Quantum Realm Effect From Ant-Man Quantumania (After Effects Tutorial)

Ant-Man and the WASP quantumania is in theaters right now and as we do often we decided to recreate a shot from the trailer this one because it's awesome so we did again here's the original shot from the trailer and then our Recreation done using After Effects element 3D trap code mirror and stock elements so let's waste no time and Jump Right In First with filming our actor we shot Emily on the green screen with simple Silhouette Lighting and then moved on to After Effects inside of After Effects we'll create a new 4k comp and then a solid layer to apply element 3D which we'll use for the rocky landscape inside of element We'll add the main ground first by using the ground rock 5 model we got from turbosquid scale it up and really flatten it on the y-axis to get a smoother leveled ground for our character to stand on and to get closer to the look that we want we will change the material contrast brightness saturation and use the diffuse color to warm it up a bit for all the other rock formations we spent some time using a variety of models to Kit bash and build out the rest of our landscape changing position rotation and scale of duplicated models as well as including larger scaled up Assets in the far distance for depth all the models we use will be linked in the notes below as well so if you want them down there if you're using a number of different assets and are going for a uniformed look try to balance and match the colors closely and you can speed up this process by copy and pasting the color number value and going through the scene materials or you could take one rock material and apply it to everything in the scene but once our landscape is built we'll change the environment map to something darker and exit element now we'll create a camera and go for a wide lens to match the original shot we went with this 15 millimeter to really fit a lot in frame we'll change position and rotation of the camera and once we like the framing we'll create a null layer and make it 3D Now link the camera to the null which we can now use to animate the camera move we like the rotating camera in the original so we're going to set a keyframe for the nulls Y rotation then move to the end of the timeline and change the value to give us a constant rotation now with the shot framed up we're going to add these distant floating rocks so back inside of element we'll create a group 2 and again again add a bunch of the random Rock models that we have majority of them being the tall vertical ones we'll also add a few of these pre-fractured models and small rocks which come included with element and apply a rock material to each back in After Effects we're going to follow basically the same process as we did for the floating rocks in our Sandman Recreation by going into group 2 drop down particle replicator and set to 3D grid we'll change the position to push it into the distance and increase shape scale all of these steps are completely customizable and unique to your scene and the models that you use so we're just going through and changing random settings for scale and rotation before going into particle look and enabling multi-object we altered a bunch of these values to spread the individual elements and fill the sky and there was a lot of going back and forth and changing the random seed until we eventually got this in the original there's some vertical motion so we can keyframe the Y scatter multi-over time to shift elements up and down as well as wide displace to add some extra movement giving us this there's a couple of bigger floating Rock structures with the same slow destruction which we can kind of mimic by duplicating the element group 2 and switching to group 3 then going through the particle replicator again and spending a while to alter a bunch of settings in keyframe to create this fake reverse destruction style animation just changing a couple of settings can give you different looks so it's interesting to test out different things to add another one to the right we can copy the group utility and paste it in group 4 then inside element duplicate again changing to group 4 and this time we'll hide most of the models to alter the look now change the replicator position and once again going through the settings and set keyframes for some to add animation giving us this for the background we'll be combining free stock images from pixels and unsplash but before we do that let's thank today's partner and the source of all the music you've been hearing which is musicbed they have everything from Big heroic scores to the music that we're using in the background of of the tutorial and in fact there are two great playlists on their site filled with big Blockbuster style scores which you can find in the notes below but musicbed does have a lot of pretty much everything they're easily one of my favorite places to find music for projects because their quality is through the roof thanks to the amazingly talented and passionate artists that musicbed works with they also have over 40 000 songs and a curated roster of over 1 000 authentic and relevant artists like Ryan Talbert who you are listening to right now all available to license for any project and they make finding the right music super easy with their browse and search tools built with filmmakers and creatives in mind use anything from genre and mood to Advanced filters like BPM and key and if you still need help finding whatever you need their team can help with complimentary song searches and if you use the code film riot at checkout you'll receive one month free when you purchase an annual subscription so check out the playlist below and take your projects and films to the next level with musicbed hello again we are using free stock images from pixels and unsplash for the background so we're going to create a new comp and make it wider to account for the camera move first we'll use one image as the main background and then build up with other stock using the pen tool to mask out sections that we like for this area around one of the portals we can use the mesh warp effect to distort it more spherically for better blending of other elements you can set them to screen and use curves to crush the Shadows we spent some time adding multiple elements masking and warping them to closely match the original and now we'll add an adjustment layer and use a tint effect to desaturate and curves to lower the brightness using a duplicate we'll mask the bottom area and lift the Shadows to create some distant Haze then using multiple other adjustment layers we'll mask to different areas and add High feather and use curves to tint them different colors the original shot has some of these warm energy fractals which we can get by masking sections of these ocean images setting to screen crushing the Shadows tinting and coloring a warm shade we also duplicated the haze layer making new feathered masks over the fractals and warming up the curves effect to add some subtle animation like the original will make a new adjustment layer and use the liquify effect on the last frame of the timeline just warping different areas then setting a keyframe for the percentage going back to frame one and turning the percentage down to zero we'll also use a displacement effect with zero vertical displacement but a bit of horizontal