3d camera matching is simultaneously one of the most widely used and most elusive to learn CG techniques in both the film and advertising industries today. In this video tutorial, we will discuss a comprehensive method for tracking video footage, and eventually exporting it for use in your 3d package of choice.
Match Your 3d Animation to Live Action Footage using Syntheyes, Cinema 4D, Realflow, and After Effects
Nov 12th in 3D Art, Adobe After Effects, Animation, Maxon Cinema 4D, Particles, RealFlow by Chris Martin
First we will track some live action footage in Syntheyes, and then export it for use in Cinema 4D. Then, in Cinema 4D, we will create some 3d text, and also create the desk geometry that will receive the shadows and reflections. We will then export the whole scene to Realflow, where we will design a simulation using a rigid body, and export it back to C4D to apply compositing tags, and export using multipass rendering. Finally, we will bring it all into After Effects, where we will isolate the text, and apply a few finishing post effects.
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Tutorial Video
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User Comments
( ADD YOURS )josué November 12th
awesome! Could you do it for 3d max??? PLEASE!!!
( )Paolo Bruno November 12th
awesome! Could you do it for 3d max??? PLEASE!!! (2)
( )Ben November 12th
Wow…looks great! Way to show up all those people hating on your last tutorial!
( )joeykache November 12th
WOW Ammaaayyzing Tutorial!!!! Good job, more of these tuts would be greatly appreciated..so flippin SWEET!
( )xsid November 12th
well looks great, and a little complicated, the use of realflow here is strange as i thought tht it is for fluids only, but its great to use app. for different purposes.
( )thanks a lot
Chris Martin November 12th
Glad you enjoyed it!
( )bob November 12th
AMAZING! THIS IS WHAT SHOULD BE ON HERE!
( )Anders November 12th
I’ve been doning this for years with Boujou/Maya/AE but what you show here actually looks like a better workflow. Sweet!
A question though… how do you export the table reflection as a seperate pass (separated from the plate)?
( )Chris Martin November 12th
I am not sure how it is done in Maya but in Cinema all you need to do is set up multipass rendering and select the reflections as a separate pass.
( )Robert Morris November 13th
In Maya, you simply set up a reflection shader for the table… and do multipass rendering as well. But as I’m more familiar with 3D production processes, I realize it’s much more involved than what I (or the previous poster) just said. Do some research into Render Layers and Render Passes in Maya. You’ll find there’s a world of opportunity open, as opposed to some of the smaller, simpler 3D packages. Cinema 4D is great for motion graphics people who just want to do simple 3D interaction. But personally, I prefer the Maya/Boujou/AE workflow to have ultimate freedom of creative expression.
Anders November 13th
I guess I should rephrase my last question – What I was trying to ask is if there is any way to manage render layers in C4D (not just passes)…?
In Maya I usually set up useBackground-shaders (shadow+reflection catchers) for all dummy geometry and then kick out seperate render passes for reflection/shadows/AO and so on. But then I also always use primary visibility switches to control which objects to appear in different render layers. In this particular case I’d like to get everything that is appearing in the table reflection and completely hide the non-reflected geometry (not just mask it out with a object buffer) in one pass and then get another pass with the non-reflected text.
Right now to do this in C4D it seems like I have to go through and hit render two times with different settings. Feels a little cumbersome compared to Maya Render Layers…
Chris Martin November 13th
I see what you are saying….unfortunately I don’t think there is an easy solution for what you want to do…I am guessing that Maya has a bit of an edge over Cinema in this type of scenario.
( )sevenderd November 12th
good input
( )Robert Morris November 13th
This is a great quick tutorial. But I think it’s a little deceiving in the title to say “match”. Because that would be more of a compositing tutorial, which this is not. There’s barely any compositing done on this to “match” it to the footage. So here, the author was implying it was a “tracking” tutorial to match the objects to the footage. Just had to specify that. The 3D text has a long way to go to “match” the shot footage in terms of compositing. And as Anders points out, there are several more steps involved to render out a reflection/shadow pass on the table for true compositing control. It’d be nice to see an example of that.
( )Jan November 13th
maybe you could make a tutorial of that?
( )illd November 14th
Nice one,
( )but I wonder how to use trackdata on an uneven floor…For example you have an rough or bend surface as a floor and not flat one. How would you create the floor then inside C4D?
Mike November 18th
When I create 3d objects in a Maya scene, that has a tracked camera with a image plane created from Matchmover, I find it very difficult to position the object in the right spot, that synchronize with the movement of the camera, know any workflow to do this in Maya?
( )Chris Martin November 19th
Sorry…I am really not a Maya guy…sounds like Robert Morris above might be the one to talk to about that.
( )