AE 4.0 Invig. Manual TOC.03z.indd

Transcription

The Zaxwerks 3D Invigorator™
for After Effects®
User Guide
Covering Classic and PRO v.4
Zaxwerks 3D Invigorator for AE - User Guide
1
Zaxwerks Inc.
5724 Camellia Ave.
Temple City, CA 91780
(626) 309-9102 phone
(626) 309-9142 fax
http://www.zaxwerks.com
Sales: [email protected]
Tech Support: [email protected]
© 1996 - 2005 Zaxwerks Inc. All rights reserved.
This manual, as well as the software described in it, is furnished under license and may only be used or
copied in accordance with the terms of such license. The information in this manual is furnished for informational use only, is subject to change without notice, and does not represent product specifications or commitment on the part of Zaxwerks. Zaxwerks assumes no responsibility or liability for any error or inaccuracies
that may appear in this document.
The Zaxwerks 3D Invigorator is a trademark of Zaxwerks Inc. After Effects, Illustrator and Photoshop are
trademarks of Adobe Systems Inc. FreeHand is a trademark of Macromedia Inc. Apple and Macintosh are
registered trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc. Windows, Windows 2000, and Windows XP are registered
trademarks of Microsoft, Inc. OpenGL is a trademark of Silicon Graphics Inc. All other product names or
trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
2
Table of Contents
A Word From Zax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
INSTALLATION INSTRUCTIONS
Macintosh installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Windows installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
BASIC CONCEPTS
Modeling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Surface Set Up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Scene Set Up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Animation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Rendering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
QUICK START . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Think Like A Photographer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
EXPANDED QUICK START
Create The Beginning 2D Shapes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Adding The Shapes To The 3D Invigorator . . . . . . . . 30
Adjusting The Camera, Lights, or Objects . . . . . . . . 31
Creating The Animation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Rendering The 3D Graphic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Saving Your Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
TUTORIALS
Tutorial 1
A Camera Animation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Tutorial 2
A Walk-About Through The Set-Up Window . . . 51
Tutorial 3
Selecting, Renaming & Manipulating Objects . . 60
SELECT ARTWORK
Show All Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Open By Layers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Use Illustrator Colors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
Dismantle Incoming Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
Move Objects To Center . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
The EFFECT CONTROLS WINDOW
Scene Preview Window . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
Toolbar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Mode Buttons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Display Textured/Shaded/Wireframe . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
Manipulator Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
Tumble Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
Roll Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Track Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Dolly Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
Scale Tool For Sets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Selection Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
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Zoom Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Create Button . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Views Popup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Lights Popup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Sets Popup. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Help Button . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Update Camera Button . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Update Lights Button . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Set-Up Window Button . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Linking To The AE 3D Cameras and 3D Lights . . . . 89
Limitations Of The Comp Camera Option . . . . . . . . 94
The ANIMATABLE PARAMETERS
Animatable Camera Parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
Camera Type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Which Camera To Use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
Animatable Lighting Parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
Light Color . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
Light Intensity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Light Direction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Animatable Set Parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
Set Position . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
Set Rotation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
Set Depth Scale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
Layer Map Parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
Layer Maps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
4
Composite On Original . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
AE Reset Button . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
Caps Lock Key . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
The SET-UP WINDOW . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
Scene Preview Window . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
Toolbar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
The CAMERA CONTROLS
Camera Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
Camera Manipulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Camera Tumble . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Camera Roll . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
Camera Track . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
Camera Dolly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Camera Manipulation Shortcut Keys . . . . . . . . 126
Zoom Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
The Camera Tab
Camera Views Presets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
Camera Lenses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Super Fast Rendering (PRO Feature) . . . . . . . 130
Antialiasing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Alpha Channels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
Background Color . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
The LIGHTING CONTROLS
Light Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
Light Manipulation
In The Scene Window . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
Light Manipulator Ball . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Spot Lights And Point Lights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
Creating and Using . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Lights List . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Turn On This Light . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Disable All Shadows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
Light Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
Light Name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
Light Color Picker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
Light Color Eyedropper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
Light Intensity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
Shadow Casting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
Shadow Darkness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144
Shadow Softness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Light Preview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Light Commands Popup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
Save Light To Bin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
Lights Bin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
Lights Swatch Commands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Apply Swatch To Light . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Duplicate Light Swatch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Delete Selected Swatches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
Clear Bin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
Lighting Styles Bin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
Lighting Styles Swatch Commands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Save Lighting Style . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Apply Lighting Style . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Duplicate Lighting Style . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
Delete Selected Lighting Styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
Clear Bin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
OBJECT CONTROLS
Object Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
Object Manipulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
Object Nudging . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154
Object Tumble . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
Object Roll . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
Object Track . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Object Dolly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
Drag Using Object’s Axes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
Object Scale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
Selecting Objects
Selection Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
Primary And Secondary Selections . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
Adding To And Removing From Selections . . . . . . 164
Drag Selecting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
Select All . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
Deselect All . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
Select Invisible . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
Using Manipulation Tools For Selecting . . . . . . . . 166
5
Small Object Tab . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
Object List . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Bold Object Names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Italic Object Names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
Bullets In The Object List . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
Set Assignment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
Make Invisible . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
Reset . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
Delete . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
Duplicate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
Move To Center . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173
Create Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
User Prefs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
Clear Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
Clear Scene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
Large Object Tab . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
Object Name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
Object Stats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
Reload Layer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
Replace . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
File Name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184
Object Faceting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184
Draft Quality vs. Best Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
Generate Model Parts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
Front Faces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
Back Faces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
6
Outside Edges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Hole Edges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Depth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Spike Buster . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
New Looks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
Spike Buster and Edge Offsets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
Unbustable Spikes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190
Edge Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
Outside Edges vs. Hole Edges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192
Edge Profiles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
Edge Scale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194
Use Same Profile for Hole Edges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
Use Same Material for Hole Edges . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196
Use Same Scale for Hole Edges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196
The MATERIAL CONTROLS
The Classic Materials Tab . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
The PRO Materials Tab . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
Materials Bin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
Moving And Rearranging Swatches . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
Selecting Swatches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
Duplicate Selected Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
Select All Unused . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
Delete Selected Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
Clear Bin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
Material Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202
Loading A Material Into The Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
Loading By Drag and Drop . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
Loading By Double Clicking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204
Material Name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204
Material Color . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204
Eyedropper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
TEXTURE MAPPING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
Picking A Texture Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
Sizing and Positioning The Maps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
How Auto-Sizing Works . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
Map Enabler Checkbox . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210
Layer Map Selector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
Image Maps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212
Decal Maps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213
Highlight Sharpness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214
Highlight Brightness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216
Bumpiness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217
Making Better Bump Maps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218
Transparency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
Transparency Maps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
Reflectivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221
Reflection Maps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222
Highlights And Reflections By Surface Type
Polished Jewelry and Stone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Glass and Vinyl . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Chrome . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
Plastics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
Polished Wood . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225
Satins/Metals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225
Paper/Cloth/Rough Cut Stone/Unfinished Wood . . 226
How The Color Channels In A Map Are Used . . . . . . . 226
Channel Usage by Map Type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
Material Commands
New Material . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
Duplicate Material . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
Save Material To Bin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
Clear Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
Seeing Textures And Reflections In Draft Mode . . . . . . 230
OBJECT STYLES
Object Styles Tab . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
Applying Object Styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
Linking Objects To Object Styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
Renaming Object Styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
Adding Notes To An Object Style . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
Object Styles Swatch Popup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
7
Save Object Style . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
Unlink Object Style . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
Remove Object Style . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
Duplicate Object Style . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
Select All Unused . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Delete Selected Object Styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Clear Bin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
Moving Object Style Swatches. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
Regenerating Deleted Object Styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
USER PREFERENCES
Default Set Number . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
Shadow Quality. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
Duplication Offset . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
Hard Shading Angle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
Save Project Data As . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 254
Show Ground Plane In Preview Windows. . . . . . . . 255
Ground Plane Y Offset . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
MATERIAL SET-UP & ASSIGNMENT
Material Set-Up Button . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
Material Assignment Window . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
Material Set-Up Toolbar
Display Splits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
Split Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
Grabber Hand . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244
Dolly Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
Zoom Tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
Palette Commands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
Clear All Splits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
Fit Edge Style . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
Swap Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
Delete Selected Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
Materials Palette . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
Palette checkbox . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
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ADDITIONAL PRO FEATURES
EDGE OFFSET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
CUSTOM EDGE PROFILES
How To Create A Custom Edge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 260
Each Layer Becomes A Single Edge . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
Where Do Custom Edges Appear In The Menu? . . 261
Setting The Scale Of A Custom Edge. . . . . . . . . . . . 262
What Types Of Paths Can Edges Be? . . . . . . . . . . . . 263
Crossing The Y Axis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 264
Crossing The X Axis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
Editing A Profile While The Project Is Open. . . . . . 265
Importance Of The Starting Point For Mapping. . . 266
How To Tell Where The Seam Will Be . . . . . . . . . . . 268
Edge Profile Examples. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
LAYER CYCLING
What Is A Layer Cycling Object? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 272
Understanding Layer Cycling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
Example Uses For This Technique. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
How To Prep The Vector File . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277
How To Make A Layer Cycling Object . . . . . . . . . . . 278
The Layer Cycling Controls. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
The Frame Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
Total Frames Field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
Frame Counter. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
The Playback Controls. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
Start Frame . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
Show Before Start Frame. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
Change Every. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282
Sequence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283
Play Once . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283
Play Once And Hold. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283
Loop . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283
Ping-Pong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283
Reverse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
Randomize . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
Random Seed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
Exporting Layer Cycling Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285
Combining Sequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286
Using Cycling Objects Inside ElectricImage. . . . . . 286
Using Cycling Objects Inside Other Programs . . . . 289
IMPORTING 3D MODELS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 290
EXPORTING 3D MODELS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 292
Exporting All, Selected Or Visible Objects . . . . . . . 293
Baking Transformations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
MESHING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294
WHAT’S NEW IN 4.0 PRO? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 296
CREATING TEXT OBJECTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 300
Text Entry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 300
Setting The Block Size . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 300
Font Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
Size
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
Leading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302
Spacing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302
Kerning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302
Width Scale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302
Height Scale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303
Baseline Shift . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303
Justification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303
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Cleaning Up Problems With Font Models . . . . . . . . 304
3D Text Editing Tips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305
3D PRIMITIVES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307
Making a Primitive Object. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307
Changing A Primitive’s Shape . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 308
Coloring A Primitive Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 308
Animating A Primitive Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 308
Making A Primitive Look Faceted . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 309
How To Squash Or Skew A Primitive. . . . . . . . . . . . 309
THE .ZXO IMPORT / EXPORT FORMAT . . . . . . . 310
How To Save A .ZXO Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 310
Adding .ZXO Objects To Other Projects . . . . . . . . . 311
Making .ZXO Objects Larger or Smaller . . . . . . . . . 312
MOTION BLUR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313
LAYER MAP ANIMATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
How To Animate A Layer Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
Finding The Perfect Reflection. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 316
HIGHLIGHT MAPPING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
How To Make A Highlight Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317
How To Give A Material A Highlight Map . . . . . . . . 318
Creative Uses for Highlight Mapping . . . . . . . . . . . . 319
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RENDER FARMING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321
ADDITIONAL MATERIAL TYPES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 322
Wireframe And Hiddenline Rendering. . . . . . . . . . . 322
How To Give Objects A Wireframe
or Hiddenline Look . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 323
Making The Lines Thicker or Thinner . . . . . . . 325
Setting The Color Between The Lines . . . . . . . 326
Making The Lines React To Lights . . . . . . . . . . 327
Making Lines Shine With Reflections . . . . . . . . 328
Applying Grids Across Object Faces . . . . . . . . 329
Cartoon Coloring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 330
How To Give Objects Cartoon Coloring. . . . . . 330
Absolute Coloring. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 332
How To Give Objects Absolute Coloring . . . . . 332
2D Graphics In A 3D World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333
Absolute Coloring For Pop Art Looks . . . . . . . 334
The Stroked Pop Art Look . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 335
The Modified Pop Art Look . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336
Making TV Screens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337
Making 3D Environments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337
The Matte Color Material . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 338
Making Transition Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 338
Masking Out Unwanted Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . 339
Making Objects Circle Around 2D Elements . . 340
The Shadow Catcher Material . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341
Setting Up The Camera For
A Shadow Catcher Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343
TRACKING AE’S 3D OBJECTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 344
What Kinds Of Objects Can
Track An AE Plane? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 345
How To Make A Set Track A 3D Plane. . . . . . . . . . . 346
Animating With A Controller Plane . . . . . . . . . . . . . 349
Adding Objects To The Tracking Set . . . . . . . . . . . . 350
What To Do If Objects Are Rotating Off Center . . . 351
Troubleshooting Tracking Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . 353
Using 3D Tracking To Scale In All 3 Dimensions . . 355
SPECIAL TOPICS
Changes To Swatch Handling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 358
What Is A Set? What is An Object?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 360
How To Place The Center of Rotation For A Set . . 362
How Do Materials Work?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 365
Understanding Vector Shape & Text Objects . . . . . 369
Creating Spheres And Other Primitives. . . . . . . . . . 373
Creating Grids. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 376
Working With Objects Outside The View
Of The Camera. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 378
Preparing Your Vector Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 379
How To Edit An Illustrator File And Get The
Invigorator To Use The Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . 384
Using Clip Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387
Overlapping Objects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 388
The Holes In Objects Are Filling In . . . . . . . . . . . . . 389
Spikes On Smooth Curves. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 390
Spikes On Points. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 391
Using Scanned Artwork. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 392
The Tiny Camera And Light Buttons . . . . . . . . . . . . 394
Making Projects Render Faster . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 396
TROUBLESHOOTING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 398
KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 403
APPENDIX: The Edge Profiles
Bevels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 407
Inset Faces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 409
Pipes & Half Pipes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 411
Sharp . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 412
Stacks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 414
Chiseled . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 415
Special Purpose . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 416
Woodwork . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 418
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 419
11
A Word From Zax
Welcome my friends to the world of the 3D Invigorator. Like its name implies, the Invigorator will help bring energy and
life to your graphics.
The 3D Invigorator is the first 3D tool ever designed from the ground up for the needs of the graphic artist on a deadline.
Like the best ideas, it was born from the nursery of experience, and the school of hard knocks. Too much labor, too many
sleepless nights, there had to be a better way!
Current 3D tools have not been designed for the fast paced world of everyday graphics production. They are too difficult to
use, take too long to learn and produce modest results until you have “mastered” them. The Invigorator changes all that.
If you are brand new to the world of 3D you will find the Invigorator to be very inviting. You can play and experiment with
your designs as you go, refining your work in “passes” rather than working along a constricting series of steps. You can get
beautiful images right out of the box. These are concepts almost unheard of in 3D work.
If you are already familiar with 3D applications you’ll find tools in the Invigorator that you won’t find anywhere else. We
have broken new ground in 3D modeling technology enabling you to add details to text and logo models that are extraordinarily difficult to create in any other modeler. We have also created some exciting new techniques for texturing and
antialiasing that enable you to easily get images of beauty and depth.
As rookie or veteran, the 3D Invigorator will be an experience you won’t find elsewhere. Merging your 3D application into
your 2D compositor raises your creative work to new heights. It unlocks the restrictions of working in different environments and enables you to mix 3D and 2D at will.
So, welcome to a whole new way of looking at 3D graphics. The Invigorator makes working in 3D such a fun and fast experience I’m sure you will feel, like many of our users, that you have just stepped into the 21st Century!
All my best!
Zax Dow, President
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Installation Instructions
13
INSTALLATION INSTRUCTIONS
System Requirements - MACINTOSH
- A PowerPC Macintosh running Mac OS 9.2.2 or 10.2.8 or 10.3.8.
- Apple’s OpenGL 1.2.1 system extension.
- A High Rez color monitor set to Millions of Colors.
- Adobe After Effects version 6.0 or 6.5
- 128 MB of RAM allocated to After Effects, plus 36 MB of “Largest Unused Block” RAM once all applications are open.
- 50 MB of unused hard disk space.
Installation Instructions - MACINTOSH
The 3D Invigorator software consists of a plug-in, several folders
of support files, and the OpenGL system extension. All of these
files are required for the software to run correctly. Fortunately it’s
easy to put the right things in the right places, so follow the directions and you’ll be up and running quickly.
1 - Insert the application CD and open it, or decompress the
archive you downloaded.
Drag the Zaxwerks folder into the AE Plug-ins folder.
14
The disk or download archive you received contains a main
folder with the words 3D Invig in the title. Double click on this
folder to open it.
Inside the window that opens you will find a folder called
Zaxwerks. Inside this folder is the 3D Invigorator AE plug-in, the
Zaxwerks Invigorator Startup file, the Zaxwerks Swatches folder
and several other support files and folders. Locate the Zaxwerks
folder. It will be used in the next step.
2 - Find and open the Adobe After Effects folder, then find the
Plug-ins folder inside of it. Drag the Zaxwerks folder from the
CD or downloaded archive into the Plug-ins folder.
WARNING: Do not move the folders inside the Zaxwerks folder!
Drag ONLY the Zaxwerks folder into the After Effects > Plug-ins
folder. This will copy all the required files into the appropriate
location on your hard drive. If you drag individual files you may
end up missing the swatch libraries and other support files.
The Invigorator requires Apple’s OpenGL system extension. If
you have OpenGL already installed on your Mac, then make sure
it is turned on. If you don’t have OpenGL then you must either
install it from your system CD, or download it from the Apple
website at http://www.apple.com/opengl/.
You are now ready to launch After Effects and create your first
Invigorator project.
The Invigorator, OpenGL and RAM Usage
The Invigorator is not an ordinary plug-in. It’s a
full 3D application that runs inside After Effects.
Because of this there are some important things
you need to keep in mind when using it.
1. Every Invigorator effect you add to a project
will use from 5 to 10 megs of RAM. It doesn’t
matter whether a particular Invigorator is visible,
invisible, in the current Comp or in a Pre-Comp
sitting off to the side. If it’s in the open AE
project, it’s using RAM. So if you have lots of
Invigorator effects in your project you may run
out of RAM and crash.
2. OpenGL uses its own RAM. (Mac OS9 only) If
you have After Effects set to use too much RAM,
or have other programs open that are using the
available RAM you may crash. OpenGL is a
system extension so it allocates more RAM as it
needs it. You can’t set aside RAM for it, you just
have to make sure free RAM is available when
OpenGL wants it.
Continued in sidebar on next page.
15
The Invigorator, OpenGL and RAM Usage
(continued)
3. The Invigorator uses additional system RAM.
The Invigorator uses a special type of memory
handling, similar to a system extension, that
will allocate system RAM on the fly. As you add
more Invigorator effects to the same project, or
work with high resolution renderings, you may
find that there is no free RAM available and you
may get a crash.
Authorization
You will find the Invigorator plug-in under the Zaxwerks menu.
(Effect > Zaxwerks > 3D Invigorator.) The first time you add the
plug-in to a project it will ask you to enter your Authorization
code. Enter your Name and Organization, and type the code
exactly as it was given to you, then press the OK button. If you
click the Demo or Cancel buttons you will have to relaunch After
Effects before it will give you the authorization window again.
Solution: If you are experiencing crashes try
setting the amount of RAM allocated to After
Effects either up or down, and make sure you
don’t have other programs open that are taking
up additional RAM
If After Effects is set to use nearly all of the
available RAM (i.e. you are running with a “largest unused block” of less than 30 megs) then
turn the amount of RAM allocated to AE down.
NOTE: If you are on Windows or OSX you cannot set RAM sizes so you most likely won’t experience out of RAM conditions, unless you’re running less than minimum system requirements.
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System Requirements - WINDOWS
- Intel Pentium III or 4 processor.
- Microsoft Windows 2000 or Windows XP.
- The OpenGL system .dll file.
- A High Rez color monitor set to True Color.
(OpenGL accelerator card recommended.)
- 256 MB of RAM, 50 MB free disk space.
- Adobe After Effects version 6.0 or 6.5
Installation Instructions - WINDOWS
The 3D Invigorator software consists of a plug-in and several folders of support files. All of these files are required for the software
to run correctly. Fortunately it’s easy to put the right things in the
right places, so follow the directions and you’ll be up and running
quickly.
1 - Insert the application CD and open it, or decompress the
archive you downloaded.
The disk or download archive you received contains a main
folder with the words 3D Invig in the title. Double click this
folder to open it.
Inside the window that opens you will find the main Zaxwerks
folder. Inside this folder is the 3D Invigorator AE plug-in, the
Zaxwerks Invigorator Startup file, the Zaxwerks Swatches folder
and several folders of support files. Locate the Zaxwerks folder.
It will be used in the next step.
2 - Find and open the Adobe After Effects folder, then find the
Plug-ins folder inside of it. Drag the Zaxwerks folder from the
CD or downloaded archive into the Plug-ins folder.
(See the Warning sidebar.)
You are now ready to launch After Effects and create your first
Invigorator project.
WARNING
Do not move the folders inside the Zaxwerks
folder!
Drag ONLY the Zaxwerks folder into the After
Effects > Plug-ins folder. This will copy all the
required files into the appropriate location on
your hard drive. If you drag individual files you
may end up missing the swatch libraries and
other support files.
17
NOTE: The Invigorator requires OpenGL 1.1 to run. OpenGL is
a system extension (opengl32.dll) that comes with your Windows
operating system. If you try to run the Invigorator and get an
error saying OpenGL is missing, reinstall it from your System CD
or download it from the Microsoft website Downloads Center
(http://www.microsoft.com/downloads)
Authorization
You will find the Invigorator plug-in under the Zaxwerks menu.
(Effect > Zaxwerks > 3D Invigorator.) The first time you add the
plug-in to a project it will ask you to enter your Authorization
code. Enter your Name and Organization, and type the code exactly as it was given to you, then press the OK button.
If you click the Demo or Cancel buttons you will have to relaunch
After Effects before it will give you the authorization window
again.
TROUBLESHOOTING TIP
On some systems running Windows XP, you will not be able
to type any more than 2 or 3 characters per field. If this
happens to you, type the information into NotePad then
copy each line and paste it into the appropriate field.
18
Basic Concepts
19
20
BASIC CONCEPTS
The 3D Invigorator creates its own images. It does not process
existing footage to give it a “3D effect”. Instead, you create a
Solid and apply the 3D Invigorator filter to it.
The 3D Invigorator is more like a full application than it is a
plug-in. Like After Effects it has a workflow style that is straightforward and quick to understand. Like most other plug-ins it can
be used within minutes of opening it up. Unlike most plug-ins
however, it has the depth of a full application. There is a tremendous amount of technology and workflow design packed into this
program. The reason it was made as a plug-in is because a tight
integration of a plug-in with its host speeds up the workflow, increases flexibility and raises the overall quality of the final work.
To aid in getting the most from the 3D Invigorator, here is a short
overview of the steps for creating a 3D graphic.
Modeling
The 3D Invigorator creates its own models out of Adobe Illustrator files and Vector Clip art. Models can be modified using the
controls in the Object Tab. A selection of over 100 preset edge
“bevels” come built into the program.
The PRO version of the 3D Invigorator can also import models
that were created in other 3D programs, build basic shapes of its
Modeling
The creation of an object’s shape.
Surface Set Up
The “paint job” that is applied to the surface of the models.
Scene Set Up
The positioning of the objects and lights
within the 3D scene. Also the positioning of
the camera which views the scene and films
the animation footage.
Animation
The moving of the camera, objects or the
lights within the 3D scene.
Rendering
Processing the animation into the final
movie footage.
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own, and create models out of fonts. There are thousands of 3D
models that can be purchased or downloaded for free from websites around the world. Look on the goodies page of our website
for links to other websites that offer 3D models.
(www. zaxwerks.com/goodies.html)
Surface Set Up
The Invigorator has a completely unique way of handling surfaces. Up to six different materials can be applied to each object
and that object may use those six materials in a variety of ways.
Once you use it you will see how the Invigorator has finally given
to 3D artists the tools to create a new generation of 3D title and
logo graphics. Graphics like you have never seen before.
Scene Set Up
Setting up a 3D scene has been streamlined to make it easier
for 2D motion graphic artists to make the jump to 3D. A scene
can have as many objects as you need and objects or groups of
objects can be rotated and positioned independently. Up to six
lights can be used, and once you get your lights perfect they can
be saved and reused in future projects.
Object manipulation within the 3D scene is being done in a way
that’s completely new. Single and multiple objects can be manipulated with speed and fluidity. There are a full compliment of
short cut keys. Even nudge keys are supported.
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Animation
The animation is handled completely from inside the AE Effect
Controls window and the AE Timeline. All your familiar methods
for handling Keyframes, Ease In/Out, Expressions and Animation
Assistants can be used. When animating, only the animation tools
are presented, so there is less to worry about and the workflow is
once again faster.
Rendering
The rendering engine is designed for the rigors of professional
production. It creates beautiful images with excellent antialiasing,
image mapping, bump mapping, reflection mapping, soft
shadows, transparencies for glass effects, chrome effects, flythroughs, fly-bys and can even place After Effects movie footage
onto any object in the 3D scene.
The rest of the manual is divided into the following sections:
The Quick Start section will give you a quick
overview of the 3D Invigorator process. It uses
standard 3D terminology and is geared toward
users with previous 3D experience.
The Tutorials section will walk you through
the process of creating many different kinds
of 3D Invigorator projects. It’s best to follow the
tutorials in order since each builds on material
presented in earlier tutorials.
The Feature Reference section presents indepth explanations of what each tool and setting does and how to apply them.
The Special Topics section addresses common
questions and their solutions.
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24
Quick Start
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26
Quick Start
(Also see the Expanded Quick Start section)
These are the most basic steps required to create a 3D graphic.
Use vector artwork made in Illustrator or FreeHand.
1. Draw some 2D shapes in a vector drawing program or select
them from a vector-based clip art library. Save the file in Illustrator CS or earlier format.
2. Add a 3D Invigorator effect to a Solid and bring the shapes into
it by opening the Illustrator file made in Step 1. The shapes will
automatically become 3D objects. NOTE: Do not turn on the 3D
switch for this solid. (For the PRO version, first click the “Open
Illustrator File” button, then open the file made in step 1.)
Find the 3D Invigorator under the Effect menu. A
box will open for you to pick a vector file.
3. Open the 3D Invigorator’s Set-Up window (click the Red Ball
button) to enhance the object shapes, set surface materials, set
lights and position the camera. Use the Effect Controls window to
set keyframes for animating the camera, lights and objects.
The Set-Up window is where you do everything except setting
animation keyframes. Click the tiny Red Ball button to open it.
4. Create the final 3D image by setting the Solid to Best Quality.
The Invigorator contains dozens of presets you can use to make
your objects look like gold, chrome and glass, in a variety of
shapes and sizes. These can all be dropped onto your objects
from inside the Set-Up window.
Turn on the Best Quality switch to see exactly
how the final rendering will look.
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We highly recommend you read the Expanded Quick Start and
the Tutorials section. The Expanded Quick Start is short, and
contains information that will dramatically affect the quality of
your work.
Think Like A Photographer
It’s important to remember that when you work with the 3D Invigorator you are using a real 3D program. 3D programs simulate
a photographer’s studio. You can move objects, set lights, and
reposition the camera.
You are always looking at the scene through the lens of the
camera. The Preview window shows you what the camera sees.
What you see through the Camera lens (the Preview window) is
what you will get in the final rendering.
Thinking like a Photographer helps you figure out what to do.
For instance, moving one object closer to the camera will make
that object bigger. On the other hand, moving the camera closer
to the objects will make all the objects bigger.
If you are taking a picture of a group of people and you can’t see
them all in the camera’s viewfinder, what do you do? Have everyone move back? Or move the camera back? Both would work,
but one is easier.
Once you start to think like a person shooting a picture with a
camera, things start to make more sense.
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Expanded Quick Start
Step 1 - Create The Beginning 2D Shapes
Draw some shapes in a bezier-based vector drawing program
such as Illustrator, FreeHand or Corel Draw and save them in
Illustrator format (CS version or lower) or select vector clip art
from a vector-based clip art library.
Use Vector Outlines
Raster images
won’t work
The shapes must be vector outlines. Pixel images or scans won’t
work unless you turn them into vector outlines by tracing them.
(See the section called Using Scanned Artwork in the Special
Topics section.)
Stroked paths become hollow objects.
Don’t over build. Keep the line art simple. Most of the pizzazz
comes from the Edge Styles and shading applied to the models
inside the 3D Invigorator.
When the vector paths are filled they create solid 3D objects.
Paths that only have a stroke create hollow 3D objects. Stroke
widths are ignored.
To create text in the Classic version, layout the text in your vector
drawing program, then convert the text to outlines before saving
the file. If you have the PRO version you can type text directly
into the text window and make unlimited changes at any time.
Filled paths become solid objects.
A Text Object
Vector Outlines
Convert Text to Outlines before saving.
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Step 2 - Adding The Shapes To The 3D Invigorator
Add the 3D Invigorator to a Solid.
Pick a vector file when you see this dialogue box.
In After Effects create a Solid that you want the size of your 3D
rendering to be. The 3D Invigorator uses the size of the Solid as
the size of the final rendering. There is no limit on the size of the
Solid, however most times the solid is the same size as the comp.
NOTE: Do not turn on the 3D switch for this Solid. It
must remain a 2D layer.
Select the Solid and add the 3D Invigorator from the Effect menu.
(Effect > Zaxwerks > 3D Invigorator) A dialogue box will open
asking you to open the vector file you created in Step 1.
(If you are using the PRO version you will first see a window
with several buttons on it. Click the button that says “Open Illustrator File”.)
Select the file containing the vector shapes you want to invigorate
and click Open. The shapes will automatically be turned into 3D
models using the default Object Style.
Comp window
The Effect Controls window will open and you will see a Preview
window of the objects in the 3D scene. A Draft mode rendering
will be done and placed into the Comp window. Draft mode has
no textures, shadows or antialiasing. However it renders in nearreal time so it’s perfect for motion tests.
Effect Controls window
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If you want to create more objects click the Create... button and
open another file. In the PRO version this button is actually a
menu of creation options and is called the Object menu.
A file may be added more than once to create multiple 3D objects which all look the same. When you do this though, the 3D
shapes will be in exactly the same place making it look like you
have only one 3D object. Go into the Set-Up window, click on the
Object tab, then use the tools to move them apart.
Step 3a - Adjust The Camera, Lights or Objects
Click this button to add more objects.
Click this button to open the Set-Up window.
Under the Scene Preview window in the Effect Controls, click the
little button with the Red Ball on it to open the Set-Up window.
The Effect Controls contains everything that is animatable.
The Set-Up window contains everything non-animatable.
Change the shape of the objects, their Depth and the Edge Profile
applied to them by selecting the objects, then changing the sliders
and popup menu choices in the large Object Tab on the right half
of the Set-Up window.
Object shape and depth is controlled here.
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Color the objects by dragging and dropping material swatches on
them from the bin of swatches in the large Materials Tab.
Change the direction, color and intensity of the lights by clicking
on the Light mode button in the toolbar to reveal the direction
manipulator and other lighting controls.
Change the position and rotation of each Object by clicking on
the Object mode button in the toolbar, then selecting and manipulating single or multiple objects using the manipulator tools.
Hold down the Shift key and click on objects to add them to the
current selection.
Assign objects to animatable Sets by choosing a Set number from
the Sets popup menu. A Set is a parent which can move multiple
children at one time. After Effects can animate eight parent Sets.
The Set assignment is done in the Set-Up window, but the animation is done in the Effect Controls window.
