Shang-Chi 10 Rings Effect (After Effects Tutorial)

[Music] [Music] [Music] hey coming out last week we had to take a crack at this shot right here because obviously [Music] we shot this one on green screen since we wanted to get as close to the actual vibe of the shot as we could and for the wide shots we shot both josh and justin as individual plates so that we could place them far enough apart in post as well as giving us an easier way to have reactive light on both of them which wouldn't have been possible if they were both in the same shot together so in each shot the other actor that wasn't on camera would be controlling a light to give some movement in the color of their power and we also just didn't have the space to do both of them so this was the only way that we could do it as usual we're jumping into adobe after effects and we'll drop one of our shots into a new comp we have multiple episodes on keying so we're gonna skip that process here just check the notes for links to some of those episodes for the glow on the toy prop rings which the toy prop rings were these things from target which are very cheap looking very plastic looking and originally not at all what they ended up being we just hacksawed them apart to give them something that they could be holding on to and in the end it actually actually worked okay but for adding a glow to those rings we 2d tracked position and rotation using a null layer for each one we created a solid layer and linked to one of the tracks with motion blur enabled we're going to mask a shape within the ring area keyframe the mask if needed and we're gonna apply a fractal noise effect changing the contrast and brightness a bit decrease the scale and animate evolution throughout the length of the shot to give this effect add a solid composite with the color set to black then use a glow effect we use red giant's optical glow from their vfx suite finally we use an effect to change the color to match what the character's power effect will be and set the layer to screen once you're happy with the look select the ring and null layer right click and pre-compose then set the layer back to screen and link it to your actor layer repeat the whole process again with the shot of your other actor this time changing the ring color to match their power effect now scale and reposition both actors to have them facing each other at a decent distance for the standoff for the environment we did originally think about using stock photos but we decided to use this 3d model of a cave within element 3d so that we had control over camera placement as well as adding interactive lighting to match and it was a really cheap model to get we've also made an episode before on using element 3d for cg environments so we're going to skip that process too link for that in the notes below as well to add some faint shadows we're going to be using red giant's shadow plugin changing the position and angle right now it's clipping since the dimensions of our layer end here but unchecking clip to bounding box expands it beyond the border we'll lower the opacity and soften to give us this then copy and paste to josh changing the position and angle in the original xiang chi shot when both characters pull apart we see multiple floating rings in a row since it's a wide shot they are pretty undefined so we can quickly make these by copying one of the glowing ring layers and pasting them in the main comp delete any masks and reset the rotation then use an ellipse mask for the outside of the ring then another for the inside setting it to subtract it's best to rename this layer since we will have multiple copies move this into position then duplicate and move closer to the center in the fractal noise effect you can change the evolution random seed to vary the pattern in each copy duplicate and move closer changing the evolution seed again now duplicate and move renaming and changing the color for the other character and you can copy and paste the color effect that we used last time do this two more times until we have a row of rings they look like they remain pretty still throughout most of the original shot but we do see at the beginning they all start closer to the center so move to that frame where your actors have completed their sudden move and keyframe the position of each ring move to the first frame and change the position to have them all jumbled in the center select the last keyframe and press f9 to easy ease them to make the ease more gradual you can select these keyframes and go into the graph editor stretching this bar to make the animation very fast in the beginning then gradually come to a stop for the main part of the super power cord effects we're going to be using our assets from our beams pack anyone who has our extinction pack are gonna have these assets too if you don't have them link for that in the notes as well for the main body of the gold side though we're going to be using the nebula asset drop it into the comp and set to screen move it in the timeline so that instead of the beam appearing we have it constantly visible now we're going to change the time to slow it down we also chose to reverse this and we made it over five times slower and of course enabled frame blending move the anchor points to the starting area then change position rotation and scale to have it fit within the floating rings we can mask just this section to stay visible and feather it to change the look we're going to add a tint making it black and white then copy and paste the same glow and color effects that we used on the rings changing the settings a bit to give us this link it to the gold ring in the center and enable motion blur to have it stretch when the rings first spread out we can just keyframe and scale them then use the graph editor again and make the transition slow down gradually to add some line details we're going to duplicate this and then replace it with the phoenix main asset by holding the alt key while dragging and dropping the file over the duplicate to replace it then we're going to link this layer to the nebula layer below and delete the scale keyframes from before if you use the anchor point tool and shift click and drag you can move the asset within its mass to find a different pattern or placement and because the phoenix asset already has warm colors we're gonna lower the tint effect slightly to bring some of those redder tones back through for the two chords going to his hands duplicate both of these layers changing their place in the timeline to not look like a copy and reposition this time we're going to rotate in the opposite way to have this area be over the hand ring and change the scale and rotation to connect the other end to the floating ring adjust the mask on both assets if needed depending on how big or small you want this cord and delete any scale keyframes we lowered the gamma and brightness of both assets slightly and used a bulge effect to make this area a little wider to match the asset to the left duplicate both again moving in the timeline to look different and changing the position rotation and scale to connect to the other hand there's more work to do here but before we do let's pause so we can thank our sponsor creative live creative live is one of the reasons film schools really aren't needed anymore and you can find out exactly what i mean and check out my class at creativelive.com forward slash film riot and use the coupon code filmright10 at checkout to save 10 off of a creative live subscription plus you can watch several of my lessons for free but back when we even started film riot the only real option to learn filmmaking was by going to film school getting in a ton of debt and hoping that was worth it but now you have great resources like this online they have over 700 instructors over 2000 classes and over 60 000 different lessons 60 000 and these classes are taught by incredibly talented people like will and brooke blair teaching film composing 