3D to live action

[crutch]

I'm looking for some tutorials regarding adding 3D to live action. Does one use say DigitalFusion or AE and pull their 3D into the live action? Or does one use say Maya and pull the live action footage into Maya? I thought to add 3D to live action a grid or plane has to be laid over the live action which would make me assume that you import the film footage into Maya and then place the animations accordingly. I'm obviously a newb, any reading or input would be greatly appreciated.
-open AE -open live footage -import 3D :confused:
or is it
-open Maya -open live footage -lay down 3D -finish in AE :confused:

[russ_c]

Hey Crutch,

Welcome to VFXtalk! Concerning live footage and 3D compositing: This can be dependent on how complicated your live footage is (i.e. does the camera move or not). To answer your question in a broad sense, you would build a "dummy" scene in Maya that represents key objects in the live footage your 3D object/character would interact with. You would then animate and export the 3D render and composite in something like Digital fusion. You can certainly import the footage as reference in Maya to help you build the scene, but ultimately you would not be rendering the 3D with the footage. You would marry the two in a composite system so you have more control. There are many details that I am not getting at here...but a good start would be to read up on matchmoving.

If your live camera moves, you have to calculate that movement and setup a 3D camera in you scene file that moves in 3D space identically (matchmoving). Really, what your asking could be about 30 different discussion :D . Other topics that are import to look up and research are premultiplication and rotoscoping.

I hope those three topics will get you started,

Russell

[crutch]

Thank you for your input Russ. I guess I should have been more specific but I do need to study the topics you mention. I have a character I created in Maya and would like to add it to my live footage. The camera, the appropriate term I think, is locked off so there is no camera movement. I'm an absolute newb so I am trying to start off very small. My character will do nothing more than move through the scene.

[maynard]

cmiVFX has a dvd on this toipic coming out this week.

visit http://www.cmivfx.com and it will be under advanced 3d tracking.

-c

[Hugh]

Even if your camera is locked off, you still will want to get a rough 'set' inside Maya - this will involve lining up the two cameras (by hand if needs be) and creating, in Maya, a set (in it's simplest form, a simple plane for the floor) - this you'll then use to create things like shadows...

[preti23imp]

Hello everyone,
I am new to this community and this is my very first post.

this is for my school project.

I am filming a character walking in front of the green screen and the camera is on a dolly. but there is no tilt or pan.
And I am creating a 3D room in Maya. I have to composite both and I understand that i have to do some motion tracking (since there is a dolly movement) but I have some questions,
can I composite both 3d and Live action in After effects?
What are all the measurements I have to take while filming?
what is the work flow?
I am new to motion tracking and i am very curious. really appreciate a reply
Thanx

[vnotman]

Keep in mind that the VFX Industry is software handy all sorts of techniques are used. But it has been my personal experience that working with Live Action Plates is better suited for a Node Based Composite System not AE. Such as Nuke, Shake, Fusion, Composite, Flame.
The measurements that you need are usually vertical filmback, horizontal filmback, lenses mm. It is also nice to get a warp card to match footage to proper warp. Cheers Mate.

Villian