Wow… it took forever, but I’m here to bring you more demo reels then ever before! Maybe you are hurting for some graphics ideas, or just need to whet your inspiration palate? There’s no better way to throw away an afternoon. Enjoy!

• 

  Teisson Froes

  I don’t really know much about this fellow, mostly because I don’t speak spanish, but I don know that he is an awesome motion graphics artist dealing with mostly products and commercial production.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Joost Korngold

  Joost Karngald is a freelance designer/director and has a killer portfolio over at his website renascent.nl

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Syndrome 2009 Reel

  Syndrome has a ton of clients, recently finishing up Spike TV’s Arkham Asylum Broadcast package and the new Ke$ha music video… check out their reel with a ton of clips from the T-Pain music videos, Rob Dyrdek’s Fantasy Factory and a ton of braodcast packages.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Bill Dawson

  Working at XK9 Design, Bill Dawson showcases some of his promo work in motion graphics for some prominent shows like The Apprentice and Wheel of Fortune.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Ghost VFX Reel 2009

  This company has some really amazing looking stuff in their reel including some crazy awesome visual effects for some lesser known movies as well as some bigger names like AVP and Die Another Day, and what they create is absolutely spectacular..

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Monkeyhead Reel 2009

  Instead of making a reel to showcase their work, Monkeyhead decided to actually make a short animated film showcasing all their skills.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Jesus Alvarez Reel

  Jesus has a cool reel with a nice mix of everything, visual effects, compositing, some motion graphics, breakdowns and 3d animation.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Tony Hudson Demo Reel

  This guy does everything… matte painting, digital creatures, art direction… you name it. Check out his reel with work on some really well known movies like Harry Potter and A.I.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  The Molecule

  This shop continues to produce some amazing looking work with shows like Rescue Me and Damages as well as some feature films. Also make sure you check out the Mograph reel too. YOu can follow them on Twitter @themoleculevfx.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Cinesite

  This company has produced some absolutely breathtaking imagery for some huge, and I mean huge films. The Dark Knight, Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix, Hellboy… oh and of course, Beverly Hills Chihuahua.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Winston Galera

  Galera is a small design studio in Buenos Aires that specializes in everything a small studio normally does. Check out the sick looking graphics they put out in their reel.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Carmina Soler Balaguer

  Carmina is a freelance designer loated in Sbadell, Barcelona. She specializes in motion design, web and graphic design. Check out her site .

  View Demo Reel

• 

  UPPER FIRST

  Upper First is a relatively new shop in thier first year or so of operation. Check out their reel from the last year and a lot of commercial productions.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  SuperNova – Scott Novasic

  Scott has some amazing looking branding packages utilizing tons of 3d and After Effects. Lots of sports, logos, and mograph goodness.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  MAKE Reel 2009

  Make specializes in the art of storytelling through motion graphics, vfx, and animation. Check out their demo reel at makevisual.com.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Amoeba

  This is a one man operation providing art direction and desing for branding, print publishing, motion graphics and music video production. Very awesome, grungy looking reel.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Autodesk’s Siggraph 2009 Show Reel

  Autodesk obvioulsy is going to put out some ridicouly amazing work… so I will just let this reel speak for itself.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Joe Herbert

  This reel was made mostly with AE and C4D with a touch of almost all the other 3d packages out there.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Rawbot

  Luma Bros has since become Rawbot, and you can check out rawbot.se to see their demo reel and see what they are all about.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Artem Ludyankov

  Artem has an awesome mix of 2d and 3d motion graphics that really put out a visually stunning look with artistic eye.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Federico Ponce

  Federico is a fantastic 3d designer, and his skills mixed along with motion graphics make for a pretty awesome reel.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Blur

  Blur’s work continues to amaze anyone and everyone that sees what comes out of this talented bunch of people at the studio.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Kamen Markov

  Kamen is a flame artist with an insanely aweosme reel to boot. I found him on PostFolio’s Top Ten Reels video they made… really great stuff.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Method

  Method Studios has got some big clients under their belt, and the content that they produce ain’t too shabby either.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Goran Forsling 2008 Reel

  Goran is a freelancer out of Stockholm, Sweden with some great visual effects and motion graphics work, mostly for commercial production.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  The Ronin

  These are some of the selected works of Rob Chiu, an amazing motion designer, director of film and photography.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Thomas Horne

  Thomas has an awesome way of displaying his work, there is a bar at the bottom of his reel that highlight what role he played in each spot.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Houdini Reels

  Houdini’s website has 4 reels on their site in which you can check out and see what the product is all about… I recommend watching the Demo and the Artist reels.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Dstrukt Showreel 2006

  Dstrukt’s website now reroute’s to christopherhewitt.com, in which Christopher a London based freelnacer working in motion design and art direction.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Peter Szewczyk

  This guy has worked on Star Wars, Harry Potter, and the Madagascar series. Check out his site, Light+Mathematics, and click the link to get to his reel on Vimeo.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Mathieu Gérard

  This is a bunch of Mathieu’s clips from his student days… A lot of really great looking, very detailed 3d works in here.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Colour Movie

  This company is great… they make a wide range of styles, but they seem to specialize in commercials and branding packages mostly. Check out the reel to see more of what I am talking about.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Transistor Studios

  This reel starts off all elegant, then gets some radio distortion and kicks it into high gear. Very cool audio track and even cooler imagery to go along with it.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  PostPanic

  Absolutely gorgeous reel. There is tons of content in this, along with individual samples to pick and choose from.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Sixis

  Kinda slow to start out with this one, but once you make it past the beginning, the rest is spectacular. Hit it up.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Rodion Rusu

  Rodion has some killer samples of what he has worked on over the years… there’s some damn good stuff in there.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Jacob Mathew

  A great mix of 2d and 3d animations to create some really in your face stuff, as well as some calmer pieces too.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  The Mill 2010 Showreel

  Anything that The Mill puts out, is just out of this world amazingness, so I can’t describe this shortly… just watch.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Talmeez Rehman

  I found this guy via the Creative COW and I can see why he was rated 5 Stars. Check out his wide range of Mograph animations to see how he utilizes his skills.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  Buck

  I love Buck’s work… it always seems to have a nice mix of cartoony, but still high end vfx and mograph related animations.

  View Demo Reel

• 

  After Effects 1.1 Showreel

  Ahh way back when… we have from the old archives… the After Effects 1.1 showreel. Who knew that we would be so fascinated with this… what? 14 years later?

  View Demo Reel

If you enjoyed this post, please give it a vote on Digg or a stumble to say thanks!

007 GoldenEye

28 Days Later

Wolf’s Bane (Wolverine Font)

Squealer (AC DC Font)

Blade Runner Movie Font

Aurabesh (Star Wars Symbols Font)

Han Solo (Star Wars Font)

SF Fedora (Indiana Jones Font)

Back To The Future 2002

Batman Forever

Due Date (COPS Font)

CNN

Fight This (Fight Club Font)

Friday13 (Friday the 13th Font)

Grinched (How the Grinch Stole Christmas Font)

Ringbearer (Lord of the Rings Font)

Elvish Ring NFI (Lord of the Rings – Elvish)

Aniron (Lord of the Rings – Alternative Font)

Matrix

Nightmare Before Christmas

Planet of the Apes

The Ring

Sin City

Trek (Star Trek Font)

Harry P (Harry Potter Font)

Lumos (Harry Potter Book Font)

SF TransRobotics (Transformers Font)

Waltograph (Walt Disney Font)

Final Fantasy

Halo3

Army of Darkness

Blade 2

Beynkales Demo (Corpse Bride Font)

Trajan-Regular (The Movie Font)

Red Right Hand (Hellboy Font)

Homoarakhn (Spiderman and PS3 Font)

Scream Real (Scream Font)

An Unfortunate Event (Lemony Snicket’s Font)

Fiddums Family (Addams Family Font)

Battlestar Galactica

Alien League (Alien Font)

Adam Warren 0.2 (300 Font)

AVP (Alien VS Predator Font)

Timepiece (A Clockwork Orange Font)

Metrolox (Enemy of the State Font)

The Godfather

Impossible (Mission: Impossible Font)

InvisibleKiller (Predator Font)

Resident Evil

Terminator Real NFI (Terminator Font)

If you enjoyed this post, please give it a vote on Digg or a stumble to say thanks!