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subscription and watch those classes of mine for free they're only free for all of you for the next seven days so jump over to do that now links below [Music] but jumping right back into it right now these are all static but what we can do is unlink the two top nebula assets from the golden ring layer and pre-compose these top four assets together in their comp add a new black solid to the background to remove any alpha areas back in the main comp set the blending mode to screen copy and place the two hand-tracked nulls from the rings comp that we made earlier unfortunately if you remember we since scaled and repositioned the josh ring comp layers meaning these nulls no longer sync up correctly in retrospect when we first pre-comp them we could have duplicated them and linked these to the josh layer when we altered the scale end position but there's an easy enough fix to get these nulls lined up in the hands again create a new null and change the anchor point values because this is a 4k comp we need to change our values to 1920 by 1080 then link the other two nulls to this new null copy the anchor position and scale from the actor footage and paste to the new null which will align the hand tracks correctly you can then delete this null to link the chords to each hand use the puppet pin tool and add a point for each hand as well as where they connect to the floating ring pressing the u key will display these puppet pins select the nulls and press the p key to show position then use the pick whip next to each puppet pin to link to the corresponding null positions do the same for the third puppet pin with the position of the floating ring layer enable motion blur and now our chords stretch and track with all three points for justin we also have electric beam assets that we can use we liked glass main with these floating shapes so we'll trim it to start at this frame because of justin's hand positions we don't need to split his beam into two separate chords so we can just use one version for the whole thing set to screen and again change anchor point position scale and rotation to match your shot we added a tint and a bunch of curved variations changing brightness and contrast then copy pasted the color effect from the blue rings lowering the brightness and gamma and making the blue a bit more of an electric aqua we found some areas distracting so drew a couple of masks set to subtract with some feathering lastly we're going to add turbulent displays and we'll go with a low amount and keyframe the evolution to give us a little jiggle a little wiggle in our jiggle you know oh yeah this section of the asset doesn't last long so we'll duplicate it and then slide it over in time keyframing the color vibrance brightness and gamma to fade in we duplicated again and again moving them in time to fill the length of the shot to add some variety we selected every other duplicate and flipped them vertically next we used the ribbon beam asset to add some more electric details we flipped it horizontally to change the direction of the electricity and added a tint plus curves again for contrast and a blue color but with lower vibrance this time we do a mask to again subtract the core area then duplicate the layer on this one masking out the main body just keeping the end point with a high feather overall this asset feels too smooth and consistent for the shengqi look which is more steppy so on the bottom copy we made it three times slower but with no frame blending we used a fractal noise effect with high contrast and scaled up set to multiply keyframing the evolution to change rapidly so that some sections are visible and others aren't it can feel a bit freeze framy so we can use another bit of turbulent displace with animated evolution and offset to give it more life you could try going through the different displacement options for instance horizontal displacement if you only want it going in certain directions if you want some more random details you can duplicate again and this time enable time remapping using a wiggle expression to have the asset jump to random points in time every few frames and lower the fractal noise brightness to minimize the visible areas duplicate this as many times as you like maybe changing the displacement or flipping the layer again to randomize them until finally altogether we have this then we went through the same process we did with the gold chords pre-composing all assets together and using a black background to remove any alpha copy and pasting the track nulls the anchor position and scale properties to a control null to make them line up and then use the puppet pin tool to draw points link them to the nulls and floating rings enable motion blur and ended adding a glow effect giving us this for some other elements we use this glass extra asset trimmed and reversed placed in the center as well as a few frames of this demon extra for a center flash we masked around this ultron asset to add some flickering elements and use the end of the demon main asset with the sparks changing the color like with the previous asset to match for some extra touches we used a few of our energy pack assets such as chaotic 1 and 2 colored blue and gold placed in the center mast energy throw assets on both sides for the initial chord stretch some added anamorphic energy around justin's hand and along the beam and a faint scale energy leak acting a bit like a smoke burst we pre-composed all of these together including the nulls and floating rings once again setting the blending modes back to screen and using the puppet pin tool to make points at each floating ring plus a couple closer to each actor we can use a wiggle expression on each of these floating ring points to add some jiggle like we see in chongqi the reason for the pre-composing together was just to make it easier to have all the effects moving correctly with each other also with josh's action he moves back slightly so we keyframed the puppet pin position of this floating ring to move in sync with him in the original they have these one frame lightning blasts in different directions we will make these using a black solid set to screen and the advanced lighting effects keyframing the angle and length of these strikes differently on each frame at a fractal noise set to multiply to add some detail and like other layers we used a glow and color effects again and this is how it looks solo for some environment light interactions you can use a mask adjustment layer and add a color effect to match or because the environment is cg we can use 3d lights and position them to be around the scene to match the effects you can see in chongqi that a lightning strike causes a ground blast so we used an action essential 2 asset to replicate this there's a bunch of other things that you can do such as adding light sweeps to the actors or keyframing the shadow directions to match the flashing lights and like usual we add final touches like more glows especially for a few frames to replicate the bright chongqi flash and some lens stock footage and textures over bright areas and the last thing that we've done is add a camera shake giving us this [Music] that's it for today and if you haven't seen it check out the version of this effect that our friends over at fx home did inside of hitfilm we'll put a link to that in the notes below for you to check out and if you're not subscribed make sure you do that and hit the bell so you're notified when we put out new content and until next time don't forget to write shoot edit repeat [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Film Riot

Views: 704,007

Keywords: film riot, triune films, ryan connolly, filmmaking, tutorial, how to, adobe, film school, shang-chi, shang chi, 10 rings, visual effects, energy effect, rings, vfx, marvel, fight, magic

Id: oe4Dem6M2EQ

Length: 16min 28sec (988 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 10 2021