keyframe to change over time for some pinch and chromatic aberration we added red Giant's chromatic displacement with a low amount but back in the main comp we'll drop the background comp below everything make it a 3D layer and reposition it with it pushed far in the distance and scaled up large enough to fill the background for the full camera animation we also want some fog for depth in the landscape but using the built-in element fog effect doesn't work in this instance because of the various colors and contrast in our background for example if we sample a color here the fog works well well but not up here unless we sample again and so on so what we can do instead is duplicate both the background and element and move above on the new element layer under output select World position and change these settings to get a distance and feather suitable for the fog in your scene invert the mat and set the background layer below to Luma matte making it visible in the brightest areas of our element scene now if we use a fast box blur on the background and use a curves to add contrast we can get a hazy fog look you can also use another curves before the blur 2 and lower layer opacity if we darken the main element layer you can more easily see the effect this fog has next for the lighting the original terrain looks like it is mainly lit by the warm reactive light from the Strand so we'll create a new light and make it a warm color because our background is a 3D layer we need to switch except lights and shadows to off on both this and our fog background layer and we'll move the light over to one of the Strand positions if you want to direct it in a specific area you can change it to a spotlight and use rotation as well as the cone angle and feather to focus it spotlights can also make shadows just enable them inside of the element render settings too now we'll duplicate the light and move it over to where the other strand will be and did this several more times to like different areas of our scene closely following the original including these purple highlights angled at the floating Rock destruction areas then using a curves effect on the element layer will add some contrast and boost the red slightly again for our character we shot Emily on a green screen with the camera locked off at a low height close to the ground to match and we used warm color balanced lights on either side of her to act as light reaction from the strands so we'll drop her into the comp mask around her and feather slightly and while shooting we asked her to keep her feet locked meaning we don't have to keyframe the mask we'll use key light to key it move the Anchor Point to her feet and make her a 3D layer setting the accept lights and shadows to off again and change position rotation and scale lining her up in the frame until it looks like she's standing on the CG ground then using curves we adjust contrast and color to match our scene with a new adjustment layer above we'll use red Giant's Optical glow and alter the settings to give a soft glow to the full frame for the sky portal we'll use a duplicate and change settings again to focus on the portals specifically as well as using a color tint then using another copy of the glow with the new settings including radiate to add some subtle volumetric style beams for the energy strands we'll create a new comp this time making it shorter then create a new solid and apply mirror which is part of red Giant's trap coat Suite mirror uses 3D fractal geometry which we can use to get a similar look to the original by increasing the size X lowering size y pushing away in d space increasing vertices and bending the x-axis in the fractal settings we'll change the multi lower amplitude and frequency increase complex and smooth normals then set a keyframe for the evolution and scroll X now move to the end of the timeline and increase both values for some smooth animation and in the Shader drop down we'll change these two settings next use a turbulent displacement to add some more shape changing complexity amount and size then keyframing offset and evolution to animate throughout the shot we'll also use a liquify effect to add some bloated and shrunken areas with that done we made a few variations altering multiple settings to differentiate them as well as make some thinner for the most distant strands we'll render these out and can drop them into the main comp setting to screen and making them 3D layers again switching off except lights and shadows after finding the placement for each one we want to move most beneath the element layer but when we do this the glow adjustment layers affect the strands which we don't want so instead what we can do is duplicate the camera and null move above the Strand layers and pre-compose with all the strands we want to be in the background to fill these gaps use a solid composite and set to Black next we'll use a set matte effect select the element layer choose effects and mask and invert Mac then set the blending mode to screen we'll also need to use a set mat for Emily but it doesn't work with 3D layers rather it uses the alpha for how she would be as a 2d layer so we need to pre-compose her with a duplicate camera and null 2 for it to work now we can add color and glow effects another benefit of doing it this way rather than actually placing the strands below is we get this glow spilling in front of the obscuring layers which we wouldn't get otherwise for this close strand we will again pre-comp with duplicate camera and null and copy paste the other strand effects onto it however we want the Strand in front of most of the element but to be obscured by these foreground rocks so we'll duplicate element and on this version go to the camera cutoff settings and change the far plane to bring it forward until we are left with just the area we want obscured now change the string and set matte effect to this new element layer and we get this we'll just use an extra glow since this one is closer and we are basically done although one thing we ended up not liking so much was the look of the fractal on some of the strands so we changed the fractal individual frequencies and also used a duplicate on top set to screen and altered some of the settings to get a slight variation giving the strands a bit more detail then re-rendered you can right click and reload to update if it doesn't automatically the last steps were adding a bit of Shadow for Emily using a dark curves on a mask adjustment layer adding some particles using the full frame Embers 3 and 4 from our Embers Pack set to screen some lens stock a chromatic aberration and ended with a grade and you can try out different element group settings or camera animation to change the look and get something more unique but that is it our breakdown done all in After Effects as always if you try it for yourself shoot it over to us on any of the social places links below and until next time don't forget to write shoot edit repeat [Music] [Music]

Channel: Film Riot

Views: 151,259

Keywords: adobe, ant man, ant-man, ant-man and the wasp quantumania, ants, big, blender vfx, effect, element 3d, film riot, film school, filmmaking, how to, kang, landscape, marvel, quantum realm, ryan connolly, small, triune films, tut, tutorial, vfx

Id: 23egbhh-VQY

Length: 13min 36sec (816 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 17 2023