3D Tracking in After Effects

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
After Effects 2020

  1. Select the footage layer in the composition and choose:
    Animation > Track Camera.
    * A 3D Camera Tracker effect will be applied to the layer, tracking will be processed, and when finished tracking points will be displayed.
  2. Hover over the tracking points and click to select a planar position, a location where the round icon is placed between 3 planar tracking points.
    * If you don’t see the tracking points make sure the 3D Camera Tracker effect is highlighted in the layer’s Effect Controls.
  3. Right click and choose Create Null and Camera.

Related:
Export 3D camera data to 3ds max

HDRI / Environment Sampling in Blender

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
Blender 2.79

Improve HDRI sampling by increasing the MIS (Multiple Importance Sampling) map resolution in World > Settings

2018-01-19

When the Sampling method is ‘Branched Path Tracing’ the environment sampling isn’t found in the general Sampling Settings but in World > Settings.

2018-01-19

* The Sampling Method can be chosen in the Render > Sampling settings

 

3ds max Map Scaler Modifier

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
3ds max 2017

Use the Map Scaler (MapScalar) Object Space Modifier to make UV coordinates conform to a uniform map real-world size.

Tip:
Create effective UV coordinates for angular geometrical meshes quickly by applying an Unwrap UVW modifier, and in the UV Editor, selecting all the mesh, and choosing Mapping > Flatten Mapping, and than applying a Map Scaler modifier and setting its Scale parameter to the wanted texture size..

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Notes:

  1. When applying the Map Scaler modifier to an object with deformed UV’s, it will break the UV’s in order to force consistent scale.
  2. If the Scale parameter matches the file’s system unit definition in Customize > Units Setup > System Units Setup, than it will effectively work as real world map scale, and allow you to set a real world texture size in the Coordinates rollout of the texture in the Material Editor.

3ds max Transform Toolbox

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
3ds max 2017

Edit > Transform Toolbox

TT.jpg

A utility providing handy transform operations like scaling to a set size, quickly setting the pivot point to useful preset positions, ect.

Notes:

1) Scaling works only in system units.

2) Scaling works in local coordinates of the object

Sample based white balance using the physical camera in 3ds max / Maya

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
3ds max 2017 | Maya 2018 | V-Ray 3.6

3ds max

Render a test with White Balance set to Custom with pure white color.
Let the rendering go on at least until the pixel values stabilize (the Denoiser works at least once..).

WB_A
Test done using custom white balance with pure white

set the white balance custom color to a color sampled from the VFB at a point that you know should be appearing completely neutral (neither warm or cold)

WB_B
White balance is set using sample from the test rendering

Render again.

WB_C
A new render done with the sampled white balance color

* Each time you want to test different sample locations you need to sample the pixels from the test rendered with custom pure white.

Maya

The procedure in Maya is identicle,
Add V-Ray Physical Camera attributes to the camera and enable them,
Create a test render with pure white White-Balance Color,
Sample the white/grey surface color in the V-Ray VFB (Render Window) to the White-Balance color, and render again.

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V-Ray for Maya Physical Camera

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

To access V-Ray Physical Camera functionality in Maya,
V-Ray Physical Camera attributes must be added to the camera and enabled.

1) select the camera

2) In the attribute editor open the Attribute menu and choose V-Ray > Physical Camera

3) make sure treat as physical camera is enabled

* you can add more V-Ray Attributes to the camera like this

V-Ray_Physical-camera

3ds max ProBoolean shading artifacts

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
3ds max 2017

There are certain situations in 3ds max where using a ProBoolean operation on a model will perform the geometrical operation but produce shading/smoothing artifacts, or problems in later operations like Chamfer.
* This can often happen with geometry (models) imported from other software like Sketchup for instance

In many of these cases setting the ‘Planar Edge Removal’ to ‘No Edge Removal’ in the ProBoolean Advanced Options will solve the problem.

Probool

The reason I’m not adding some visual example of the problem I described is that I couldn’t reproduce it..
So the tip is, if you perform a ProBoolean operation, and weird stuff happens,
Try setting No Edge Removal, it may solve the problem.

Daylight system for Blender

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
Blender 2.78

Found a simple and effective sun positioning addon for Blender,
It can be downloaded here:
https://developer.blender.org/F20492
The addon is easy to install like all other addons in Blender,
Once installed you will find it’s controls in the World settings,
You specify a sky environment map and a sun node and it will control them acording to given latitude longitude, date, timezone ect.
Also lets you set the north direction of the system as needed.

Very simple and very effective.

Related:
Photometric daylight setup in V-Ray for Maya