• 

  Video Copilot – Submerged

  Andrew is back with tutorial number #96, in which you create that effect where you are going underground, like on that show Cities Of The Underground on History Channel. This uses camera mapping techniques and lots of textures to create and awesome looking camera move through the earth.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Video Copilot Tip: Mask Transition

  In this quick little tip in Andrew’s Vlog he shows you how create a really quick transition that follows someone that walks past the camera, and gives you a wipe into the next shot in your comp. Tip starts at 1:22.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Video Copilot Tip: Paint a Punch

  Another tip from Andrew in the next Vlog features Sam Loya, a guy we haven’t seen in a while. In this tip, the choreography for a fight scene slips a little bit, and you can see there is no impact with the punch. Learn how to use the Clone Stamp tool in AE to fix this. Tip starts at 3:08.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Video Copilot Optical Flares Preview

  This isn’t much of a tutorial, rather than a preview of what is to come. Andrew has been giving us some glimpses of the new Optical Flares plugin from Video Copilot. The first preview is a video dedicated to it, and the second starts at 10:50

  Visit Preview #1 Visit Preview #2

• 

  Graymachine’s Favorite 5 Expressions

  Again, not much of a tutorial but Harry Frank, the master of expressions, had some time to write us his favorite five expressions, explain them, and also provide them as a download.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Creative Cow & Eran Stern – The Pusher

  Eran uses the Wave World, Caustics, and Color Finesse to create an effect that is similar to one of the abilities from “Push”, kind of like making the space around you act like rippling water.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Creative Cow & Gyorfi Szilard – Shortcuts Part 2

  This is the second part to last month’s Shortcuts Part 1 tutorial over at the COW where Gyorfi gives you some navigation tips to utilize a better workflow.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Multi-Camera Synchronization

  This is a really simple technique that teaches you how to make a timecode counter, so that if you are on a multi-camera shoot, everyone points their cameras to the comp on a laptop to sync them up in post.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Introduction to Programmatic Animations in AE

  Here is a huge set of videos from MAX 2009 of Michael Coleman, the product manager of After Effects teaching you how to use javascript-based expressions to increase your workflow.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  How to Remove Banding Artifacts in AE

  Nick Campbell takes you through some handy technique to keep you videos from coming out with banding when rendering or compressing, and also some background information on why this happens.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  How To Export Your Scene From C4D to AE Full Version

  A bit back, I featured Nick’s tutorial he hosted on Maxon for the release of C4D R11.5 on how to bring scenes into AE from C4D. Nick has the full version on his site now, with a ton of handy tips that weren’t in the previous version.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Motionworks – Rotoscoping Fields

  John Dickinson has a ton of tutorials this month, this one deals in working with rotoscoping interlaced footage, and the troubles you may encounter when doing so.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Motionworks – Motion Sketch

  A little known function in After Effects, at least to me is Motion Sketch. John shows you were to find this panel, and how to utilize it in your workflow.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Motionworks – A Workflow With Soundkeys

  Learn how John used Trapcode Soundkeys to control the look and feel of a boxing promo for Foxtel in this e-seminar for Adobe.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Motionworks – Explosive TV Promo Graphics

  John shows us how he takes rendered 3d text from C4D and brings that into AE, adds motion blur, and composites it all together to make some killer looking promos for the release of Fast and Furious on DVD and Blu-Ray.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Motionworks – Simplify Your Workflow

  John demonstrates some simple techniques to speed up your workflow with a few expressions and the Source Text parameter.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Motionworks – AE and ProAnimator

  Another e-seminar that John hosted the other day showed you a new workflow with ProAnimator inside of AE to make a Sopranos-style 3d text look.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Motionworks Effects A-Z: Maltaannon – Audio Spectrum

  In the A-Z Effects rundown, Maltaannon covers the Audio Spectrum effect and shows you a few uses and what the parameters do.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Motionworks Effects A-Z: John Dickinson – Beam

  Not many people use the Beam effect, but hopefully after this tutorial you can find a few uses for it.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Motionworks Effects A-Z: Topher Welsh – The Bevel Effects

  2 in 1! I demonstrate the differences between Bevel Edges and Bevel Alpha, and how you can use them in your workflow efficiently.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  CGtuts+ & Chris Martin – Create an Amazing Liquid Apple Effect

  Using RealFlow, Cinema 4D, and After Effects, Chris Martin takes you through three different tutorials to create this awesome looking liquid apple simulation.

  Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

• 

  CGtuts+ & Amilcar De Carvalho – Create a Cool Looking Molecule Effect in Maya and AE

  Modeling the molecule object in Maya, bring that into After Effects, create a camera movement and set up a particle system to finish it all off.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  RGTV Ep.31 Chad Perkins – Creating an Old-School Sci-Fi TV Opening

  Chad Perkins does a lot of After Effects training on Lynda.com, and now in his first Red Giant TV episode, he teaches you how to make an awesome looking Twilight Zone show open with Trapcode 3D Stroke, Echospace and some other Trapcode plugins.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  RGTV Ep. 32 Chan Bonanno – Feature Film Title Treatment

  Chan Bonanno teaches you how to recreate the title treatment he made for the movie “Dreamgirls” using Trapcode Particular and Knoll Light Factory.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  After Effects Apprentice – Render Queue

  In the monthly tutorials from Chris and Trish Meyer from their book After Effects Apprentice, they teach you how to use the Render Queue thoroughly within After Effects.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Big Mike Design – Spider Web Animation

  Learn how to use Illustrator and After Effects to create a spider web that animates and catches text that flies into it.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Garus Booth – CC Cylinder Effect

  There aren’t many tutorials that deal with CC Cylinder, and this one takes an intermediate look into utilizing it to create some cool effects mixed with 3d renders.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Garus Booth – Trapcode 3D Stroke

  In this tutorial you can go from story boards to the final AE composition using 3d Stroke to achieve a killer result.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Hologram Preset Tutorial

  This has been a long time coming tutorial from Chad Castleberry using his hologram preset on some footage in After Effects.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Superperson Opening Titles

  This is an updated version of Chad Castelberry’s Superperson video that was hosted on Youtube back in the day. This is an effect similar to the title effects in Superman or The Last Starfighter.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Creating Smoke/Fog in AE

  This effect’s tutorial has been made a few times, but there are a ton of different ways to do it. This way uses CC Particle World to create fog on some existing footage.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  ProJuice.org – Virtual Backgrounds

  Nick and Arlo from ProJuice.org show you how to take some green screen footage of Arlo, and create some curved screen backgrounds.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  VideoHive and Topher Welsh – Paint Panel Explained

  In this tutorial, I show you what the options actually are inside the Paint Panel in After Effects, how they work, and what exactly they do.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  VideoHive and Topher Welsh – Forcing Motion Blur

  With some help from John Dickinson, we outline thrree different ways to force motion blur onto your layers using either AE’s built in motion blur, CC Force Motion Blur or the Timewarp effect.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  CGPOV.com My Fave Things Part 2 – Max2AE

  Chad Smashley outlines his favorite things on his blog CGPOV.com and he shows how to setup and use the plugin for 3ds Max, Max2AE.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  AEScripts – AudioToMarkers

  Lloyd Alvarez’s newest script, AudioToMarkers will add markers, split a layer or add a new text layer with incrementing numbers based on audio intensity. Make sure you hit the Demo Video button for the tutorial.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  AEScripts – SpellCheck

  This is perhaps the script I have been waiting for my whole AE career. Kind of obvious how it works… it spell check s things for you in your comp. Hit the Demo Video button for all the details on how to use this script.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  AEScripts – Chameleon

  This is an awesome script from Mathias Möhl that assists you to browse through color themes obtained from Adobe Kuler.

