.

Enjoy the work - perhaps you share it when it is done.

Have a great weekend

Sassi