Volleyball Final Project - Post 2 (The Return!) - Progress

A ball into space, uh? What a stupid idea! Why didn’t I chose something a bit less complicated, like… I dunno… a text into space? Oh, no, wait, I’ve already done this one… But still, this ball is killing me.

Because, first of all, I have to create that ball, that dear and sweet ball. At first I thought that I could use a texture I found on internet, and apply it to a sphere.

Fail.

The volleyball texture I found on internet. I don't want to think about what they did to that poor ball...

Then I tried to modify it, and worked harder to apply it on a sphere.

Fail.

Then I tried to follow a very non explicit tutorial to create a volleyball under Maya.

Fail. After 6 hours of work.

Then I attempted to kill myself.

Fail.

And the next day, I tried to restart to work on that ball from the beginning, knowing where I failed.

Success.

Wait… success? Really? Oh my God yes! Yes it IS a success! And look at that, if I apply a white leather texture on it, it’s just perfect! That’s crazy! I created a Volleyball! I feel like a God!

I’m really proud of that ball especially because of all the lines, who aren’t textured, but real little line on which I used the tool Bevel to create deepness (when it didn’t completely screwed it up, like the day before).

The white leather texture I applied on the ball.

The Masterpiece! Seriously, how cool is that ball?

Then I tried to import the ball into Photoshop and then After Effect and had a lot of issues with light, which Photoshop recreated. I had to create an environment of light all around the ball to erase all shadow. It worked out at the end.

Now I could start to create an environment for that ball into After Effect. Using particles, I created stars that would move toward the ball, giving an impression of speed. The ball is constantly rotating on itself, like if it was moving forward. This part worked out (with the help of Ben to master those undisciplined stars).

I then added the Death Star from Star Wars, which the ball would pass very quickly. The effect worked well, so I know I’m going to use it later on with other ships.

My next step was to create a camera, and to rotate around the ball. Success.

But when I created the smoke trail, I started to have some issues.
First of all, one of Andrew Kramer’s tutorial inspired me to create the smoke (see the tutorial on http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/smoke_trails/ ). But I had a hard time putting the smoke right in front of the camera and behind the ball. Once again, Ben rescued me.

The cloud I used to create the smoke.

Once my smoke was in position, I duplicated it, and used it to create the fire and sparkles effect. Then the main problem was that I had way too many particles, and it slowed down the project. But it looked awesome.

With the same idea, I used that footage of fire in order to create it.

Here is a little preview of the effect of the smoke, fire, and the rotation.


Preview final project FX from Vincent Desgrippes on Vimeo.

Just to let you know, it took one hour to render... that tiny little piece of footage, one hour. I don't want to think about the final export...

I realize that time passes super quickly, and that I’ll have to shoot the footage that will held the special effect. Just have to find a girl who will agree to take a fake ball on the face. Easy…

Then I’ll finish to add the few effects I have in mind, add the sound FX, and put everything inside a small editing.

But it's alright, because now I love this project.