  Visit Tutorial

• 

  Zola Media – Flame Vortex

  In Zola Media’s first tutorial they show you how to create what they call a “Flame Vortex” effect, like those seen in video games. Check out the tutorial for a preview of the effect.

  Visit Tutorial

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Today I’m extremely happy to announce that we’re joining forces with another industry powerhouse: Rerendered.com and visionary After Effects producer Justin McClure. We have combined our inventory, providing you quick access to content from two of the leading sites in the AE Project Files game! The merge brings hundreds of new project files, many of which are already migrated over into our Project Files category. With our powers combined we are continuing to make VideoHive THE marketplace for Adobe After Effects!

VideoHive + Rerendered

By merging sites we’re combining our inventories into VideoHive’s After Effects Project Files category. This means you visit one site, from one account and have access to all of the great files from both sites. Alongside the file migration, we’ve also brought over new authors and buyers to join our community! Of course with a larger author base brings more file submissions, so you’ll have more frequent submissions and more of a variety to look through when searching for that perfect project to suit your needs.

Interview with Justin McClure

To kick off the merge, VideoHive site manager Mark Brodhuber sat down for a chat Justin McClure (one of the masterminds behind the creation of Rerendered) about his thoughts regarding the merger, and the future of VideoHive.

Q. Tell us a little bit about why you got started in video?

A: When I was 12 years old my brother and I would borrow my parents (then state-of-the-art) VHS video camera and create short films which were entirely edited in camera WITH music being pumped through a tape walk-man that was duct taped to the microphone. Yep, that is where it all started. My true passion developed later in college with my first After Effects 4.0 course. I was a Design major, but at Fort Hays State University you were required to have a final portfolio on an interactive CD. So along with learning programs like Director and InfiniD, After Effects for the animation and interactive components was essential. I was hooked. I mean, come on… Photoshop in motion? I was in love.

Q. Why After Effects, and why not a different software package?

A: I have never been opposed to trying new things. When Motion first came out I must of gave it a good full month of test driving, because I was sure that it was the next big thing. I also bought Shake when it first came out, I knew it wasn’t really motion graphics driven, but I wanted to have multiple tools for different needs. In the end, After Effects was just so easy to use and robust, it was really the only tool I needed.

Q. Are you a Mac or a PC? Any specific reasoning?

A: I am totally a MAC snob. I don’t have an apple sticker on my F-150 anywhere, but I can’t even begin to figure out how to adjust the volume on a PC. MAC is all that I have ever known, even since the days of Lemon-aid Stand and Oregon Trail… I realize I just hit a soft spot with a certain age group.

Q. We all love to hear each other’s war stories. Got any great horror jobs?

A: Not so much a war story, but my first week at CMT was a rough one. I was given a very small introductory project, I was to develop and animated a logo for a 5 sec open that would be on CMT.com. So I of course started where I always start, sketching and filtering through my available fonts. For some ungodly reason, Extensis Suitcase was giving me huge headaches. I think because CMT has a trillion fonts first of all, and secondly because I was of course like a kid in a candy store activating all of the cool new ones I had never seen before. Reggie, our groups IT guy, took a look and seemed to fix the issues I was having, but I was left with zero fonts activated… got to have at least the basic ones right? Anyway, at some point while activating, waiting, watching pin wheel, activating, waiting, watching pin wheel, I mistakenly ‘Activated All Fonts’ bringing the already slooow G5 to a screeching crawl and the issue that had been fixed was back again and I was too embarrassed to tell anyone. My Art Director at the time, Amie Nguyen, somehow without fail only walked by my workstation while I had my hands over my mouth, staring at my fonts with the pinwheel rotating. Gut wrenching and nerve racking experience, I was already the newbie treading water in the deep end of the pool and I thought for sure I was going to get fired before I even finished my first project. I hope Amie reads this, because I’m pretty sure even to this day, she thinks I have some kind of weird font fetish.

Q. You’ve worked with some amazing clients, such as the Discovery Channel and Dell. What’s been your experience working with such large clients, and what’s the project you’re most proud of.

A: I have had the opportunity to work with a large range of clients, some big and some small, but the recipe to do great work is the same every time. There maybe a few more pages in the branding guidelines and a couple more levels of reviews for the bigger fish, but that is to be expected. All in all, the process remains the same. I think I am most proud of the CMT Coyote Ugly show package, It was my first big solo project at CMT and I was able to get my hands dirty from start to finish. Directing the green screen shoot wasn’t so bad either.

Q. Can you tell us why you decided to launch Rerendered?

A: Rerendered started out as my personal library of experimental After Effects tests and cutting room floor materials. It certainly didn’t start out as a marketplace, it was simply an online location to keep my files available for download, instead of being scattered across multiple hard drives at home, work and in between. My friend, and later business partner, Larry Penrod, who at the time was helping me set up the site, had asked me if it maybe worth including other After Effects artists and also selling the files. We agreed to try it, but also agreed it should to be more like a garage sale and less of a corporate type of site. It was meant for AE artists to download and share files, very simple files, files that could save an hour perhaps and other files just to inspire creative things a third party plugin could do.

Q. What makes you feel that Rerendered is a good fit with VideoHive?

A: I think Rerendered is a great fit for VideoHive, because it fills a void. Most of the files you find on the current site are much more elaborate files that a producer might be more inclined to purchase as opposed to an After Effects artist. Having these types of smaller presets and pre-comp type files allows AE artists another outlet. Artist such as myself are not looking for, “replace photo & type here” plug and render types of files. But, I am however searching for little nuggets that I can change and alter very quickly and then sprinkle into a commercial or promo. Items such as trees and birds, simple little particular effects for a quick transition and so on and so forth. I am really excited for more of these types of files to start showing up, and I am looking forward to downloading them.

Q. In your opinion, what are the advantages that come with using stock motion graphics?

A: Besides the advantages I listed above, I would say the other big advantage, is introducing different styles and elements to your work. Of course they are also great time savers as well. One of the most creative things i have been exposed to while working in this field, is collaborating with multiple artists on a single project. I have always grown creatively every time, with no exceptions. Whether it is being exposed to a different way of animating or simply an introduction to a different style, I believe we all can grow from interacting with and learning from other artists and this can easily be achieved via stock items and the online community of VideoHive as easy as it can be from working with another artist sitting right next to you.

Q. Tell us a bit about SqueezeMe.tv?

A: SqueezeMe.tv started out as another internal idea actually. I wanted to create a home page that had nothing but the latest motion graphics industry’s news, highlights and tutorials all in one place. It is simply a one stop shop and I think if you are in to motion graphics or video at all, you will fall in love with it. Special thanks to Dominic Flask (link: www.dangerdom.com) and Jeff Lang for bringing it to life.