Assigning Object 1 to Set 1.
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Step 3b - Creating The Animation
Animation is done by dragging in the Scene Preview window seen
in the Effect Controls. Setting keyframes is handled inside the
After Effects Timeline with the standard keyframing techniques.
The Camera, three Lights and eight Sets can be animated. To create keyframes enable the animation stopwatches for the parameters you want to animate. Then move the Time Marker and drag
in the Scene Preview window. Do not drag in the Comp window.
(NOTE: Both the Classic & PRO versions can use the AE camera. See the section called: Linking to the AE 3D Camera)
Drag in the Effect Controls window to set keyframes.
Mode buttons
Manipulation tools
The three mode buttons (Camera, Light, Set) located below the
preview window, tell the program which type of object will be
affected when you use the manipulation tools.
To rotate or move the Camera, click on the Camera tab, then use
the manipulation tools. (Tumble, Roll, Track, Dolly)
Click the Camera Mode button to manipulate the camera.
Lights are handled the same way, except you can only tumble
lights, you cannot Track or Dolly them.
(NOTE: To create Spot Lights or Point lights see the see the section called: Linking to the AE 3D Camera and 3D Lights)
Click the Light Mode button to manipulate the lights.
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To rotate or move a Set, first click on the Sets button (3 cubes),
then use the manipulation tools. Remember, animating a Set will
affect all the objects that have been assigned to that Set.
Click on the Sets Mode button to manipulate sets of objects.
When objects are first loaded into the 3D Invigorator, they are
assigned to Set 1 by default. This can be changed in the Invigorator’s User Prefs. When you select a Set (click on it) you will see
bounding boxes around each object within that Set. Objects can
be freely moved from one Set to another when you are inside the
Set-Up window.
Step 4 - Rendering The 3D Graphic
The rendering quality is controlled by the Draft/Best quality
switch on the Solid that the 3D Invigorator effect is applied to.
Draft mode produces OpenGL renderings which have no shadows
or antialiasing, but render in nearly real time which makes doing
motion tests incredibly fast.
The layer quality switch on Draft Mode.
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Full 3D rendering takes quite a bit of time and is not interactive,
so you should leave the solid on Draft mode unless you are working on the final look of the 3D scene. When setting up the Render
Queue, adjust the settings for Best Quality and the layer will then
render with all textures, shadows, reflections and antialiasing.
What goes into a Best quality rendering is controlled from inside
the Set-Up window. You can adjust the antialiasing level from a
popup seen below the toolbar when the Camera mode button is
clicked.
Shadows, textures, reflections and layer maps are all set up inside
the Set-Up window and don’t appear until a Best quality rendering
is done.
Inside the Set-Up window, holding down the Command key (Mac)
or Alt key (Windows) turns the OK button into the Test button
which will do a Best quality rendering at small size. This is very
useful for testing the look of the lighting and textures without
having to go back to the AE comp window to see the results of
your changes.
Antialiasing popup menu
Do a test render to get a Best Quality rendering
while inside the Set-Up window.
Back in After Effects, the Caps Lock key is used to abort renderings in progress. Turning on the Caps Lock key will stop any
rendering within seconds so you can make adjustments.
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Saving Your Work
Your work is saved as part of the After Effects project file. When
you next open your AE project the data is reloaded and the 3D
scene is recreated, ready to be edited or rendered.
Each Invigorator effect you add to the project carries its own 3D
scene data, as well as all of the settings needed to recreate the
materials, lights, and objects styles.
The swatches in the bins are not saved into the project file, they
are saved into the Zaxwerks Swatches folder which is located on
your hard drive in the same folder as the 3D Invigorator plug-in.
By saving them into this central database any material or object
style you create is available to be used by any other 3D Invigorator project.
All swatches that appear in the Invigorator are saved
into the central library called Zaxwerks Swatches.
One thing to remember however, is if you delete swatches from
the bins they will be deleted permanently from the hard drive.
Deleting swatches does not hurt your current projects, it just
means that the swatch disappears from the bin.
Once cleared from the bins, swatches can be regenerated by
selecting an object and clicking the Material Set-Up button. The
swatches will appear at the bottom of the window in the Materials Palette. Once regenerated they can be dragged to the bin and
used in other projects.
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Tutorials
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These tutorials are designed to get you acquainted with the 3D
Invigorator by walking you through simple projects.
Before You Start
Please follow the installation instructions to make sure you have
the plug-in and all supporting files installed on your machine in
the correct locations before you start the tutorials.
This manual assumes you have an understanding of After Effects.
If the tutorial says “Make a new Comp” or “Open the Effect
Controls window”, and you don’t know how to do that, please
go back to the After Effects manual, do the tutorials there and get
familiar with how After Effects works.
TUTORIAL 1
A Camera Animation
Title animations that introduce a show, tell you what’s coming up
next or identify a presenter can be brought to life by the use of a
simple camera animation.
In this tutorial we will import a graphic, turn it into 3D models,
then animate the camera around the models to lend a very simple
but effective 3D feel to the graphic making it much more inviting
and attractive to look at.
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Add The Invigorator To Your After Effects Project
Every 3D Invigorator animation starts the same way. You must
create a Solid and then apply the 3D Invigorator to it by selecting
the effect from the Effects menu.
1. Open After Effects.
2. If you’re starting from scratch create a new Comp and a new
Solid. The size of the Solid determines the size of the 3D rendering. Most times you’ll make the size of the Solid the same size as
the Comp. NOTE: Do not turn on the 3D switch for this Solid. It
must remain a 2D layer.
3. Select the Solid, apply the 3D Invigorator to it which is located
in the Effect menu.
(Effect > Zaxwerks > 3D Invigorator)
4. The Select Artwork dialogue will open which lets you pick
an Adobe Illustrator type of file containing vector artwork. The
file must have vectors in it and saved in Illustrator CS or earlier
format. Bitmaps and scans will not create 3D models.
Macromedia FreeHand and Corel Draw both have options
to export their files in Illustrator format.
The Select Artwork dialogue
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If you are using the PRO version you will first see a window with
several buttons on it. Click the button that says “Open Illustrator
File.”
5. Find the Gold Rush.ai file which is located in the
Invigorator Tutorials folder.
6. Double click on the Illustrator file or click Open. This
will put you back into the main After Effects interface
and open the Effect Controls window. Here you will see
a 3D Scene Preview window, a toolbar and the animation
controls. A Draft mode rendering of the image will also
appear in the Comp window.
7. The right side of the 3D Scene Preview window will
be clipped off by the edge of the Effect Controls window.
Drag the bottom right corner of the Effect Controls window to make it larger so the Preview window doesn’t get
clipped off.
Drag here to make the Effect Controls window wider.
8. In the Effect Controls window, click on the Views
popup and select High Left. This will move the camera
closer to the words.
Notice how the Illustrator graphic has already
been turned into 3D objects, (called models in 3Dspeak.) The Invigorator creates the models based
on default settings but you can change the settings to change the look of the models.
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Looking Over The Effect Controls
Take a moment to familiarize yourself with the layout of the
controls. The animation control center for the Invigorator is the
Effect Controls window. Here you can see a 3D Scene Preview
window which shows you your 3D scene. This window shows
you solid 3D objects but it does not show you shadows, reflections or image maps. Rendering those things takes extra time
and the Scene Preview window is designed for speed. It’s a
preview of the rendering. To see the final full quality rendering
set the layer to Best quality and look in the Comp window.
The Scene Preview window is also where you drag the cursor to
affect the camera, lights or objects. Select a tool from the Toolbar, pick which scene element you want to adjust, and then drag
the cursor in the window to see the effect. Dragging things with
these tools is how you set keyframes to create an animation.
Drag in the Scene Preview window
to manipulate scene elements.
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You get to the part of the Invigorator that handles object set up,
surface set up and all the other non-animatable aspects of a 3D
scene by clicking the Set-Up button which is the red ball, located
just below the Scene Preview window. Do not click it at this
time, we’ll be getting to it in a moment.
Keyframing and animation editing is controlled from the Timeline
window, where all the other After Effects animation editing is
done.
The Comp window shows you the current composite. The Invigorator will render a frame and show it to you in the Comp window
respecting whether you have Draft or Best mode turned on.
The Timeline window is where all keyframes are set.
Be aware that unless you are linking to the AE Comp
camera or lights, you cannot drag anything in the Comp
window that will affect the 3D scene. You can drag the
rendered 2D image just like any other layer, but interacting
with the 3D scene is done from the Scene Preview window
in the Effect Controls.
Going back to the Effect Controls then, you will notice that in the
toolbar directly under the Scene Preview window the first icon
on the left, the Camera, is highlighted in blue. This means it is
turned ON and you are in Camera mode. Any dragging you do
inside the Scene Preview window will affect only the Camera.
Take a moment and do this. Make sure the Camera icon is blue,
then click on one of the four manipulator tools on the right:
Tumble, Roll, Track and Dolly. Try out each tool and see what
it does. If you get lost you can always use Undo to get back to
where you started.
Camera Mode
Button
The Cameraʼs
Manipulator Tools
The Effect Controls Toolbar
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1. Click on the Camera mode icon, then click on the Tumble tool
and drag in the Scene Preview window. Drag up/down/left/right
and watch what happens to the scene.
2. Select each of the other tools and drag them in the Scene Preview to see their effect.
Remember you are looking through the lens of a camera.
As you drag you are moving the camera around the objects. It may feel like you are moving the objects in front of
the camera, but if the Camera button is blue, you are really
moving the camera.
Watch the floor grid as you drag. Notice that the floor is
moving too. This lets you know you are moving the camera.
If you were moving objects the floor would stay in place.
3. When you’re done experimenting select the High Left option in
the Views popup menu located just under the Tool bar. This will
set you back to the default view.
Select High Left in the Views popup menu.
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Adding Color To The 3D Scene
Since you are working in a full 3D program you get to play with
the lighting! Let’s add a little color to the scene by changing the
color of the lights.
Below the Scene Preview window is a list of animation channels. They are organized by Camera controls first, then Lighting
controls, then Set controls, then Layer Maps.
1. Click on the arrow next to Lights to reveal the three
animatable lights, then click on the arrow next to Light 1 to see
the animation channels.
The 3D Invigorator has six possible lights but only three of them
can be animated. These animatable lights are set to have a direction only. There is no position to worry about so you won’t accidentally find yourself placing a light behind the objects or pointing them away from the objects. You set the direction you want
the light to shine in and the program will automatically place it so
that all the objects will receive the light.
See the section called: “Linking to the AE 3D Camera &
3D Lights” for information on how to create Spot lights and
Point lights.
Click the color chip to change a light’s color.
Next you will change the color of the lights by changing the color
chip for Light 1.
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2. Click on the Light 1 color chip and pick a saturated yellow color. If you have an image on your screen
with a strong yellow in it you may use the Eyedropper tool to pick the color from that image.
Once you do this you will notice how there is a strong
yellow cast shining on the left side of the objects.
These objects all started out white so you see the full
effect of the lighting. As object colors get darker and
more saturated you will see less effect from colored
lights.
Now change the color of the second light.
3. Click on the Light 2 color chip and pick a strong
red color that’s not too dark.
Click on the Light Color Chip and pick from the color picker.
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Now you will see the right sides of the objects lit
up in Red. Where the two lights shine on the same
surfaces they mix to a nice golden color. Light 3 is
turned off so we won’t do anything with it.
Animating The Camera
Now that the lighting is set, it’s time to create our first animation.
Go back to the toolbar and switch to Camera mode. There are
three types of cameras in the Invigorator. These are selected from
the Camera Type popup: Orbit, Look At and Hand Held.
The Orbit camera is what we will use for this animation because
it’s the perfect camera for doing table-top-style shots. The Look
At camera is best for fly-bys and fly-throughs. The Hand Held
camera is best for animations where you need to “wander”
through a scene frequently changing what you’re looking at. It’s
more flexible but takes more control. These camera types are
covered in detail in the camera section.
1. Under the Scene Preview window, click on the Camera icon to
activate the camera controls.
Below the toolbar are several popups and buttons. Find the
popup that says Views. The contents of this popup changes
based on whether the Camera, Lights, or Sets icon is blue. When
the Camera icon is blue the Views popup displays a list of preset
camera views and also lets you save your own views.
2. From the Views popup, select the Low Right view preset.
This will move your camera so you are looking up at the objects
from a little off to the right side making the objects look large and
grand. This will be the position of your first keyframe.
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In order to set a keyframe we need to enable the animation channels for the Camera.
3. In the Effect Controls window turn down the arrow in front
of “Camera” and find the two channels labeled Camera Tumble.
Click on the little stopwatches in front of the two tumble channels to enable animation for these parameters.
This is the fastest way to turn on animation for a channel. The
other way is to go to the Timeline window, turn down the arrows
until you find the Tumble parameters for the camera then click
on the animation stopwatch icons.
4. In the Timeline window move the Time Marker to the 4 second
mark.
Now you are ready to set your second keyframe.
Click on the animation stop watches for both Camera Tumble
channels to turn on animation for these channels.
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5. Return to the 3D Invigorator Scene Preview window and
select the Tumble tool. Click in the window and drag to the right.
This will orbit the camera around the objects. Drag until you
have a viewing angle that is similar to the Low Right view you
started with but is now looking from the left. Release the mouse
to set the keyframe.
If you now drag again without moving the Time Marker the
Invigorator will simply update the existing keyframe. There is no
need to remove the old keyframe in order to change it.
Be careful, however, not to drag with any other tool besides
the tumble tool. In Step 3 only the animation channels for the
Tumble tool were enabled, so using any other tools will affect
the entire animation, not just the current time.
Previewing Your Animation
You can now preview the animation by clicking the Play button
in the After Effects Time Controls palette.
If you like you can click the RAM Preview button and watch your
animation play back in real time! If you want the viewing angle
to change more, stop the preview and go to the keyframe you
want to change. Then, in the Invigorator Scene Preview window,
drag to change the view, then Preview again.
You are never locked into one view or one animation. Everything
can always be changed. Experiment with setting the second
keyframe to end with a high view instead of a low view.
Drag with the Tumble tool active to orbit the Camera.
Click the RAM Preview button in the AE Time Controls
palette to watch animation playback in real time.
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Drag up
with the
Dolly
tool to
move the
Camera
closer
to your
objects.
If you’d like to experiment with coming closer to the objects as
you orbit around them, go back to the first keyframe. Find the
channel in the list titled Camera Distance, enable animation for
this channel, then go to the second keyframe, select the Dolly
tool (the one that looks like an arrow pointing in and out of the
screen) and drag up and down to move the camera closer to or
farther away from the objects.
Rendering The Final Animation
To render the final version of your animation all you need to do
is set the layer to Best quality instead of Draft quality and pick
Make Movie, from the Composition menu.
At this point however, you will not see much difference between
the Draft version and the Best version with the exception that the
images are now antialiased. This is because the surfaces of your
objects are simply colored white. There are no shadows, reflections or images covering your objects which are the things that
come out during the final Best quality rendering pass.
To change the surfaces you must click the Red Ball button to
enter the Invigorator’s Set-Up interface. This is where most of
the controls are and a 3D program has a lot of controls. However,
we’ve organized things to be easy to get to and the next tutorial
will walk you through the highlights of the Set-Up interface.
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TUTORIAL 2
A Walk-About Through The Set-Up Window
The part of the Invigorator program that lets you set up everything prior to the final animation stages is opened by clicking the
Set-Up (red ball) button below the Scene Preview window. This
is called the 3D Invigorator Set-Up window.
If you are starting fresh with Tutorial 2 and don’t have any objects
in your scene, do Step 1. Otherwise proceed to Step 2.
1. Open After Effects. Create a New Comp. Create a New Solid.
Select the Solid and apply the Invigorator (Effect > Zaxwerks >
3D Invigorator). Find the Gold Rush.ai file in the Tutorial Files
folder. Double click the Gold Rush.ai file to open it.
This will return you to After Effects and open the Effect Controls
where you will see the Invigorator’s Scene Preview window. Below the Scene Preview window is the Set-Up (red ball) button.
2. Click the Set-Up button to open the 3D Invigorator Set-Up
window.
The Set-Up window can be divided into a left half and a right half.
The left half has the 3D Scene Preview at the top, the toolbar
below that and a small tab area that changes at the bottom.
Click on the Set-Up (red ball) button in the Effect
Controls window to open the Set-Up window,
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3. Click on the Camera mode button to see
some settings and controls for the camera.
Camera Mode button
Views... menu
Here you see the Views... popup like you
saw below the toolbar in the Effect Controls
window. There is also another popup menu
which lets you change the lens the camera
uses. Using a shorter lens (one with a lower
mm value) emphasizes the perspective, making near objects appear much larger than
distant objects.
Lens popup
Light
Swatch
Bin
Light
Editor
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4. Click on the Light mode button. When
you do this two things happen at once. First
the small tab area at the bottom of the left half
of the interface changes to show you the lighting controller and the lights list where you can
select different lights to work with.
The second thing that happens is the whole
right half of the interface changes to show you
the Light Editor at the bottom and a bin of
light swatches at the top. This bin of swatches contains preset lights which can be applied
by clicking and dragging one of the swatches
and dropping it onto the current light’s swatch
located in the Light Editor.
These light swatches contain information for only a
single light, letting you fine tune one light at a time.
To apply a whole scene’s worth of lights in one action you can use the Lighting Styles swatches.
5. Click on the Lighting Styles tab located at the
top of the right half of the lighting interface.
This tab contains swatches of Lighting Styles. A
Lighting Style is a complete set of lights, including their positions, directions, colors, intensities,
shadows and every other setting used to arrange the
lights in exactly the same way as when the swatch
was saved.
Click the Lighting Styles tab.
Lighting Styles is a very powerful feature. It
enables you to design a particular lighting set
up and then save it for future use. The Lighting Styles swatches can be exchanged with
other artists so a Creative Director can design
a particular look for the project and have all
the other artists working on the project use the
same lighting.
A Lighting Style swatch is applied by dragging it
from it’s location in the swatch bin, and dropping
it into the Scene Preview window. When you do
this you will replace all other lights currently in the
scene.
Drag a Lighting Style swatch from the swatch bin
and drop into the Scene Preview window.
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6. Back at the toolbar, click on the Object Mode button.
Object Mode button
Set Assignment popup
Object
List
When you were working in the Effect Controls window this
button had three cubes on it and was called the Set Mode
button. This is because you can only animate Sets in After
Effects not individual objects.
Inside the Set-Up window however, you get to work with individual objects and the Object Mode button has only a single
cube on it to show you this.
When you clicked on the Object Mode button two things happened. First the area under the toolbar changed to show you
the Create Object button which you use to create new objects. It
also shows you the Object List popup where you select individual
objects, and the Set Assignment popup which you use to assign
an object to one of the animatable Sets.
The second thing that happened is the entire right half of the interface changed from the Lighting controls to the Object controls.
You’ll notice up at the top there are three tabs. There’s a tab for
Objects, a tab for Materials and a tab for Object Styles.
The Object tab controls the shape of the models.
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The Object tab controls the shape of the models. The Materials tab controls the color and appearance of the surface of each
model. The Object Styles tab contains customizable presets for
the complete look of a model, both shape and surface settings.
7. Click on the Object tab, if it’s not
already the front-most tab.
This tab is where you control the shape
of your objects. The controls in it will
change based on which object is selected. Select an object in the Scene Preview window. If more than one object is
selected (shift click), it will show you the
controls for the Primary selection which
was the object selected first.
Object, Materials & Object Styles Tabs
Primary Selection
Secondary
Selections
The Primary selection is given a red
bounding box in the Scene Preview
window, whereas the other selected
objects have green bounding boxes.
8. Click on the Materials tab.
This is where you create materials that
will be applied to the surface of an
object. At the top of this tab is a storage
bin of material swatches similar to the
storage bin of light swatches you saw in
the Lights tab.
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Materials
Swatch
Bin
Material
Editor
Current
Material
being
edited
PRO
Features
Texture Map Thumbnails Enable Texture
appear here
Check Box
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Layer Map
Selector
Material swatches are saved into a
central library on disk and loaded in
the bins each time the Set-Up window
is opened. Each swatch contains all
the settings needed to create a material, including pointers to the texture
maps used. Texture maps are scans
or pictures applied to objects to make
their surface color and texture more
interesting.
At the bottom of the Materials tab is an
area containing the material controls.
This area is called the Material Editor.
The swatch ball shows you the current
material that is loaded into the Material
Editor. The sliders control various settings, and the boxes show any texture
maps used. The little checkboxes turn
the texture maps on or off.
You load a swatch into the Material Editor by either double clicking on it, or by dragging it from
the bin and dropping it onto the
swatch in the Editor.
9. Click on the red material swatch in the
Materials bin , drag it into the Scene Preview
window, and drop it onto one of the selected
objects. This is the fastest way to apply materials to objects.
10. Click on the Object Styles tab.
This tab contains swatches of Object Styles.
An Object Style is a complete set of every
material and every shape setting used to create and color an object.
Apply a material by dropping
a swatch onto an object.
This is a very powerful feature! It enables
you to design a look for an object, save it
and then apply it to something else with
one action. Object Styles swatches are
saved into a central library, so they can be
exchanged with other artists and reused on
future projects. They enable you to design a
look and then reuse that look over and over.
Applying an Object Style takes nothing more
than dragging it from its location in the bin
and dropping it onto a selected object in the
Scene Preview window. If more than one
object is selected, the swatch gets applied to
all of them at once!
Apply an Object Style by dropping
a swatch onto an object.
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11. Above the Scene Preview window is a button titled Material
Set-Up. Click it. (Make sure an object is selected or else the Material Set-Up button will be dimmed.)
When you click the Material Set-Up button you do two things at
once. You reveal the Material Set-up window, and you reveal the
Materials Palette which is the set of six square docks where material swatches can be placed. The palette can also be hidden and
revealed on its own by using the Palette checkbox.
Edge
Profile
of
selected
object
The Material Set-up window shows you a drawing of the
Edge Profile applied to the currently selected object. If
more than one object is selected you will see the Edge
Profile applied to the Primary selection, which is the object
with the red bounding box in the Scene Preview window.
Material
Chips
The Material Set-up window also shows you the materials assigned to the Edges and Faces of your objects. You can apply up
to six different materials to each object. By default the material
in dock #1 is applied to everything. You can see this by spotting
the green material chip, with the number 1 in it, sitting next to the
Front Faces, Outside Edges and Back Faces in the window.
Materials
Palette
Docks
The Materials Palette for Vector and Text objects has six docks.
The Materials Palette for Imported objects has only one dock.
The Materials Palette for Primitives changes based on the
number of sides.
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You can change the material applied to an object by simply dragging a swatch from the Materials bin on the right, and dropping it
into dock #1 in the Palette. (Click on the Scene Preview button to
see what the color looks like applied to your object.)
To assign more than one material to an edge profile, drag another
swatch from the Materials bin down and into an empty dock in
the Materials Palette. Select the Split Point tool and click on
the black line of the edge profile at the point where you want the
color to change from one material to another. Then drag the new
swatch from the palette and drop it onto one of the green chips.
(See more on assigning materials in the Material Set-Up Window section of the manual.)
12. Click on the Scene Preview button to return to the main 3D
window and see what your model color looks like.
Split Points
Split
Point
tool
- – —————————— – -
Drag the swatch from the Materials Palette and
drop it onto one of the material chips.
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TUTORIAL 3
Selecting, Renaming And Manipulating Objects
Let’s look at the basics of how we work with individual objects.
Clearing An Old Scene And Creating New Objects
1a. If you are continuing from the end of Tutorial 2: Open the
Set-Up window and click on the Clear Scene button, which is
located to the left of the Objects List once you’ve made the Object
mode button active (blue). This will delete all objects from your
scene and set everything back to its default state. Next do Step 2.
1b. If you are starting fresh with this tutorial: Add a 3D Invigorator effect to a Solid. When the file picker appears open the Stars.
ai file and once the Effect Controls window appears find the
Invigorator’s Scene Preview window and click the Set-Up (red
ball) button just below it. Now skip Step 2 and continue with the
next section.
2. Click on the Create Object button. (If you are using the PRO
version click on the “Object...” popup menu and pick “Open Illustrator File”) When you see the Select Artwork window find
the Stars.ai file located in the Invigorator Tutorials folder, and
click the Open button.
This will open an Illustrator file containing some stars.
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Examining The Object List
1. Click on the Object Mode button, if it’s not already blue, and
then click and hold down on the Object list.
The Object List is a pop up menu containing a list of all objects
in the Invigorator.
You will notice that there are four items in the list: Object 1, 2, 3
and Group 1. These are the default names given to the objects as
they were imported from the Illustrator file.
Notice that all the objects have 3D boxes around them made of
lines. These are called wireframe bounding boxes.
You can see that the bounding box of the first star is red while the
others are green. The red object is called the Primary selection
and its settings are displayed in the Object tab.
If you look in the Object list you will see that the item called Object 1 has a bullet in front of its name. That’s because Object 1 is
the Primary selection.
The other objects are called Secondary selections and their
settings are not shown in the Object tab. We can change which
object is the Primary selection by choosing a different object
from the Object list.
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2. Click on the Object list and release the mouse on Object 2.
Now the red bounding box is surrounding the second star. This
star looks hollow. That’s because when it was created in Illustrator, this object was given a stroke color, but no Fill color. When it
comes into the Invigorator you see the edges but no centers.
The first star, Object 1, had a fill color so it appears solid when it
is turned into a 3D object.
3. Click on the Object List and release the mouse on Object 3.
You will see that the third star now has a red bounding box and
its name is displayed in the Object list when this popup is in its
closed state.
This object was created as a compound path inside Illustrator
by using one of the Pathfinder tools. A compound path is two or
more vector shapes that make up a single object.
In most cases the extra shapes are holes. The Invigorator knows
when you have holes in your Illustrator shapes and creates the
models accordingly. There are even special controls for giving
holes extra attention.
Selecting Object 2 from the Object list.
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4. Click on the Object list and release the mouse on Group 1.
A Group is a set of shapes which have been combined into one
locked multi-part object by selecting them all in Illustrator and
using Illustrator’s “Group” command on them. When objects are
grouped together they all move as one unit.
Anything that appears as a single item in this object list is always
referred to as an object. This is because even though there are
several individual stars in Group 1, all those stars are locked
together and can only move as a single unit.
Important Point To Remember
Anything that is grouped in Illustrator will come into the
Invigorator locked together.
If you need to rotate, position or color objects individually you must remember to ungroup them in Illustrator
before saving the Illustrator file.
5. At the top of the Object List is a menu item called Select
None. Pick this command.
All the bounding boxes will disappear signifying that no objects
are selected.
Use the Select None command to deselect all objects.
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Selecting And Renaming Objects
There are four tools located in the toolbar under the Scene Preview window that are used to manipulate objects. These are the
Tumble tool, the Roll tool, the Track tool and the Dolly tool.
These Manipulator tools can also be used to select objects.
1. Click on the Tumble tool to select it, (making it blue), then
click once on the first star.
Be sure not to drag when you click. If you drag, the program will
think you are trying to tumble something, however if you click
without dragging the program knows to select the object that was
under the mouse.
If you cannot hold the mouse still enough during the click to
select the first star you can use the Selection tool instead. The
Selection tool isn’t particular about whether you click or drag
during a selection, so it’s easier to make selections with it. The
Selection tool is the icon of an arrow with a little “click” at its
end. It’s right next to the magnifying glass.
Click one of the Manipulator tools to make it
active, then click once on an Object in the
Scene Preview window to select it.
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When selected you can see how the bounding box is red. This
again means that this object’s settings are being displayed in the
Object tab.
2. Take a look at the Object tab.
At the top is an edit box containing the name Object 1. This is
where you can change the name of the object to something more
meaningful.
3. Click and drag over the name Object 1 in the edit box. Type in
the words: First Star.
When you hit the enter key, or the tab key, or click on another
popup or edit box, the Invigorator will accept the name and you
will see the new name in the Object list.
Change the name of an Object in the Object Name field.
Manipulating Objects
With the first star selected, you can now tumble it around its
center point.
1. Check to be sure the Object button and the Tumble tool are
still selected. Select them if they’re not. Then click and drag the
mouse in the Scene Preview window to tumble the first star.
Play with the star for a little bit. See what happens when you
drag left and right and then up and down. Release the mouse
and then click and drag again, observing what happens this time.
Notice that if you get the object upside down, left and right seems
to be reversed. Of course it’s not, its just because the object is
upside down.
Click the Object button and the Tumble tool button, then click
and drag in the 3D window to tumble the selected object(s).
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Troubleshooting Tip
If you click and let up on the mouse without dragging,
then click again to start the drag, chances are nothing
is happening. That’s because you deselected the star
with the first click so the Tumble tool doesn’t have anything to tumble.
If this is what happened, click on the star until you see
the wireframe bounding box. Then you can click and
start dragging all in one motion and you will see your
star tumbling in space.
2. Select the second tool, the Roll tool. Click on the second star
to select it, then change the star’s name to Second Star.
3. Once you’ve done Step 2, drag the mouse in the Scene Preview
window to Roll the second star.
Play with the second star a little bit. See what happens when you
drag left and right and then up and down. Notice that you don’t
move your mouse in circles around the star, you just drag left and
right. Dragging up and down doesn’t do anything. Release your
mouse and then drag again. See how the star continues to spin
from where you left off.
Select the Roll tool, click and drag an Object.
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Also notice how the rotation of the second star is a little off. This
is because the camera is viewing the scene from an angle. If the
camera was viewing the scene from the front the star would spin
more like a propeller. (See section on Drag Using Objects Axis.)
4. Release the mouse but leave the Second Star selected. Click
the right arrow key on your keyboard several times. Watch the
Star as you do this. Then hit the left arrow key several times.
What you are doing is nudging the star. Each click of the
arrow key rotates the star five degrees. If you hold the
Shift key and click an arrow key you nudge 15 degrees at
a time. If you want to rotate an object a perfect 90 degrees, hold down Shift and hit the arrow key six times.
Nudging works for all the manipulator tools.
5. Select the third tool, the Track tool. Click once on the third
star to select it. Then rename it Third Star.
6. Drag in the Scene Preview window to see what the Track tool
does. Hit the arrow keys to see what Track tool nudging does.
Notice that the Track tool doesn’t actually move objects in the X
and Y directions, it moves the objects parallel to the computer
screen. This means the direction changes based on the viewing
direction of the camera.
Now, just for fun, select two objects at the same time.
7. Hold the Shift key down and click on the First Star. This will
leave the Third Star as the Primary Selection, but then add the
First Star to the current selection, so both stars will be selected.
When two objects are selected, tracking moves then both.
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8. Drag with the Track tool to see both objects moving. Change
to the Tumble tool and drag again.
You will now see both objects tumbling. But notice something
different. They are both rotating around a common center!
Important Point
When two objects are selected, tumbling rotates
them both around a common center.
Whenever you have multiple objects selected they will
all rotate around a common center. If you add objects
to the selection, the center of the rotation will change
so the pivot point remains at the common center of all
the currently selected objects.
9. Shift click to add the Second Star to the current selection, then
experiment Tumbling, Rolling and Tracking all three objects at
once.
Once you’re done playing, leave all three objects selected and find
the Reset button. It’s located below the Scene Preview window.
10. Click the Reset button.
This will move all currently selected objects back to their starting
points. It does not however, remove keyframes. All keyframe
issues are handled inside the main After Effects interface, not
inside the Invigorator’s Set-Up window.
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11. Click on one of the little stars without holding the Shift key
down. This will deselect the other objects and select only the object you clicked on. Since these three stars were grouped together
in Illustrator, clicking on one of them selects the whole group.
