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Tutorials
Posted by BIGMIKE in the categories: Uncategorized
Welcome to the tutorials page. I wanted to put this page on my site because of how important online video tutorials were and still are to my growth as an artist. I feel like I should give something back considering how many tips and techniques I’ve learned from other people I never met through these same type of tutorials. So these may not be the best out there, but I will try to offer anything to help anyone develop their skills in motion graphics.
Tutorial: Outer Space Galaxy with Fractal Noise
This tutorial uses the always handy fractal noise plug-in to create different elements in an outer space scene. Space gas, planets, and star fields originate from this handy plug-in and with the right settings you have a nice looking galaxy environment that you could move a camera through if you so choose.
Fractal Noise Galaxy Tutorial from Mike on Vimeo.
Tutorial: 3D Stroke Glow in After Effects
Here’s a tutorial that is done entirely in After Effects using Trapcode 3D Stroke and Particular. It creates a light streak animation that culminates in a glowing logo reveal with a particle explosion. It creates something like this.
3D Stroke Glow Tutorial from Mike on Vimeo.
Tutorial: Paper Crumple in Cinema 4D
This tutorial shows you how to make an animation of a paper crumpling up into a ball. It uses the cloth tag in Cinema 4D and requires no keyframing. I give an example of some settings that work with the cloth tag, but you can tweak the numbers to vary your results. Download the project file here to start the tutorial.
Paper Crumple Tutorial in Cinema 4D from Mike on Vimeo.
Tutorial: Camera Shake in Cinema 4D
Check out this tutorial to learn how to simulate camera shake in Cinema 4D. It’s a pretty easy tutorial, but it shows you how to create User Data and use it with Xpresso, which could be good to know when designing other things down the road. Here is a ZIP file that contains the Cinema 4D project to use for this tutorial.
BIGMIKEDESIGN: Camera Shake Tutorial from Mike on Vimeo.
Tutorial: Interactive Speaker in Cinema 4D Using MoGraph
In this tutorial I demonstrate how to model a 3D speaker and use the sound effector in MoGraph to have it move accurately to the beat of a sound file you specify. Here is a ZIP file that contains the Cinema 4D file to start and a short audio file to use.
BIGMIKEDESIGN: Interactive Speaker Tutorial from Mike on Vimeo.
Tutorial: Super Text in Cinema 4D
Cinema 4D users should check out this tutorial on how to create “Super Text.” Super Text is not exact, but similar to what Superman’s font looks like. It has 3D letters that extend far back into a vanishing point. Here is a project file to start you off with the materials I will be using in the tutorial.
Tutorial: Paper Rip Effect in After Effects
This tutorial will show you how to make it appear that a big piece of your footage is being ripped off like a sheet of paper.
This tutorial uses Photoshop and After Effects, and deals with alpha channels, track mattes, precomposing, and you need CC Page Turn or a similar page peel plug-in.
21 Responses to “Tutorials”
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November 9th, 2007 at 8:21 am
Thanks for the tutorial. I agree, there are so many tutorials out there, it’s great to give back. I’ll make it my new years resolution to do that myself.
I’ll be sure to send you a link when I get around to using this great effect.
I read somewhere on your site that you’re a C4D user. I go back to version 6. I wouldn’t put myself up against may of these hard core 3d artists out there, but it helps to augment my AE work.
December 12th, 2007 at 4:04 pm
[...] Big Mike has a new tutorial on his site and it looks very cool. Super Text in Cinema 4D tutorial. [...]
June 13th, 2008 at 2:05 am
[...] I found the Camera Ahake tutorial particularly useful. Great stuff Mike. Thanks for making these. [...]
June 24th, 2008 at 9:56 pm
Love your tutorials. I’m trying to learn more about C4D since I just started, and your stuff really helps. I was wondering if you could give some insight on how you did the “current_ cubes” video you have up. I really love that one and would love to learn how something like that is done. Thanks again for sharing your knowledge with us.
June 25th, 2008 at 11:32 pm
Well Mike, you will need though MoGraph module in C4D for that. If you have it, create a Cube primitive and use a cloner object set to Grid. Add and line up your clones so they essentially form a solid Cube that is now composed of many, many cubes. Add a random effector and set the parameter to position, and keyframe the value of the effector to move the cubes outward, which you can do just a little to offset them slightly, or make them explode far away from their origin.
Check this info here for more info on MoGraph. It’s worth the price, it creates endless possibilities for animation.
http://www.c4dcafe.com/reviews/Mograph/cloner.php
July 13th, 2008 at 7:59 am
Are really good tutorials, i hope to see more in future.
http://www.imandesign.at
August 5th, 2008 at 7:02 pm
[...] Tutorials SubscribeCategories [...]
October 30th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
Hey Big Mike,
Just checking out your bad ass site. It totally rocks! Would love some feedback/tips for my own site (not yet ready to be posted but close)
ttyl
Jennifer
November 27th, 2008 at 11:49 am
Hi Mike,
Great tutorials. I look forward to many more.
Quick tip on the Super Text tutorial;
Instead of making the type editable use C1, R1 (front of type) C2, R2( back of type) [C = caps R= rounding ]. Example: Apply the material to extrude nurbs/ select material/ tag/ in selection area insert - C1. Drop a material w/o specific selection as the base material - this will texture the sides. In the view window/display/select -stacked materials. Order the material tags on the extrude nurbs accordingly i.e. base, rounding, caps.
For the spot light work around: Turn off auto light in render settings/ options.
-G
December 5th, 2008 at 1:03 am
Thanks for dropping the knowledge G.
December 5th, 2008 at 12:26 pm
Hi Mike,
thanks for the Tutorials, I just googled for Camera Shake and ended up watching every clip here
Just one note on the paper rip tutorial:
if you got an alpha map with no sharp edges, you can also use curves on the alpha channel to get rid of the half transparent pixels. You can also grow your alpha map using a blur and after that the curves on the alpha channel.
December 10th, 2008 at 11:01 am
Good call that would definitely work, nice tip.
December 28th, 2008 at 6:04 am
great stuff… just one thing sound effector only accepts selected .au and wave files haha it was a little irritating finding this out after hours of trying to recreate what you were doing…
December 28th, 2008 at 6:50 pm
Sorry I didn’t mention that in the tutorial. I was definitely using an aiff file in the tutorial but included an mp3 version in the downloadable project files. I switched it out. Thanks for visiting.
January 4th, 2009 at 8:00 pm
Please make a tut on how to create that spray paint effect you have in your reel!
March 3rd, 2009 at 9:17 pm
Thanks for the tips, I love finding out about new tricks
March 16th, 2009 at 12:03 pm
thanks for making such good tutorials. keep it up.
April 4th, 2009 at 3:00 am
good tutorial… thx…
April 23rd, 2009 at 4:01 am
[...] Mostly Cinema4D tutorials but some AE ones thrown in there. Worth taking a peek. [...]
May 27th, 2009 at 5:58 pm
re-elect clay davis! sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeit…
May 28th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
Good, somebody besides me has seen The Wire.