Q. Where do you see the industry going in the next ten years?

A: Without giving up my plot to rule the galaxy, here are a few things to be aware of. First off, there is a great new tool coming out soon called the internet. It will be amazing; you will be able to collaborate with people from around the world from the luxury of your very own home. All joking aside, most agencies and studios still are not utilizing this amazing tool, they simply don’t get it. They want to hire people in house and on site, and build with bricks and mortar. This method is on the brink of extinction, or at least a silent revolution. Times have changed, and a new trend has been set in motion and will remain to be the norm for the next 5 to 10 years. Everyone is looking for a bargain, including big businesses. I’m not saying you should lower your price tag, but you better be able to offer something new and have incentives for your customers. And if you are a big agency or studio you better be able to leverage your overhead, by hand picking temporary talent for each particular project as opposed to hiring someone full time with benefits that is mediocre because you think they can fill multiple rolls. You also might want to rethink those round trip plane tickets to Los Angles for your two creative directors, because you no longer need to be sitting right next to an editor, to be art directing. You no longer have to have everyone is the same building to collaborate effectively, you just need to have them on the same page.

Q. Do you have any advice for aspiring video artists?

A: Find something you love and then work your ass off owning it.

Visit VideoHive

We couldn’t be more excited about the decision. We welcome the Rerendered team, authors, and buyers over to VideoHive. We’re looking forward to a long lasting relationship, and some really great files! Be sure to stop in at VideoHive and check out all the new items as well as our Popular Files page, featuring the best and brightest of VideoHive each week! And be on the lookout in the coming weeks for a Best of Rerendered article highlighting some fantastic Rerendered files!

Aetuts+ – After Effects Tutorials

• 

  Simulate a Realistic Sniper Scope Perspective – AE Plus

  My tutorial deals with a VFX shot that’s easy to attempt but hard to master: A convincing looking sniper scope view.
  I will outline the assets that I provide in Photoshop and the principles of accomplishing the intended outcome. In After Effects I’ll make use of pre-compositions, motion tracking and some easy expressions. For clarity’s purpose I’ll get into details about optical phenomena when necessary.

  Continue Reading

• 

  Form a Unique Transition

  In this tutorial we are going to reveal how to create a cool particle transition between 2 videos using Trapcode Form. We will cover the importance of layer maps while using this plugin as well as how to create a stylish displacement of the particles.

  Continue Reading

• 

  Making Your Color Scheme a Whole Lot Kuler!

  Adobe Kuler is a great resource for color themes that is perfectly integrated in all Adobe CS4 software – except for After Effects. But this has changed now.

  Continue Reading

• 

  The Best Sound You’ll Ever See!

  Satya is back with a new tutorial that will help you look as good as you sound. This technique has many options so sit back and learn how to create an attractive visual generated from your audio spectrum.

  Continue Reading

• 

  Terminate Your Footage With Expressions

  Sep 21st in VFX by Ben McEwan If you’re wanting to help to save Sarah Connor then maybe this tutorial will give you an insider’s perspective on what to do. Ben McEwan has created a 3 Day Series crammed full of useful expressions to create the UI found in the Terminator.

  Continue Reading

Nettuts+ – Web Development Tutorials

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  11 Classic CSS Techniques Made Simple with CSS

  We’ve all had to achieve some effect that required an extra handful of divs or PNGs. We shouldn’t be limited to these old techniques when there’s a new age coming. This new age includes the use of CSS3. In today’s tutorial, I’ll show you eleven different time-consuming effects that can be achieved quite easily with CSS3.

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  20 HTML Forms Best Practices for Beginners

  Working with XHTML forms can be somewhat daunting; they not only use some niche HTML elements, but also blur the line between static content and user interaction. Let’s review some things to remember when creating your next form.

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  Search Engine Optimization 101

  Your website may be top notch but what’s the use of an online presence if no one can find it? In this quick start guide to search engine optimization we’ll review an assortment of tactics to increase your page ranking.

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  How to Design and Code a Flexible Website

  In this tutorial, we’re going to be designing and coding a simple blog-style web-page. We’ll pay special attention to making our design flexible and accessible by using clean and simple XHTML and CSS. This tutorial is aimed at beginners, and anyone looking to improve the accessibility of their web designs.

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  Getting Clean with PHP

  Data security is important and often undervalued by designers, developers, and clients alike. Since PHP 5.2.0, data sanitization and validation has been made significantly easier with the introduction of data filtering. Today, we’re going to take a closer look at these filters, how to use them, and build a few custom functions.

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Psdtuts+ – Photoshop

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  Render a Cereal Box Cover from Scratch Using Photoshop’s 3D Tools

  Hi everyone! This time I’ve got for you a fun tutorial, we’ll create a cereal box design from scratch, using only Photoshop. We will render several fruit flavored cereal loops using the Photoshop’s CS4 Extended 3D tools, apply textures to the loops, bump the surfaces and mock-up them into a real 2D image. Are you ready?

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  Create a Big Air Event Poster with Photoshop and Illustrator – Psd Plus Tutorial

  We have another Psd Plus tutorial exclusively available to Plus members today. If you want to take your Photoshop and Illustrator integration skills to the next level, then we have an exciting poster design tutorial for you. Learn more at the jump!

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  Create an Intense Movie Poster in Photoshop

  Designers love to be critical about movie posters, and while you may think you have better ideas about how to sell a movie to an audience, how many times have you actually tried doing it? In this tutorial, we’re going to create a poster for a fictional movie called “Fugitive.” The movie is meant to be a suspenseful thriller that features one’s escape under the cover of darkness, despite man’s attempt to capture the lone hero. Thin and cheesy plot? Check. Awesome opportunity to better your PSD skills? You got it!

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  How to Create Eroded Metal Text with Photoshop

  In this tutorial I’ll show you how to create an eroded metal text effect. Throughout this tutorial we’ll make use of various drawing techniques, channels, and patterns.

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  Add Fantastic Color to 3D Text – Part I

  This is the first part of a two part series. Part two will be released tomorrow. In this piece you will learn how to bring a simple text to life and place everything in fantastic, colored and glowing 3D space. Some neat techniques covered here will allow you to bring your art to the next level. Don’t miss it! There are two parts to this tutorial: Part I and Part II.

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Vectortuts+ – Vector & Illustrator

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  How to Create a Golden, Vector Compass in Illustrator

  In this tutorial I will take you through the steps and techniques of creating a golden compass. For this tutorial I’ve used just Adobe Illustrator and a heavy dose of ingenuity.

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  How to Create a Yellow Submarine Icon with Gradient Meshes – Vector Plus Tutorial

  We have another great Vector Plus tutorial available exclusively for Plus members today. If you want to learn how to use gradient mesh, pattern brushes and other advanced Illustrator tools to create a shiny submarine, then we have an awesome tutorial for you. Learn more about this tutorial at the jump!

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  Build a Promotional iPhone App Website Wireframe in Fireworks

  Fireworks is a great tool for creating a wireframe and while it doesn’t work perfect with Photoshop, you can export over there and then build off your wireframe. We’ll cover the design process of creating a wireframe for an iPhone application website in Fireworks. For those of you not familiar with this program, it will be a good jumping off point for using it to wireframe your web design projects. This is a multi-part series and will be fun! Here is Part I of and Part II.

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  How to Create a Caramel Ripple Effect

  In this tutorial, we will create a hot chocolate caramel effect using some distort tools and the 3D revolve tool. This is a simple and effective technique to obtain a quality vector ripple effect quickly. Here we go!

