The Thursday News Roundup

By RC Concepcion in Layers Blog
Thursday March 5, 2009

newltv New Layers TV Up and ARCHIVE DESCRIPTIONS
Happy Thursday everyone. I’m excited about a couple of things today. First off, the new Layers TV episode is up – that’s always a plus. I cover a little bit of After Effects for the web, while Corey creates a really cool grunge type graphic in Illustrator. However, the more exciting news. Our Layers TV Archive pages have descriptions to them!!!! This was something a ton of people emailed about. Now, you can click on the Previous Episodes link and read a brief description of each of the episodes and see if you want to check that one out. A very heartfelt thanks to Tommy (our resident programming genius) for doing this in short order. It’s the small things that make a difference, and this ROCKS!

Video of the Day
Jean Francois O’Kane from The Studio Coach is up today with a great video on how to create a very simple portrait using side Window Light. Some of the best shots I have is using side light, so I’m excited to see that Jean Francois covers this in his tutorial. Click on the link below to watch the video:

Jean Francois O’Kane – Side Lighting with Window Light

Written Tutorial of the Day
Steve Holmes of Energi Design has got a great article written on 3D effects in After Effects! Make sure you check that out below:

“Animating your After Effects design in 3D space is fun and, for the most part, easy to achieve. However, the camera and objects can have their own agendas in some instances, but a few tricks can change a seemingly uncontrollable camera animation into pure, cool cinematography…

1 CREATE COMP; IMPORT/CREATE FOOTAGE
Start out in a blank After Effects CS3 project, and press Command-N (PC: Ctrl-N) to create a New Composition. In the Composition Settings dialog, choose HDV/HDTV 720 29.97 from the Preset menu, enter 6 seconds for Duration, and click OK. Then create, or double-click in the Project panel to import, an item you wish to move the camera around in 3D space. (For this flyby title animation, I’m importing a clip named SBE173H from Artbeats.com—an HD clip of a 3D-animated soccer ball.) A circular element like this will add even more 3D depth to the scene. When imported, drag the clip into the Timeline.”

That’s it for today everyone. We’ll see you guys back here tomorrow morning!

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Author: RC Concepcion Rafael Concepcion (RC) is an education and curriculum developer for the National Association of Photoshop Professionals, and the co-host of Layers TV - The How To Podcast For Everything Adobe. An Adobe Certified Instructor in Photoshop, Illustrator, and Lightroom, RC has over 10 years in the I.T. and ecommerce industries and spends his days developing content for all applications in the Adobe Creative Suite. RC has held training seminars in the U.S., Europe, and Latin America, and recently combined his photographic and web experience to teach with famed wildlife photographer Moose Peterson at the "You Can Do It Too" workshops in Mammoth, CA and at the Voices That Matter Web Conference in San Francisco, CA. RC also writes columns for Layers and Photoshop User magazines.