more research screenshots

this is the cover of the ebook i was using, i downloaded it as a pdf and it has the whole book although i only needed chapter 1, it made it a lot easier for me being able to download the book for free

here are a couple of the links to different audio books i found, i was looking round for interesting voices to use but i ended up finding one on itunes that i ended up using.

evaluation

I have really enjoyed experimenting with this new technique and i think after this project after effects is definitely one of my favourite programs and i would like to incorporate it in my future projects where possible. I think the idea of animating the text in a book in this way definitely makes it more interesting for the reader. by having the viewer follow the type with their eyes especially when it is moving in an unusual way almost distracts them from the fact that they are even reading a book. This project took a lot longer to complete than the music video i did for D&AD because there are a lot more words in this one, this is also the reason i couldn't do much individual animating for certain words like i did in the d&ad video because they are read out soo fast and only on screen for a short time, thats why they are shown more on screen as groups of words. I think the idea to have the camera zoom out at the end and reveal the word flatland made up of the words from the chapter works really well, given an unexpected twist to the end of the video for the viewer. After completing the video i noticed that the audiobook i had used was slightly different to the exact wording of the book which i used for all my text so there are a couple of examples of the narrator saying slightly different words to those shown on screen but it doesn't effect the video. Overall i am really pleased with the final outcome of this project and i think it makes the book a lot more interesting to any potential viewers and throughout this project i have taught myself a lot about the use of after effects which i had never even heard of before i started these briefs. Kinetic typography is something i have been interested in for a long time and i am glad i have now developed some of the skills i need to create my own videos in the future. I have also been noticing that after effects could be used for a lot of other kinds of motion graphics such as television adverts.

flatland final

here is the final video. I have gone through and changed a few little things and stuck with the same ending as the second video i posted. overall i am very pleased with this final outcome and i think it answers the brief very well by using typography to make the book flatland more interesting to readers.

endings compared

these are the 2 different endings i have used in my videos. the top one is the one i think i am going to go with, i think the word flatland works better on one line rather than split up onto 2. it was also my original plan to include the authors name underneath like i have in the top picture and i think this is very effective. when i was talking to mike the other day he said it might be a good idea to use the top ending but then after a few seconds to make the image/word blow up or shatter in to pieces that fly off the edge of the screen to add a bit more excitement and then make the video look like it could continue in to chapter 2. i really like the idea but i'm not sure if i will have time to do that. i am going to make sure i have got everything finished with the ending i am already happy with then if i have got time go back and attempt to create this explosion effect.

still rendering...

i set my final video up to start rendering before i uploaded the last few posts on here and its still going, at the start it predicted about 28 minutes till it was finished but this keeps adding on it has been going for over an hour and if its anything like the others it will be around 2 hours by the time its finished. my mac has 8gb of ram and at times it is using 95% of this, if i tried to do this on my laptop i would be here all day but i am hoping that after this has finished and i watch it through there wont be any more changes that need making and i can upload it as a final video

the audiobook

in the background i wanted to use an audiobook read by a celebrity, maybe morgan freeman but i spent nearly a week back in the early stages of the project looking around for different versions of this book. i could only find about 3 good examples and the voices were very lifeless and boring so i finally settled on a version i found on itunes, it was available as a podcast and each episode was a chapter of the book so i just downloaded episode 1 and used that. i think after listening to all the options i have chosen the best one. the only other way to do it was to record someone reading it myself.

flatland version 2

this is the second version of the video i created, i went back and changed the ending and added the authors name, i think the ending works a lot better now but there are still a few things i need to go back and change for the final video. i also noticed that the words the narrator says are slightly different than the text in the actual book and i just stuck to words in the book so there are a couple of occasions in the videos where the words are slightly different to what he is saying but i dont think these effect the video much and arent that noticeable

flatland version 1

this is the first video i finished, i am pleased with most of the video but after i started rendering it i realised that i hadn't changed the ending to zoom out and have the word flatland on one line and show the authors name so this is the first thing i changed on the second video, i also let this video run a little bit long at the end and the second chapter starts playing right at the end, because the file was so large i couldn't keep doing previews during making it like i have been doing on the d&ad project so i couldn't see what it looked like until i rendered the video at the end. i am pleased with the majority of this video and i think i only really need to make those slight changes to complete it.