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  How to Create an Energy Saving Bulb in Illustrator

  Here we’re showing how to create an energy saving bulb with the help of the Illustrator’s Mesh Tool. At the beginning it could be quiet hard to work with, but if you get used to it, it’s fairly simple.

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Activetuts+ – Flash, Flex & ActionScript Tutorials

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  Create a Unit Converter Application for Flash Lite Enabled Devices

  Flash Lite is an implementation of the Flash runtime for mobile phones, consumer electronic devices, and Internet-connected digital home devices. According to Adobe, the number of Flash Lite shipped devices will reach 1 billion in 2009 and more than 2.5 billion by the end of 2010, so if you are a Flash Developer it is important to know how this technology works and how it differs from Flash Player for the desktop.

  In this tutorial I’ll guide you through the basics of Flash Lite using the 1.1 version; sacrificing features, but ensuring compatibility.

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  Build a Mini Golf Game with ActionScript 3.0

  In this tutorial I´ll show you how to create nice Mini Golf Game with ActionScript 3.0. We´ll work with Event Handlers, Functions and also the Timer Object which is a really cool feature in AS3.

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  AS3 101: Loops

  Welcome back to AS3 101, the fifth edition! At this point, you should be comfortable with the concepts of variables, functions, conditionals (branching), and Arrays. Not only should you be comfortable with the concepts, but you should also be fluent in how ActionScript 3 implements these concepts.

  For this fifth episode, we’ll be adding to that catalog of skills the various looping structures found in AS3. You’ll find some dependencies on the information learned in AS3 101 Part 4, on Arrays, so if you’ve skipped that one or need a refresher, please review that tutorial before continuing with this one.

  For our final project, we’ll combine loops and arrays, to make a simple shoot-em-up game.

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  Improve Your Memory With an Away3D Game

  In this tutorial we’ll build a 3D memory game. Along the way we’ll look at adding variables and mouseEvents to Away3D objects. Let’s get started..

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  Build a Photo Viewer Using Flex and the Flickr API

  In this tutorial you will learn how to use the as3flickrlib library to create a Flash Flickr photo viewer.

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Phototuts+ – Photography & Post-Processing Tutorials

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  Photography Kick-start Guide: Adjusting Your Camera’s Settings for the Photo You Want

  Cameras vary in terms of functions offered. There are differences from one brand to the next and even from one model to another of the same brand. By necessity, this tutorial will have to generalize but let’s try to de-mystify some of the more common settings found on cameras today, what they mean (to the camera) and how to use them.

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  Mastering the Art of Black and White Photography

  In the early days of photography, photographers had no choice but to shoot in black and white, as it was the only available medium. Then, in 1936, the invention of kodachrome gave colour photography to the world. But black and white photography didn’t die off, instead it flourished. Modern black and white photography at it’s best is art, and many photographers regard it as the purest form of photography.

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  Freezing Time: 80 Inspiring Examples of High Speed Photography

  In our last roundup, we covered a selection of amazing HDR images. This time we move onto something completly different, with stunning high speed photography. These images freeze time, and allow us to observe scenes that the naked eye would struggle to capture. It’s definitely worth a look for some great inspiration!

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  8 Tips for Taking Sports Photos Like a Pro

  Are you looking to shoot better sports photos, and make an impact? Sports photography presents you with many opportunities to capture dramatic and vivid imagery that will last a lifetime. No other medium presents you with heart-pounding action, vivid color patterns and unique shooting opportunities.
  The steps and guidance featured in this tutorial cover a broad range of areas – from perfecting shutter speed, to making sure you don’t miss the action.

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  How to Photograph Waterfalls

  Waterfalls are some of the most beautiful natural features you will ever get the opportunity to photograph. But though they can look simply stunning, photographing waterfalls is not easy to do well. How do you avoid your photos being too dark? How do you deal with clipping in the water? How do you compose your photos to capture the authentic beauty of the scene?
  In this tutorial, nature photography expert Steve Berardi shares his best tips for photographing waterfalls.

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Cgtuts+ – CG Tutorials

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  Model and Texture a Posh Living Room Scene in Maya

  In this tutorial you will go through the process of modeling and rendering a Living Room in Autodesk Maya. You will also learn to use Mental Ray (along with the new architectural materials), create realistic fur, and implement studio lighting to create nice and soft shadows and highlights.

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  Using Splines to Add Detail to Your High-Poly Model in 3ds Max

  Splines are an often-overlooked aspect of 3ds max when it comes to game art. Most people know that you can use a spline for a wire – but you can also use it for things like grooves, whole objects like handles, and even text! In this tutorial, we’ll take a look at some of these advanced ways that splines can be used to save a lot of time on tasks that would otherwise have to be done by hand.

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  Create a Rocky Video Game Terrain in Blender

  In this series of tutorials you will learn how to create a finished environment for Blender’s Game Engine. The main focus of the series will be texturing and lighting, with the use of some custom 2d filters to enhance the result.

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  Model a Photorealistic Swiss Army Knife in Modo

  Subdivision modeling is an extremely powerful tool that can allow you to add high levels of detail to your models in a relatively short amount of time. In order to use it effectively, however, one must know when, and more importantly, when not to use it. In this three part, beginner to intermediate tutorial series, professional Modo artist, Matt Braeley, will demonstrate how to model a photorealistic Swiss Army knife, using polygonal and subdivision modeling in Luxology’s Modo 302.

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  Build an Advanced Drifting Car Rig in 3ds Max

  In this advanced level tutorial, you will learn all of the steps necessary to build a fully functioning car rig in 3D Studio Max. This rig features working suspension, steering and body roll, as well as some functionality for drifting and powerslides. You will learn how to set up internal functionality through links, constraints, expressions, and parameter wiring. The final result will be a robust rig with easy, and accessible controls.

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Audiotuts+ – Audio and Music

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  Introduction to Polyrhythms

  The usage of simple, common time (4/4 time signature, where there are four beats to a measure, and each quarter note gets one beat) is pervasive in Western popular music, including rock, blues, country, folk, pop, and various forms of electronic music including many sub-genres of house and trance music. The four-on-the-floor mindset can be difficult to escape, but every musician and composer can benefit from a study of rhythm that includes a wider variety of time signatures and rhythms.

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  How to Design Reeses and Hoovers

  Have you ever wondered how your favourite dance music producers create those amazing sounds that make you jump on the dance floor? Well, it usually takes a lot of experience and a huge amount of time spent on experimenting and processing sounds a ridiculously high number of times.

  But it’s quite hard to reach the stage of experimentation if you don’t even know the basics behind some kind of sounds often heard in dance tracks. This tutorial will teach you how to design from scratch a DnB trademark, the reese bass, and how to reproduce the infamous hoover sound, introducing you to the technique of resampling.

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  A Beginner’s Introduction to Home Recording

  Home recording technology seems to get better and cost less every year. It puts power in the hands of ordinary people. You’ve probably found this article because you want to get into home recording.

  Most of our tutorials here at Audiotuts are at the intermediate or advanced level. And that’s OK, because you won’t be a beginner forever. But we do have some more basic tutorials and articles aimed at the beginner. This article will refer to many of them, and hopefully give you an overview of what’s involved in getting into home recording.

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  A Basic Guide to Subtractive Synthesis (Part 1)

  This screencast is the first tutorial in a series on synthesis. This first installment shows a basic guided tour of Subtractor in Reason and covers oscillators, filters and envelopes.