12. Rename Group 1 to Star Cluster.
13. Select the fourth tool, the Dolly tool, and experiment with using it on the Star Cluster object.
Notice that this tool only works when you drag it up and down.
Pulling down pulls the object toward you and pushing up pushes
the object away from you.
This is opposite to how the Dolly tool works on the Camera.
By clicking on one of the tiny stars, you select the
whole group. They were grouped together in Illustrator.
14. Click on the Camera button.
This will now make the Dolly tool operate on the Camera instead
of on any objects.
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15. Drag up and down with the Dolly tool.
Notice how pushing up now makes the objects bigger, and pulling
down makes them smaller. That’s because what you’re pushing
and pulling is the camera, you’re no longer pulling the objects.
When you’re in Camera mode you’re pushing and pulling the
camera. So when you drag up you are pushing the camera toward
the objects which makes them get bigger because the camera is
getting closer to them.
In Camera Mode, by using the Dolly tool you push and pull
the Camera closer to or further away from the objects .
When you drag down you’re pulling the camera away from the
objects which makes them look smaller because the camera is
getting further away from them. Got that? It acts just like a real
camera. So whenever you’re in doubt about what to do, just say
to yourself “What would I do if I were holding a real camera?”
That’ll usually keep things straight in your head.
That’s it for how to manipulate, rename and select objects. You
should be quite a pro at it now.
16. Click the Clear Scene button.
That will erase all Objects and reset the Camera.
17. Take a break.
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Feature Reference
71
Select Artwork
This is the window that opens when you first add an Invigorator
to your project, or when you click the Create Object button. (If
you are using the PRO version this is the window you get when
you choose the Open Illustrator File button from the Start window.) This window tells you to Select an Illustrator format
vector file to open.
This window is where you find the Illustrator file that will be
turned into 3D models. It does not create a link to the file. When
you open an Illustrator file the Invigorator stores all of the vector
information it needs, so you don’t have to worry about hurting
your project by moving or losing the original Illustrator file.
Any Illustrator file from version 88 to CS can be used to create
Invigorator models. If you use FreeHand to create your vector
files, use the “Export As Illustrator 5.5” export option and the files
will work without a hitch.
If you are creating text, be sure to convert the text to bezier
curves before saving the final file. Use the Create Outlines command in Illustrator to do this.
Following are explanations of the options available from this
window.
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Show All Files
The Show: menu lets you pick which files are displayed in the
Select Artwork window. The All Files option makes the file window show all files present. This is useful for the times when the
Illustrator file you are attempting to open comes from a PC or a
Mac, or doesn’t have the correct .ai extension.
Open By Layers
At the bottom of the Select Artwork dialogue is a checkbox
labeled Open By Layers. If this option is checked, when the Illustrator file is opened each layer in the Illustrator file becomes one
object in the Invigorator.
This feature lets you do two things. First it enables you to name
the objects while you are still inside Illustrator. The name of the
layer will become the name of the object. It doesn’t matter how
many vector paths are on each layer, everything on a single layer
will become a single, locked together, 3D object.
Opening a file by layer also enables you to use the Reload Layer
feature. This lets you make changes to the Illustrator file, and
then exchange the new vector paths for the old paths with one
click. (See the Reload layer section.)
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Use Illustrator Colors
If this option is checked when you open the Illustrator file, the
colors you have applied to each vector path will be converted into
an Invigorator material and applied to the 3D object.
If a vector object has a fill color but no stroke color, the fill color
will be applied to the whole 3D object. If a vector object has both
a fill color and a stroke color, the front and back faces will be
given the fill color and the edges will be given the stroke color.
Once inside the Invigorator colors can be changed just like any
other color.
Dismantle Incoming Groups
If this option is checked when you open the Illustrator file, any
bunch of vector objects that have been grouped together in the
vector file will be separated into their individual pieces.
Normally the Invigorator respects the grouping structure in the
Illustrator file, meaning any objects that have been grouped together will come into the Invigorator grouped into one big object.
This makes it very easy to move and color objects that are to be
treated the same, such as all of the stars on a flag.
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However, sometimes you will open a piece of clip art only to find
that every single path in the file has been grouped together so
it’s impossible to do anything with the resulting 3D objects. This
command will separate the individual pieces of that vector file so
you can animate or color them individually.
If you group together objects that overlap, you
may get strange holes or flashing polygons
where the 3D model geometry lies on top of
itself. If you have overlapping shapes it is
better to combine them into one shape using
Illustrator’s Pathfinder tools or FreeHand’s Path
Operation tools.
Move Objects To Center
When you open an Illustrator file with this option turned on, all of
the objects created from this Illustrator file will be moved to the
center of the 3D world as one big group.
Inside the program there is also a Move to Center button. The
one difference between using Move To Center when you open
a file compared to when you use it from inside the Invigorator’s
Object tab, is that with the first way it doesn’t center the objects
on the Z-axis. The front faces are left at Z = 0.
This is done so that 3D slabs created in the Invigorator will register perfectly with 3D planes created in After Effects.
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76
The Effect Controls Window
77
The Effect Controls Window
The 3D Invigorator has two main interfaces. One for creating
animation keyframes, and the other for handling all of the set up
tasks that are non-animatable, such as working with the shapes
and colors of the objects. The Effect Controls window contains
the part of the interface for creating animation keyframes.
Scene Preview Window
The Scene Preview window is where you do the interactive
dragging to create Camera, Light, and Set keyframes. This
window shows you the 3D scene as the camera sees it. Since it’s
a preview it does not show textures, shadows, transparency or
antialiasing. However it’s perfect for interactive dragging, and
navigating from shot to shot.
There are three types of scene elements that you can drag around
inside this window. The camera, the lights, and the objects which
have been grouped into Sets.
Scene elements are moved by first selecting the appropriate mode
button, then selecting one of the manipulator tools, and then
clicking down and dragging inside the Scene Preview window.
Dragging must start with the cursor inside the preview window.
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Toolbar
Mode Buttons
Manipulation Tools
The toolbar is located directly below the Scene Preview window
and contains buttons and popup menus for activating tools and
issuing commands.
Mode Buttons
When the Camera Mode button is active (blue), the manipulator
tools will affect only the Camera. Dragging in the Scene Preview
window with one of the manipulator tools selected will change
what the camera is looking at.
When the Light Mode button is active, the manipulator tools will
affect only the selected light . Which Light is currently selected
is picked from the Lights popup menu.
When the Sets Mode button is active, the manipulator tools will
affect only the selected Set . Which Set is currently selected
is picked from the Sets popup menu, or by clicking on it in the
Scene Preview window with the Selection tool or one of the
manipulator tools.
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Display Textured/Shaded/Wireframe
Clicking this button toggles between Wireframe, Solid, and Textured display modes. This button only affects Draft mode rendering. It has no effect on Best quality rendering.
Manipulator Tools
These are the tools that let you move and rotate the scene elements inside the 3D world of the Invigorator. The manipulator
tools will work on the Camera or the Lights or a selected Set of
objects, depending on which one of the Mode buttons is active.
It’s important to note that Set manipulations occur with
respect to the camera axes, not the axes of the Set. This
means that manipulating a Set will yield a different result if
the Camera is viewing the object from different directions.
Try looking at an object from the front and comparing a
roll manipulation to what happens when you view the same
object from the side.
Tumble Tool
The Tumble tool works by placing the cursor inside the Scene
Preview window, and then dragging left to right or up and down.
The selected Set (or light or camera) will rotate in the direction of
the drag. In 3D terminology a left to right drag rotates around the
and Y axis, and an up and down drag rotates around the X axis.
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When dragging you can hold down the Shift key to constrain the
drag to only left-right or only up-down. Nudging with the arrow
keys on the keyboard does not work here in the Effect Controls
window. Nudging only works inside the Set-Up window.
Roll Tool
The Roll tool will work on either the camera or the current
selected Set. It does not work on lights. This tool only responds
to a left-right drag. When rolling the camera, the view will spin
around the center of the camera lens. When rolling a Set, the Set
will spin around the camera’s Z axis. Again, remember that the Z
axis is based on the direction the camera is pointing, so the direction of the roll will change as the direction of the camera changes.
Track Tool
The Track tool responds to left-right or up-down drags, and can
move the Camera or Sets. The movement is parallel to your
computer monitor’s screen. Like the other manipulator tools, the
effect of a drag will change based upon the current viewing direction of the camera.
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Dolly Tool
The Dolly tool responds to up-down drags only. When manipulating the camera, the Dolly tool will push the camera in closer
to the objects or pull it out away from the objects. It does this
directly along its line of sight.
The Dolly tool acts slightly different depending on which Camera Type you have selected. When the camera is in Orbit mode,
there is an invisible Target point which the camera orbits around.
Dollying-in while in Orbit mode will move the camera closer and
closer to this target point but it won’t let it go past.
When in Look At mode, the camera and its Target point move
together at the same time. This is so you get a smoother motion when doing fly-throughs and fly-bys. It also lets you go right
through an object if that’s what you want to do.
When in Hand Held mode, there is no target point, so the Dolly
tool simply moves the camera forward or backward along its line
of sight.
When using the Dolly tool on a Set, the Set will be pulled closer
toward the camera or pushed back away from the camera along
the camera’s line of sight. This is also how the Dolly tool works
inside the Set-Up window, however there is an extra option inside
the Set-Up window called Drag Using Object’s Axes which makes
the Dolly tool act differently. (See the Object’s Axes section.)
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There’s one other important point about the Dolly tool that will
help you use it. This may sound obvious, but when you’re in
Camera mode you’re dollying the Camera. When you’re in Sets
mode you’re dollying a Set. When you’re dollying the Camera, a
drag up with the mouse pushes the camera closer to the objects
making them appear larger, while a drag down with the mouse
pulls the Camera back away from the objects, making them appear smaller.
On the other hand when you’re dollying Sets, dragging up with
the mouse pushes the Set away from the Camera. The further
something is from the camera the smaller it looks. Dragging
down with the mouse pulls the Set closer to the Camera making it
appear larger.
Object
What the
camera sees
Object
What the
camera sees
Camera
Camera
Dollying the camera
pushes the camera
closer to the objects.
Dollying objects or Sets
pushes them away
from the camera.
Try this out and you’ll understand why this makes sense.
Set Scale Tool
The Scale tool works only on the currently selected Set. It does
not affect lights or the camera. This tool only responds to an
up/down drag of the mouse.
The Set Scale tool makes objects larger or
smaller, only in the Z direction.
Sets scale only in the Z direction. Their scaling center is set by
the position of the Set’s pivot point. By setting the pivot point to
the back of the Set, you are able to animate the scale of a Set to
make it enlongate toward the camera.
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Selection Tool
With the Selection tool you can click on Sets in the Scene Preview window to select them. You can do the same thing with any
of the manipulator tools too, as long as you are careful to click
without dragging the mouse. However, with the Selection tool
you can also drag a box around many objects to select them all at
once.
You can hold down the Shift key and click on other Sets to add
them to the Selection, or you can click on already selected Sets to
remove them from the current Selection. Shift-clicking can also
be done with the manipulator tools.
When a Set is selected all objects within the Set are given blue
wireframe bounding boxes. This is different than the red and
green wireframe bounding boxes that appear when objects are
selected inside the Set-Up window.
Zoom Tool
When the Zoom tool is selected, clicking the cursor in the Scene
Preview window will move the camera forward. This has the
effect of magnifying the view. Holding down the Option (Alt)
key while clicking the mouse moves the camera back instead of
forward causing the view to shrink. Double clicking on the Zoom
tool is a shortcut for the Fit All command.
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Create Button
Clicking on the Create button opens the Select Artwork dialogue
box. This is the same window that opens when you first add an
Invigorator effect to your project. It lets you open an Illustrator
format vector file which will then turn into a 3D model. You can
add as many 3D models to an Invigorator project as you want.
The Classic “Create” button.
PRO NOTE: If you are running the PRO version this button
will say “Object”.
Views Popup
The PRO “Object” popup menu.
The Views popup appears whenever the Camera button is highlighted. It contains preset camera views as well as the command
to Fit All Sets within the current view, or to fit whatever is
selected into the current view. It does this by repositioning the
Camera while preserving the general direction that the Camera is
pointing in. It does not move the Sets themselves.
The Save View command at the bottom of this popup lets you
save the current Camera position and direction information as a
custom view. Custom Views appear at the bottom of the popup,
and are shared between the Effect Controls window and the
Set-Up window, so a Custom View saved in one window will also
appear in the Views menu in the other window.
Use the Save View command to
store important camera views.
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Lights Popup
The Lights popup appears whenever the Light mode button is
highlighted. You use it to select one of the animatable Lights.
When a Light has been selected, dragging your cursor in the
Scene Preview window will change the direction of the light. As
the light direction is being changed you will see its effect on the
objects in the scene .
Sets Popup
The Sets popup appears whenever the Sets mode button is
highlighted. You can select one of the eight animatable Sets by
picking it from this list. You can also deselect all Sets by picking
the Select None command.
At the bottom of this popup is the Recenter Pivot command.
This command is used by first selecting the Set whose center of
rotation needs to be recentered, and then picking this command
from the popup. The Invigorator will examine the current position of all objects within the Set, and move the pivot point to the
common center of all those objects.
Help Button
Clicking the Help button opens the Invigorator Help window.
This window contains a variety of tips including some advice on
how to choose when to use each of the three camera types. Once
the Help window is open click anywhere on it to close it.
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Update Camera Button
The tiny camera button below the right corner of the Scene
Preview is called the Update Camera button. It enables you to
change the view in the Effect Controls window to match the last
Camera view seen inside the Set-Up window.
This is useful for the times when you have created a camera animation and you don’t want the act of entering the Set-Up window
to accidentally add a keyframe or change an existing keyframe.
You can enter and exit the Set-Up window as often as you like,
and as long as you don’t click the Update Camera button your
camera animation will be left untouched.
When the Invigorator effect is first added to the project, clicking
the Update Camera button acts as a shortcut for picking the High
Left Camera View preset.
Update Lights Button
The tiny light button below the right corner of the Scene Preview
window is called the Update Lights button. It works similarly to
the Update Camera button, in that changes made to the Lights
inside the Set-Up window will not affect the Effect Controls part
of the interface unless you click the Update Lights button.
If you make changes to the lights while inside the Set-Up window,
and those changes don’t “stick” when you exit the Set-Up window, then what you need to do is click the Update Lights button.
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This includes making changes by using the Lighting Style presets
and doing things like turning shadows on or off. Even though a
new lighting style might change every one of your lights inside the
Set-Up window, you still need to click the Update Lights button
to see those changes in the rendering that appears in the Comp
window.
Set-Up Window Button
Click the Set-Up (red ball) button to open the Set-Up window.
Clicking this button opens the Invigorator’s Set-Up area which
controls all of the non-animatable parts of a project. This includes adjusting the shape of the objects, their color and set
assignment, as well as adjusting the shadows, texture maps and
rendering quality.
The Set-Up window can also be opened by clicking the Options
button above the Scene Preview window.
You can also open the Set-Up window by clicking the Options button.
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Linking To The After Effects 3D Cameras
And 3D Lights
Much has been done to closely integrate the Invigorator with After Effects. One of the big results of this integration is the ability
to link together the Invigorator’s and AE’s cameras and lights.
There are two checkboxes below the Invigorator’s toolbar in the
Effect Controls window. One says Use Comp Camera, and the
other says Use Comp Lights. When these options are checked
the Invigorator’s camera and lighting controls are dimmed and
control is passed over to the AE camera and lights. This means
that when you move the AE camera you will also be moving the
Invigorator’s camera, and when you reposition one of AE’s 3D
lights you will also reposition the Invigorator’s lights.
This is an excellent feature because it merges the two programs
very tightly. You can seamlessly mix 3D AE layers and 3D Invigorator objects in the same Comp. Although the two programs are
rendering images in different “spaces” those spaces use the same
camera angle and lighting so objects in the two spaces look as
though they are in the same space.
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It’s best to be in Draft mode during interactive dragging.
To use this feature just turn on the Use Comp Camera or Use
Comp Light checkboxes. Now you can drag the AE camera in the
Comp window, and as you do you will see the Invigorator scene
moving at the same time. It’s best to have your Invigorator layer
set to Draft mode while dragging otherwise the drag speed will
drop to only a frame or two per second. On the other hand if you
are trying to set your lights so the shadows fall in the correct
position, getting a frame a second is a pretty nice way to go!
Sometimes you will want to use the Comp Camera, but not
use the Comp Lights. This would happen when you wanted
to apply different lighting to the Invigorator objects. For
instance you could have dark and moody lighting on the
AE layers, but bright lighting on your Invigorator 3D logo.
The two elements will move together as the camera moves
around them, but the lighting will be entirely different.
Here is some important information you need to know to work
effectively with AE’s cameras and lights:
1- To get the Invigorator to use the AE camera and lights turn on
the checkboxes in the Effect Controls window. These checkboxes
are located below the Invigorator’s toolbar. One says “Use Comp
Camera” and the other says “Use Comp Lights”.
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2- For the Invigorator’s camera and the AE camera to match
properly, you must have the size of the Invigorator’s Solid be the
same size as the composition. For example, if your Comp size is
640 x 480, then you must use a Solid that is 640 x 480 too. If you
change the size of your Composition, you must remember to also
change the size of the Solid.
3- The Invigorator camera follows what After Effects calls the
“Active Camera”. This is the camera view seen when the 3D Views
popup is set to Active Camera. It’s also the camera used when
rendering a movie.
Because the Active Camera can change during the course of an
animation, the Invigorator’s camera can also change from position to position during an animation. This means you can animate
the objects in a scene and then have several cameras positioned
at different spots to record the action from different angles. By
animating from camera to camera you will be cutting from one
camera to the next, as though you were switching between video
feeds during a live event!
Switching between cameras during a rendering
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4- When you turn on the Use Comp Camera button the camera
will shift positions making it look like your objects jumped. To
keep the jump to a minimum we have a special feature called
“Move To Center”. This option is found in the window where
you pick an Illustrator file and is turned on by default. (See more
about this feature in the “Move To Center” section of this guide.)
5- In the sample files folder there is a file called “640x480 plane.
ai”. This is a rectangle that will perfectly match a 640 x 480 pixel
solid created in After Effects.
The Move To Center option puts the Illustrator artwork
at the center of AE’s 3D world.
If you open this file in the Invigorator and turn on the Use Comp
Camera, the slab it creates will register perfectly with a 3D
Solid that is 640x480 pixels in size. As you move the AE camera
around, the 3D Solid will look like it is stuck to the front face of
the Invigorator’s 3D slab. This allows you to use the Invigorator’s
Edge Profiles to put fancy edges around any AE 3D layer. Now AE
layers can have thickness and nice frames!
When you use this technique it is important that you do NOT
move or animate the position or rotation of the Solid or Invigorator object. If you do, the two elements will not align anymore.
Only animate the After Effects camera. By animating only the
camera, you can make the slab fly on and off the screen, and the
two elements will remain locked together.
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Another way of making an After Effects layer have depth and fancy edges is by using the Layer Mapping technique. This technique
has none of the limitations of the technique described above.
In a nutshell what you do is to make the AE layer a Layer Map,
then apply the layer map to the front of an Invigorator slab. Then
you can animate the slab in any way you want and can even mix
slabs and other 3D objects together. By turning on the option to
show textures in the Comp window you will have no trouble at all
setting up exactly the animation you are looking for. (See the section in this User Guide called “Seeing Textures and Reflections
in Draft Mode” for more about this technique.)
6- In example number 5 above, you were told that a 640x480 point
Illustrator rectangle brought into the Invigorator will register with
a 640x480 pixel After Effects Solid. Thus “points” in Illustrator
become “pixels” in After Effects. This is how you set the size for
everything you do.
When working inside of Illustrator, preparing text and logos to
bring into the Invigorator, it is a great idea to make a rectangle
that is the same size as the After Effects Comp. That way you can
see whether you are creating objects that are generally too big or
too small for your After Effects project.
An AE 3D plane and an Invigorator 3D slab perfectly
registered. The AE plane creates the front face and the
Invigorator creates the beveled edges and sides.
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For instance, text that is only 12 points tall in Illustrator will be
teeny when brought into AE. When you are creating text to turn
into 3D objects with the Invigorator you should keep it around 72
to 100 points tall. A little larger or smaller is OK, but if you go too
far away from this range the presets may not create the desired
effect and it will take more fine tuning of the settings to get everything to look right.
12 point text appears bloated when the Invigorator’s
default settings are applied.
Limitations Of The Comp Camera Option
When you start to use the Comp Camera option you will find that
in some situations one of the images is always in front of the
other. Here’s an explanation of why this happens...
Text in the 72 to 100 point range looks great when
the Invigorator’s default settings are used.
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AE and the Invigorator each have their own “3D space”. Think
of them like two different photo studios. Each photo studio is a
separate room, and each has their own camera, lights and objects
inside the room.
When you turn on Use Comp Camera you are not merging the two
rooms together, you are making one camera control the position
of the other camera. Think of this as if the Invigorator’s camera
becomes a robot, and as you move the AE camera, the robot camera follows along matching the moves of the AE camera every
step of the way.
The cameras are moving in perfect sync, but you still have two
different cameras in two different rooms. Got it?
The pictures created by these two different cameras are each on
their own layer in the AE Project Timeline, and whichever one
is on top in the list of layers will always be shown in front of the
other one. This causes an “always in front” problem as you orbit
the AE camera around to the back. The top AE layer always stays
in front, because these are two separate movies created by two
separate cameras.
The useful range of motion to prevent this problem is about +/- 45
to 60 degrees off center. Much further than this and the AE planes
flatten too much and the images will start to skid past each other.
HOT TIP!
The perfect workaround for the “always in front” problem,
is to create a rectangle in Illustrator that is the size of your
AE layer. Then open this rectangle in the Invigorator, set its
Depth to 0, and apply the AE layer to the rectangle as a
Layer Map.
When you do this the AE layer is now inside of the Invigorator’s 3D space so it will interact perfectly with any other Invigorator object. Shadows work, perspective works, camera
moves work. It’s a beautiful thing.
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Animatable Parameters
Below the Scene Preview window and Toolbar menu, are all the
Invigorator parameters that you can animate. They are divided
into four groups: Camera parameters, Light parameters, Sets
parameters and Layer Maps.
Animatable Camera Parameters
If you turn down the arrow next to the word Camera , you will
see all of the parameters you can animate for the camera. At first
glance there seems like an awful lot of them, but once you get
used to it you realize that only a few are used at a time.
The Camera Type popup menu lets you select one of three styles
of camera (See the section on Camera Type). The other ten
camera parameters all work together to position the camera in
space and point it in the right direction.
The three Camera Eye parameters position the eyepiece of the
camera in XYZ space. The three Camera Target parameters are
used to position an invisible target point which the camera always looks at as it moves around. The Camera Distance parameter is used to measure the distance from the Camera Target to the
Camera eyepiece. The two Camera Tumble parameters are used
to control left-right and up-down camera rotations The Camera
Roll parameter is used to spin the camera clockwise or counterclockwise around its line of sight.
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You’ll notice that the name of each parameter has some letters at
the beginning. There are three letters used, O, L, and H. These
letters stand for the names of each of the Camera Types. O stands
for Orbit, L stands for Look At, and H stands for Hand Held.
The letters help you to see which parameters are used by each
of the three Camera Types. The ones with the O in front of their
names are used by the Orbit camera. The ones with the L in front
of their names are used by the Look At camera. The ones with the
H in front of their names are used by the Hand Held camera.
Fortunately you don’t need to know much about what all of these
parameters do. When it’s time to animate the Camera, turn on
the animation stopwatches for all ten parameters. Then as you
drag in the Scene Preview window, using the manipulation tools,
keyframes will be set for only the parameters that are affected.
Camera Type
The Invigorator has three different types of camera. Each camera
is designed for a certain type of animation project. The three
types are Orbit, Look At and Hand Held.
Orbit Camera is designed to move the camera in curved arcs.
It always keeps the Camera’s Eye Point the same distance away
from its center point. This makes it very easy to create an animation which smoothly moves around a set of objects.
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Top View
B
A
The Orbit camera always keeps the same
distance away from its center target point.
You can create an orbiting animation with only two keyframes
whereas creating a smooth orbit with the Look At or Hand Held
types of Camera takes at least five keyframes.
The Orbit camera is made to keep the same distance between
the Camera Eye and center points. However, you can animate
this distance value to get smooth spiral-type motions. An Orbit
camera will never go past the center point of the orbit, meaning
the distance will get smaller and smaller and then stop when it
reaches zero. The distance won’t go negative which would put
the camera on the other side of the object.
The Look At camera is designed for fly-throughs and fly-bys.
Top View
A
B
The Look At camera will take the shortest distance
between two keyframes rather than creating an arc.
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The Eye and the Target are tracked based on their independent
positions in space. This means the camera will take the shortest
distance between two keyframes rather than create an arc from
keyframe to keyframe, like the Orbit camera does. Because of
this, if you try to do Orbiting animations with the Look At camera,
the objects will appear to grow and shrink as the camera goes by.
However, the Look At camera is perfect for animations where you
want to fly past objects (fly-bys), or travel through a scene in a
forward (depth) direction (fly-throughs).
Above, we said that the Orbit camera would stop when the distance between the Eye and the Target reached zero, but with the
Look At camera the Eye and Target are tracked only by their positions in space and the distance between them is ignored.
As you move the Eye forward to do a fly-through, the Target also
moves forward. This makes it easy to travel down tunnel-type objects
or pass objects arranged like billboards along the road.
The Look At Camera also has a special horizon stabilizer feature
that the other two Cameras don’t have. For instance, if you use the
Tumble tool with the Orbit camera and you drag up/down, you will
see that you can rotate the Camera right over the top of your Objects.
If you keep dragging, the scene will appear upside down.
This won’t happen with the Look At camera. With the Look At
camera, the up direction will always appear at the top of the image.
So taking the same example as above, if you drag up/down with the
Tumble tool while the camera is in Look At mode, you will see the
camera automatically roll-over as it goes over the top of the objects.
If the camera Eye goes directly over the top of its Target point, the
roll-over happens very quickly and is disturbing to look at when the
animation plays back. However by staying a little off to the side you
can create a fantastic “helicopter shot” . The roll happens much more
slowly and lends a great feeling of flying to your animation.
The Look At camera
automatically rolls
over as it goes over
the top of objects.
1
2
3
The Hand Held Camera handles multiple-points-of-interest shots.
An animation that has multiple points of interest is one where the
camera first looks at one thing then moves and looks at another. This
type of camera creates shots that feel like you are moving through a
scene with a camera on your shoulder. It’s the type of camera that
most closely simulates how a person moves their head.
4
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The Hand Held camera does not have a Target point that controls
the center of what it looks at. It only has an Eye point. Because
of this the Tumble manipulator tool works very differently with
the Hand Held camera versus the other cameras. With the Hand
Held camera, the Tumble tool rotates the Eye point left and right
like you do when you rotate your head left and right. This motion
is called panning and is the type of motion that occurs when you
have a camera mounted on a tripod and you swing the camera
left and right. The Camera Eye point stays in the same position in
space while it rotates.
When you use the Tumble manipulator with the Orbit and Look
At cameras, the Eye point moves and rotates at the same time,
in an attempt to keep the central objects in view. With the Hand
Held camera, tumbling rotates the camera in the direction of the
drag. So, just like real life, if you rotate your head to the right,
the objects you were just looking at will end up at the left side of
your view.
Panning a Hand Held camera to the right
is like rotating your head to the right.
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Once you go through a few exercises and get used to how the
various cameras work you’ll find that the Hand Held camera
really does the trick when there is more than one thing to look
at. It enables you to look at one object, turn your head to spot
another object, move in to look at it closer, and so on. Doing the
same type of animation with the other cameras is cumbersome
and difficult.
TUMBLE
ROLL
TRACK
DOLLY
View through camera lense
O
R
B
I
T
L
O
O
K
A
T
H
A
N
D
H
E
L
D
Top View
drag left
Camera Eye point always looks
toward Target point, preserving the
distance between Target and Eye.
drag right
Camera Eye rolls around the
center of its lens. Target and Eye
positions are not affected.
1
2
1
Camera Eye and Target move
together.
2
Camera Eye moves, but the Target
point stays still.
Top View
Roll is identical for all
three Camera types.
Eye point looks toward Target
point, but the distance between
Target and Eye is not preserved
1
2
1
together.
2
together.
Top View
Roll is identical for all
three Camera types.
Camera Eye pans in the direction
of the drag, like turning your head.
There is no Target point.
1
2
Camera Eye moves.
1
2
Camera Eye moves.
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Which Camera To Use?
Here are some rules of thumb you can use when deciding which
camera to use. You will find exceptions to these rules but until
you gain the firsthand experience to know which camera works
best with your animation style, these rules will help you nicely.
First decide if you have only one thing to look at, or if there are
several points of interest. If there are several, use the Hand Held
type of camera.
If there is only one main point of interest you will need to decide
between the Orbit or the Look At cameras. Sometimes you may
have two things to look at, but the amount of change between
the two is fairly small. Choose the Hand Held camera only if the
change is large.
If you are flying into the depths of a 3D scene you must use the
Look At or the Hand Held camera. If the fly-through is complex,
where you turn and look this way or that while you are flying,
then you should use the Hand Held camera.
If you are flying around a single thing that is the main center of
interest, always keeping it centered in the view, then use the Orbit
type of camera.
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By the way, it’s best not to change the Camera Type once you’ve
set keyframes. If you do your animation won’t appear as expected because each Camera Type uses different parameters.
With that said it’s important to not hesitate to switch cameras if
you get part way through an animation and realize that it might
work better using a different one. You will find that throwing
out your work and redoing the animation from scratch will take
only a fraction of the time as your first pass, and the quality will
always turn out better. If you stick with a camera just because
you’ve labored with it for so long, you may find the going pretty
rough and frustrating.
Animatable Lighting Parameters
There are six lights you can use to illuminate your 3D scene.
Three of them are animatable. The lights are of the directional
variety. This means they have a direction only. You do not set
their position in space, nor do you set a “cone angle” that describes the central area inside of which objects are illuminated.
All you have to do is set the direction the light is shining in, and
the rest is taken care of for you. In other 3D programs these
type of lights are called Sun lights or Parallel lights.
The lighting controls that you can animate are Color, Intensity,
and Direction.
NOTE:
To get Spot lights and Point lights you need to
link up to the 3D lights in After Effects. (See the
section called “Linking to the AE 3D Cameras
and 3D Lights”)
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Light Color
The color of a light can be animated. Coloring lights works well
for setting moods. Most artists use straight white lights and then
apply color to their models, but white models are very good for
picking up color changes that occur with the lights.
Colored lights are also good for adding an extra level of color that
helps to make your animation look especially nice. An extra light
shining from the side, with a strong color, provides a rim light and
highlights that add a nice touch to the final image.
When setting light color be careful not to use a dark color. This
will only decrease the intensity of the light. It’s better to use the
Light Intensity control to darken the light. That way you can
always brighten it up when you need it.
In case you’re wondering, setting the Light Color to black has the
same effect as setting the Intensity to zero. It turns off the light.
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Light Intensity
The intensity of a light can be increased or decreased during an
animation. This can be used to create some interesting effects
like where pulsating the light intensity makes it look like there
are emergency lights off screen, or also to simulate the light
coming from a flickering light that is burning out and leaves the
Objects lit only by the rim light.