2 more screenshots

 just incase you were wondering the typeface i have used for all the main text in this video is one i downloaded called savings bond, i wanted a chunky typeface that is easy to read when it is moving so after looking around for a while i settled on this one. also the chunkier and bigger the typeface is the better it is for the motion blur effect i have used in the video.

In the video when the narrator talks about countrymen i decided to show a few silhouettes of men above the word. so i searched for a silhouette of a man. the one i found was black so wouldn't show up on my background so i changed the colour to white in photoshop. after watching the video i think the idea to include these silhouettes works really well alongside the type. maybe i could have thought about adding more illustrations or objects in to the video so its not just all type. 

more screenshots, click on the image to see full size version

 this first screenshot is a more zoomed in picture of the dots representing camera movements, you can see on the side that the 3 areas i have changed in this project for the camera movements are just position, scale and Z rotation

 this is just a small image to explain what these 2 boxes are, all the text layers have these 2 boxes checked. the square symbol on the right is to show that the layer has 3d enabled, enabling 3d means you can change more things about the type, use different angles and it also allows the camera to control the layer, a layer that doesnt have 3d selected can't be affected by the camera. the button on the left enables motion blur, this is the blurriness that appears when something is moving, this makes the whole thing look a lot more effective and makes the movement look soo much better. 

 you can see that all the text layers in the bottom half have 3d and motion blur selected. also to makes the camera work easier it is best to use a null object which is just a blank square in the middle of the screen, then tell the camera to follow it, this means you can put all the movements in the null area or even have more than one null area and the camera just follows their actions, this allows all the 3d actions to work a lot easier.

this is just a quick screenshot to show how long each video took to render, the first one was just a 15 second clip so didn't take very long but the others were the full video but with 2 different endings, i was expecting them to maybe take half an hour but one of them took over 2 hours. this is because of the large amount of files and actions involved in this video, i still want to go back and make a few slight changes before the deadline tomorrow but this will mean i have to render the video again and this will take a long time.

some screenshots

 The first screenshot gives you an idea of the number of camera movements i have had to add to this video ... each dot on the timeline shows a camera movement or rotation. i have zoomed out on the timeline so you can see the full amount of camera movements.

 The second screenshot is a zoomed out version, this is to show some of the layers. each word is on its own layer and when the red starts is when the word appears on the screen. you can see how the timing of the words happens, i go through listening to the book being read and start each red bar as each inidividual word is being said, this is one of the most time consuming parts of this technique.

I have zoomed in so you can see in more detail when each layer starts on the timeline. this is just a sample of some of the layers, i cant fit them all on the screen because for this particular project there are hundreds of layers. The longest part of this project was individually typing in each word and positioning them and then timing all the layers up with the sound in the background. adding the camera effects afterwards only took about 2 days.

ending

this is how the video currently looks at the end, the camera zooms out revealing the word flatland and the authors name.

update

i spent about 5 hours last night doing all the camera movements for the first 5 letters, moving around so the camera is focussed on each word or a group of words. I spent another few hours this morning finishing the camera movements for the rest of the words and made the camera zoom out at the end revealing the word 'flatland' the only problem is because there is such a lot of information it takes over an hour and half to render the file as a video so i did the first one and after it had eventually rendered i watched it through for the first time. there are a few things i need to change including the position of the word flatland at the end and i want to add the authors name. I have made a few changes and the video is currently about half way through rendering ... (already been rendering for nearly an hour). I am going to have another look when this one is finished to see if there are any other adjustments i need to do, i am also going to look into the possibility of making the word break up and explode at the end after a few seconds but i dont know if this will be possible yet

getting there...

i have finally finished putting all the text in to my after effects composition. Using chapter one to make up the word flatland. aswell as just adding all the text i have also spent a long time syncing all the text up with the words on the audiobook so it appears on screen the same time the man reading the book out loud says it. so now when i play the video i can see the word flatland and each word appears at  the right time, now all i need to do is add the camera and make it zoom in on each word and add all the movement, this will also hide the fact the words are positioned to make the word flatland until the end of the video.