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  Is the Public Capable of Recognizing Quality Music?

  Can the average music listener recognize quality? Can they distinguish a virtuoso from a mediocre musician? Can they recognize a “hit” that will still be esteemed a masterpiece in a hundred years? Does “popular” mean the same as “quality”?

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  Conscious

  This nice piece is a little rough with the keying and keyframes, but using a “raining letters” type of effect, it produces a very cool looking surreal video.

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  Hey Ya

  Okay, you are gonna watch that and be all “hey that was made in Flash!” Yeah, well typography is typography, and this piece by Brian Shaler with Obadiah Parker’s cover of Outkast’s “Hey Ya” is absolutely one of my favorite kinetic pieces.

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  Look What You’ve Done

  This video is all over the place and uses some really nice camera movement and text orientation to display the lyrics for the song.

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  Blink 182 – “Online Songs”

  Who doesn’t love some Blink 182? Even though the the roto on this is a little rough… its still one of the fastest kinetic pieces I have found on the net.

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  A Lesson On Typography

  Ahh, education… The Vancouver Film School has this very informative video on what makes up typography, and how it is used.

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  Justice – “DVNO”

  This is an absoultely stunning retro-esque music video from Justice, using some amazing text reveals and clever animation techniques.

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  Justice – “D.A.N.C.E”

  These guys have some awesome videos… here’s another one from Justice with some cool animations on the character’s shirts as well as some interesting type spelling out the lyrics.

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  Typophile Film Festival 5 Opening Titles

  Instead of creating all of this in AE, or some 3D program, the artists and photographers used CG as well a RED One, Canon 5D MKII, 40D, and Nikon D80 to get some amazing stop motion going on.

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  F is for Fail

  Interesting video showing what each letter can stand for in the creative process. I find it hard to believe, but no AE filters or effects are used to make this spectacular piece… now try to figure that out? No Particular? That’s preposterous!

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  Manu Chao – Bongo Bong Typography

  I think this video caught my eye, not because its yet ANOTHER kinetic typography piece, but because it uses a bunch of differnt elements and effects to go with the nouns and verbs in the lyrics.

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  STOPandTHINK – Talking Head

  This is a nice piece integrating type as well as actual footage. The silhouettes, lighting, and type really work well together, and all was created in just two days!

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  Rockwell

  Some people just love their favorite fonts… here is a nice little animation showing the love for the typeface Rockwell.

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  Typography on my Mind

  This maybe only a 15 second animation render, but the technique at the end is something that looks fantastic. Just watch it and you will see what I mean.

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  Habitat For Humanity

  Another video that doesn’t use animation techniques to convey the typography aspect, but actual camera work to produce a very cool commercial.

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  Typographie

  Some more stop motion with real life elements rather than CG, these always deserve recognition for the pure imagination that is put into them, as well as how long they must take to produce.

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  The Hush Sound — Lions Roar

  This is another very professional, smooth kinetic typography peice that really flows with the drawls of the singer… it also has some hidden messages in the text if you can find them.

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  Death Cab For Cutie – Little Bribes

  Being a Washingtonian at heart, I love the band Death Cab For Cutie… and this music video by Ross Ching really is phenomonal when it comes to this style of music videos.

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  Obama 08′ Vote For Hope

  This is a killer vector art/typography video using some impressive techniques to go along with this hip hop video promoting Barack Obama in the 2008 election.

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  Nascar Spots by Superfad

  Stepping outside of kinetic typography, this series of spots by Superfad, uses blackboard type graphics along with CG graphics to create a chalkboard draw-on type animation.

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  California Lottery Spots By Superfad

  Another series from Superfad, they use some very simple typography to morph into differnt things you could possibly buy if you won a million bucks from the lottery.

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  VMA 2009 Titles

  Prologue created an amazing set of title screens for the 2009 Video Music Awards on MTV, here is the compilation of all of them for your viewing pleasure.

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  The Raven

  An illustrated version of Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Raven” by Michael Dibblee, doesn’t have tons of type reveals or coolness to it, but I do admire the drawn look to the text as well as the images that accompany them.

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  TEDxEdges Opening Titles

  This is an amazing use of full 3D renders to create a coming together look of the TEDxEdges logo, as if it were on huge peice of glass that was broken into a thousand pieces.

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  Karoshi

  In this experimental video, the artist tries to create an interesting 3D extrusion effect, using what seems to be mulitple layers, lots of lights and different colors, cool, but kind of a mindtrip.

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  We believe / Neue Digitale

  This piece mixes very simple type with some insanely complex 3D renders like hair and fur, or particle type effects like Form effects and interesting lighting on them.

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  AICP Minnesota Show Reception Sponsor Reel

  An absolutely breathtaking sci-fi steampunk type of visual effects peice, this heavily relies on strong integration of 3D renders and live action to make an awesome looking final piece.

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  Hershey’s – ‘Happiness Is…’

  Definitely using the old school animation style (where it looks like frame by frame) they use drawn-looking typefaces as well as animations on the character’s shirt to create an interaction between the animation and the live action.

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  Lift Typography Reel 2009

  Sometimes you just need an overload of inspiration, and watching a reel like Lift’s is just what you need. Check out the various spots that they have worked on just to get some ideas of how they use typography on everyday jobs.

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  MTV BLOOM

  You don’t see what this spot is saying right away, but if you pay attention, you start to get the idea. This is a great demonstration of using growing elements to display words and phrases as well as making it look rad. Hypercolors FTW!

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  LOVE/HATE/EVIL

  This isn’t really a typhographical piece but more of a concept of creating an object that shows multiple different views. Hard to explain, but easy to understand… just watch and be amazed.

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  The Rumble in the Jungle

  A speech taken from the famous George Foreman vs. Muhammad Ali fight, this kinetic piece uses some awesome elements and motion to really give some oomph to what the speaker is saying.

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  Alcon Animation

  A PSA moving at a nice pace is a nice change every once in a while… not everything has to be hard hitting in your face to get the message across.

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  NEUFORMA FONT #HFT002 IDENT

  A nice promotional video for a typeface called Neuforma. The beginning looks a little similar to Mattias Peresini’s tutorial a few months back.

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  Ermes – Video Contest

  If I can’t read what this says, and I can make it through the entire video just because of how good this kinetic typography looks… that’s got to say something.

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  MasterCard PayPass

  I love how the text just kind of pops up like a flow chart on this, how the CG elements look so real, and just how everything overall just looks absolutely polished… and again… didn’t understand a word

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  iQ Font – When Driving Becomes Writing / Full Making Of

  A more unconventional typography video, this shows you how Toyota’s iQ font was made using a tracking system attached to a car and a professional driver writing by driving and drifting the car certain ways.

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  The New York Times

  With the whole of New York Textured in words, phrases, languages and whatever else… this is an interesting look created by Imago for the New York Times newspaper.

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  Typography Landscape

  This is an absolutley stunning creation of thousands of extruded 3D words that make up a world in which the camera flies though, and cars drive on.

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  Crazy Enough Title Sequence

  This is a title sequence from a movie that has yet to be made, but thousands of keyframes and a ton of shapes later, this little beauty was created.

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  Interesting timeline take on kinetic typography and elements by making the text and everything seem like it is from the pages of a book.

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If you enjoyed this post, please give it a vote on Digg or a stumble to say thanks!

The Interview:

First of all, Thank you very much for doing this & Can you briefly tell us how did you get into the industry?