The intensity of the light is at full value when it is at 100%. But
the possible range goes up to 300%. A 300% light intensity creates
an overly bright light that will bleach out the side of the object
that the light is facing. This type of effect is useful for creating
the feeling of an overpowering presence off-screen. The sort of
light that you have to squint to look into.
Light Direction
The direction of a light is controlled by two parameters one for
the up/down direction and one for the side to side direction.
However, the two work together and are controlled by the same
Tumble manipulation.
The big Set-Up window has a Lighting Ball Manipulator which
shows you direction arrows for the lights in the scene. The Lighting Ball Manipulator is not available in the AE Effect Controls
window so light direction animation is set only by dragging in the
Scene Preview window and observing the effect of the light direction change.
The Lighting Ball Manipulator inside the Set-Up window.
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Keyframes can be set with the Lighting Ball Manipulator, in a
two step method, by opening the Set-Up window and moving the
lights with the lighting ball, then closing the Set-Up window and
clicking the Update Lights button.
Click the “Update Lights” button to bring the changes you’ve
made in the Set-Up window into the Effect Controls window.
Animatable Set Parameters
These controls allow you to animate objects inside the Invigorator. If you want to move objects independently from other
objects, you assign them to one of the eight animatable Sets and
then animate the Set.
The nice thing about Sets is that they can contain any number of
objects so animating a single object or multiple objects is exactly
the same process.
You can change the Set an object is in by simply picking a different Set from the Set Assignment popup, located in the Set-Up
window. (See the section on the Set Assignment popup.)
There is a section in the Special Topics part of this User Guide
that contains a complete discussion about what a Set is.
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There are eight possible Sets that you can animate in an Invigorator effect. If you need to animate more than eight objects, you
can add a second Invigorator from the Effects menu.
If you click the arrow in front of the Sets parameter you will see
Sets 1 through 8 listed underneath it. Opening the arrow for one
of the Sets will reveal the animatable parameters. X, Y & Z Position, X, Y & Z Rotation and Depth Scale.
Set Position
Set Position controls the location of the objects in the Invigorator’s 3D space. Working with objects in 3D is a little harder than
working with them in 2D as the distance of the object away from
the camera determines the object’s visibility and its size. There
is no such thing as layers or stacking order. If one object is
closer to the camera than another object, the closer one is going
to be visible. Just like real life.
After Effects doesn’t have a parameter type that holds all X,
Y and Z values at the same time, so we have to have separate
controls for each one. They all work together, however, so when
you turn on animation for a Set you should enable all three
position or rotation parameters. Otherwise you may get some
unexpected results.
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The positioning of Sets should be done by dragging with a manipulator tool inside the Scene Preview window. You should not
attempt to set position keyframes directly with the sliders, unless
you know what you are doing.
All objects come into the Invigorator standing up and facing
forward. This is different than some other 3D programs where
Illustrator files come in laying down as if they were drawn on a
table top. The Invigorator treats Illustrator files as though they
have been drawn on the wall which is how people work with Illustrator files on their computer screen.
Because of this convention, the X direction is left/right; the Y
direction is up/down; and the Z direction is forward/backward. The Z direction can also be thought of as in/out, as in into
the computer screen and out of the computer screen.
Set Rotation
The X, Y and Z Set rotation controls determine an object’s orientation in 3D space.
X rotation is a forward/backward motion. If you held a
broomstick horizontally out in front of you and rotated your hand
around the broomstick you would be doing an X rotation. This is
the rotation of a car tire or a rocking chair.
X rotation for Set 1.
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Y rotation is a spinning rotation. If you spun a basketball and
balanced it on your finger, it would be doing a Y rotation. This is
the rotation you get when unscrewing the lid of a jar, the beaters
of a mixer, a Hoola-Hoop or driving around a corner in a car.
Z rotation is a whirling rotation. The propeller of an airplane
spins with a Z rotation. This is also the rotation of a clothes
dryer, and the steering wheel of a car.
Most often things in real life are combinations of all three rotations.
Sets rotate around a central point called the pivot point. (There
is a section in the Special Topics part of the User Guide that
contains a complete discussion about how to set and control
pivot points.)
Y rotation for Set 1.
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Set Depth Scale
The Depth scale parameter lets you grow or shrink objects only in
the Z direction. This enables you to animate the depth of objects
for various effects.
A Depth Scale of 100 retains the original size of the objects within
the Set. Higher values stretch the objects and lower ones squash
them.
Layer Map Parameters
Layer Mapping is texture mapping where the texture comes from
an After Effects layer. The layer map can be used for the color of
an object, the bumpiness of an object, or to control which parts
of the object are transparent, or what image appears in the reflection bouncing off the surface of an object. In other words any
part of a material that can be controlled with a standard texture
map, can be controlled with an After Effects layer.
This means you can have moving images in your texture maps.
As the animation progresses, each new frame of the 3D animation
receives the appropriate frame pulled from the layer map.
You can use a Pre-Comp as a Layer map. This means you can use
any number of movies or effects to create a composite texture
map that is calculated on the fly and requires no pre-rendering.
This greatly speeds up the production process, especially when
clients ask for changes that affect texture maps.
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Layer Maps
If you turn down the twirly arrow next to Layer Maps in the AE
Effect Controls window, it will reveal ten popup menus labeled
Layer Map 1 through Layer Map 10. To make Layer Maps work,
there are two steps to follow.
First, you click on one of these popups and pick any layer inside
the current After Effects project. That assigns the layer to the
Layer Map you clicked on. For instance clicking on Layer Map
1 and picking a layer in your project called Fire Footage, assigns
the Fire Footage to Layer Map 1.
Second you must go to the Material Editor inside the Set-Up
window. There, next to each texture map thumbnail box is a little
popup menu. This menu is usually empty and says No Maps if
you click on it. However, when you have assigned a layer to one
of the Layer Map popups, like you did in Step 1, the mini popup
menu will display the Map number.
For instance, if you did Step 1 and picked a layer for Layer Map 1,
then this little popup will have a line item in it saying Layer Map
1. It will only display maps that have a layer assigned to them,
so if this popup says No Maps, then you need to go back to AE
and assign a map to one of the Layer Map popups in the AE Effect
Controls window.
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Once you’ve picked a Layer Map from this mini popup menu you
will see a picture in the texture map thumbnail box which says
From Layer. We can’t show you what the map is, so this indicates you are using a layer as a map.
If you look over the Material Editor you’ll notice that there is a
mini Layer Map popup next to every texture map thumbnail box.
This means you can use a Layer Map for the color of your objects,
the bump map on your objects, the transparency map and the
reflection map too. Moving images can be used for any of these
attributes. And again, since Layer Maps can be Pre-Comps, any
effect or adjustment can be used in the creation of your texture
maps. The reason why we stress the word Pre-Comp here is
because any effect that you apply to a layer must be Pre-Comped
with that layer in order for you to see its effect in the texture map.
Pre-Comping bakes the effects into the layer footage so you can
use the output for further purposes. Many users make the mistake
of applying some effect (such as blur) to a piece of footage, use
the footage as a Layer Map, and then don’t understand why the effect doesn’t appear in the final rendering. In order for the effects
applied to a layer to show up in a Layer Map, the layer must be
Pre-Comped and the Pre-Comp then used as the Layer Map.
The same Layer Map can be picked from each of the mini popups. This means you could use the same Layer Map to control
the transparency and the color, and the other texture mappable
attributes, all by the same AE layer.
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It also means you could use the same Layer Map on several different Materials. This can come in very handy . For instance,
say you had the same moving cloud movie being used as a
reflection in some Gold, Silver and Chrome materials. Making
changes to the clouds layer back in AE will affect all three materials, and it will affect every single place those three materials
have been applied to objects. No matter how many times those
materials have been used in the scene.
Composite On Original
This feature is used when you want more than one Invigorator
per layer. When this checkbox is turned off (the default), the
Invigorator will use only its own pixels. This causes the underlying footage to be completely ignored. When this checkbox is
turned on, the underlying footage shows and the Invigorator’s
image is composited over the top of it.
This feature can also be used when you want more than one
Invigorator per layer. When you apply two or more Invigorator effects the second one down the list in the Effect Controls
window replaces the image produced by the one above it. But
with the Composite On Original checkbox turned on, the second
Invigorator’s image is composited over the top of the first, so
you see them both.
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AE Reset Button
This is the word button found at the top of the AE Effect Controls
window. If you click it, all parameters will reset back to their
default values. These are the same values that are set when you
first add an Invigorator effect to a layer.
The AE Reset button only resets the animatable parameters. This
button does not, however, reset anything that you’ve done inside
the Set-Up window. So if you have rotated or moved individual
objects you must enter the Set-Up window, select all, and then
use the Reset button found below the Object List.
Caps Lock Key
If you find you are having to leave the Caps Lock key down all
the time, it’s possible that you are leaving the Best quality switch
turned on for the layer the Invigorator is applied to. Best quality
does full renderings with all the bells and whistles. Draft quality
does fast rendering where there are no shadows, no antialiasing
and no textures but the objects still look solid.
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Draft quality can render in near-real time and is sufficient for motion tests, whereas Best quality takes much longer but gives you
much nicer pictures. So it’s better to leave the layer on Draft and
turn it up to Best only during the rendering of the final movie.
The Set-Up Window
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Set-Up Window
The Set-Up window contains everything that is not
animatable within the Invigorator. It is the main control interface for setting up the 3D scene and handles all shape
and material settings, the lighting controls, the camera lens
and rendering controls.
The user gains access to the Set-Up window by clicking either the
red ball button at the right end of the toolbar, or by clicking the
Options button just above the Scene Preview window.
Click this button to open the Set-Up Window.
The Update Camera & Update Lights buttons.
The Set-Up window and the Effect Controls window each have
different lights and cameras. When you exit the Set-Up window,
you are able to bring the last camera view or lighting arrangement
from the Set-Up window into the Effect Controls window. This is
done by clicking the Update Camera or Update Lights button.
Updating the camera or lights will either change the current keyframe, or add one if one isn’t present.
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Scene Preview Window
This is the area in the interface which shows you the actual 3D
scene. When in draft mode it shows you an OpenGL draft mode
rendering of the 3D scene where all objects are solid, but there
will be no shadows, transparency, textures or reflections.
If you hold down the Command key (Mac) or Control key (Win)
and then click the OK button (which will now say “Test”) a Best
quality rendering will be done and displayed in this window.
The size of the Scene Preview window cannot be changed.
Hold down the Command key (Mac) or Control key (Win)
to turn the OK button into the Test Render button.
Toolbar
The toolbar is directly below the Scene Preview window. It has
tools for manipulating the scene elements and mode buttons for
switching between different types of scene elements.
Mode buttons
Manipulator tools
There will always be two buttons on the toolbar that are blue.
The three buttons on the left tell the program which type of scene
element you want to manipulate, the buttons in the center choose
a manipulation tool.
When a button is highlighted in blue it means that that tool or
mode is turned on or selected.
Following are descriptions of each Mode and Tool button.
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Camera Controls
Camera Mode
When this button is made active (blue) the camera controls will
be revealed and the manipulator tools will affect the 3D camera.
Camera Mode button
You will know that the camera is the thing that’s moving because
all objects will move as if they’re stuck together. You’ll also
notice that the floor grid moves too. You can’t directly move the
floor grid so if you see it moving, you are moving the camera.
Sometimes it’s difficult to get used to the idea that you are moving
a camera because there is no other feedback except for the image
in the scene preview window. However, with a little experience
you’ll get the hang of it. Just remember that moving the camera
will make it look like you are moving everything in the 3D scene.
If you want to move certain objects independently from the rest,
you have to have Object mode enabled, not Camera mode.
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Camera Manipulation
When the Camera mode button is blue and one of the four manipulation tools is selected, clicking and dragging in the Scene
Preview window will move the camera. You must start the manipulation drag by clicking down inside the scene window. Don’t
start dragging while clicking on a button.
Also note that if you click on an object, then let up on the mouse
button without dragging, you may change which object is selected. Clicking without dragging, makes the manipulator tools,
act like the selection tool. When you do a camera manipulation,
verify that Camera mode is active, select a tool, then click and
immediately drag in the Scene Preview window.
Camera Tumble
This tool responds to mouse movement in any direction. Tumbling the camera makes it orbit around a central target point.
This point is placed at the center of the objects by default.
When in Orbit mode, most of the manipulation tools will leave
the target point in its same position, however the target point will
be moved out of position if you use the Track tool. This means
that once you use the Track tool the camera may start to orbit
off-center.
Camera Tumble Tool
Nudging with the Tumble tool
Each click of an arrow key on your keyboard,
will tumble the camera 5 degrees in the direction of the click. (left / right / up /down)
Holding the Shift key down and clicking an
arrow key will tumble the camera 15 degrees.
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If the camera starts to tumble off center you can recenter the target point by using any of the camera presets (Front, High Right,
etc.) from the Views popup menu, or by using the Fit All command. Using the Fit Selected command will place the target point
at the center of the selected object(s).
The Dolly tool will move the camera’s eye point closer and closer
to the target point but won’t go past it. This is to prevent the
camera from going through an object.
Views popup menu
When in Look At mode, instead of Orbit mode, the target point
can be moved by using the Track tool and the Dolly tool. With the
Look At camera, the Dolly tool will move the target point forward
at the same time it moves the eye point forward. This makes the
Look At camera ideally suited for fly-through animation where the
camera keeps going and going and going forward.
Camera tumbling will work for both the Orbit and Look At types
of camera. When the Hand Held type of camera is in use, the
tumble tool makes the camera pan and tilt instead of orbit.
Camera Type popup in the Effect Controls window
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Pan and tilt is what a camera does when it’s sitting on a tripod.
The eye point of the camera doesn’t move from its spot on the tripod, it’s the camera’s viewing direction that changes. Pan swings
the camera’s view from side to side, and tilt angles the camera’s
view to point up or down.
Also be aware that when using a Look At type of camera, using
the camera tumble tool in the interactive scene preview window
preserves the distance between the eye and target points. This is
done as an aid in setting keyframes. However when the keyframes are interpolated during an animation, a Look At camera
pays no attention to the distance between the camera’s eye and
target points.
Preserving the distance between the camera’s eye and target
points during an animation is only done with the Orbit style of
camera. This makes the Orbit camera ideally suited for arcing
types of camera moves. Two keyframes with an Orbit camera
will create a perfectly smooth arc all the way around an object,
whereas the same two keyframes with a Look At camera will
make the camera pass right through the object.
Top View
The Look At camera moves directly
from one keyframe to the next.
Top View
The Orbit camera moves in smooth
arcs between keyframes.
(In the above illustrations, the black
cameras are keyframes and the grey
cameras are the in-between positions.)
Holding the Shift key down will constrain the Tumble tool to only
one axis. Up/down drags will tumble around the X axis only.
Right/left drags will tumble only around the Y axis.
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Camera Roll
The Roll tool spins the Camera’s Eye
Point, tilting the horizon left or right.
Nudging with the Roll tool
Each click of an arrow key on your computer
keyboard, will roll the camera 5 degrees in
the direction of the click. (left/right only)
arrow key will roll the camera 15 degrees.
Nudging with the Track tool
keyboard, will track the camera 1 point in the
direction of the click. (left/right/up/down)
arrow key will track the camera 10 points.
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This tool responds to mouse movement only in the left/right
direction. The Roll tool will spin the Camera’s Eye Point making
the horizon tilt left or right. You don’t drag the mouse in a circle
around the center of the picture, you just drag left or right.
When working with the Roll tool imagine that you are grabbing
a wheel at the top (12 o’ clock position) so when you drag to the
right you are spinning the wheel to the right and when you drag
to the left you spin the wheel to the left.
The Shift key has no effect on this tool.
Camera Track
This tool responds to mouse movement in any direction. The
Track tool moves the camera’s eye and target points to the
left/right or up/down without rotating the camera. It changes the
position of the camera, not it’s rotation.
The movement is always parallel to your computer monitor’s
screen, so left/right/up/down are based on the direction that the
camera is currently facing.
Holding the Shift key down will constrain the Track tool to only
one axis. Up/down drags will track in the Y direction only. Right/
left drags will track only along the X axis. Remember that these
axes are based on the camera’s current viewing direction.
Camera Dolly
What the
camera sees.
What the
camera sees.
This tool responds to mouse movement only in the up/down direction. The Dolly tool pushes the camera closer to the objects
and pulls it away from the objects. This is similar to holding a
camera and walking toward your subject or backing up away
from your subject.
As mentioned in the Camera Tumble section, when using an
Orbit type camera the camera won’t dolly through the target
point. However, when using the Look At type of camera the
Dolly tool will move both the eye point and target point equally
so the camera will continue moving forward as long as you are
dragging up.
With the Hand Held type of camera there is no target point so
the Dolly tool will move the camera forward even if it goes
right through an object.
The Shift key has no affect on this tool.
Dollying the Camera
Dollying the Object
Nudging with the Dolly tool
keyboard, will dolly the object 1 point forward
or back in the direction of the click. (up/down
only)
arrow key will doll the camera 10 points.
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Camera Manipulation Shortcut Keys
Camera Track is activated by holding down
the Spacebar only (Mac and Win).
Camera Tumble is activated by holding down
the Spacebar + Command (Mac) or Spacebar +
Alt (Win).
Camera Dolly is activated by holding down
the Spacebar + Control (Mac and Win).
The shortcut keys for camera manipulation are only available
inside the Set-Up window. They are extremely useful and should
be learned at once. No matter which mode you are in these
shortcuts will activate the camera and let you manipulate it. This
makes it very fast to do things such as moving the camera to a different angle while you are still working on an object.
Notice that there is a pattern to the keyboard shortcuts. They all
use the Spacebar and sometimes one or two other keys. The Shift
key is always reserved for constraining the drag.
Camera Roll is activated by holding down the
Spacebar + Option (Mac) or Spacebar + Alt+
Control (Win).
Note: If you also hold down the Shift key during any of the above keyboard shortcuts, you
will enable constrained dragging.
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Also notice that the keyboard finger positions are identical between the Mac and Windows versions. This is to make it seamless for the user to switch between Mac and Windows systems.
Zoom Tool
The Zoom tool looks like a magnifying glass and is found at the
right end of the toolbar. It combines the actions of the Dolly and
Track tools into a single tool. Because of this, using the Zoom
tool will change or add keyframes.
When you select the Zoom tool and do not have any other key
held down, each click with the tool will zoom in a certain amount.
You must click inside the Scene Preview window to execute the
zoom. Clicking on the Zoom button will only select the tool.
Zoom Tool
Double clicking on the Zoom tool is a very useful shortcut for issuing the Fit All command.
When you do a zoom, the spot that you clicked on will pretty
much stay under the point of the cursor.
If you hold down the Option key (Mac) or Alt key (Win) and then
click, the Zoom tool will zoom out instead of zooming in.
The shortcut for selecting the Zoom tool is to press the Z key on
your keyboard. (This works inside the Set-Up window only.)
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The Camera Tab
Camera View Presets
The Views popup menu contains a list of preset camera views,
such as Front, High Right and Low Left. It also contains the Fit
All, Fit Selected, and the Save View... commands.
Fit All moves the camera back along its line of sight until all
objects are within the view of the camera. If needed it will also
track the camera side to side or up and down so the objects fit
with the least amount of extra space on the sides.
The Views popup menu
Fit Selected does the same thing as Fit All except it fits only
the currently selected objects into the 3D window. More than
one object can be selected and they don’t have to be next to each
other. As with Fit All, the camera won’t change the direction it is
pointing in, it will just move backward / forward, and left / right
until the objects are on screen.
During either of the Fit commands the length of the lens doesn’t
change. It’s as if you had used only the Track and Dolly tools to
reposition the camera until the objects fit into the window.
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Save View... will create a preset out of the current camera view
and save it under a name you can specify. The named view will
appear at the bottom of the Views popup menu. You can return
to the view at any time by picking it from the menu the same way
you can pick any of the factory preset views.
Camera presets are saved only inside the project. They won’t appear in the views menu of any other project.
Camera Lenses
This menu lets you switch between lenses of various lengths. All
lens lengths are based on the viewing angle of a 35 mm single lens
reflex camera. So with this as the film base, a 50mm lens is considered a Normal view, 28 mm is a wide angle view and 200 mm is
a telephoto view.
At the top of this popup is a special type of lens called Orthographic. This lens removes all the perspective from the image,
so parallel lines won’t converge. This means objects that are the
same size will stay the same size no matter how far away from the
camera they are.
The Orthographic lens is a good choice when you want to see 3D
edge effects on lettering, but don’t want the letters at the end of
the word to get smaller as they go off in the distance. With the
Ortho lens the letters will stay the same size.
Lens popup menu
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Super Fast Final Rendering (PRO Feature)
PRO NOTE - Super Fast Final Rendering
is part of the PRO version. You must have
the PRO version to use this feature.
The Invigorator PRO has the ability to use an OpenGL accelerator card to do Broadcast quality final rendering with antialiasing,
reflections and textures. OpenGL is not made to do final quality
antialiasing so there were some interesting tricks involved in getting this to work. However, the outcome was that you can render
very nice images very very quickly. In many cases at less than
one second per frame!
Interactive Tip
To turn on this option, open the Invigorator’s Set-Up window and
change the renderer popup from Invigorator renderer to Hi-Quality OpenGL renderer. That’s all you have to do. To see a frame
rendered with the Hi-Quality OpenGL renderer, close the Set-Up
window and turn the quality switch for the Invigorator’s layer to
Best quality.
If you leave the Invigorator’s layer set to
Best quality and then try to drag a 3D object or camera, the OpenGL Render Buffer
may pop open while you are in the middle
of the drag. To keep this from happening
set the layer to Draft mode quality.
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When you do this you will most likely see a window appear that
says “OpenGL Render Buffer” at the top. Do not be alarmed.
This window is where OpenGL is doing its magic. When it disappears the final image will be handed off to After Effects and then
displayed in the Comp window.
The Hi-Quality OpenGL renderer is perfect when you need antialiased images with color texture maps and reflections. However,
it does not render shadows, transparencies or bump maps, so you
can’t do glass effects, but there is a lot of bread and butter work
that makes this one feature very worthwhile.
Antialiasing
The Antialiasing popup menu lets you select between
various levels of antialiasing. (3x3 is roughly twice as
smooth as 2x2, and 4x4 is roughly twice as smooth as
3x3.) The nice thing about the Invigorator renderer is
that it only applies antialiasing where it’s needed so you
can change antialiasing levels without severely impacting your rendering times.
PRO Note: The High Quality OpenGL rendering option slows down quite a bit as antialiasing levels are
increased.
You will see other numbers in the antialiasing popup
such as +0.6, +1.0, and +1.5. These extra values are
anti-crawl filtering for video playback purposes. Each
level of anti-crawl filtering makes the image a little more
fuzzy. This fuzziness is visible on your computer screen,
but when played back on a television helps to prevent
jitter around the edges of your images.
If you are used to setting the antialiasing using the pre3.0 menu here are the conversions to the new settings...
Antialiasing popup menu.
No antialiasing
Web sharp
Web smooth
Video sharp
Video smooth
Video smooth+
Film sharp
Film smooth
Print sharp
Print smooth
AA Level=1x1
AA Level=2x2
AA Level=4x4
AA Level=3x3 plus crawl filtering of 1x0.6
AA Level=5x5
AA Level=3x3
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Alpha Channels
The Alpha Channel checkbox enables the creation of an alpha
channel during the Invigorator rendering. When this option is
turned on, which it is by default, the background color of the
Invigorator scene drops out and only the pixels making up the 3D
image will remain. If this option is turned off, you will see the 3D
image as well as the Invigorator’s background color which will fill
in the rest of the Solid it is applied to.
The alpha channel also contains the antialiasing information. This
is used to make the 3D rendering composite perfectly with the
underlying layers.
NOTE: The alpha channel option applies to both Draft and Best
quality rendering modes. In Best mode renderings the alpha
channel contains the edge antialiasing. In Draft mode renderings,
however, there is no antialiasing so the alpha channel will be jagged and non-antialiased.
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Background Color
The Background Color swatch shows the color of the background
used in the Invigorator’s scene preview window, and used in the
rendered image if the Alpha Channel option is turned off.
The color can be changed by clicking on the color swatch itself.
This will open up a color picker where you can pick any color.
NOTE: The Background color is independent from the color of
the Solid, or the Background color of the Comp that the Invigorator is applied to. Changing the color of the Solid or the Comp will
do nothing to change the Invigorator’s background color.
Background Color swatch
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Lighting Controls
Light Mode button
The Invigorator has three kinds of lights, but two of them are only
available if you link to the 3D lights in After Effects. If you don’t
link to AE’s lights the only type of light available is the kind that
has a direction but no position. After Effects calls this a Parallel
light. Parallel lights are perfect for beginners because you can’t
accidentally place the light in the wrong position. Once a light is
turned on it has an effect on every object in the scene. However,
the other light types are very useful and create different looks.
Light Mode
When the “Use Comp Lights” checkbox is NOT turned on, the
Invigorator has control over its own lights. When the light mode
button is made active (blue) the Lighting Controls are revealed,
and the manipulator tools will affect the lights.
Manipulating lights is done in two ways, by dragging directly in
the 3D Scene Preview window, or by dragging on the light manipulator ball found below the Scene Preview window.
Light Manipulation In The Scene Window
The lighting direction changes by dragging
in the Scene Preview window.
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When the Light mode icon is activated you will notice that all of
the manipulator tools turn gray except for the Tumble tool. This
is because lights in the Invigorator have a direction but no position. Lights of this type are much easier and faster to work with.
You don’t have to worry about objects going outside the cone of a
spotlight or accidentally placing an object behind a light pointing
in the wrong direction.
By simply dragging with the Tumble tool in the 3D Scene Preview
window you will rotate the currently selected light to change
the direction it is pointing. As you drag you will see the lighting
change as it illuminates the objects.
Dragging up will raise the light until it stops
directly overhead. Dragging down will lower
the light until it stops directly underneath the
objects. Dragging left and right will roll the
light around the objects. If you keep dragging, the light will circle around the objects
and come back to where it started.
Select the light you want to manipulate by picking it from the
Lights List popup.
Lighting Manipulator Ball
The Lighting Manipulator looks like a ball and is revealed when
the Light mode icon is selected (blue). Clicking and dragging
on this ball will manipulate the currently selected light. You will
see the light pointer move as you drag. The pointer indicates the
direction of the selected light.
Select a light by picking it from the Lights List, not by clicking on
the pointer inside the Lighting Manipulator window.
Once you have dragged the light pointer to a new location, releasing the mouse button will make the 3D Scene Preview window
re-render and show you the effect of the new light direction.
Clicking and dragging on the Lighting Manipulator ball
moves the currently selected light.
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Spot Lights and Point Lights
The other two light types are Spot lights and Point lights. You
create these type of lights by linking to the AE lights (See the
next section for more on this.) As the name suggests, Spot lights
shine light in a circular spot of light. If the source is very close to
the object, the circle of light is small so not much is illuminated.
As the light and objects get further away from each other, the circle gets bigger and bigger so more and more area is illuminated.
Three AE spot lights pointing in different directions
with varying sizes of cone angle.
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Spot lights have controls for how the circle of light spreads,
(called Cone Angle because the circle is the bottom of an imaginary cone), and the softness of the illuminated area near the
edges (called Cone Feather). You place Spot lights at a position
in space and then point them in the direction you want them to
illuminate. Since the Cone Angle, position, direction, and distance
from light to subject all affect the final look of the illuminated
areas, it takes practice to learn how to set up a Spot light. Sometimes you will try and try and the light just doesn’t seem to be
turned on, but finally you discover that you’ve placed the light
behind the object you are trying to light up or you have it pointing
in the wrong direction. So you need some patience when learning
how to control Spot lights. Still, the time you spend is well worth
the investment. Spot lights can add a great deal of interest to the
lighting of a scene.
Point lights are like uncovered light bulbs. They have a position in
space and cast light in all directions. You can’t point a Point light
in the wrong direction, but you can accidentally put it behind the
object you are trying to illuminate so you need to be careful.
Always switch to a Top or Side view to make sure you are setting
the light at the correct depth in the Scene. Using that extra Zdimension in 3D space can be a little tricky on a flat 2D computer
monitor.
Creating And Using Spot Lights and Point Lights
You make a light into a Spot light or a Point light by changing
its Light Type inside of After Effects. Double click on the name
of the light in the After Effects Timeline and the Light Settings
window will open.
Using Spotlights can make a scene look much nicer, but takes
extra time and practice to set up.
To make the Invigorator use Spot lights and Point lights, turn on
the Use Comp Lights checkbox located below the Invigorator’s
toolbar in the Effect Controls Window. You cannot make an
Invigorator light be a Spot light or a Point light while inside the
Invigorator’s Set-Up window. You can only get spot or point lights
by linking to the lights in the After Effects composition.
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Once you have linked to the AE Comp lights, you can no longer
use the Invigorator’s lighting controls. Now you adjust the position and direction of your lights by using the regular After Effects light manipulators. Do this by selecting the light you want
to move and then dragging the light’s manipulator handles in the
Comp window.
Special Note: Whenever you turn on Use Comp
Lights you should also turn on Use Comp Camera. Otherwise it will be very difficult to move
the lights properly.
You’ll notice that when you turn on Use Comp Lights the look of
a Spot light while in Draft quality mode is jaggy and very different from the look of a Spot light when in Best quality mode. This
is because Draft mode uses OpenGL rendering and that’s just the
way OpenGL Spot lights look. There are fancy things you can
do to make the lights look better but those tricks require extra
hardware and are part of the Invigorator PRO version.
Once you set the layer to Best quality, Spot lights are rendered
using our Invigorator’s internal renderer which makes them look
nearly identical to what they look like inside of After Effects.
This enables you to mix Invigorator 3D objects with After Effects
3D layers and it will look like the same light sources are lighting
all objects.
Draft Spotlights have jagged edges.
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Best Spotlights have
smooth edges.
Lights List
The Lights List popup menu contains a list of all lights in the
Invigorator. The currently selected light is the one whose name
shows when the popup is collapsed. Selecting a different light
is done by clicking on the popup, dragging down to highlight the
light you want to select, then releasing the mouse.
The text style used for the names of the lights tells you information about the lights. If a light’s name is written in Bold, then
you know the light has shadow casting turned on. If the name is
written in Italics, then the light has been turned off. In this way
you can quickly scan down the list and see how many lights are
bold, meaning they’re casting shadows, or if a light is turned off
(italics) that should really be turned on.
Turn On This Light
This checkbox lets you turn a light on or off. The Invigorator
comes with six lights, some are turned on by default and some
are turned off. This checkbox acts like a light switch.
When you turn a light on, its name will change from italics to
plain text in the Lights List. You will also see a new light pointer
appear in the Lighting Manipulator window.
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Disable All Shadows
The Disable All Shadows checkbox turns off shadow casting for
all lights in the 3D scene. The lights will still have their Shadow
Casting checkboxes turned on, and the Shadow Darkness and
Softness settings will remain, but the shadows won’t be rendered
in a Best quality rendering.
This feature lets you temporarily disable all shadows to speed up
Best quality rendering while you are working on the look of other
things in the scene. Shadows take extra time to render so keep
this feature in mind. It greatly speeds up the creation process
when you flip one switch and turn off the shadows, work out the
textures, then flip the switch back on and have all the shadows
set up the way you left them.
The Light Editor
The settings for lights are located on the right side of the interface below the lighting swatches. This area is called the Light
Editor, all the settings for a light are contained in this one spot.
As you select different lights, their settings will be shown by the
controls in the Light Editor. Only the settings of the currently selected light are shown, (the light whose name is displayed in the
Lights List.) When you select a different light the controls update
to show you the settings of the new light.
