Living in Toytown

Sep 30th in VFX by Richard Bird

Until recently this effect has been created in-camera using specialized lenses. In this tutorial, Richard Bird gives an overview of how the "Dollhouse Effect" can be quickly recreated in post-production without the use of 3rd party plug-ins by remapping the depth of field, use of simple colour correction and altering the frame rate.

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Author: Richard Bird

Richard Bird has been creating and supervising visual effects in film and television for over twenty years, both on the set and in post-production. His work has taken him everywhere from the Australian Outback to the North Pole. He currently lives and works in London, England.

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Tutorial

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User Comments

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  1. PG

    Alex September 30th

    Bello! …

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    IANH - BR September 30th

    Wow! Freaking awesome, so creative!
    congrats!

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    Aido September 30th

    i saw an ad like this the other day and i was shocked to find out it was lens that created this effect.
    Fantastic work!

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    Tilt September 30th

    http://www.vimeo.com/keithloutit

    The godfather of this effect.

    ( Reply )
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      Benjamin Reid October 1st

      Yes! I love their work. The Bathtub series is amazing. I really want to give this a go myself.

      ( Reply )
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    aalex September 30th

    isnt this just the tilt-shift effect that you get when you use the tilt-shift lense on your cam ?
    that shouldnt mean that you should use this lense, its very expensive ^^

    so long,
    nice effect nice tut :)

    ( Reply )
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    Attila September 30th

    Well, I would expect more from a visual effects pro…

    ( Reply )
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      John October 11th

      haha… well you know how plain and boring the British are….

      ( Reply )
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    Rafael Guerra September 30th

    hum…dont want to sound negative but I’m pretty sure we have had several tilt-shift tuts in Topher’s roundups, he even made one himself. But anyways, apart from that it is a good explanation of the effect.

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    Dragos September 30th

    looks great!

    ( Reply )
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    Amit September 30th

    Nice, good work.

    Thank You!

    ( Reply )
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    Rev65 September 30th

    Thanks, Richard! I appreciate the explanation of the overall workflow and the details regarding each effect and its use in creating this particular look. Blessings!

    ( Reply )
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    mohamed September 30th

    i loved this new idea,thanks richard,its very awsome ;)
    ………………rock on After effects

    ( Reply )
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    arlington cruz September 30th

    Hello Richard

    Your Pacing on the tutorial is Great and Clear. Thanks for sharing your knowledge with us.

    ( Reply )
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    Piper September 30th

    This has always been something of a great visual for an AE dummy like me, and I am really happy to know there are actually tutorials that can teach me how to make such stuff myself… thanks :)

    ( Reply )
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    Leo September 30th

    excellent tutorial… simple, short, and the result is simply awesome. Thank you, Richard!

    ( Reply )
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    jim hines September 30th

    A different method than I have seen demonstrated before. I will try it. Thanks!

    ( Reply )
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    Håvard Fandrem September 30th

    But, as almost everybody else, does you (tutorial-guy) forget to mask out certain objects.

    ( Reply )
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    Ghost Digital October 1st

    I think this process over complicates what is an extremely simple thing to do within after effects. Sure, some many want to take the long way around but there are much quicker ways to get to the exact same result.

    Personally, the brightness/contrast adjustment that you added (granted, it may have been the recording) just washed out your footage. From what you say though I believe this was your intent and I’m not sure why, as a ‘model’ would be very vibrant in colour and not washed out. Hence, I think, adding this adjustment actually took away from the result rather than enhancing it.

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  18. PG

    will October 1st

    Richard Bird

    did you watch panorama

    they had this effect

    i was thinking , this sould be on tuts thanks

    ( Reply )
  19. PG

    Web 2.0 October 1st

    Awesome, great work…

    ( Reply )
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    Chris Martin October 1st

    Nice look!

    ( Reply )
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    Nikolaus October 1st

    Yeah, the Telekom use this atm in a commecrial. Great effect. Thank you for this!

    ( Reply )
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      v Ralle v October 1st

      And I’m really happy to know how they did it =D Thanks for the great tut und the awesome explaination!

      ( Reply )
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    Christine Wilde October 1st

    That is awesome! I’ve always wondered how this effect was created! Thank you!

    ( Reply )
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    shespider October 1st

    Is there any way i can get the footage for this tutorial?

    ( Reply )
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    Osvaldo_Tampico October 1st

    Nice! But isn’t there a EXPRESION with wich someone could DELETE frames in between? for example, in HD there are 30fps maybe someone should write an expresions that DELETES frames every amount of frames, like if the expresion says “DELETE “n” QUANTITY OF FRAMES EVERY “n” AMOUNT OF FRAMES” With that we could fake STOP MOTION isn’t it right?

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      Ghost Digital October 3rd

      Or you could use the posterize time filter and do exactly the same thing essentially :D Why over complicate it?

      ( Reply )
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    Antwan October 2nd

    Check out Maltaannon’s tut on this! Its better!!!

    ( Reply )
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    markus October 2nd

    NOW THIS IS A TUTORIAL!

    This is wat AE tuts should always be about.

    ( Reply )
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    Frippe October 3rd

    Anyone got any good footage that I could use to try this effect?

    Not always easy to make this kind of footage as it is best if it is taken from an elevated position.

    Thanks in advance

    ( Reply )
  28. PG

    RichardB October 4th

    Hello Everyone

    Thank you for all the comments- it’s great to get feedback!

    The thing I enjoy about an effect like this is that it’s open to a lot of personal interpretation- if you give 10 people the same footage, you’ll get back 10 different results.

    If people are interested – or feeling shortchanged!- I’ll try to make a more in-depth sequel: the hardest thing for me in recording this was ‘what to leave out….’ : originally this tutorial was half an hour long and talked about codecs, and how to choose a picture, and manipulating the focal plain, etc etc, – so for those who want to get into that stuff, speak up and I’ll talk to Alex about it.

    Again, thank you all for taking the time to give feedback, I look forward to reading your comments.

    Cheers
    RB

    ( Reply )
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    lima October 5th

    But I saw similar tutorial on along ago (in march)
    http://www.digitalartsonline.co.uk/tutorials/index.cfm?featureid=1844

    AE TUTS Keep up with the quality

    ( Reply )
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    Watson October 6th

    The Dollhouse effect is something that is used a lot nowadays in stuff that is mostly outdoor. It is a great opportunity for novices to learn how to get this particular effect.

    ( Reply )
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