It was a very gradual process. I had a college major in Audio production and at that time, I was an audio engineer at a studio. It’s like in the mid-90’s where we had an All-in-one ‘Media 100′ production facility if any remembers what it is. So, I got into doing both Audio and Video production there and since my background is more technical, I gradually moved from doing Audio into Video Mastering and then into Video Editing and finally started using After Effects. It was version 3.1 and I don’t even think the term ‘Motion Graphics‘ was coined yet.

What did you think has changed from the mid-90’s to the current day in terms of the industry?

It’s pretty much the same thing, there are same design principles people always implement and we are still complaining about the render times. The video resolutions increased on par with the computer speeds (From 640×480 to today’s HD) and the designs got more complex. Other than that, I don’t see a major shift in the industry.

Being an experienced freelancer, Can you tell us how did you deal issues with your clients?

You just have to show them various solutions and explain your idea behind it. More accurately, it depends on your role in the project. If you are an animator, the real challenge is to take the design and make it look good and animate it 30frames per second, which is where many people run into problems. Being an Art Director, it is hard to come up with ideas, but it is easy to make changes later on. For the animator, it is very difficult to bring those changes into life. So I guess, you have to deal with the situation depending on your role in the project.

Freelancing or Working for a studio? What do you like doing more?

(Laughs) The grass is always greener. Sometimes, it feels good to freelance & work all the time with higher pay and some other times, I just feel like punching the clock and enjoy the stability. You just have to appreciate the good things you have and stick to the decisions you make. I decided to go freelance long time ago and it has been good so far. But I am no longer young and keeping my health in mind its very hard to keep on doing it.

Did you ever try to use a different program other than After Effects?

I remember when Apple Motion was announced, I thought it will considerably change the industry, especially after seeing how Final Cut Pro took a huge chunk of market share from Avid and Premiere to become the de-facto editing standard. So I tried using Motion for a while, but it lacked many features back then. Even today, it lacks many features compared to AE. There are a dozen compositing applications out there,but AE has a strong hold on the Motion Design industry. On the bottom line, AE has the complete toolset for a freelancer as a hybrid Compositing/ Motion Graphics application.

How did you come up with an idea to do Video Training on AE Expressions?  Do you have any prior programming/scripting background?

Interviewer’s note: for readers who don’t know about it, check that out. It is the training series that started everything for me.

I had experience in every defunct programming language out there and back in the early Commodore days, you really have to program something to use computers as they aren’t that complex and functional. I guess that indirectly helps, but other than that I don’t have any prior programming or more accurately javascript experience. When Adobe introduced expressions for AE, I started playing with and spent most of my time researching it.

Yeah, I reference it even today, you really explained everything in a great detail!

I tried to look at it as somebody who doesn’t have any experience in scripting and come from a complete design background. I really spent a whole year doing the training, explaining everything in detail so that anyone can understand the purpose of expressions and how they can become an invaluable set of tools for the daily work. Lot of people aren’t interested or scared to use them. So my goal was to make them more accessible to the community and every designer out there. I also priced it very low in order to make it affordable to everyone. Mark Coleran once told me that I under-priced the product, but I wasn’t that upset since I was trying to help the community.

Graymachine was one of the first few sites that had AE training. But today, there are numerous websites offering all kinds of tutorials, which many of them are free. So what do you think of this phenomenon ?  Do you think it is helping the community or deluding the spirit of it?

Brian Maffit was interviewed by John Dickinson on Motionworks, and he was asked a similar question i.e., there is so much free content out there on the internet and how do people who make a living on training survive? I guess I fall in the same category too. Free tutorials are usually more specific, whereas training series are usually comprehensive covering many concepts. For example, my training series on expressions, it covers almost every expression available in AE at that time, along with comprehensive introduction to scripting in design. But these days, I see overlapping of various concepts and ideas between tutorials, but I guess it benefits the community in a way since it introduces many new users and creates new markets.

What suggestions do you give to people who are about to come to the industry?

If you are talking about Motion Graphics, you really have to focus on the design aspect..well more like explore as much design as possible irrespective of the medium. Be it print, web, paintings, TV spots whatever new comers should really observe the composition, design, color, timing etc., of various artworks. When you start observing them, your whole perspective on design changes in a gradual process. It’s more like how you interpret things and what makes something look good. There are many subtle things that actually make difference like a little Depth of Field, slight color changes, etc., At the same time, knowing the right tools is also important.

Another important thing related to the tutorial community is, people just get caught up in the whole end product and often forget the purpose of the tutorial. I usually get comments like ‘the end product doesn’t look that finished’ etc., I tell them that the whole point of the tutorial is to teach you something that might be useful for you to make such finished products.

With various programs getting more & more complex everyday, How do you see the future of Motion Design?

That is a very tough question. It’s hard to predict something in this era. Like, when Flash came out, it literally changed everything on the web. All of a sudden everything started looking vector and clean. Technology always has a huge impact on design in general. It’s kinda like the Youtube phenomenon, you never know until something new pops up and everything changes. But, I can say that we have a better understanding motion design now than a few years ago. Similarly, the design gets more complex with a better understanding and better use of technology in the future. It only sets the bar higher and higher.

What do you say about Trapcode plugins? I find it very hard to believe that all of them were coded by one person! Do you think they have become a vital necessity?

If you are talking about Trapcode Particular, Yes. I think Particular is almost like it’s own program except that everything happens through a single layer. I released a training series long time ago and whenever I meet Mr. Peder Norrby he thanks me for the series and I thank him for the plugins. Everyday I discover something new in Particular. Coming to Trapcode Form, it is still in it’s 1.0 release and I can’t wait to see all the amazing things that are about to come in the future. I hope we continue to see some great things from Mr. Norrby.

Can you tell us about the future of Graymachine?

I have some project only training stuff and other project files right now, but I am working on a library of Motion Design elements which will be a great addition for Motion Designers and Video Editors. It should be coming out in October. I also have some training ideas, especially integrating Cinema 4D in the workflow etc., There are many tutorials on Cinema 4D, but they are highly specific which makes it really hard for somebody on a deadline to learn the program. I am still working on it right now and I will release the details later on.

If you come out with the training, I will be the first customer since I think you are a great teacher and I learned a lot from your expressions training series. Thank you very much for your tips and sharing your ideas and I hope to see you again!

No Problem, you are always welcome.

Congrats to Alexander Tregaskis of Connecticut for being the winner of our AE Icon Pillow Giveaway!

***Editor’s Note***

Though the winner was picked at random, I did want to shine some light on another comment that would have won a creativity prize if we had one. I think you should have had some “o’s” in between some of those “x’s”

OH my word. I want a pillow so bad I can taste the soft comfy ADJUSTMENT LAYERS.
Nothing would be better after doing a hard days COMPOSITING when I feel SHATTERED. I would be able to ADJUST and LAYER to get comfortable. Then try to count randomly generated PARTICLE WORLD sheep to drift off to sleep. A pillow like that would RENDER me a good rest and give me a nice GLOW and help me from feeling blue by COLOUR CORRECTING me to a happy pink. It would fit my CURVES and I never try to DUPLICATE or DELETE it.

xxx

MySuiteStuff

For the chance to win the Ae Icon pillow pictured above all you need to do is comment. Make sure to include your correct email address with your comment so that we can contact you. This giveaway is open worldwide, but make sure to get your comment in before midnight this Friday, Pacific Eastern Standard Time.

To increase your chances of winning, make sure to enter again once on each Tuts+ site. There are a total of 8 pillows to be won!

If one pillow isn’t enough, you can order the whole set from MySuiteStuff.

Please note: Envato staff and people who have written more than two tutorials/articles for a Tuts+ site are not eligible to enter.

