Flame and Smoke Masters

To celebrate the 20th anniversary of Flame, we're bringing in a variety of Flame (and Smoke) artists to share projects and knowledge which they find particularly interesting. So much has changed in the software over the last several years, sometimes the best way to see what you've missed is by watching others work. The course will feature five different artists over the duration of the term. Profs include Randy McEntee (The Mill, NYC), Brian Mulligan (WTHR-TV, Indianapolis), Victor Wolansky, and others.

course syllabus

We explore PFTrack 2011's image modeling and texture extraction features to allow us to quickly solve a camera and generate textured geometry in order to execute a partial set reconstruction.

We complete our FBX scene export from PFTrack and bring it into Smoke where we walk through the composite specifics and final the shot.

Creating something from nothing. We use Smoke to make a motion graphics piece from a few stills to create a ground level football field fly over. We explore Action with camera animations, expressions, and some brute force effects. This is a typical motion graphics piece done with Smoke instead of After Effects at WTHR-TV in Indianapolis.

Creating something from nothing, part 2.

The line between CGI and Flame gets blurred. Normally render time intensive, here we generate AO, Z-Depth, reflection and other passes in a fraction of the time with the power of Action.

Blurring CGI and Flame, part 2.

Mark Renton walks us through his independent spec project "SR71", completed entirely within Flame. Part 1 of 2.

Mark Renton walks us through his independent spec project "SR71", completed entirely within Flame. Part 2 of 2.

Eric Bruno, lead Flame artists at CBS Digital on the Star Trek remastering project works through some of the compositing challenges encountered from using archival footage.

Continuing through the work done on the Star Trek remastering project; Tony Graf works through some of the expression tricks used to make repetitive tasks much easier for the artists on a day to day basis.