The Light Editor.
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Light Name
This is an editable text field where you can change the name
of the current light. Click in this field and type something new.
When you hit the Return or Enter keys, or click on a different
control, the new name will be accepted and the Light List will
change to show you the new name.
You cannot name two lights the same name.
Light Color Picker
The Light Name field.
The little box next to the word “Color” shows you the color of the
currently selected light. To change a light’s color click once in
the color box. This will open your computer’s color picker where
you can pick a different color and click OK to get back to the
lighting controls.
When picking a color for a light, remember that picking a darker
color has the same effect as lowering the intensity of the light. So
picking a dark blue has the same effect as picking a bright blue
and lowering its intensity.
Sometimes you will find yourself having to raise the light intensity
above a value of 100 in order to get the light bright enough. If
you do this you should check to see if your light color is working
against you and perhaps you should lighten the color instead of
increasing the intensity.
Click once in this box to open the Color Picker.
The color of a light can be animated, but the
keyframes must be set inside the AE Timeline.
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Light Color Eyedropper
The color eyedropper is located next to the color box. You use it
by clicking on it once, moving the eyedropper cursor over an area
you want to sample the color from, then click the mouse again.
The Light Color Eyedropper.
If you want, you can hold the mouse button down during the sampling process and drag it around. As it passes over new colors
you will see the color box changing. When you’ve sampled the
color you want, stop dragging and release the mouse button.
Light Intensity
The light intensity slider controls how bright or dark a light is.
An intensity of 100 means the light is “full on”. An intensity of 0
means the light is turned off. Changing between 0 and 100 acts
like a dimmer switch that increases or decreases the electricity
applied to the light.
Notice that above the slider is a text field where the numbers
appear. This text field can be typed into directly. This is useful
when you want a value that is greater than 100 or less than 0.
The Light Intensity slider.
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A light intensity greater than 100 will start to bleach out the
scene. It makes the objects very white wherever the light hits.
A light intensity less than 0 creates a “negative” light. This is a
light that removes light wherever it hits. A negative white light
makes the objects darker wherever it shines on them. A negative
red light removes red making the objects more cyan.
Shadow Casting
Lights in the Invigorator do not cast shadows by default. Shadow
casting takes extra rendering time and isn’t always desired. Shadows do however, add to the realism of a scene making the images
look very nice.
Shadows are turned on by first selecting the light you want
to have shadows come from, then putting a checkmark in the
Shadow Casting checkbox. When you do this you’ll see the sliders become active so you can change them if you want.
It’s good to know that the Invigorator creates 3D shadows. This
is where shadows are cast from one 3D object onto other 3D
objects in the same Invigorator scene. Shadows are not cast from
3D objects onto other layers in an AE project.
Many times you may be wanting to create a “drop-shadow” effect
where the shadow from a 3D object falls onto another AE layer.
Turn on the Shadow Casting checkbox to enable shadows.
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If this is what you are looking for, then don’t do it by having the
Invigorator create 3D shadows, just apply AE’s drop shadow effect to the same layer the Invigorator is on. This will make a drop
shadow out of the alpha channel the Invigorator creates. The
drop shadow effect renders much faster than full 3D shadows.
The quality of a shadow is determined by the size of the shadow
map it creates. Sometimes, depending on how spread out your
objects are in the scene, your shadows will look a little ragged
around the edges. When this happens click the User Prefs button
and increase the Shadow Quality setting.
Increase the Shadow Quality setting in the User Prefs.
Shadow Darkness
The Shadow Darkness setting controls how contrasty the shadow
is. A setting of 100% creates a very dark shadow. A setting of 0%
makes the shadow so light you can’t see it.
Use higher settings for Shadow Darkness when
shadows fall onto dark colored objects.
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Most of the time you will use lower settings when the shadows
fall on light colored objects and higher settings when they fall
onto dark colored objects.
Shadow Softness
The Shadow Softness setting lets you control how fuzzy and diffuse a shadow is. The default value gives you a fairly soft shadow. Move the slider to the right to get a softer shadow and move
it to the left to get a crisper shadow.
Note: Softer shadows increase rendering time.
Move the Shadow Softness slider to
the right to get softer shadows.
Shadow Quality
See the section on Shadow Quality under User Preferences.
Light Preview
The Light Preview is the picture in the top right corner of the
light Editor area. It shows you an example of what the currently
selected light looks like when shining on a white sphere. This includes the color and intensity of the light as well as its direction.
The Light Preview always shows the ball from a front view, so for
lights that shine on the backs of objects the Light Preview will
show the current light as a rim of color on one edge of the ball. If
the light is far enough behind the sphere, the Light Preview won’t
show the light at all.
The Light Preview shows what
the selected light looks like
applied to an object.
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To save a light swatch, click on the sphere and drag it from
the light editor up into the Lights bin, releasing it over an
empty dock.
To apply a light swatch to a light, select the light you want
to color, then drag the swatch from the bin down into the
light editor and drop it onto the Light Preview.
Light Commands Popup
Drag a swatch from the bin on to the Light Preview to apply the
swatch to the selected light.
The Light Commands popup menu is seen just above the Light
Preview ball. Clicking on it reveals the commands available to
use. Drag down to highlight a command and release the mouse to
execute it.
Save Light To Bin
Using this command will save the settings for the light currently
seen in the light editor as a reusable swatch. The swatch will be
placed in the first available dock in the lights bin, directly above
the light editor.
Using this command saves the current light’s settings as a
swatch in the Lights Bin.
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Saving the current light’s settings as a swatch can also be done
by clicking on the Light Preview ball and dragging it up into the
lights bin.
Lights Bin
The Lights Bin is found at the top of the Lights tab. It is an array
of docks which can each contain a Light swatch. Each Light
swatch contains the settings for intensity, color, shadow and
direction. When a Light swatch is dragged from the bin down
to the Light Editor area and dropped onto the Light Preview the
currently selected light will receive the settings contained in the
Light swatch. In this way Lights that have been created at other
times can be used over and over again, by simply dragging the
swatch onto the Preview image in the light editor.
When swatches are saved to the bin they are immediately saved
to disk. This way they are available to reuse in any other Invigorator project.
The Lights Bin is located at the top of the Lights tab.
Important Note
The swatches in the Lights Bin are not linked to the
lights currently in use. They are simply a convenient
way to encapsulate a group of settings. If you drag a
swatch from the bin to the light editor this will apply its
settings to the current light. If you then edit the settings you will not change the swatch in the bin. You will
only be changing the current light.
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Lights Swatch Commands
The Swatch popup menu for lights is seen at the top right corner
of the Lights tab. Clicking on it reveals commands which deal
with the organization and management of the swatches in the
Lights bin. Drag down to highlight a command and release the
mouse to execute it. Explanations of the commands follow.
Apply Swatch To Light
This command applies the selected Light Swatch to the currently
selected light. It takes all of the settings in the Light Swatch and
applies them to the light seen in the Light Editor.
The same thing can be done by dragging a Light Swatch from the
bin and dropping it onto the preview picture in the Light Editor.
If more than one Light Swatch is selected, only the first selected
will be used. The first selected light is displayed with a red selection rectangle around the swatch.
Duplicate Light Swatch
This command will duplicate the selected light swatch and place
it at the first available dock in the bin. If more than one swatch is
selected, then all selected swatches will be duplicated.
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Delete Selected Swatches
This command will delete all light swatches that are currently selected. Selected swatches have red or green selection rectangles
around them.
When you delete swatches from bins, you are deleting them from
your hard drive too.
Deleting swatches does not hurt the project. It only removes the
pictures from the bins.
Clear Bin
Clearing the bin will delete all of the swatches from the bin. It will
also delete them from your hard drive so they won’t be available
to use in any other project.
Deleting swatches will not change the lights in the current project. It only removes the pictures from the bins.
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Lighting Styles Bin
The Lighting Styles bin is where entire lighting set ups are stored.
A Lighting Style is a recording of the settings for all of the lights
used in a 3D scene. Saving a Lighting Style uses the current lights
to light a proxy scene and then makes an icon out of it. The icon
appears in the Lighting Styles bin ready to drag and drop into the
3D scene window.
Each Lighting Style has two editable fields next to the picture.
The top one is only one line long and is for the name of the Lighting Style. The lower one can have multiple lines and is where the
user can type in notes, such as which project the Lighting Style
came from, or anything else.
Type a name into the top text field.
Type notes into the bottom text field.
Lighting Styles are applied to the current project by dragging the
picture icon from the bin and dropping it into the 3D window.
When you drag over the window you will see a red highlight
around the window indicating that this target is ready to receive
the drop.
You cannot name two Lighting Styles the same name.
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Lighting Styles Swatch Commands
The Swatch popup menu for Lighting Styles is seen at the top
right corner of the Lighting Styles tab. Clicking on it reveals
commands which deal with the organization and management of
the swatches in the bin. Drag down to highlight a command and
release the mouse to execute it.
The Lighting Styles Swatch popup menu
Save Lighting Style
This command is how Lighting Styles are created. Set up the
scene lighting, then pick this command. A small image of the
scene window will be rendered and placed into the first available
dock in the Lighting Styles bin.
Changing the scene’s lights after you have saved the Lighting
Style will not automatically update it. If you change the scene’s
lights, delete the old Lighting Style and save the new one.
Apply Lighting Style
The Apply Lighting Style command will take the currently selected Lighting Style and apply it to the 3D scene. An alternative way
to do this is to drag the Lighting Style swatch from the bin and
drop it into the 3D window.
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Duplicate Lighting Style
This command will duplicate the selected Lighting Style and place
it in the first available dock.
Delete Selected Lighting Styles
Selecting one or more Lighting Styles and then using this command will delete them from the bin and from the hard drive.
This will not change the lighting in the current 3D scene.
Clear Bin
Clearing the bin will remove all of the swatches from the bin and
from the hard drive.
This will not change the lights in the current project.
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Object Controls
Object Mode
When this button is made active (blue) the Object controls and
tabs are revealed and the manipulator tools will affect the objects
in the 3D scene.
Sometimes you may want to manipulate individual objects, but all
of the objects act like they are stuck together. This usually means
you are in Camera mode, not in Object mode. Look to see if the
Camera button is blue or if the Object button is blue. Another
clue is that if you are manipulating the camera, the floor grid will
move as you drag. When you manipulate objects, the floor stays
in the same place.
Objects need to be selected before they can
be manipulated. If you drag and nothing is
moving, check to see if you have selected the
objects you are trying to move.
Also notice that inside the Set-Up window the Object button has
only one cube on it, whereas in the Effect Controls window the
Sets button has three cubes. This is to help you remember that in
the Effect Controls you are manipulating sets of objects, while in
the Set-Up window you can manipulate individual objects
Object Manipulation
To drag objects in the Scene Preview window you have to do the
following three things: 1- Click on the Object mode button so
it appears blue; 2- select one of the five manipulation tools; and
3- select one or more objects. If you miss one of the three parts,
you won’t be able to manipulate objects.
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When manipulating objects select the tool then start the drag
inside the 3D scene window. Don’t start dragging while clicking
on a manipulator tool button.
3
1
If you click the mouse button, then let up without dragging,
you may change which objects are selected. Clicking
without dragging, makes the manipulator tools act like the
selection tool.
2
When you do an object manipulation, verify that Object
mode is active, select a tool, then click and immediately
drag in the Scene Preview window.
Object Nudging
Do three things to drag objects:
1- Click the Object mode button.
2- Select a manipulation tool.
3- Select an object.
Now you can drag in the window and
the object will move.
When you’re manipulating objects and you need to make small
adjustments to an object’s rotation or position, the nudge keys
come in very handy. All of the manipulation tools respond to
clicks on your keyboard’s arrow keys. The Camera, Light and
Object manipulators all respond to nudging, so be sure you are in
the correct mode with the desired manipulation tool active.
If nudging doesn’t appear to be working, click on the manipulation tool again to put the keyboard’s focus on that tool. (See the
side-bars on the next few pages for specifics about how nudging
affects each tool.)
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Object Tumble
This tool responds to mouse movement in any direction. Tumbling objects makes them rotate around a common rotational
center. When only one object is selected, this central pivot point
is located at the center of the object. When more than one object
is selected the pivot point is at the center of all selected objects.
When inside the Set-Up window, the pivot point will change based
on the size of the objects and which objects are selected at the
time of the tumble. On the other hand, the pivot point for each
Set stays in the same position unless changed. (See the section on
Set Rotation.)
The axes which objects rotate around are relative to the current
view direction of the camera, so a rotation around the X axis
means the camera’s current X axis. If you want to rotate the
object around its own X axis you must turn on the “Drag Using
Object’s Axes” option found just below the manipulator tools.
(See the section on Drag Using Object’s Axes.)
Keyboard shortcut: inside the Set-Up window,
tap the T key to activate the Tumble tool.
Nudging with the Tumble tool
keyboard, will tumble the object 5 degrees in
the direction of the click. (left/right/up/down)
arrow key will tumble the object 15 degrees.
Holding the Shift key down will constrain the Tumble tool to only
one axis. Up/down drags will tumble only around the X axis.
Right/left drags will tumble only around the Y axis.
When the Tumble tool is active, holding the Control key (Mac &
Win) will temporarily activate the Roll tool. This enables you to
get X, Y and Z rotations without changing tools.
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Object Roll
This tool responds to mouse movement only in the left/right
direction. The Roll tool will spin the object(s) like the propeller
of an airplane. You don’t drag the mouse in a circle around the
center of the picture, you just drag more to the left or to the right.
tap the R key to activate the Roll tool.
Nudging with the Roll tool
keyboard, will roll the object 5 degrees in the
direction of the click. (left/right only)
arrow key will roll the object 15 degrees.
When working with the Roll tool imagine that you are grabbing
a wheel at the top (12 o’ clock position) so when you drag to the
right you are spinning the wheel (objects) to the right and when
you drag to the left you spin the wheel to the left.
Like the Tumble tool, the Roll tool will rotate a single object
around its center point, and if more than one object is selected
when the roll starts they will all be rotated around their common
center point.
The roll axis is relative to the current viewing direction of the
camera, meaning that the roll will happen around the camera’s
current Z axis. If you want to rotate the object around its own
Z axis you must turn on the “Drag Using Object’s Axes” option
found just below the manipulator tools. (See the section on Drag
Using Object’s Axes.)
When the Roll tool is active, holding the Control key (Mac & Win)
will temporarily activate the Tumble tool. This enables you to get
X, Y and Z rotations without changing tools.
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Object Track
Track tool moves objects left/right or up/down without rotating
them.
The movement is always parallel to your computer monitor’s
screen, so left/right/up/down are based on the direction that the
camera is currently facing.
Holding the Shift key down will constrain the Track tool to only
one axis. Up/down drags will track along the Y axis. Right/left
drags will track along the X axis. Remember that these axes are
based on the camera’s current viewing direction. (See the section
on Drag Using Object’s Axes for how to move objects along their
own axes.)
When the Track tool is active, holding down the Control key (Mac
& Win) will temporarily activate the Dolly tool. This enables you
to move in the X, Y or Z directions without changing tools.
tap the M key to activate the Move (Track) tool.
Nudging with the Track tool
keyboard, will track the object 1 point in the
direction of the click. (left/right/up/down)
arrow key will track the object 10 points.
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Object Dolly
tap the D key to activate the Dolly tool.
Nudging with the Dolly tool
Each click of an arrow key on your computer,
will dolly the object 1 point forward or back in
the direction of the click. (up/down only)
arrow key will dolly the object 10 points.
This tool responds to mouse movement only in the up/down direction. The Dolly tool pushes objects away from the camera or
pulls them in closer toward the camera.
Notice that the up/down response is reversed when dollying the
camera vs. dollying objects. This is because you are operating on
two different types of thing.
Remember that you are always looking at the scene through the
lens of the camera, so dragging up pushes an object away from
the camera making it smaller in the window, whereas if you’re in
camera mode, the same drag up pushes the camera closer to the
objects making them appear larger in the window. Once you understand when you are moving objects and when you are moving
the camera, the drag motion makes sense.
When the Dolly tool is active, holding down the Control key (Mac
& Win) will temporarily activate the Track tool. This enables you
to move in the X, Y or Z directions without changing tools.
Dollying the Camera
pushes the camera
closer to the objects.
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Dollying objects
pushes objects away
from the camera.
Drag Using Object’s Axes
This option is found just below the toolbar when the Object Mode
button is highlighted. When this option is enabled it makes the
manipulator tools work differently. Usually objects will move
or rotate relative to the direction the camera is viewing them in.
However, when the Drag Using Object’s Axes option is turned on,
the manipulation happens relative to the direction the object is
currently facing.
For instance if you highlight Object mode, uncheck Drag Using
Object’s Axes, select an object and pick the Dolly tool, dragging
up and down will move the object closer or further away from the
camera.
But if you check Drag Using Object’s Axes you will see that the
object moves in the direction its front and back faces are pointing
in. (This is most easily seen when you are viewing the scene from
a high right or high left angle.)
Even if the object has been rotated at some odd angle you will see
that the Dolly tool still moves the object in the direction that its
front and back faces are pointing.
With Drag Using Objects Axes option turned on, the
Object moves in the direction it is facing.
Keyboard Shortcut
When dragging with a manipulator tool,
holding down the Command key (Mac)
or Alt key (Win) will temporarily activate
Drag Using Object’s Axes mode. This enables you to quickly switch between drag
modes without having to stop and click
checkboxes on and off.
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With Drag Using Object’s Axes turned on, the Track tool will
move the object in the direction its sides are pointing in. Dragging up/down will move the object towards its top/bottom. Dragging left/right will move the object toward its left/right sides.
If an object has been rotated upside down, and “Drag Using Object’s Axes” is turned on, dragging up will make it
move down and dragging down will make it move up. This
is one of those things that looks so funny when you see it
happen it should trigger in your mind that you must have
“Drag Using Object’s Axes” turned on.
The rotation tools work in Object Axes mode too. The Roll tool
will always spin the object like a propeller, directly around the
center of its front face.
With Drag Using Object’s Axes option turned on,
the Track tool will move the object in
the direction its sides are pointing in.
The Tumble tool will rotate the object as if it has had a broomstick pushed through it from top to bottom or from left to right.
This feature is very useful when you are first spacing out your
objects in the Z dimension. The Invigorator does not have the
traditional Top-Front-Side views found in some 3D programs.
Moving objects straight back to space them out would usually be
done by selecting an object in the Front view, then moving it in
the side or top view.
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However, with Drag Using Object’s Axes turned on, Dollying the
object back will move it only in the Z direction, preserving the X
and Y positions of the original artwork. The artwork will move
properly no matter which direction you are viewing it from.
Experiment with this option on and off to get a feel for when
you might use it. You’ll find that it is very useful when you need
to rotate or move an object and you don’t want to reposition the
camera to do it.
Dragging With Multiple Objects Selected
When multiple objects are selected and Drag Using Object’s
Axes mode is turned on, the axis of the Primary Selection is
used as the drag axis. This makes all the selected objects
move along the axis of the Primary Selection.
This will keep the selected objects together, otherwise objects that are facing different directions would spread apart
in an unpredictable way.
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Object Scale
Keyboard Shortcut: Inside the Set-Up window,
tap the S key to activate the Scale tool.
Nudging with the Scale Tool
keyboard, will increase or decrease the
object’s scale by 1% , based on the arrow key
clicked. (Y scale = up/down, X scale = left/
right, hold the Control key down (Mac & Win)
and click the up/down arrows to get Z scale.)
Holding the Shift key down and clicking
an arrow key will increase or decrease an
object’s scale by 10%.
Scale tool makes objects bigger or smaller along one or more
axes. Dragging to the right increases the object’s X scale. Dragging to the left decreases the object’s X scale. Dragging up or
down affects the object’s Y scale. Holding down the Shift key will
constrain the scaling to only the X or Y axis or it will scale both
the same amount if you drag at a 45 degree angle away from the
point where you started the drag.
To make an object Scale along its Z axis, hold down the Control
key (Mac & Win) before dragging. Holding down the Shift and the
Control keys at the same time will make the object scale proportionally along all three axes.
Scaling is always based on an object’s original axes, which is the
way the object appeared when it first came into the Invigorator.
If you’ve rotated the object to some odd angle, the scale may not
look like it’s acting right. (This is similar to how Drag Using
Object’s Axes works, so see that section if you are uncertain
what this means.)
If you have multiple objects selected, using the scale tool will
scale each object individually along its own original axis. This
prevents objects from distorting, or “skewing.” If you want to
distort the objects, scale the Set the objects are assigned to.
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Selection Tool
There is a rule that the Invigorator follows that says, “if a change
is made, then whatever is selected gets the change.” Knowing
this, it’s important to be able to select and deselect objects at will.
Primary selection
Secondary selections
The Selection Tool is the arrow cursor with a “click” at its point.
It is used to select objects in the 3D scene. Click on the tool to
highlight it, then click on objects in the Scene Preview window.
When an object is selected a wireframe bounding box appears
around it.
Objects can also be selected by dragging with the Selection tool
and by picking them from the Object List. (See the sections on
Drag Selecting and the Object List.)
Primary And Secondary Selections
When objects are selected, wireframe bounding boxes are drawn
around them. Sometimes the bounding box around an object is
red and sometimes it is green. When the bounding box is red it
means it was the first object selected and is called the Primary
selection. Its settings are the ones shown in the Object tab.
Selection tool
Keyboard Shortcut: Inside the Set-Up window,
tap the V key to activate the Selection tool.
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If the bounding box is green it means the object was selected
after the Primary object had already been selected. The green
selections are called Secondary selections. The settings for a
Secondary selection are not shown, you must make an object the
Primary selection for its settings to be shown.
The name of the Primary Selection is shown on the Object List
popup when this popup is collapsed. It also has a bullet in front
of its name in the Object List.
Adding To And Removing From Selections
A single click on an object will select that object. If you don’t
hold down any other key, then clicking on another object will
deselect what is currently selected and select the new object.
Holding down the Shift key when you click will add other objects
to the current selection when you click on them.
If an object is already selected, holding down Shift and clicking
on it will remove it from the current selection. If you Shift-click
on the Primary selection it will be deselected and a different object will become the Primary selection.
Hold down the Shift key and click on other objects
to add to the current selection.
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Drag Selecting
You can drag with the Selection tool to select multiple objects in
one motion. Any object that is partially contained inside the drag
rectangle will be selected. You do not have to drag around the
entire object to select it.
Select All
Double clicking the selection tool is the shortcut for the
Select All command.
Using a menu command you can select everything by picking
Select All from the top of the Object List.
Deselect All
If you click in the 3D scene window on a spot where there are no
objects, you will deselect all objects that are currently selected.
You can also deselect everything by picking the Deselect All command from the top of the Object List.
Select Invisible
The Select Invisible command is used to quickly select all invisible objects so you can make them visible again.
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Using The Manipulation Tools For Selecting
You can use the manipulation tools to select objects. This is a
very useful technique and prevents you from having to switch
back and forth between the selection and manipulation tools.
To make this work all you have to do is select any manipulation
tool and click on an object without dragging the mouse. This will
make the tool temporarily act like the selection tool and select
your object. If you drag, the tool won’t make a selection. Instead,
the tool’s main function will kick in and whatever is already selected will get manipulated.
Click without dragging to make selections while using
the manipulator tools.
Small Object Tab
When you click on the Object mode button you reveal a group of
object controls below the Scene Preview window. We call this
the small object tab to distinguish it from the large object tab on
the right half of the Set-Up window.
The small object tab.
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Object List
The popup menu called the Object List contains a listing of all 3D
objects that are inside your scene. If it’s not in this list, it’s not
inside the Invigorator.
Click on the popup and hold down to see the list. Drag down to
highlight one of the items and let go to select it.
If you hold down the Shift key when selecting objects from the
object list you can add or remove objects from the current selection, the same way Shift-clicking works when selecting objects in
the 3D scene preview window.
If it’s not in this list, it’s not in the project.
The text style, in which the object names are written, tells you
information about them. Following are explanations of what each
text style means.
Bold Object Names
When objects are selected their names in the Object List are written in Bold. If you click and hold down on the Object List you
can quickly scan down the list and see which objects are selected
because all of the selected object names will be written in Bold.
Selected objects are indicated by a Bold text style.
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Italic Object Names
There is a checkbox located just below the Object List that says
“Make Invisible” next to it. Objects that have been made invisible
will have their names written in Italics. This makes it very easy to
see which objects are invisible. You simply open the Object List
and scan down it to see which object names are written in italics.
Invisible objects are indicated by Italics.
Bullets In The Object List
When objects are selected you will notice that one of them will
have a bullet (a good sized dot) in front of its name inside the
Object List. The bullet is in front of the object that is the Primary
Selection. As discussed in the section on Primary and Secondary
selections, only one group of object settings are displayed at a
time, and the Primary Selection is the object whose settings get
this honor.
The Primary Selection has the bullet.
Release the mouse on another object to
make it the Primary Selection.
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You can change which object is the Primary Selection by clicking
on the Object List, highlighting the object that you want to be the
Primary Selection and releasing the mouse on the new object’s
name. It will now become the Primary selection and the various
object controls will update to show you the settings for the new
primary object.
Set Assignment
Next to the Object List is a tiny popup menu called the Set Assignment popup. This popup is what you use to assign objects to one
of the animatable Sets. After Effects has a limit on the number of
objects you can animate so we have pre-configured the Invigorator to have eight animatable sets of objects.
We call it a Set because each Set can contain any number of objects. When it’s animated, a Set moves the objects assigned to it
as though they were all locked together.
Assigning Object 1 to Set 1
Any number of objects can be assigned to a Set at one time. Select all objects you want to assign to a Set, then pick the Set number from the Sets Assignment popup. Since they were all selected
they will all receive the same Set number.
Objects can be moved from one Set to another by first selecting
the object, then picking a different Set from the Set Assignment
popup.
Understanding Sets
Imagine you had a house with furniture in it.
The house would be the Set and the furniture
would be the objects. Now imagine that you
could see the furniture but the house was invisible. And finally, imagine what would happen
if you took ahold of the house and lifted it up,
and moved it, and rotated it. What would happen? Since the furniture objects are sitting on
the floors of the house they would be carried
along with the house as it was moved. That’s
how a Set moves its objects.
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If the Set is empty when the objects are assigned to it, the
rotational center for the Set is placed at the common center of all the objects. Once objects have been assigned
to a Set the rotational center (also called the “pivot point”)
is not moved until either the Set gets emptied out, or the
Recenter Pivot command is used. This command is found
in the Sets popup menu inside the Effect Controls window.
The Recenter Pivot command is located in the Sets
popup menu inside the Effect Controls window.
Moving objects inside the Set-Up window will move them inside
their Set but will not recenter the pivot point. So if you assign
a single object to a Set, then move that object when inside the
Set-Up window it will no longer be centered on the pivot point.
You will have to use the Recenter Pivot command to put the pivot
point at the new center of the objects.
Make Invisible
The Make Invisible checkbox turns off the visibility of an object.
All of the settings needed to rebuild the object will be preserved,
but the modeling process will be turned off.
To generate the model again, select it from the Object List and
uncheck the Make Invisible checkbox. Note that there is a Select
Invisible command in the object list which can be used to quickly
select all invisible objects.
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Reset
The Reset button will remove the position and rotation changes,
also called object manipulations, that you have applied to an
object while inside the Set-Up window. (It will not remove the
manipulations applied to Sets. See below.)
When this button is clicked, the selected objects will be returned
to the positions where they first appeared inside the Invigorator.
Nothing will happen to the materials or shape settings applied to
the objects, only the manipulations will be removed.
If you click the Reset button and the objects don’t go back to
their starting position it may be because the Set that the object
is inside of has also been manipulated. To Reset a Set, go to the
Effect Controls window and click the Reset button that appears
next to the effect’s name. This will reset all the animatable parameters for the whole Invigorator. Sets, Camera and Lights. If you
only want to reset a single Set, open the twirly arrows for that Set
and return the position and rotation settings to zero.
DOUBLE CHECK FOR SELECTIONS! Of course there’s another
reason why clicking the Reset button inside the Set-Up window
may not make an object return to its original position. That’s if
the object you are trying to reset is not selected. If a button or a
command doesn’t work, always be sure to double check that the
objects you are trying to apply the command to are selected.
If you have rotated or repositioned the
Set that an object is assigned to, clicking
the Reset button inside the Set-Up window
will not remove the Set manipulations, it
will only remove the Object manipulations.
Remember this and tuck it away in the
back of your mind, so that if you ever click
the Reset button and the objects do not go
back to their original position, realize that
the Set the object is assigned to, must also
be rotated or moved.
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Delete
Selecting an object and clicking the Delete button will remove the
object from the 3D scene. If more than one object is selected, all
selected objects will be deleted.
You cannot delete a Set. You can only delete objects. Clicking
the Delete button inside the Effect Controls window will delete
the whole 3D Invigorator effect.
While inside the Invigorator’s Set-Up window, you can also hit the
Delete key on your keyboard to delete the selected objects.
Duplicate
The Duplicate function will make an exact copy of the selected
objects and place them in a new position that is slightly offset
from the original. The default offset position is 50 points down
and 50 points to the right of the original object, but this offset can
be changed inside the User Prefs window.
By changing the amount of the offset you can quickly make rows
of objects such as grid lines, roof arches, and patterns of stars.
Duplicated objects are given the same Object Style as the original
object, so changing the material or edge settings for one of the
objects will affect all of them. To gain control over each object
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independently you have to give each object its own Object Style
or use the Unlink Object Style command from the Swatch popup
in the Object Styles tab.
Using Move To Center From The Small Objects Tab
Objects can be moved to the center of the world at any time during a project. Inside the Invigorator’s Set-Up window is a Move To
Center button located on the small object tab directly below the
Object List.
When you click this button, all selected objects will be moved to
the world origin as a big group. If you only have one object selected, only that object will be centered. If you have many objects
selected, all of them will be moved to the origin in one unit.
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Create Object
This is the button you click when you want to bring objects into
the Invigorator’s 3D world. Clicking it will open the same “Open
Illustrator File” window that you see when you first add an Invigorator effect to an After Effects project.
Take a moment to familiarize yourself with the location of this
button. Notice that it is on the small object tab. So when you
want to create a new object, you click on the Object Mode button
which reveals the small object tab, and there you will see the Create Object button.
Click this button to add objects to the Invigorator.
PRO NOTE
In the Pro version, the Create Object button
is replaced by the Object... popup. Inside
the Object... popup, the “Open Illustrator
File” command does the same thing as the
Create Object button.
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Something good to know is that when you open an Illustrator
vector file, the vector paths are extracted from the file and stored
inside the Invigorator effect. This data is stored inside the After
Effects project It does not create a link to it.
The original Illustrator file is not needed to reopen an existing project. The Invigorator doesn’t re-read the file every time
it opens, so you don’t have to worry about keeping the original
Illustrator file around. (Texture maps, however, are not stored
inside the AE project so you do have to keep them with the rest of
your source files.)
User Prefs
Clicking the User Prefs button will open the User Prefs window. This window contains various settings such as the default
Set number that new objects are automatically assigned to, and
whether or not the floor grid is shown in the preview window.
This is also where you tell the Invigorator to save the settings you
want to use for your default material, default bevel settings, and
default Object Style. (See the User Prefs Window section.)
Clear Objects
Clicking this button will remove all of the objects from your 3D
scene. Whether they are selected or not doesn’t matter, every
object will be deleted. Everything else will be left as it is. The
materials bin, custom camera views, etc. will not be touched.
Only the objects will be deleted.