AE Vernacular That Often Gets Mixed Up:

• Scripts.
• Expressions.
• Plug-ins.
• Effects.
• Filters.
• Presets.
• Custom Effects.

Some of you may look at this list and say, “Who could confuse a Plug-in with an Expression?” Valid question, but don’t be a jerk… at one point you didn’t know either. Go read something else.

Scripts:

From Adobe:

A Script is a series of commands that tells an application to perform a series of operations. To run a script that has not been loaded, choose File > Scripts > Run Script File, locate and select a script, and click Open. Run the sample script “Demo Palette.jsx” to get an idea of what sorts of things you can do with scripts.

We have a round of Scripts
here. These are some of the best from AE Scripts.

One key thing to remember is that a script is almost like it’s own little executable program within the program. It only affects what you’re working on when you run it through it’s commands and then it is done until you run it again.

If you’re interested in writing your own scripts, Dan Ebberts has a site that will walk you through the basics here.

Expressions:

From Adobe:

An Expression is a little piece of software—much like a script—that evaluates to a single value for a single layer property at a specific point in time. Whereas scripts tell an application to do something, an expression says that a property is something. After you add an expression to a property, you can continue to add or edit keyframes for the property. An expression can take the value of a property as determined by its keyframes and use that as input to generate new, modified values.

Other then mask parameters, any parameter that has a stopwatch next to it can be assigned expressions.

There is a lot training on expressions out there, but Harry Frank created a simple blogger site that very clearly explains the basics and it’s been the most easy to follow, free walk through that I’ve come across. Check it out.

Plug-ins:

From Adobe:

Plug-ins are small software modules—with filename extensions such as .aex, .pbk, .pbg, and .8bi—that add functionality to an application. After Effects “effects” are implemented as plug-ins. Not all plug-ins are effect plug-ins; for example, some plug-ins provide features for importing and working with certain file formats.

So when we apply something as simple as a Gaussian Blur, we are actually applying the Gaussian Blur Plug-in.

For a list of practically every plug-in on the market today you can check out the Toolfarm’s list here.

The term: “Third-Party Plug-in” typically is just referring to any plug-in that didn’t come packaged with After Effects, although even some plug-ins that come free with After Effects such as Foundry Keylight or Cycore FX are technically still considered “Third-Party”.

Effects:

This is one that can get confusing because we use this same word for lots of different things. We talk about the “Matrix Bullet Time” Effect, a “Day for Night” Effect, a “Slow Motion” Effect…. Generally speaking it is used to describe a generated result. But what is the true meaning of the term in relationship to AE?

From Adobe:

After Effects includes a variety of Effects, which you apply to layers to add or modify characteristics of still images, video, and audio. For example, an effect can alter the exposure or color of an image, add new visual elements, manipulate sound, distort images, remove grain, enhance lighting, or create a transition. You can apply multiple instances of the same effect to a layer, rename each instance, and set the properties for each instance separately.

So from what we read earlier, all effects are plug-ins, specifically “effect plug-ins”.

Filters:

From Adobe:

Effects are sometimes mistakenly referred to as Filters. The primary difference between a filter and an effect is that a filter permanently modifies an image or other characteristic of a layer, whereas an effect and its properties can be changed or removed at any time. In other words, filters operate destructively, and effects operate non-destructively. After Effects uses effects exclusively, so changes are non-destructive. A direct result of the ability to change the properties of effects is that the properties can be changed over time, or animated.

I feel the reason we would make this mistake is because most of us working in AE are also familiar with Photoshop where we apply “Filters”.

Presets:

From Adobe:

With Animation Presets, you can save and reuse specific configurations of layer properties and animations, including keyframes, effects, and expressions. For example, if you created an explosion using several effects with complex property settings, keyframes, and expressions, you can save all of those settings as a single animation preset. You can then apply that animation preset to any other layer. Many animation presets don’t contain animation; rather, they contain combinations of effects, transform properties, and so on. Animation presets can consist entirely of an expression. A “behavior animation” preset uses expressions instead of keyframes to animate layer properties. Animation presets can be saved and transferred from one computer to another with the filename extension .ffx.

Most plug-ins will come with a number of their own presets. Additionally, there are many places online to find user-created presets for the plug-ins already included with After Effects. Andrew Kramer has a number of presets that you can download for free here.

Custom Effects:

A CustomEffect is a special kind of preset that looks and behaves like a plug-in. It allows you to save a special collection of multiple plug-ins and key frames into one package that you can reuse without having the clutter of seeing each plug-in individually.

Maltaannon is the big name when it comes to CustomEffects. He has a number of them that you can download from his site along with a video explaining them in his own words.

Another place to to find some CustomEffects is over at Alex Czetwertynski’s site AEnhancers.com where Jorrit Schulte has provided some available for free.

What About You?

I’m just curious how often you guys use these aids (specifically expressions, scripts, presets, and CE’s)? I talk to a lot of people who know stuff exists to help them, but never end up getting around to using it. Let us know what’s been helpful for you.

Last week Adobe asked us to change our name and URL so that it would no longer contain the term ‘Flash’, which is a registered trademark of Adobe. We know that the success of our sites is about the community and content, not the names. So here at Envato HQ we’ve been busy thinking up new names and we think we’ve found a great new home for both our marketplace and our Tuts+ blog on Flash.

As of today the two sites now live at ActiveDen and Activetuts+.

The new names amend the use of the word Flash, open us up for adding other technologies and are short and memorable! To kick off the new names I thought I’d round up a few of the best tutorials and items on the sites:

Kick Ass Flash Files – ActiveDen

Without a doubt the leading marketplace for Flash files, ActiveDen has some really popular files. Here are a few of the latest:

More Popular Items on ActiveDen

Killer Flash Tutorials – Activetuts+

Though it’s one of our newer Tuts+ sites, Activetuts+ is already brim full of quality Adobe Flash, ActionScript, Air and Flex tutorials and gaining momentum with every passing week. Here’s a few of the standout tutorials:

1. Build a Fluid Website Layout
   A fluid web layout uses 100% width (and height) of the browser, floating all the contained elements into certain positions. This is opposed to fix-width layout where contents remain fixed no matter what the browser size is…

2. Create an Attractive Digital Clock in Flash
   ActionScript 3.0 is a very powerful language, capable of creating anything from simple and light utilities to full-featured desktop applications…

3. Build a Mini Golf Game with ActionScript 3.0
   In this tutorial I´ll show you how to create nice Mini Golf Game with ActionScript 3.0. We´ll work with Event Handlers, Functions and also the Timer Object which is a really cool feature in AS3…

4. Build a Dynamic Flash Gallery with Slider Control
   In this tutorial, we’ll create a gallery which displays all image files in a given directory. A slider is used to browse easily through the images…

5. Create a Shuffle Gallery in Flash Using XML and ActionScript 3.0
   In this tutorial I’ll explain how to access and use the Display List whilst creating an XML based image gallery with ActionScript 3.0 …

6. Create a Glowin Mouse Trailer in Flash
   Mouse Trailers are objects which follow the mouse cursor as you move it. In this tutorial, I’ll help you create a blue and shiny mouse trailer using ActionScript 3.0 …

More Flash Tutorials on Activetuts+

More About The Change

You can read more about the change on the ActiveDen Blog or on TechCrunch. There’s also a super long discussion thread on the ActiveDen Forums.

I’d also like to take a moment to say thanks to everyone for helping us with the transition and supporting FlashDen through three years of amazing growth and community, here’s to many more as ActiveDen!