Clear Scene
Clicking this button will erase everything and reset the entire
scene to its default state. All objects and camera views will be
deleted. The scene will look as it does when a brand new Invigorator effect is created. To add objects to a cleared Invigorator
scene click the Create Object button or, if you are using the PRO
version, use the Object... popup.
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The Large Object Tab
Click this to reveal the large Object Tab.
The right side of the Set-Up window contains the main controls
for objects, lights and the bins of material and light swatches. As
you click between the Camera, Light and Object buttons the right
half of the Set-Up window changes to reveal the controls that are
relevant for the mode you are in.
When you click on the Object Mode button the right half of the
Set-Up window displays three tabs, the Object tab, the Materials
tab and the Object Styles tab. We call the Object tab contained
here the “large Object tab” to distinguish it from the “small Object
tab” seen below the Scene Preview on the left half of the Set-Up
window.
The large Object tab contains the settings that control the shape
of the objects. At the top of the large Object tab you will see a
title that says Vector Shape Object. This means the object was
created using Illustrator vector shapes for the input. The controls
in this Object tab will change to show you their current state for
the selected object. If more than one object is selected the controls will show you the settings for the primary (red) selection.
The small Object Tab.
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The large Object Tab.
Object Name
When objects are first created they are simply called Object 1,
Object 2, Group 1, etc. The Object Name field is where you can
change these default names to something more memorable.
No two objects inside the Invigorator can have the same names.
The Object Name Field.
Inside an Illustrator file you cannot give names to individual
paths, however you can give names to layers. So when you open
Illustrator files and use the Open By Layers option, the name of
each object will be the same as the layer it came from.
Once you have loaded the objects by layers you can change the
name inside the Invigorator by editing it inside the Object Name
field. Even if you change the name here the Invigorator will still
be able to find the original layer inside the vector file it came from
so the Reload Layer feature will still work.
Once you have use the Open By Layers option, do not change the
name of the layer inside the original Illustrator file, as the Invigorator will no longer be able to find the layer and the Reload Layer
operation will fail.
WARNING
Do not name two layers the same name
inside of Illustrator. If you do, the Invigorator
won’t be able to tell one from the other when
you use the Reload Layer operation, and
will simply reload the first one it comes to.
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Object Stats
If you’re the kind of person who likes to work with numbers, then
the Object Stats window is for you.
The Stats button opens the
Object Stats window.
You open this window by clicking the Stats button located underneath the object’s name on the Object tab. An object must be
selected for this button to be active. If you have more than one
object selected the information for only the primary selection will
be shown.
When the Object Stats window opens, the name of the object is
displayed at the top of the dialogue. This helps you know for
certain which object you are working with.
Inside this window you will find the numerical readouts for the
Position, Rotation and the Scale of the object. If you are running
the PRO version you will also see the Meshing controls.
To change a value, type a new number into one of the edit fields.
Clicking one of the Reset buttons will set the values to 0,0,0 for
Position and Rotation, and 1,1,1 for Scale.
The Object Stats window for the Classic version.
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Click the OK button to close the dialogue or click the Apply button to watch the change take effect without closing the dialogue.
You can drag the Object Stats window to get a better view of the
scene window.
If you are using the PRO version of the Invigorator the Object
Stats window will have extra controls for Meshing.
Meshing is used to prep an object so that it can be deformed.
(Read more about Meshing in the section called “Meshing” elsewhere in this User Guide.)
The Object Stats window for the PRO version.
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Reload Layer
The Reload Layer button, in combination with the Open By Layers option, are the keys to a great work saver. What this button
enables you to do is to change the shape of your 3D models by
changing the vector paths being used to create those shapes. It
does this by reloading the original Illustrator file you used to create the models and then switching the old vector shapes for the
new vector shapes. If you have changed the vector shapes in the
Illustrator file, the result is that the 3D models change shape to
reflect those changes.
For example say you had the words Monday Night Sports and
you wanted it to become Tuesday Night Sports. By replacing the
word Tuesday for the word Monday in the original Illustrator file
and then clicking the Reload Layer button, you will switch them
out. The layer will be “re-loaded”. The model will be rebuilt using all the same settings as were used to build the original model.
But now it will say Tuesday instead of Monday.
Opening an Illustrator file using the ‘Open By Layers’ option.
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In order for this feature to work, you must have prepared for it by
splitting your vector paths among several different layers. Then
when opening the Illustrator file for the first time, check the
Open By Layers checkbox in the Select Artwork window. Each
layer will become a separate item in the Object List.
Once that is done you are ready to make changes to the Illustrator file, then update the models made from them by reloading the
layers they are on.
Position things on the Illustration page the way
you want them to appear in the final project,
otherwise they may jump after reloading.
In steps that’s:
- Change the vector paths in the original Illustrator file.
- Save your changes.
- Select the object inside the Invigorator that you will be updating.
- Click the Reload Layer button.
(See the section above on the Object Name Field for more information about using the Reload Layer feature.)
If you haven’t prepared for using this feature, you can still update
existing models by using the Replace feature. (See next page.)
Before using Reload Layer.
IMPORTANT POINT
Whenever you edit Illustrator files remember that the
position of the vector shapes on the Illustrator page
determines where the 3D objects end up inside the
Invigorator.
For instance when you erase the word Monday and
insert the word Tuesday, be sure to position the new
word in the same spot as the old word. Otherwise the
new word will shift positions during Reload or Replace
operations.
(See pictures on this page.)
After using Reload Layer, when the new
objects were placed out of position.
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Replace
Like the Reload Layer button, the Replace button will let you update the 3D models by switching the vector artwork. With Reload
Layer however, you have to plan ahead by separating the vector
paths onto different layers and turning on the Open By Layers
checkbox when you first load the Illustrator file.
With the Replace function you do not have to pre-plan anything.
You can update any 3D model by loading in a new Illustrator file
to replace the old vector paths. However since Illustrator does
not attach names to individual vector paths there is a rule you
have to follow to get this function to work properly. The rule is:
During the Replace operation the Invigorator will use all
visible vector paths in the Illustrator file and switch them for
the vector paths of the Primary Selection only.
When we say “visible vector paths,” what we mean is, paths
which are on a layer and that layer’s visibility is turned ON.
Everything you do not want to become part of the new 3D object
should be put on a different layer, and that layer’s visibility eyeball should be turned OFF. When that is done the invisible layer
will be ignored when the file is opened.
(Continued next page)
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Visibility does not mean “hidden”. As in how you can show/hide
paths inside Illustrator. To make paths invisible to the Invigorator, they must be on their own layer and that layer’s visibility
eyeball must be turned OFF.
Let’s use the same example of Monday Night Sports becoming
Tuesday Night Sports. We’ll assume that each word had been
grouped together in Illustrator so there are only three items in
the Object List. (If they weren’t grouped together see the Special
Note side-bar.)
Inside Illustrator create a new layer and put the word Tuesday
on it. Position it directly on top of the word Monday. Then turn
off the visibility of the other layers leaving only the word Tuesday visible on its own layer. Save the file.
Back in the Invigorator, select the Monday object and click the
Replace button. This will open a file picker. Find the Illustrator file you just saved and click Open. The Invigorator will load
in the visible paths in the file and switch them out for the paths
used to make the selected object. The model will then rebuild
itself using all the same settings as were used for the Monday
object, except now the model says Tuesday.
Special Note
If the word Monday wasn’t grouped together but instead was six individual letters
there are two things you can do with it.
First, if each letter is being animated on its
own you will have to do the Replace function six times, one for each letter.
If on the other hand the whole word is in
the same Set but it just wasn’t grouped
together inside Illustrator, what you do is
delete all the letters except for the M in
Monday. Then you use the Replace operation to switch out the M for the whole word
Tuesday. This will keep you from having to
do the Replace operation more than once
and you’ll still get the same result.
When you replace vector paths, the Invigorator doesn’t care how
you change the vector file. You could replace a single letter for
an entire alphabet, or you could replace a letter for a logo. It
doesn’t matter.
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File Name
Below the Object Name field is an area that displays the name of
the file the vector paths came from. This file name is not editable.
It is there to help you remember which file was used to create the
objects.
Object Faceting
Low Object Faceting
High Antialiasing
Low Object Faceting
Low Antialiasing
The Object Faceting settings control how many polygons are created for the 3D models. Polygons are little flat surfaces that are
connected together to build the whole model. The smaller they
are, the smoother the curves in a model. However, the smaller
they are, the more of them it takes to build the model, and the
longer it takes to render the 3D image, so there’s a speed trade-off
to take into account.
The Object Faceting sliders range from .1 to 10. As you move the
slider to the left it means that the polygons become smaller so the
curves become smoother.
High Object Faceting
High Antialiasing
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High Object Faceting
Low Antialiasing
Think of a circle. If you use a hundred short line segments to
draw a circle the circle will look very smooth. On the other hand,
if you use only eight line segments to draw a circle, the circle will
look “chunky” or “faceted.” In fact it will look like an octagon,
which you don’t usually think of as being a circle at all.
Note that the faceting of an object is a different setting than
the antialiasing of the pixels. Decreasing Object Faceting
smooths out the curves in an object, but it does not increase the
antialiasing. Antialiasing is a camera rendering control. Object
Faceting is an object modeling control.
Object Faceting: Draft Quality vs. Best Quality
You’ll notice that there are two sliders for Object Faceting. One
slider controls the smoothness of the 3D models during Draft
Quality renderings. The other controls how smooth the 3D models are during final, Best Quality renderings.
The reason there are two sliders is that the smoother the objects,
the more polygons created. More polygons take more time to
render. When setting up animations using Draft Quality rendering
you don’t need completely smooth objects. You can tell perfectly
well an object’s shape and location without having completely
smooth models. Since the models aren’t so complicated they
render very quickly. This keeps the creation and animation phase
very fast and interactive. It also lets you render motion tests at
Draft Quality very very quickly.
When it’s time to do the final rendering, switch the Invigorator’s
After Effects layer to Best mode and the model is automatically
rebuilt using the Best Quality setting.
Setting Best Quality TIP
When figuring out what setting the Best
Quality slider should be set to, there’s a
trick you can use. Since you can’t see the
effect of the Best Quality slider inside the
Set-Up window, use the Draft Quality slider.
Adjust the Draft slider until the 3D model
looks smooth, then slide the Best Quality
slider until it matches. Finally, set the Draft
Quality slider back to what it was before,
(the default setting is 3).
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NOTE: You may notice that when you adjust the Best Quality
slider nothing appears to happen, whereas when you adjust the
Draft Quality slider the model rebuilds in the Scene Preview
window. This is correct. The Scene Preview window shows the
draft quality model. The best quality 3D model won’t be created
until you switch the After Effects layer to Best Quality mode and
render the Comp window.
Generate Model Parts
This little area contains four checkboxes. Each checkbox
enables or disables the generation of one of the four parts of a
model.
Front Faces - Putting a checkmark in this checkbox enables the
creation of the front faces of a Vector model. The front faces are
the part of the model taken directly from the vector shapes in the
Illustrator file. Disabling the front faces lets you look into the 3D
model creating a “bowl” type of effect.
Back Faces - The back face of an object is a copy of the Front
Face placed behind the front face at a distance set by the Depth
control. Texture maps applied to the back faces are automatically flipped so they are right reading when viewed from behind.
All Model Parts turned on
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Front Faces only
Turning off the front and back faces creates a tube effect where
you can look right through the object.
Outside Edges - The outside edges of a model are the sides
around the outside perimeter. These have separate controls from
the edges that are built inside holes. The outside edges include
the bevels, corners, sides and indentations; everything that is not
a front or back face.
Hole Edges - The hole edges of a model are the sides built
around the insides of holes. For instance a T, C, S or U doesn’t
have holes so they won’t have any hole edges. On the other hand
a B, D, P and O all have holes so extra edges need to be created
around the inside of the holes.
Outside Edges
Hole Edges
Turning off the Hole Edges checkbox will prevent the generation
of the sides built around the inside of the holes,
Depth
The Depth slider controls the distance between the front and
back faces. The units the Depth slider works in is points. A 100
x 100 point rectangle made in Illustrator and brought into the
Invigorator will become a perfect cube if its Depth is set to 100.
As you increase the Depth of an object you will notice that the
object also gets fatter. This is because object edges are applied
proportionally. As you increase the Depth (which increases the
distance between the front and back faces) the edges will get
proportionally bigger which makes them taller, wider, thicker and
fatter all at the same time.
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To thin down objects that get too fat without changing their
depth, adjust the Edge Scale.
There is no limit as to how deep you can make an object. If you
want a value that is outside the range of the slider, all you have to
do is to type it into the edit box.
Spike Buster
Before using Spike Buster.
Spike Buster helps you clean up problem vector shapes. Sometimes you will see long spikes jutting out of an object. These
spikes are caused by very sharp points in the vector file. The
points could be so small they can hardly be seen, but when used
to create a 3D model they cause big problems such as spikes.
To remove the spikes, slide the Spike Buster slider to the right.
The amount of “busting” is based on the angle between the sides
of the sharp points. For instance, a value of 10 will clip off the
end of any spike whose two sides meet at an angle of ten degrees
or less.
After using Spike Buster.
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New Looks
Spike Buster can also be used to clip the corners of objects even
if they don’t have spikes. Clipped corners have an intriguing beveled look to them and may be just the thing you’re looking for to
add an extra bit of detail to a design. The slider goes up to 110
degrees so it’s easy to clip the corners off of right-angled objects.
Like everything else in the Invigorator you are never stuck in a
decision. Try it to see if you like it. If you don’t like it, just set the
slider back to zero.
Clipping the corners of objects for a new look.
1
2
If you need an angle greater than 110 degrees type it into Spike
Buster’s edit field.
Before Edge Offset.
Spike Buster And Edge Offsets
When using the Edge Offset feature, part of the PRO version, to
make your object’s faces smaller, you may pinch the object into
two or more parts. When a pinch occurs a spike will jump out because of the sharp angle at the point of the pinch. When you see
this happen, turn on Spike Buster and the spikes will disappear.
3
The pinched points become spikes when the
edges are applied.
Edge Offset can pinch the
object into two parts.
4
Spike Buster cleans up the
spikes.
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Unbustable Spikes
Sometimes a spike won’t bust. When this happens there is something about your vector file that is preventing Spike Buster from
working. If you find a case like this you will need to trace the
spike to the area on the object that is causing the problem, then
go back to your vector drawing program and clean up the vectors
by hand. Usually a quick drag with Illustrator’s Smoothing tool
will do it, but sometimes there is a difficult area and you have to
do some major work.
You may also find that some spikes are caused by vectors in your
file that can be called nothing else but “junk.” This junk could be
partial paths, duplicated pieces, or templates left over from the
construction process. Whatever the case, these types of problems are simple to repair once you know what they are.
Problems of this kind happen mostly when you inherit a vector
file from another artist. One user found that his problem file had
30 copies of various parts of the artwork all stacked on top of
each other and grouped together. To clean up the file he dragged
each piece off of the main group, one at a time, to see if it was
needed. If not needed, the part was deleted. When the clean up
was done the file worked perfectly.
Another thing that can influence the success of spike busting is
the Object Faceting setting. By changing the Object Faceting
level higher or lower you may get a pesky spike to bust cleanly.
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Edge Controls
The edge applied to a Vector Shape object is one of the main
design features that changes the look of your 3D models. Edges
can be thick or thin, simple or complex. If you know from
woodworking what a router is, think of the edge as a fancy router
bit. You can also think of an edge as a flexible picture frame. It’s
a decorative edge treatment that perfectly follows the curves of
your original vector paths.
The Edges Controls contain the settings that let you decide which
edge to apply to your text and vector shape objects, as well as the
scaling for that edge and whether or not to use a different edge
style for the holes.
PRO NOTE
If you are using the PRO version of the Invigorator you will
see more edge controls than are shown in the following pictures. These additional controls, such as Edge Offset, are
explained in the PRO section of the user guide.
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Outside Edges vs. Hole Edges
Outside
Edge
controls
Hole
Edge
controls
As was discussed in the Generate Model Parts section, the edges
applied to holes in objects are treated separately from the edges
applied to the outside perimeter of an object. This puts the
Invigorator in the unique position of letting you apply different
edges, or scaling values, to the holes.
The value in this feature is in the following situation. Oftentimes
putting a nice looking edge around the outside of an object will
end up plugging the holes inside an object. By having separate
controls for the holes you are able to leave the outside edges the
way they are, and make adjustments to only the holes, which will
make the text and logos more readable.
If you look at the interface you will see that there is a bar separating the controls for the Outside Edges from the controls for Hole
Edges. The Outside Edge controls will affect the whole model
unless specifically told to treat the holes differently. This is done
by disabling the checkboxes in the Hole Edges area.
The edge controls for the Classic version.
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Edge Profiles
The Edge Profile popup is where you pick the shape that is applied to the edges of an object. Each object can use a different
Edge Profile. The Classic version of the Invigorator comes with
over one hundred edge profiles built in as presets. The Profiles
are divided into groups of similar profiles. The Appendix of this
manual contains pictures of them all.
You can see the profiles one by one, by clicking on the Material
Set-Up button. This will reveal the Material Set-Up window and
a picture of the profile currently selected. As you change the
profile the picture changes.
Once you’ve picked an edge profile you can use your keyboard’s
up/down arrow keys to step through the popup menu. With each
click you will step to a different profile. This will cause the model
will rebuild itself so you can see what it looks like with that edge
profile applied to it.
When you click down on the popup you will see that the menu
has two levels. The first level lists the the profiles by group. The
second level contains the actual profiles.
The Edge Profile Popup.
Once you’ve selected a profile you can use the up/
down arrow keys to step through the profile list.
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To pick an Edge Profile, click on the popup and drag down to one
of the main groups. When the second level opens, drag over to
the sub-menu and highlight the Edge Profile you want to apply.
When you let go of the mouse name of the Edge Profile you just
picked will appear on the closed popup menu.
Once an Edge Profile has been selected a bullet is placed in front
of its name in the menu so you can find it quickly again. An arrow
is put in front of the first level menu item so you can tell which
sub-menu the chosen profile is inside of.
Edge Scale
The Edge Scale slider makes the edges of an object thinner or
thicker without affecting its depth. The Depth control also makes
edges thinner or thicker so these two features have to be adjusted
together. The best way to work is to set the Depth first, then
adjust the Edge Scale if you need to.
Sometimes when you make an object very thick the object puffs
up like a balloon. This “puffiness” can be fixed by reducing the
Edge Scale. Be careful though not to reduce the Edge Scale so
much that the slider goes negative, unless you want that look.
Half Pipe @ 50%
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Half Pipe @ 100%
Half Pipe @ 200%
Edge Scale does not affect the width of the original vector
artwork. Making the scale negative will not “cut into” the vector paths thinning them down. It only affects the width of the
edge profile itself. If you want the edges to cut into the original
artwork you need to use the Edge Offset feature.
Use Same Profile For Hole Edges
When this checkbox is checked, the same profile is applied to
both the perimeter and the holes of the object.
When this checkbox is turned off, the Edge Profile popup menu
for holes becomes active and you are then able to pick a different
edge profile for the holes.
The second Edge Profile popup menu works the same way as the
first one. Click down, drag to highlight one of the main groups,
drag to highlight a profile, release on the one you want. Once
you’ve made a selection, the up/down arrows will blink indicating
you can use the arrow keys on the keyboard to step through the
edge list.
To make the arrow keys work on the first Edge Profile popup
again, you must click on that popup. To switch to the second,
click on the second. If you ever wonder why the arrow keys
aren’t working, just click on the popup with your mouse because
you probably clicked on something else.
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Use Same Material For Hole Edges
With this checkbox turned on the arrangement of surface colors,
texture maps, split points, and where they appear along the edge
is the same for both outside and hole edges.
The effect of turning this option off is seen in the Material SetUp window. If you look in this window you’ll notice how the
profile used for holes is normally drawn with a dotted line. This
indicates that the hole edges are being controlled by the same settings as the outside edges and you can’t do anything to them. But
when you uncheck the “Same Material” checkbox the hole profile
becomes solid and it gets its own green material chip.
With its own material chip, you can set split points and material
chips on the holes side independently from the outside. (See the
section on the Material Set-Up window.)
Use Same Scale for Hole Edges
This is the hole control you’ll use most often. When this option is
on, the scale of the holes is the same as the scale of the edges applied to the outsides. But when this option is unchecked you can
adjust the hole scale on its own.
When the holes in letters fill in because the edges are too large,
this is the feature that enables you to open them back up.
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Material Controls
The Classic Materials Tab
When the Object mode button is highlighted, the right side of
the Set-Up window displays three tabs at the top. One tab for
Objects, one for Materials and one for Object Styles. Clicking on
the Materials Tab reveals the controls for setting up, editing and
storing the materials used to color your objects.
The
Materials
Bin
Think of a material as the paint job applied to the models. The
Object Tab controls the shape of the models and the Materials
Tab controls the appearance of a model’s surface.
A Material is much more than just the color of the paint, however.
It defines what the object is made of, the “feel” of the surface and
whether or not the object is new or old, weathered and beaten, or
new and polished.
The
Material
Editor
The Materials Tab is divided into two halves. The bottom half is
called the Material Editor. This is where materials are created
and changed. The top half is called the Materials Bin. This is
where materials are stored as swatches for easy access.
Note: If you don’t see any material swatches
in the bin then the software hasn’t been installed correctly. Go to the Troubleshooting
section or reread the Installation Instructions.
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The PRO Materials Tab
The Materials Tab of the Invigorator PRO version looks very
much like the Classic version. The main differences are that the
Classic version can only render in what is called “photo-real”
style. The PRO version also does photo-real rendering, and supports many other rendering styles too, such as absolute rendering, wireframe rendering, hidden line rendering, cartoon coloring,
shadow catching and matte coloring.
Each of these additional styles gives you a better tool palette for
creating unique and eye-catching graphics.
Find out all about each of these additional PRO features in the
PRO section of this user guide.
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Materials Bin
The top half of the Materials Tab is called the Materials Bin. It is an array of docks that can each hold one material swatch.
When you first add an Invigorator effect, swatches are loaded into the bin from the swatches folders. Once loaded they are
ready to be used.
The Invigorator supports “drag and drop” of materials as the main method of moving them around and applying them to
objects. Materials can be dragged and dropped in the following ways:
Drag from the Materials Bin, then drop:
Gives the Result:
onto unselected objects ————————————
(with no other objects selected)
onto groups of selected objects —————————
onto an object with splits defined ————————
onto the Material Editor dock ——————————
onto an empty dock in the Materials bin —————
(while holding down the Option/Alt key)
onto an empty dock in the Materials Palette ———
onto a occupied dock in the Materials Palette ——
Drag from the Materials Palette, then Drop:
applies material to all selected objects
applies material to only the split part
loads material for editing
moves the swatch
duplicates the material
readies the material for use
replaces last material
Gives the Result:
onto a little green material chip —————————
onto the Material Editor dock ——————————
(while holding down the Option/Alt key)
applies material to a single object
applies material to a split section
saves the material swatch to the bin
loads material for editing
moves the material
applies the same material to the second dock
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Moving And Rearranging Swatches
Swatches can be freely moved to different docks by dragging
them from one dock to another. This enables you to put swatches
that work together next to each other.
Selecting Swatches
Drag swatches from one dock to another to organize materials.
Swatches are selected by clicking on them once. If you double
click on a swatch you will load it into the Material Editor. You
can select more than one swatch at a time by Shift-clicking on
them. (Holding down the Shift key and clicking with the mouse.)
You will need to select swatches in order to use the Swatch commands on them.
Duplicate Selected Materials
Double click on a swatch in the bin to load it into the
Material Editor.
This command duplicates all material swatches that are currently
selected and places the duplicates at the bottom of the bin. You
select a swatch by clicking once on it. Hold down the Shift key
and click on other swatches to add them to the selection.
You can also duplicate a material by holding down the Option key
(Mac) or Alt key (Win) then drag the swatch to an empty dock. Be
sure to let up the mouse key before letting up the modifier key.
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Select All Unused
The Select All Unused command inspects the swatches in the Materials Bin and selects those that are not being used by any Object
or Object Style. Once selected you can use the Delete Selected
Materials command to remove them from the bin.
Delete Selected Materials
Regenerating Swatches
This command will remove from the Materials Bin any materials
that are currently selected. Removing materials from the bin will
not hurt or affect any objects in the 3D scene. However, deleting
Materials from the bin will also delete them from the main library
until they are regenerated.
Sometimes swatches will get deleted accidentally. Or sometimes they get deleted from one
project but then you open a different project
and wish you had something back.
Clear Bin
Using the Clear Bin command will remove all of the swatches
from the bin. This will not delete or change the materials being
used on objects in this scene, or any other existing scene.
However, clearing the bin will remove all swatches from the main
library on disk, which means that the swatches will be removed
from all other projects too.
No worries, mate. Swatches that have been
applied to objects can always be regenerated.
Just do the following...
1- Select the object that has the Material applied to it.
2- Click the Palette checkbox to show the Material Palette. All Materials used on that object
will regenerate and be displayed in the docks.
3- Drag the swatches from the docks into the
Materials Bin. This will save the swatches to
disk and they will hereafter appear in the bin.
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The Material Editor
The Material Editor Area is the bottom half of the Materials Tab.
This is where materials are created and changed. All controls for
materials are in this one spot.
You’ll notice that a material is composed of several attributes.
Each of the attributes work together to create a final “look”.
Since that look is more than just the color, we call the combination of attributes a “Material.”
(PRO NOTE: If you are using the Invigorator PRO version, the
Material Editor will have additional controls. See the section
on PRO features at the end of this user guide.)
All controls for materials are located in the Material Editor area.
The Material Preview contains all settings of a material.
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A Material is applied to an object or to part of an object. You can
use up to six different materials on a single object. Applying materials is done by either dragging and dropping a material swatch
directly onto an object, or by splitting the object into sections and
then dropping a material onto each section. This last method is
done in the Material Set-Up window.
The Material Editor shows you a preview of what your material
looks like, on the little ball sitting in the editor’s single dock. This
dock is at the top right corner of the editor area and is called the
Material Preview. This picture contains all the settings of the
material and can be dragged from its position and dropped onto
objects or into the Materials Bin for saving.
The material attributes in the Editor are arranged into little
groups. The name of each attribute is just above the slider that
controls it. If an attribute can be affected by a texture map (a
picture that controls the attribute on a pixel by pixel basis lending much variation to the image), the thumbnail of the map is
displayed in the box to the right of the slider. If no thumbnail is
available a placeholder image appears in the thumbnail box to let
you know that a texture map is being used.
The texture map thumbnail for color.
Loading A Material Into The Editor
There are two methods for loading a material swatch into the
Material Editor. Drag and drop, and double clicking.
A material can only be loaded once you see its swatch. If you
can’t see the swatch you can’t double click on it, or drag it.
Loading By Drag and Drop
Click directly on a swatch, hold down the mouse, drag the swatch
from its current location, and position it over the swatch in the
Material Editor. Once in position, let go of the mouse button to
drop the swatch, and it will load into the editor. The sliders, text
fields and image map thumbnails will update to show you the
settings used to create this material. You can now change the settings to change the material.
Drag on a swatch in the bin and drop it on the Material
Preview (ball) to load it into the Material Editor.
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Materials used in a project are only found in
two places. The Materials Bin which is the top
half of the Materials Tab, and the Materials
Palette which is the six dock area seen at the
bottom left of the interface when you click the
Material Set-Up button.
To find which materials have been applied to
an object, make the object the Primary selection and then click the Material Set-Up button
to see the Materials Palette. The materials
applied to the object will be shown in the six
docks at the bottom of the area revealed.
Drag and drop of a material swatch will work from either the
Materials Bin to the editor, or from the Materials Palette to the
editor.
Loading By Double Clicking
Double clicking any swatch will load it into the Material Editor.
This works from inside the Materials Bin and also from inside the
Materials Palette.
Material Name
This is an editable text field where you can change the name of
the material loaded into the editor. Click in this field and type
something new. When you click Return, Enter or click on a different control, the new name will be accepted.
You cannot name two materials the same name.
Material Color
The colored rectangle with the word “Color” next to it, shows you
the base color of the object. We call it the “base” color instead
of just “the color” because there are several other things that can
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influence the color of an object. Reflections, bumps and texture
maps all add to the look of the material. However, the base color
is what will be used by an object during Draft mode renderings
when texture maps and other things are not factored into the
object’s color.
To change the color, click once on the color box itself. This will
open your computer’s color picker. Pick a color and click OK.
This will return you to the Invigorator and set the new color as
the object’s base color.
When a texture map is applied to an object,
often times the base color of an object is never
seen. However, it’s a good idea to make the
base color of an object something besides the
default light gray because then it’s easier to
tell when a material has been applied to an
object.
Another reason we call this an object’s “base” color is because, if
a texture map has an alpha channel, wherever the alpha channel
is black you will not see the texture map, but will see the underlying base color of the object. (See Decal Maps for more info.)
Eyedropper
The eyedropper tool is located just to the right of the color box.
Clicking once on this tool will activate it so you can pick a color
from anywhere on your computer screen. Move the eyedropper
cursor so its point is over the color you want to “sample” and
click the mouse button. This will load the color into the Material
Color rectangle.
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Texture Mapping
There is a word in 3D terminology called “texture mapping”
which means “the application of a picture to an object’s surface”.
A “texture map” is the picture being applied.
When you’re new to 3D, the word “texture” makes you think of
the feel of an object or surface. While the feel of a surface is one
of the things you can control with texture mapping, the term is
used more generally to take into account the application of a
picture to control any of the surface attributes.
The phrase “texture mapping” can be considered a catch-all
which refers to different techniques. The Invigorator supports
five different texture mapping techniques. Image Mapping, Decal
Mapping, Bump, Transparency, and Reflection Mapping. Highlight Mapping is also supported in the PRO version.
Picking A Texture Map
Double-click on a thumbnail box to open a file picker,
then choose an image for a texture map.
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Each one of the dark gray boxes next to the material attribute
sliders is where a small thumbnail version of a chosen texture
map appears. The thumbnail box is also a button. By doubleclicking on it you will open a file picker to choose a texture map.
When you click Open, the picture will be loaded and you will see
a thumbnail of the image in the thumbnail box.
You can load a single PICT, JPG or TARGA image as a texture
map. If you want to use a movie or any other type of image for
your texture map you can bring them into After Effects, and then
use the Layer Map feature. (See the Layer Map section.)
To change the image used for the texture map, double click on
the thumbnail image and the file picker will open again. At the
top of the file picker you will see the name of the image currently
being used for the texture map. Find a new image and open it.
The new image will be loaded, replacing the old one.
Double click on the thumbnail box to change the
image used for a texture map.
Sizing And Positioning The Maps
In Invigorator Classic, maps are applied and sized automatically.
This makes it very easy to get up and running quickly. Once you
know how the auto-sizing works it’s easy to get specific parts of a
map to appear where you want them.
First off, all maps are applied the same way with one exception.
Images used for the Color, Bump, and Transparency attributes
stick to the surface they are applied to. As the object moves the
part of the image that appears on the front surface will stay on
the front surface and the part that appears on the sides will stay
on the sides.
However, reflections don’t stick to the surface of an object. As
the object moves the reflections will change, just like how the image that appears in a mirror changes as you turn the mirror.
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How Texture Map Auto-Sizing Works
1
When a map is applied to the front or back faces, the
height of the map will be scaled until it fits the height of the
object. The width of the map is scaled until it fits the width
of the object.
This means that the map may be stretched more in one
direction than the other in order to make it fit the proportions of the object. For instance applying the same map to
a circle and applying it to a thin rectangle looks fine on the
circle but very compressed on the rectangle.
1
The original picture
(texture map).
1
0.5
1
1
Picture and object have
the same proportions.
Picture and object have
different proportions.
Texture maps are applied to the edges (sides) of objects using
a different method than is used on the front and back faces of
objects. Maps applied to the edges are wrapped around the object in a counter-clockwise direction. The wrapping follows the
curves and corners of an object.
Think of how you would wrap wallpaper around a room that was
shaped like an L. At one corner you would be wrapping the paper
around the corner and at the other you would be tucking it into
the corner. Now think of wrapping wallpaper around a room that
was shaped like an S. It’s slightly more complicated, but the idea
is the same. The paper would wrap around the inside of some
curves and then wrap around the outside of other curves.
In both of these cases, you would start wrapping at one spot,
work your way around the letter and end up back at the point
where you started.
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The starting point for a texture map is determined by the “Lowest-Leftest” rule. Mapping begins at the lowest-leftest point on
the object. For instance if the object is a circle the lowest point
would be at the center of the bottom curve. It doesn’t matter if
you rotate the object upside down, the lowest point will always
be based on how the object originally came into the Invigorator.
In other words, the lowest point on the object as it appears in the
Illustrator file.
Maps wrap around an object in a counter-clockwise direction.
The wrapping follows the curves and corners of an object.
If there is any question about what the lowest point is, the Invigorator will select the left-most of all the equally low points. If we
use the letter E for example, there are two points that are equally
at the bottom of the E. One on each side of the bottom leg. In
fact if you also include the distance between the ends of the leg
there could be a great number of spots where you could start the
texture map.
What the Invigorator does is to look at all of the points that are
equally low and then picks the one that is furthest to the left. It
applies the left edge of the texture map to this point, wraps the
texture counter clock-wise around the edge of the object, and
ends with the right side of the texture map meeting the left side
back at the starting point.
Lowest point
Multiple points equally low
Wrapping starts at the lowest point farthest to the left.
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Map Enable Checkbox
There is a checkbox located next to each of the texture map
thumbnail boxes. This checkbox turns the texture map or the
layer map ON or OFF.
The Map Enable checkbox turned on.
If turned OFF, a map will be ignored. The map isn’t removed
from the object, it’s just temporarily disabled so it isn’t used during the final rendering. To get the map to be used again, just turn
the checkbox back ON.
For some attributes a texture map is required to get an effect.
For instance, no matter how high you set the bump slider, a bump
map is needed before you will see an effect. Likewise the reflectivity setting doesn’t do anything unless it has an image to reflect.
Turning OFF the checkbox for the color map will remove the
picture from the object. It will appear in its base surface color.
When the Map Enable checkbox is turned off,
the texture map is not applied to the object.
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Layer Map Selector
If you want to use a movie instead of just a still image as a texture
map, you need to load it directly into After Effects and drag it into
the Comp window so that the movie becomes a layer. Then you
can assign the movie to a Layer Map in the Effect Controls window. (See the Layer Map Popup section earlier in this manual.)
The Layer Map Selector Popup menu, inside the Set-Up window,
is the little mini popup menu next to each texture map thumbnail
where you select which Layer Map will be used as the texture
for this attribute. A texture map can be either a still image or a
movie. Still images are loaded by double clicking on the dark
gray thumbnail box. Movies are loaded by picking them from the
Layer Map Selector.
The Layer Map Selector Popup.
Notice that there is a Layer Map Popup next to each of the texture map thumbnail boxes. Each of these popups can be set to
use the same layer or a different layer. For instance you could
use some moving clouds footage for the image map and the reflection map in a material.
The same layer map can also be used on different materials and
different objects. For instance, you could use the same layer map
for the reflection in two different materials. You are not limited
to using a Layer Map only once.
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Layer mapping becomes especially powerful when you have
many variations on the same material and they all use the same
layer map. By simply changing the footage being used as the
layer map you can update all of the materials with one click.
Choosing Snow as the footage used for the Reflection Map
Changing the footage changes every use of Layer Map 1
For instance, say you had to make a weather announcement and
needed a snow advisory graphic where the titles use five different
colors (light blue, medium blue, dark blue, white and yellow) and
all of these materials used the same snow footage as the reflections that appeared in the titles. Each of these materials would
have used Layer Map 1 for the reflection map.
Now say you had to create the same graphics for a rain advisory.
Well, instead of recreating the graphics from scratch all you have
to do is to load the new rain footage into After Effects and change
Layer Map 1 from the snow footage to the rain footage. That’s it.
When Invigorator renders the image, all of the materials that used
Layer Map 1 will now use the rain footage for their reflections.
Image Maps
The Image Map control.
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The Image Map control is the dark gray box to the right of the
Material Color box. Image mapping is the process of applying a
picture to an object’s surface so the color of the picture becomes
the color of the object. This is similar to how wallpaper can be
applied to a wall so the color of the wallpaper becomes the surface of the wall. If the wall turns a corner the wallpaper follows
along. In the same way a picture applied to an object will follow
the curves and corners of the object’s shape.
The main thing to remember is that if you want the object to
look like the picture has been painted on it, then you want
to use the Image Map technique.
Decal Maps
+
Image Map (RGB)
=
3D Object
Mapped 3D Object
Decal Maps are Image Maps where not all of the image shows.
When you think of a real-life decal you think of something like a
sticker that you apply to models, cars, boats, windshields, things
like that. Wherever the decal is opaque you see the decal and
wherever the decal is transparent you see the underlying surface
color of the object you are applying it to.
Decal Maps work the same way. Wherever a Decal Map is opaque
you see the decal image, and wherever it’s transparent you see
the surface color of the object you are applying it to. So the question then is, how do you make a Decal Map so that some parts are
opaque and some are transparent?
The answer lies in the Alpha channel. The white pixels in the
alpha channel tell the Invigorator to use the image map, whereas
black pixels in the alpha channel tell the Invigorator that the image map is transparent and to let the underlying surface colors
show through. Wherever the alpha channel has gray pixels you
will get a mix of the two.
Image Map (RGB)
+
=
3D Object
Mapped 3D Object
with base color showing where the alpha
was black.
Decal Map (Alpha)
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So for instance if you had a picture of a star that you wanted to
apply to the face of an object you would put the color version
of the star in the RGB channels of the Image Map and then you
would put a white star on a black background in the alpha channel. Wherever the alpha channel was white the star would show
and where the alpha channel was black the underlying surface
color would show.
Remember to antialias the star in the alpha channel otherwise it
will look like a bad composite.
Antialiased star
Non antialiased star
Decal Maps are applied exactly the same way as Image
Maps, by loading the picture into the same thumbnail box.
The only difference between the two is that an Image Map
has no alpha channel and a Decal Map has an alpha channel.
Highlight Sharpness
The Highlight Sharpness setting controls the size of the highlights
that appear on your objects. Highlights are reflections of the
light sources in the scene. Highlights look different based on the
“polish” of their surface. If an object is polished the highlights
will appear small and focused. If the object is not so polished the
highlights will be more spread out. If the object is not polished at
all there will be no highlights.
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The Sharpness control ranges from 2 - 200. As you move the
slider to the right the highlight becomes smaller and smaller
indicating a more polished surface. As you move it to the left the
highlight gets bigger and bigger indicating that the surface is getting rougher. Remember that to the right is “more sharp” and to
the left is “less sharp.”
Usually, in real life, as the highlight spreads out the brightness
dims. So whenever you adjust one control you should also adjust
the other one too.
Notice that Highlight Sharpness and Brightness are material
settings. This means that different materials can have different
settings. It’s not like you get one highlight setting per object.
Each material that you apply to your objects can have a different
“polish”.
Keep this in mind as you design the shapes of
your model:
Curved surfaces and curved Edge Profiles
will show highlights very easily.
Flat surfaces are difficult to get highlights
to appear on.
The flatter the surface the more a highlight will spread. For
instance a highlight that appears on the curved edge of an S
will usually be fairly small because curved surfaces condense
reflections. On the other hand the same highlight appearing on
the front face of the same S might smear across the entire face,
because flat surfaces spread reflections.
Highlights on curved
surfaces are small.
Highlights on flat surfaces are large.
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Highlight Brightness
The Highlight Brightness setting controls the intensity of the highlights that appear on the surfaces of your objects. As mentioned
above, highlights are reflections of the light sources in your
scene, so the Highlight Brightness setting controls the intensity of
the hot spots caused by the light sources.
When the surface of an object is highly polished the highlights are
small and bright. As the surface becomes rougher the highlights
become dimmer and more spread out.
The range of the brightness slider goes from 0 to 100 % where 0
means the highlight is turned off, and 100 is full brightness.
When using high brightness values you should be careful
about highlight “washout”. This is what happens when the
highlights are too bright creating big white spots that look
very bad.
If you see this happening you should lower the brightness
value so the highlight will still look bright but it just doesn’t
turn into a big white blob. Washout occurs most often on
lightly colored objects.
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Bumpiness
The Bumpiness slider is used in conjunction with a Bump Map. A
Bump Map is a picture (usually grayscale) that is used to give the
surface of an object a rough feel. Creating roughness takes a long
time to render if done by sculpting the geometry of the object, but
can be done with Bump mapping in a very short time. The trade
off is that the “bumps” can’t be too high or too deep, or else the
effect starts to break down.
The Bumpiness slider and the Bump Map work together. Once a
picture is loaded into the Bump map thumbnail, the Bumpiness
slider is used to set the height of the bumps. On a Bump Map
white pixels are considered to be hills above the object’s surface
and black pixels are the valleys below an object’s surface. The
Bumpiness slider sets the maximum height of the hills.
The Bumpiness slider and Bump Map thumbnail.
Notice that the slider also goes negative. Setting the bumpiness
value to a negative number will reverse the effect so that the
white pixels go down into the object and the black pixels push
out from the object’s surface.
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Making Better Bump Maps
The effect of a Bump Map comes from the gray pixels in the map,
not the white or black ones. If you have a picture that is made of
only black and white pixels you won’t get a very nice effect. The
crossover between white and black will be very short and you
will get buzzy, nasty highlights where the white and black pixels
meet.
No Blur in the Bump Map ...
creates bad looking bumps.
However if you blur the bump map a little in Photoshop before
you use it in the Invigorator, it will look very nice. The transition
between the white and black pixels will smooth out and you will
be able to increase the Bumpiness value without getting artifacts
during the rendering.
You will never, ever get sharp edges with a bump map. Bump
maps work best for adding small detail and surface texture. For
instance, orange peel, stucco, sand paper, tire imprints, embossed lettering, burlap, dents, scratches and other fine details
work great as bump maps.
Blurring the Bump Map ...
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makes better looking bumps.
Remember, if your renderings “sparkle” or you see what
looks like ants crawling along the edges of your objects,
just give your bump map a little blur and everything will
look a lot better.
Transparency
The transparency setting can be used by itself or along with a
texture map. When used by itself the transparency slider makes
the whole object transparent. The object is not more transparent in one area than another. When a transparency map is used
however, the level of transparency changes wherever the map is
lighter or darker.
Something you will notice is that when the transparency slider is
at 100% you may still see the object. That’s because the transparency slider is fine tuned for glass effects. Even though the object
is completely transparent you will still see highlights and bright
reflections on the surface, just like glass and water. If you want
the object to be completely invisible you must use a Transparency
Map to do it. Transparency Maps are tuned for visibility.
Transparency Maps
Transparency slider and Transparency Map thumbnail.
Transparency maps, like Bump maps are usually grayscale images. The white pixels in a transparency map make an object
opaque and the black pixels make an object completely transparent. The gray pixels are partially transparent.
When we say the black pixels make an object “completely transparent” we mean just that. Black areas in a Transparency map
will make that part of the object completely invisible. You won’t
see highlights or bright reflections on those areas.
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Why does it do this? Because transparency maps are usually used
to punch holes in objects, or to drop out parts of objects that you
don’t want to see.
+
Transparency Map
3D objects
You can combine Transparency Maps along with the Transparency slider. When you do that, the Transparency slider
sets the maximum level of opacity.
=
3D objects take new form with
Transparency Maps applied
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For instance if you had a picture of a leaf you could apply the
colored picture to a 3D plane as an image map and then apply
a silhouette of the leaf to the same object as a Transparency
Map. If the silhouette was made with the leaf area white and the
non-leaf area black, the 3D plane would look like a leaf and not
look like a plane. You wouldn’t even see the part of the plane that
wasn’t part of the leaf.
Continuing the leaf example, as the Transparency slider is moved
to the right, the leaf gets more and more transparent. So the
white parts of the map, which are usually opaque, get more and
more transparent. The black parts of the Transparency Map start
invisible and stay invisible. They are not affected by the Transparency slider.
Reflectivity
The reflections that appear on Invigorator objects are based on
pictures called Reflection Maps. The actual objects in the 3D
scene do not reflect each other. This is possible with a process
called Raytracing, but Raytracing is very slow. Instead of Raytracing reflections the Invigorator uses a process called Reflection Mapping which is very fast and often times produces better
results than Raytracing anyway.
To do Reflection Mapping you need two things, a slider to tell
the Invigorator how reflective to make the surface, and a picture
to reflect into the object. Thus we have the Reflectivity slider
to tell the Invigorator how reflective to make a material, and the
Reflection Map is the picture you load into the thumbnail that will
reflect back onto the object’s surface.
The amount of reflectivity you use for a material depends on the
type of material you are trying to simulate and the brightness of
the picture you are using as the Reflection Map. If the picture is
dark you will need to set the Reflectivity pretty high just to see
it. However, if the picture is bright with areas of full white, you’ll
find that a little Reflectivity goes a long way.
The Reflectivity slider and Reflection Map thumbnail.
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Reflection Maps
Reflection Map thumbnail.
The pictures that reflect in the surfaces of 3D objects are called
Reflection Maps. They are different than other types of texture
maps because they don’t stick to the surface of an object. An
object will reflect different parts of its environment based on the
angle and tilt of the object, and the angle that the camera is viewing the object. As the angle of the object changes, the reflected
environment will sweep across the object’s surface. Because
reflections dance and move across a surface they bring objects to
life and add tremendous impact to your animations.
Reflection maps can be full color or grayscale. Some pictures
work better than others on different types of objects. For instance, in order to see reflections on the flat front faces of text
and logos, you need a busy, high contrast reflection map such as
the Punchy Reflections image that comes with the Invigorator.
However, when applied to smoothly curved surfaces, a busy reflection looks strange. So curved surfaces need simpler reflection
maps such as the Graphic SkyGround image that also comes with
the Invigorator.
As objects move, reflections move across their surfaces.
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Just loading an image into the Reflection Map thumbnail does not
make a material reflective. You also have to set how reflective the
surface is with the Reflectivity slider.
Highlights And Reflections By Surface Type
There are a few basic object types that have distinct highlight
responses. Using these settings will get you quickly into the
ballpark but feel free to alter the settings slightly to get the exact
look you’re after.
To get pictures that look even more real, don’t forget about the
reflectivity settings. By using a reflection image and matching the
reflectivity slider to about the same value as the Highlight Brightness slider, you will get some incredibly beautiful pictures.
Polished Jewelry and Stone
Very polished objects have small highlights that are very bright
and crisp. So a Sharpness setting of 200 and a brightness setting
of 70 usually works well for these types of surfaces. A reflectivity level of 30 - 40 gives a nice impression of surface reflections
without drawing too much attention to them.
Glass and Vinyl
Although you’d think of glass as being highly polished, by reducing the highlight sharpness value for glass materials it is easier to
get the glare that often appears on glass.
Sharpness = 80 Brightness = 80 Reflectivity = 40 - 60
Reflections are usually bright and focuses in glass, and especially
bright in vinyl.
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Also remember to use a dark surface color with glass otherwise
the surface color will bleach out other objects seen through the
transparent glass material.
Chrome
When using the Chrome-style materials, it’s a
great time to try your hand at adding colored
rim lights.
Strong colors show up as colored highlights
on your objects adding an extra level of detail
and making your images that much richer.
Chrome is very similar to glass, although the reflectivity level is
set to 90 - 100 and the surface color must be set to black. With a
reflectivity of 100 the Chrome surface reflects the Reflection Map
image exactly. With it set to 90 the reflection is darkened slightly
indicating that some of the brightness of the image is being lost
during the reflection.
The surface color must be set to black, otherwise the surface
color will contaminate the reflection. The black areas in the
reflection map will come out as the surface color and the bright
areas will be overexposed causing bleaching and washouts.
Plastics
Plastics come in a range of finishes in real life. The kind of plastic
we’re talking about here is the kind that kids toys are made out
of. Bright shiny highlights. Be careful to lower the Highlight
Brightness as the base color gets brighter, otherwise you may get
the “washout” effect discussed earlier.
Sharpness = 50 Brightness = 70
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Polished Wood
Finished furniture has a bit of a spread to the highlights, similar
to plastics since the coatings used to finish wood are a type of
plastic. The brightness of polished wood is much dimmer than
plastics however, since the wood absorbs much of the light. You
want just a touch of reflection since even highly polished wood
isn’t too reflective.
Sharpness = 50 Brightness = 40 Reflectivity = 10
Satins/Metals
Metals also come in a range of finishes. The more polished the
metal the smaller and brighter the highlights. If you are making
polished metals use the same settings as for polished stone.
Anodized metals, however are a different story. They have a
much softer appearance with big soft highlights. The highlights
look more like glows on the surface rather than bright spots.
Satin also has this same type of feel.
When you start working with Sharpness settings this low, a little
change can make a lot of difference. Use these values to get in the
ballpark then tweak them to taste.
Sharpness = 12 Brightness = 40
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Paper/Cloth/Rough Cut Stone/ Unfinished Wood
Into this category falls all the things that have no highlights. Remember, not having a specular highlight does not mean the object
doesn’t get brighter on the side closest to the light. A wooden
ball, when illuminated by a single light, will still be brighter on
one side and darker on the other.
The specular highlight is the reflection of the light source, keyword “reflection.” Meaning anything that is non-reflective will not
have a specular highlight.
Sharpness = Doesn’t have an effect when Brightness is at 0.
Brightness = 0
How The Color Channels In A Map Are Used
The color depth of a picture is how many channels of information the picture contains. Pictures used for texture mapping can
be one of three possible color depths. Either Grayscale (8 bit),
RGB (24 bit), or RGB+Alpha (32 bit). These three image types
are used in different ways depending on which material attribute
is using them.
On the next page is a table showing how each of the color channels is used.
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— Channel Usage by Map Type —
Transparency
Maps
Ignores RGB.
Uses the Alpha channel as the Bump Map.
Ignores RGB.
Uses the Alpha channel
to control transparency.
Reflection
Maps
Bump
Maps
Image/ Decal
Maps
RGB + ALPHA
Uses the RGB channel
as the surface color. The
Alpha channel is used as a
Decal control which lets the
underlying surface color
show through the map wherever the Alpha is black.
Uses the RGB colors as
the reflection.
Ignores the Alpha
channel.
RGB
Uses the RGB channel
as the surface color.
Since there is no Alpha
channel the whole picture will be used.
Uses the luminance value
of all color channels as
the Bump Map. (Meaning,
a grayscale version of the
RGB color is created and
then used as the Bump
Map image.)
Uses the luminance value
of all color channels to
control transparency.
(Meaning, a grayscale
version of the RGB color is
created and then used to
control transparency.)
Uses the RGB colors
as the reflection.
GRAYSCALE
LAYER MAPS
Applies the image,
like a black and white
photo, to the object.
Uses the RGB channel as
the surface color. The Mask
channel is used as a Decal
control which lets the underlying surface color show
through the map wherever
the Mask is black.
The Grayscale channel is used for the
Bump Map.
If the Mask channel has
black pixels, the Mask
channel will be used as
the Bump Map. Otherwise
the Layer Map is used like
the RGB case.
Uses the Grayscale
channel to control
transparency.
If the Mask channel has
black pixels, the Mask
channel will be used as
the Transparency Map.
Otherwise the Layer Map
is used like the RGB case.
Uses the Grayscale channel
as the reflection, as though
you were reflecting a black
and white photo. This often
times works very nicely for
reflective metallic objects.
Uses the RGB colors
as the reflection.
Ignores the Mask
channel.
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Material Commands
The Material Commands popup menu is found just above the
Material Editor’s dock. Clicking on it reveals the available commands. Drag down to highlight a command and release the
mouse to execute it.
New Material
The New Material command will create a new instance of the default material and give it a unique name. This new material is not
applied to anything and is not linked to anything. It is completely
fresh and unused. The factory default material is light gray, but
the default can be set to anything you want inside the User Prefs
dialogue.
If the material sitting in the Material Editor’s dock has not been
used on any objects, or hasn’t been saved to the Material’s bin,
you will get an alert message asking if you want to save this material or permanently discard it.
Duplicate Material
The Duplicate Material command creates a copy of the material
sitting in the Material Editor’s dock and gives it a new unique
name. Although this new material will be exactly like the material it was duplicated from, it is not linked to the original material
and is not applied to any objects in the scene.
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Once duplicated the new material exists on its own, and can
be edited, stored in the bin and applied to objects. Editing the
duplicate material will not change the original material it was
duplicated from.
Save Material To Bin
When you want to move a material from the Editor’s dock up into
the Materials Bin. You can use the Save Material To Bin command. This will put the material into the first available dock in
the bin.
You can also drag the swatch from the dock up into the bin.
If the material already exists in the bin this command does
nothing.
Clear Map
The Clear Map command deletes a texture map. You must click
on a texture thumbnail first, which will put a red highlight around
the thumbnail. Then you can use the Clear Map command which
will uncheck the Enable Map checkbox and remove the texture
from the material it was a part of.
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Seeing Textures And Reflections
In Draft Mode
This is a very exciting feature. Once you apply materials to your
objects, and those materials have texture maps and reflections,
you can see those textures and reflections in the Invigorator’s
preview windows and in the After Effects Comp window while in
Draft mode.
Click the User Prefs button to turn on Draft Textures.
This feature takes extra computer horsepower so it is not turned
on by default. To turn it on, go into the Invigorator’s Set-Up window and open the User Prefs dialogue.
Inside the User Prefs dialogue you will see a section called “Show
OpenGL textures in:” followed by three different options.
“The Set-Up Window” option will display textures and reflections
on objects when you are working inside the large Invigorator SetUp window. This is the window you get to when you click the Red
Ball button.
“The Effect Controls Window” option will display textures and
reflections inside the draggable Scene Preview window that is in
the main After Effects window. This is the window with the Red
Ball button.
You can show the OpenGL textures in three different windows.
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“The Comp Window when in Draft Mode” option displays textures
and reflections on objects seen in the main After Effects Comp
window. This is by far the most useful option since it makes the
3D scene appear in nearly its final form, composited with the rest
of your AE layers.
You can turn on all three checkboxes or only the ones you want.
We give you three choices so you can use your computer to its
best ability. If you have a fast computer you may not even notice a
slow down with all three options turned on. One thing to know is
that since the Comp window is the largest, it will take the longest
to render and cause the biggest slow down.
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Object Styles
The Object Styles Tab
Next to the Objects and Materials tabs is the Object Styles tab.
When you click on this tab you see the Object Styles bin which
contains docks for holding pictures of various Object Styles.
The popup menu changes to the commands used for managing
and saving Object Style libraries.
An Object Style is similar in concept to a text style, something
that you would work with in a word processor or page layout
program. An Object Style is the encapsulation of all the settings
needed to create a Text or Illustrator model. Every material,
every split point, edge profile, edge scale and all the rest of the
settings are wrapped up into one picture.
The one thing an Object Style doesn’t have is the vector artwork
that comes from an artist’s Illustrator file. The power of an
Object Style is that once the artist loads in that vector artwork,
a single drag and drop will apply the Object Style to it. This
sets up everything. The whole model is built, colored and ready
to animate in the time it takes for you to get your finger off the
mouse button.
Object Styles are created by first setting up your model so it is
exactly the way you want it, then picking the Save Object Style
command from the Swatch popup menu.
(See the Save Object Style section.)
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Applying Object Styles
Object Styles can be applied in two ways. First you can drag and
drop the Object Style picture from the bin on the right into the
3D scene preview window on the left. All selected objects will
receive the Object Style.
If you want to apply a style to only one or two objects, deselect
all objects in the scene and drop the swatch directly onto the
object you want to receive the style.
The second way of applying Object Styles is to select the objects
you want to give a style to, then click once on an Object Style
swatch in the bin and use the Apply Object Style command from
the Swatch popup menu.
Linking Objects to Object Styles
If you hold down the Option (Alt) key when you apply an Object
Style to several objects you will create a link from all of those
objects to the Object Style. Thereafter a change to any of those
objects will result in a change to all of them.
For instance, if you change the color of one of the linked objects,
all of them will receive the same color change. Even changing the
depth or bevel of one will change all of the linked objects in the
same way.
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Renaming Object Styles
To rename an Object Style, open the Swatch menu and pick the
“Show Names and Notes” command.
You can now change the name of the Object Style by clicking in
the top text field and typing something else.
Adding Notes To An Object Style
When Names and Notes are being shown, the large text field below the name field is where you can enter notes about the Object
Style. Useful information you can enter would include how to
use the style, what project it came from or what client it was created for.
Any notes entered here will get saved as part of the Object Style.
When the style gets saved into a library and then reloaded into
other projects, the notes will still be there.
Object Styles Swatch Popup
The Object Styles Swatch popup menu is seen at the top right corner of the Object Styles tab. Clicking on it reveals the commands
available to use. Drag down to highlight a command and release
the mouse to execute it.
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Save Object Style
The Save Object Style command is the command used to create
your own custom Object Styles. To use it, set up an object so
it looks the way you want it to look. Then make that object the
primary selection and pick the Save Object Style command.
A small rendering will be created, and placed into the first available dock in the Object Styles bin as a drag-able picture icon. The
picture icon can then be dragged and dropped onto other objects
and those objects will then have the Object Style applied to them.
Unlink Object Style
Select the objects you want to make changes to, then choose
the Unlink Object Style command. Once you do this you will be
able to make changes to the selected objects without changing
any other object in the scene. If you have more than one object
selected these objects will all be unlinked in one step.
Use Unlink Object Style to modify a single object.
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Remove Object Style
The Remove Object Style command removes all colors, splits and
shape settings so the objects end up looking exactly the same as
they did when you first added them to your 3D scene.
Duplicate Object Style
Use Remove Object Style to return an object to its defaults.
Duplicating an Object Style enables you to create variations on
the Object Style without disturbing the original. Select the Object
Style in the bin by clicking on it once. You will see a red highlight
around the picture icon. Then select the Duplicate Object Style
command from the Swatch popup. This will create a duplicate
version of the Object Style and place it in the first available dock
in the bin.
When you duplicate an Object Style, any objects with that Object
Style applied to them will not be changed. Those objects will still
have the original Object Style applied to them. The new Object
Style will exist on its own and will not share any of the materials
of the original.
This last sentence is important to understand. When you duplicate an Object Style the Invigorator also duplicates the materials
used in the Object Style. That way you can make changes to the
materials and the other Object Styles won’t be affected.
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Select All Unused
The Select All Unused command selects all of the Object Styles
that are not being used by any objects in the scene. When selected you will see red or green highlight lines surrounding the
picture icons.
Once selected you can use the Delete Selected command on
them.
Delete Selected Object Styles
The Delete Selected Object Styles command deletes any Object
Styles that are selected when the command is executed. The
Object Styles are deleted from the bin, however doing this will
not hurt any objects in the scene that may be using them. It does
not remove the Object Style from any objects, it only removes the
Object Style from the bin.
In deleting them from the bin it will also delete them from the
Zaxwerks Swatches folder on your hard drive. So these Object
Styles will no longer be available to use in any other project.
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Clear Bin
Using the Clear Bin command will remove all of the swatches
from the bin. This will not delete or change the Object Styles used
on objects in the scene. It only removes the pictures from the
bin.
To regenerate an Object Style swatch, select an object that has
the Object Style you want to recover, then choose the Save Object
Style command from the Swatch popup menu. The swatch will
be regenerated and will appear in the first available dock in the
Object Style bin.
Moving Object Style Swatches
Swatches can be freely moved to different docks by dragging
them from one dock to another. This enables you to put swatches
that work together right next to each other.
Drag swatches to organize Object Styles.
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Regenerating Object Style Swatches That Have
Been Deleted
Sometimes you will delete an Object Style and then decide you
want it back. If this happens you are in luck as long as that
Object Style was applied to some object in an Invigorator project.
Object Style swatches that have been applied to objects can be
regenerated, just do the following...
1- Select an object that has the Object Style applied to it.
2- In the Object Style tab, find the Swatch menu and use the “Save
Object Style” command.
The Object Style used on that object will regenerate. The swatch
will be displayed at the bottom of the bin. This process will save
the swatch to disk and it will hereafter appear in the bin.
Select an object and use the Save Object Style
command to regenerate its Object Style.
Since the bin is shared between projects you can regenerate
swatches that were used in other projects by opening up the old
project, regenerating the swatch and saving it to the bin. Now
you can open up the new project and the Object Style will be
waiting in the bin ready to use.
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Material Set-Up & Assignment
Material Set-Up Button
The Material Set-Up radio button is found above the 3D Scene
Preview window. It will be grayed out unless an object is selected.
When an object is selected, clicking this button will change the
left half of the Set-Up window to display the Material Assignment
window at the top, a toolbar, the Palette Commands popup menu
and the docking palette of active materials at the bottom.
Material Assignment Window
The Material Assignment window is the window that replaces the
Scene Preview window when the Material Set-Up radio button is
clicked.
If the Primary selection is a text object, vector object or layer
cycling object, this window shows you the edge profile used by
that object as well as the materials applied. If the Primary selection is an imported model or primitive, only the materials applied
are shown.
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Materials are readied for application by dragging them from the
Materials bin and dropping them into one of the docks in the
Materials Palette. Each text or vector object can have up to six
different materials applied to it at one time.
A material can be applied to an object by dragging a material
swatch from the palette up into the Material Assignment window
and dropping it onto one of the little green material chips.
When working with text or vector objects each Edge Profile is
given three green material chips to start. One for the color of
the front face, one for the color of the back face, and one for the
color of the edges. Each of these three chips has the number “1”
on it, which means the material in dock number one is used to
color the whole object.
The Edge Profile has three green material chips by default.
If you want to give the hole edges a different color than the
outside edges, uncheck the “Use Same Material for Hole Edges”
checkbox in the Holes section of the Objects tab. When you do
that you will see a fourth green material chip appear next to the
part of the diagram marked “Holes.”
If you want to apply a separate material to the bevels of an edge
or to some other part of an edge, you must split the edge into
multiple parts with the Split Tool. When you do this other green
material chips will be added which you can then drag swatches
onto. (See the Split Tool section on the next page.)
To give the Hole Edge its own green material chip, uncheck the
“Use Same Material for Hole Edges” in the Object tab.
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Material Set-Up Toolbar
The Material Set-Up toolbar contains several different types of
tools. It is located just below the Material Assignment window.
Display Splits
The Display Splits button turns on/off the display of the red split
point arrows, the green material chips and the blue anchor point
dots.
When the Display Splits button is turned off these items are not
removed, they just aren’t shown so you can have a clearer view of
the Edge Profile.
Splits and Chips show
when button turned ON.
Splits and Chips are hidden
when button turned OFF
Keyboard Shortcut
When inside the Material Set-Up area,
tap the S key to activate the Split tool.
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Split Tool
The Split Tool is the button with the single red arrow on it. The
Split Tool is what you use to split the edge of a vector object into
multiple parts, such as splitting the bevel to be separate from the
sides. There is no limit to how many parts you can split an edge
into.
Splits are created by making this tool blue, then single-clicking in
the Material Assignment window. If you click near an edge line
on the profile a red arrow will be placed where you clicked.
The blue dots show where the anchor points were in the vector
file the curves came from. However, you do not have to click on
one of the blue dots. You can place a Split Point anywhere along
the line. If an arrow is close to one of the blue dots, it will snap to
it and turn hollow so you know that the Split Point is exactly on
an anchor point.
If you want to reposition a Split Point arrow, just click and drag it
from its current position to a new position. Usually you can click
in the middle of the arrow to grab the Split Point, however sometimes an arrow is nestled into a corner so it’s difficult to grab and
the Invigorator keeps wanting to add another Split Point instead
of grabbing the existing one. When this happens, just grab the arrow at its tip, by clicking where the arrow and the line meet, and
you will find you’re then able to move it.
If you are still having trouble grabbing the arrow, you may need
to zoom in on the arrow using the Dolly or Zoom tool, then try
grabbing it again.
If you want to delete a Split Point, grab the arrow and pull it off
the line. When the arrow is off the line it lightens, indicating that
if you let up on the mouse button it will disappear. If you want to
delete all the Split Points on an object there is a special command
for that in the Palette Commands popup menu.
If you pull an arrow off the line accidentally, just keep your
mouse button down and move the arrow back over the line.
The Split Point arrow will turn hollow when the split point
is placed exactly on an anchor point.
Click here to grab
tough split arrows
Zoom in on tough
split arrows.
Delete a Split Point by selecting the arrow
and pulling it off the line.
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When the arrow snaps back onto the line you can let go of the
mouse button without deleting the arrow. If you do delete the arrow you can also click the Undo button to get it back.
Whenever you add a split point you’ll notice that you add another
green material chip too. The purpose of a split point arrow is to
split a single section of the model into two sections so you can
color them separately. The extra material chip is added so you
can color the new section you’ve just created.
Use the Split Point arrow to divide a profile into two or more sections, so they can be colored separately.
Split sections can be as small as you want. If a split arrow keeps
snapping to a position where you don’t want it, use the Dolly tool
to enlarge the edge profile. You will then be able to move the arrow very close to a blue dot without snapping onto it.
You cannot split the front or back faces. They are one color only.
Grabber Hand
Keyboard Shortcut
When inside the Material Set-Up area, tap
the G key to activate the Grabber Hand tool.
This tool can be temporarily activated by
holding down the Spacebar. (Mac and Win)
When the Spacebar is released you will
switch back to the tool that was last selected.
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The Grabber Hand tool is used to slide the image in the Material
Assignment window. When the Dolly or Zoom tools have been
used to make the image larger you sometimes need the Grabber
Hand to slide the image left or right in order to see the parts of
the image that are outside the area shown in the window.
To operate the Grabber Hand, click on the tool to make it blue.
Then click and drag in the Material Assignment window.
Dolly Tool
The Dolly tool is used to enlarge or reduce the size of the image in the Material Assignment window. Sometimes you need to
enlarge the image to better set Split Points. By clicking on this
tool to select it, you can then drag up in the window to make the
image bigger. Dragging down makes the image smaller.
Zoom Tool
The Zoom tool is another way to make the image in the Material
Assignment window bigger or smaller. Select the tool and then
click in the window. Each click magnifies the window by about
25%. Holding down the Option key (Mac) or Alt key (Win) zooms
out, making the image smaller.
Double-clicking on the Zoom tool is a shortcut for the Fit All command. This will recenter the image and size it so that everything
is visible.
Keyboard Shortcut
the D key to activate the Dolly tool.
This tool can be temporarily activated by
holding down the Spacebar + Control keys
together. (Mac and Win) When the keys are
released you will switch back to the tool
that was last selected.
Keyboard Shortcut
the Z key to activate the Zoom tool.
Palette Commands Popup
The Palette Commands popup menu is seen to the left of the toolbar. Clicking on it reveals the available commands. Drag down
to highlight a command and release the mouse to execute it.
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The Palette Commands popup is unusual in that the commands
above the line affect the Materials Assignment area above it and
the commands below the line affect the Materials Palette area
below it.
Clear All Splits
The Clear All Splits command removes the split points from an
edge profile and resets the green material chips back to number
“1”. This command is used when you want to erase all material
assignments and start over from scratch.
Fit All
The Fit All command will resize the edge profile image so the
whole profile is visible in the Material Assignment window. This
command is used when the image is either too big or too small to
be fit into the window and you want to see the whole thing again.
A shortcut for this command is to double-click on the Zoom tool
button.
Swap Materials
The Swap Materials command enables you to exchange the dock
positions of two materials in the Materials Palette. Sometimes
you realize that if two colors were reversed the objects would
look better. Swapping the Material swatches does this in one step,
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otherwise you would have to manually drag the green material
assignment chips into the correct spots for however many split
areas would be affected.
In order to make this command work you need to first select two
material swatches in the Materials Palette. Do this by first singleclicking on one of them (double-clicking will load the material
into the Materials Editor). This will put a red selection highlight
around the swatch. Then hold down the Shift key and single-click
on the second material. You will see a green selection highlight
around this one.
Then execute the Swap Materials command by choosing it from
the popup menu. The two swatches will be switched and the
model will reflect the changes. If you select more than two materials only the first two selected will be swapped.
Delete Selected Materials
This command removes swatches from the Materials Palette.
Select the swatches you want to delete by clicking on the first,
and shift-clicking on the rest. Then pick the Delete Selected
Materials command and the swatches will disappear leaving the
docks empty.
In using this command, if there are any green material assignment chips whose palette docks are now empty, those chips will
be given the color of the default material until a new material is
placed into the dock.
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Materials Palette
The Materials Palette for Text and Vector objects contains six
gray boxes called “docks”. (Imported objects only have a single
dock. Primitives have as many docks as they have sides.)
These are where materials are dragged so they can be assigned to
objects. The Materials Bin at the top right of the Materials Tab is
the holding station for materials, but the Materials Palette contains the materials that are active and being applied to objects.
Material Swatches are placed into the Palette by dragging them
from the Materials bin or the Materials Editor and dropping them
into one of the docks.
The Materials Palette
If you ever forget what materials have been
applied to an object, just select the object,
open the Materials Set-Up area and look in the
Materials Palette. For a material to be applied
to an object, it must first be loaded into the
Materials Palette, or else dropped directly onto
the object. Showing the Materials Palette will
show you all the materials that are applied to
an object.
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Material swatches can be moved and rearranged by dragging
them from one dock to the next.
You can also Option-drag a material in the palette to assign the
same material to a different dock.
The main difference between Option-dragging in the Materials
Palette versus the Materials Bin is that Option-dragging in the
Materials Bin creates a duplicate material with a different name.
The duplicate material can then be edited without affecting the
original material. However, Option-dragging in the Materials Palette does not duplicate the material, rather it acts like a short cut
for assigning the same material to two different docks.
Palette Checkbox
The Palette Checkbox is found at the top right corner of the 3D
Scene Preview window. Turning it on will show the Materials
Palette without opening the Materials Assignment window.
The reason the palette has its own checkbox is because on occasion you will want to see the 3D Scene Preview window and
the Materials Palette at the same time. For instance if you want
to compare the palettes for two different objects you can display
the palette, then click on one object, and then on the other. As
you click on each object the palette will update to show you what
materials are used by each.
On other occasions you may want to check the splits and edge
profiles applied to different objects in the scene. To do this, first
click on the Object mode button so that the Object List is showing, then click the Materials Set-Up button to show the edge
profiles and split points. Finally turn the Palette Checkbox OFF.
This will leave the top window showing, but turns off the palette
so you can see the Object controls again. Now you can select
from the Object List. As you make selections the edge profiles
and split points will be displayed in the window.
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User Preferences
The User Preferences window contains various settings that affect how the current project acts. It also has the ability to affect
how every future project acts, as well as what materials appear
in the bins when a new project is created, and what the default
profile and material will be for newly created objects.
You get to the User Prefs window by clicking on the Object Mode
button and then clicking the User Prefs button directly below the
Object Mode button.
Default Set Number
The Default Set Number is the Set that objects are assigned to
when they are first created. You’ll remember that a “Set” is what
is animated by After Effects so in order to animate objects the
objects must be assigned to a Set.
By default, all objects are assigned to Set 1. You may have
noticed that when you first add an Invigorator effect, clicking on
an object while in the Effect Controls window makes bounding
boxes appear around all objects in your 3D scene. This means
that all of those objects are part of the same Set. (To change their
Set assignment pick a new Set number from the Set Assignment
popup next to the Object List inside the Set-Up window.)
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You can change the default Set number to any of the numbers in
the popup menu. Select the number you want and the next time
you add objects to the Invigorator, the new objects will be assigned to the Set you chose.
Shadow Quality
The Shadow Quality popup lets you set the size of the shadow
map created for each light that casts a shadow. The larger the
shadow map the better the quality of the shadows.
Larger shadow maps are sometimes needed when the shadows
start to look grainy around the edges. This happens when the
objects in your scene are too far apart. Since the shadow map is
made to fit all the objects in the scene, when objects are spaced
far away from each other (even if they are not seen in the camera
view) they cause the shadow map to get spread too thin. This
causes the quality of the shadows to go down and you need to
increase the size of the map to compensate for it.
Knowing that shadows take all visible objects into account, you
can help keep shadows looking their best by making objects
invisible that are out of view of the camera, or by keeping them
close to the camera, and just barely outside the camera’s viewing
area.
Changing the Shadow Quality setting will also change the softness of the shadows.
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Duplication Offset
Objects are duplicated by selecting them in the Set-Up window,
and then clicking the Duplicate button below the Object list. The
Duplication Offset values control how far the duplicated object is
moved away from the original.
The default values are 50, -50, 0 which means the object is moved
50 points to the right and 50 points down. These values, however
can be set to anything and are very useful when putting a scene
together. For instance if you want to make a row of stars you can
start with one star, set the Duplication Offset to 100, 0, 0, then
click the Duplicate button ten times. You will get ten duplicate
stars spaced 100 points apart in a horizontal row.
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Hard Shading Angle
The Hard Shading Angle makes the corners of objects look
smooth or sharp.
During the rendering process, the shading calculations will look
at each polygon to see if the polygons next to it are pointed in the
same direction. If they aren’t it will look to see how much of a
difference there is. If the difference is less than the Hard Shading
Angle value, the edges between the polygons will be smoothed to
look like a curve. However, if the difference is greater than the
Hard Shading Angle, the edges will be drawn sharp like a corner.
The Hard Shading Angle value is in degrees so for instance, if two
polygons meet at a 45 degree angle and the Hard Shading Angle
is set to 30, the edge between the two polygons will look like a
sharp corner. However, if the Hard Shading Angle is changed to
50, the edge will be smoothed and the two polygons will look like
part of a curve.
Two polygons meeting at a 45 degree angle
(seen from the edge)
When the Hard Shading
angle is set low, hard
edges appear easily.
When the Hard Shading angle
is set high, even chunky models are smoothed.
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Save Project Data As
The Save Project Data As user preference has two options. It
will save the project data in Binary form or in ASCII (text) form.
Binary data is smaller which will give you smaller AE files.
Opening and saving files will be faster especially if you have multiple Invigorator effects applied to the same project.
ASCII data is larger, but it’s cross-platform, meaning you can
take your project files from Macintosh to Windows and back
without compatibility problems.
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Show Ground Plane In Preview Windows
The two Scene Preview windows, one in the Set-Up window and
one in the Effect Controls window, each have a ground plane
made of grid lines. This option turns it on or off.
The Ground Plane helps orient you in 3D space. It also helps you
recognize when you are moving the camera or moving individual
objects. When you move the camera, the objects and the Ground
Plane all move like they are locked together. Whereas when you
are moving objects, the Ground Plane stays still.
Ground Plane Y Offset
The Ground Plane starts at the Y = 0 level which corresponds to
the bottom of the page in Illustrator.
If your vector paths are drawn at the bottom of the Illustrator
page they will come into the Invigorator sitting on the Ground
Plane. If on the other hand, you draw the paths up at the top of
the page, they come into the Invigorator floating up in the air high
above the Ground Plane.
The Y Offset enables you to move the Ground Plane up or down
so it is closer to your objects. This value is in points. A standard
8 1/2 x 11 inch page is 792 points tall so when you change the
Offset value, use large values to start. Setting the Y Offset value
from 0 to 10 won’t be very noticeable.
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Additional PRO Features
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The PRO Features
ProAnimator NOTE
As great as the Classic and PRO versions are,
don’t forget to take a look at the ProAnimator
which is another product from Zaxwerks. The
ProAnimator has a new method for creating
animations that does not use keyframes. It is
very easy to learn and can create animations
in minutes that look like they took you days.
The PRO version of the Invigorator for After Effects contains
many other features that greatly improve production speed, and
enhance the look of your graphics. Some of the PRO features,
such as super fast final rendering, are covered in the earlier part
of this user guide. However, the rest of the PRO features have
been gathered in this one place to make them easier to find.
The features explained within this PRO section are only available
when you run the PRO version. If you have the Classic version
you can upgrade to the PRO version for a small fee.
It is truly an amazing program.
Edge Offset
The Edge Offset feature is a very powerful tool that expands
or contracts the bezier paths that your model is based on. This
makes the faces of your model smaller or larger to compensate
for the thickness of the edges.
The Edge Scale slider helps to minimize the bloating effect, but
some amount of thickness is always added to the model. Edge
Offset allows the edges to cut into a model to any amount
The Edge Offset feature changes the size of the faces. If
you drag the slider to the left the faces will shrink. Dragging to the right makes the faces grow.
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As with all sliders in the Invigorator, holding down the Shift key
while dragging the slider will put the Invigorator into “continuous
update” mode. This lets you watch the model grow or shrink as
you drag the slider.
This is an extremely useful tool in the design process. As you
drag the slider back and forth objects will join together, holes
will disappear and reappear, and objects will pinch into multiple
parts.
The scale of the slider is in points. If you have a box that is 24
points wide, setting the Edge Offset to -5 will make the box shrink
by 5 points all the way around. Setting the slider to +5 will make
the box grow by 5 points on all sides.
If you thin down an object too far, parts of it will start to pinch in
two. Think of an hourglass shape. As you thin down an hourglass
the center will touch before the ends, pinching the object into
two pieces. Sometimes this causes no ill-effect, but other times
this will cause long spikes to jut out from the object. If this happens use the Spike Buster feature to clip off the spikes. (See the
section on Spike Buster)
If the Edge Offset slider doesn’t go high or low enough for you,
you can type any number into the edit field.
The Model with no Edge Offset
Edge Offset = +7
Edge Offset = -4
Edge Offset = -7
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Custom Edge Profiles
The ability to design your own edge profiles is a very powerful
feature. With this ability you can create edges that fulfill the
requirements of nearly any typographic design task, such as creating multiple outlines around text or insetting the text faces so
they appear sunken into the 3D model.
Custom edges also enable you to create special moldings for
architectural work or user interface designs.
How To Create A Custom Edge Profile
To make your own edge profile you draw the edge in a vector
drawing program (Illustrator, FreeHand, etc.) and then put the
vector file into the Custom Edges folder. This folder is located
at the same level as the Zaxwerks Maps and Zaxwerks Environments folders.
Put your custom vector files into the Custom Edges folder.
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When you next launch the Invigorator it will find this file, read
the paths contained in the file and display their names in the
Profile Popup menu. Once Custom Edges are loaded you can
make changes to them by editing the vector file they came from
and then using the Reload Custom Edges command to get the
Invigorator to use the edited version. You do not have to quit the
program and launch it again.
Each Layer Becomes A Single Edge Profile
Each layer in the vector file will become a separate Edge Profile.
This is an important point. Each layer becomes a profile. Not
each path, nor the entire file. This means by placing each custom
profile on a different layer, you can have many custom profiles
inside a single Illustrator file.
Since each layer becomes a profile you can use several shapes at
once to create multipart edges that go far beyond what you would
normally think of as an edge. For instance, very interesting models can be made by putting three circles in a diagonal line.
When applied to an object as a Custom Profile these circles become parallel neon tubes.
Where Do Custom Edges Appear In The Menu?
When Custom Edges are present you will see a “Custom Edges”
menu item at the top of the Edge Profiles popup. Selecting this
menu item will display a sub menu of all the Custom Edges currently loaded into the Invigorator.
Picking a Custom Edge Profile’s name from the list applies it to
the currently selected object. If many objects are selected the
same profile will be applied to all of them. The arrow keys on
your keyboard let you step through Custom Edges the same way
you can step through the list of preset edges.
Each layer will become a separate edge profile.
When all three circles are on one layer they will become a
single edge profile.
Custom Edges appear at the top of the Profile menu.
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Setting The Scale Of A Custom Edge Profile
The 0, 100 point
The Back Face of the model
registers with this line.
Edge profiles are based on a 100 point grid. Use the bottom left
corner of the vector drawing program’s page as the 0, 0 point,
(origin.) When you look at the drawing page, imagine you are
looking down on the model from above, exactly like how you see
the edge profile in the Invigorator’s Material Set-Up window.
The Y axis of the page becomes the depth of the model. The front
face of the model is at the bottom of the page and the back face
of the model is where Y equals 100 points.
The Front Face of the model
registers with this line.
The 0, 0 point
The bottom left corner of the Illustrator page.
Just because we are setting the back face at the 0, 100 point
do not think that all models will come out with a depth of 100.
A model’s final depth is controlled by the Depth slider in the
Invigorator’s object tab. The 100 point grid is used as a registration reference so that any custom profile can be drawn. Using
this grid as a guideline, the 0 point of the grid will register with
the front face and the 100 point of the grid will register with the
back face.
The Edge Examples.ai file that comes with the program has a
layer called Guidelines. The guides in this file can be used to
align your custom edges.
Most times the best way to work is to draw the edge; then drag
the starting point of the edge to the 0,0 point; then scale the edge
until the end point is aligned with the 0, 100 point.
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What Types Of Paths Can Edges Be?
Profiles can be open or closed paths; single or multiple parts.
They can be straight lines, curved lines, a single closed shape,
several closed shapes or a compound shape with holes.
You cannot however, use text objects, placed EPS images or raster based images. But you can convert the text to vector outlines,
break the EPS art into editable shapes and trace the raster images
to create vector paths that will work as Custom Edge Profiles.
DO use profiles like these for custom edges
Live Text
Raster Images
Placed EPS artwork
DO NOT use profiles like these for custom edges
A Custom Edge does not have to start or end at the 0, 0 and the
0, 100 points. However if it doesn’t, the faces may not touch the
sides leaving gaps in the model.
If gaps are intentional then no problem, but if they ruin the model
you need to be more careful when drawing your custom edges.
When the path of the custom edge crosses the main axes special
conditions occur. Learn more about crossing the Y and X axes in
the next sections.
An edge that doesn’t
start at the 0,0 point
Gap between
face and side
A custom edge that doesn’t start on the 0, 0 point leaves a gap
where the face and sides don’t meet
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Crossing The Y Axis
+
The Y axis
When an Edge Profile is applied to the Illustrator artwork, the Y
axis of the Profile aligns with the perimeter of the vector shape.
This means that if you drew a vertical line that was directly on
the Y axis and applied that as the Edge Profile, you would get a
straight extrusion in the final model.
=
Depth runs this direction
The Y axis in Illustrator becomes the depth of the 3D model
This part will tuck
behind the front
face
These parts will
add thickness to
the model
The front face
seen from above
If the profile goes to the right of the Y axis the profile will enlarge
the perimeter of the Illustrator artwork. This will make the 3D
model get “fatter”.
If the profile goes to the left of the Y axis, the edge of the model
will extend toward the center of the 3D model. It is important to
note, however, that the front and back faces themselves will not
be affected. Making the profile cross to the left of the Y axis will
not thin the front or back faces. Thinning the faces is accomplished with the Edge Offset control.
The 3D model
seen from above
The above profile applied to a star
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Crossing The X Axis
When the Edge Profile is set into position for the modeling process, the X axis is aligned with the front face of the model. This
means that if the Edge Profile starts somewhere along the X axis,
the edge of the model will start at the same depth as the object’s
front face.
Most of the time the Edge Profile starts at the X axis and extends
up above it. However, if any part of the edge extends down
below the X axis, the edge of the model will extend in front of the
object’s front face. This is how you can create a model whose
front faces appear to be inset down into the model.
This section crosses
below the X axis
Now the front face looks
inset into the 3D object
Editing A Custom Profile While The Project Is Open
Many times while working with Custom Edges you will want to
edit the shape of an edge applied to your model. To do this go
to your vector drawing program and open the vector file that
the Custom Edge came from. This file will be inside the Custom
Edges folder/directory.
Make the changes to your edge shapes and resave the file. Be
certain that you don’t rename the layer because this is what the
Invigorator will be looking for when you update the edge.
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Go back to the Invigorator and open the Set-Up window. AE can
still be running. There is no need to Quit or Exit or otherwise
relaunch the program.
Use the Reload Custom Edges command to update the files
used for edge profiles without having to Quit the Invigorator.
A Warning About The Reload Custom
Edges Command
This command will reload ALL the custom
edges in your menu. If you remove some
of the vector files inside the Custom Edges
folder, or turn off their layer visibility inside
Illustrator, they will no longer be seen in the
menu after using this command.
Click and hold on the Profile menu. Find the menu item called
Custom Edges and move the mouse to it. A submenu will pop
out to the side. Find the menu item called Reload Custom Edges.
Pick it and the Invigorator will flush the old custom edges and
reload the ones now inside the Custom Edges folder/directory.
The Importance Of The Edge’s Starting Point For
Texture Mapping
When creating your own custom edge, it’s important for you to
understand that the way you create the edge will affect how a
texture map is applied to it.
When the edge is an open path and starts at or near the 0, 0 point,
the map will be oriented so that the top of the map is near the
front face and the bottom of the map is near the back face of the
model.
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You can see this by looking at how a map is applied to one of the
factory preset Edge Profiles.
When an open path doesn’t start or end near the 0, 0 point the
map is aligned so that the top of the map is applied to the first
point on the path and the bottom of the map is applied to the
last point. The first point is the end of the path that you started
drawing first and the last point is where you stopped drawing.
When you make your own profiles you should keep this in mind.
The Invigorator has built-in smarts that will fix open paths that
start or end near to the 0, 0 point. But when an end doesn’t come
near enough to the 0, 0 point, there is no way of telling what the
user has intended.
A similar thing is true with closed paths, such as circles, that are
being used as edge profiles. The top of the texture map will be
placed at the first point on the circle. The map will then wrap
around the circle and come back to the first point so that the top
and bottom of the map touch each other.
Back
Front
Texture map
Texture map applied
to model.
Notice how the map is applied so that the top of the
map is next to the front of the object and the bottom
of the map is next to the back.
A custom edge where the first point was drawn at the
back of the model causing the map to be reversed.
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How To Tell Where The Seam Will Be
Some programs offer a feature where you can see the location of
the first point in a path. However, neither Illustrator or FreeHand
have this feature. The Invigorator does have this feature, so you
have to bring the custom edge into the Invigorator and look at it
in the Material Set-Up window to see it.
When you look at a custom edge inside the Material Set-Up
window, any path that is closed will have a little diamond icon
(similar to a push-pin) pointing to the first point in the path.
The first point is at the front
of the object.
The first point after the path was
cut and joined back together.
This is the point where the edges of a texture map will start/stop.
The push-pin marker shows the location of the first point.
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Edge Profile Examples
Here are some examples of vector paths used for custom edges and the models they produce.
Single Open Path
These are single vector paths that may or may not start at the 0,0 point or end at the 0, 100 point.
Single Closed Path
Edges can be closed shapes. Notice that they can cross the Y axis. In these examples you would use the Depth control to
set the size of the tubes created. The visibility of the faces has also been turned off, otherwise the centers would be filled
in.
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Multiple Open Paths
More than one vector path can be used to create an edge profile. The use of short line segments leaves gaps in the model
which lets you see the inside and the outside at the same time.
Multiple Closed Paths
When several closed paths are used you get some interesting concentric tube effects.
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Mixing Open And Closed Paths
Open and closed paths may both be used in the same edge.
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Layer Cycling
What is a Layer Cycling Object?
PRO NOTE- Layer Cycling is a part of the
PRO version. If you are using the Classic
version this feature will not be available.
Layer Cycling is a special feature that lets you create a new model
for every frame of an animation. It cycles through the layers inside a vector file and builds the model using the shapes found on
each layer. This ability gives you the power to create 3D animations that have rarely if ever been seen because they were too
difficult or time consuming to execute.
In the old days, before newer animation techniques were developed, the only way of getting a 3D object to change shape was to
create a different model for every frame or two and then animate the visibility of each model to appear for the frames it was
needed.
This is similar to how the Layer Cycling technique works. The
models produced from only a single layer are visible at any one
time. To make things more flexible, we’ve given you several settings to control how these models are “played back”.
Using the Invigorator’s Layer Cycling feature, each
layer in the Illustrator file is used to create a different
model for each frame of an animation.
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Even today with all of the fancy tools available in 3D programs,
there are still many design ideas that have to be thrown out because they are too time consuming to do. Layer Cycling not only
lets you do them, but do them quickly and easily.
Example Uses For This Technique
Layer Cycling is an extraordinarily powerful technique and you
shouldn’t overlook it. So before we get into the technical details
lets take a look at what this technique can do for you.
Animated Arrows - This is the kind of effect that started it
all. Think of the arrows that airline movies use to show you the
escape routes out of an airplane. They aren’t straight. They have
bends, they get longer and the head of the arrow leads the way.
You can’t do this effect by revealing more and more of the arrow,
and you can’t do it by simply animating the head of the arrow.
You have to create a new model for every frame of the animation.
Understanding Layer Cycling
As an added bonus, when it’s in full 3D you can do camera moves
on it too. For instance start up close, watch the arrow appear,
then pull out to see the entire exit path as the arrow grows.
The way Layer Cycling works is that each
layer in an Illustrator or FreeHand file becomes a single frame of a model sequence.
The first layer in the vector file becomes
frame one. The second layer becomes frame
two. There are several options that control
how layers are “played” but this is the basic
idea.
Animated Map Tracers - Similar to the animated arrows, these
types of effects start from one point on a map and animate in
an arc to land at a different part of the map, or bounce off of a
satellite. Since you’re not limited to the number of vector shapes
per layer you can show the tracers breaking up after a bounce, or
traveling down radio antennas.
If you drew a circle, a square and a triangle,
and put each shape on a different layer.
Turning this file into a Layer Cycling object
would only show you one object at a time.
First, the circle, then the square and then the
triangle. Got it?
Number Countdowns - Ever see a number countdown sequence
that was in full 3D? The vector paths can be completely unrelated so each layer can be a totally different number or letter.
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3D Write-Ons - These effects are always magical to look at. Doing them in 3D however is usually not worth the hassle of making
all the models. Nearly everyone tries it but there is no good way
of “eating away” a full 3D model and having it look very nice. On
the other hand, setting up a 2D write-on sequence is pretty easy
and the Invigorator automates the modeling, so now you’ll be able
to do full 3D write-ons whenever you want.
3D Wipes - Similar to the write-on technique, but used for objects
that don’t follow pen-type lines. Use Illustrator’s knife tool to cut
the object away a little at a time. Use a ragged cut or use a shape
like a block or a circle to cut the object so it has an advancing
edge like a wipe.
If you want to get fancy, do a two part wipe where you use something like advancing bar shapes to cut the object into strips, then
a second set of bars to erase the strips completely.
Morphing Logos - Your client wants you to graphically show
two companies that merged and got a new logo? Do the “merge
sequence” to the vector art and watch it become 3D in the Invigorator.
If you really want to spruce this up start to distort the logos as
they get near to each other so they look like they are magnetically snapping together. Both Illustrator and FreeHand have good
tools for doing this. In FreeHand use the Reshape tool and in
Illustrator use the pencil tool.
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The Reload button works for Layer Cycling objects too, so you
can work out the look of the animation in passes. Rough in the
movement, then add the little touches as the project progresses.
Shape Blends - Every vector drawing program has a shape
blending tool that will blend between two vector shapes. Use this
tool to set up morphing shape sequences, then ungroup and paste
each step of the blend onto a different layer. Some programs
have a “Release To Layers” command that will do this for you.
Vector Deformations - Use the 2D tools provided in your vector drawing program to create new 3D effects. For instance the
Distortion tools like Twirl and Zig Zag can be used to set up a logo
distortion where the model twirls from the client’s logo into the
name of the company’s top salesman or some other effect. The
extra special touch is that the name is spinning in 3D while the
“un-twirling” is going on!
3D Deformations - Most 3D programs have the ability to do a
basic set of deformations, like bending an object. However, doing
an art-directed deformation like bending an object so it takes on
the shape of a smile, or a heart is still a very difficult operation.
In 2D it is much easier to set up. Once you have it in vector form,
the Invigorator turns it into 3D in a snap.
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Ultra Deformations - Ever tried to do a 3D animation of a wave
traveling along a rope once it was flicked? Good luck. Or how
about a rope that wiggles itself into cursive lettering? Forget it.
This type of effect is easy when using Layer Cycling. Since Layer
Cycling lets you draw anything you want for each frame, you have
no limitations about how you can make objects change shape.
Drips, Sags and Melts - Ever seen a 3D object dripping? Me
neither, but now you can. Draw a little drip sequence and add it
to the bottoms of your shapes. Presto, 3D dripping objects!
Melting an object is a fun thing to do too. Only problem is that
most computer “melts” always look the same. The Layer Cycling
technique puts the melt into your hands. Illustrator’s pencil tool
is great for mushing and melting a shape very quickly. It also
gives you great control for making the vector shapes sag in the
middle as they’re melting, or bloat at the bottom like they are
squashing under their own weight.
Remember!
Often times the simpler it is, the better it is.
There might not be a need to morph your client’s whole logo. Perhaps morphing one letter
will get the point across without the extra work.
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Next The World ! - Once you get used to the idea that anything
can become anything you’ll find that many ideas you used to
throw out as too difficult or impossible, can now be done quite
easily. Vector clip art libraries are ready sources for artwork that
can be used in the Invigorator. Turn your client’s name into a
money symbol, a sports figure, or the Statue of Liberty.
How To Prep The Vector File
A single vector file will become one Layer Cycling object.
Each layer in the file will become one model. There is no limit to
the complexity of the vector data on each layer. Layer one could
have a single circle, Layer two could have a hundred circles and
Layer three could have the word “Hello.”
Just like any regular vector file, the position on the page will
determine where objects appear inside the Invigorator’s world. If
you take the letters of the alphabet and line them up next to each
other, the letters will change position as you cycle through them.
On the other hand if you stack the letters on top of each other,
the letters won’t change position and will look more like one is
turning into another.
Put the layers in the order that you want the models to appear.
The first layer will become the first model, the second layer
becomes the second model. Based on the playback options the
models may appear in forward, reverse or random order.
Each layer becomes one model in the animation.
Notice how the bottom layer in Illustrator becomes the
first model in the sequence.
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How To Make A Layer Cycling Object
A Layer Cycling object is made by selecting the “Create Layer
Cycling Object” command from the Object popup menu or the
Startup dialogue. This gives you the “Select Artwork” dialogue
with the “As Layer Cycling Object” option turned on.
If this option is OFF you will see all of your models at one time
and the top of the Object tab will say “Vector Shape Object”. If
you have successfully turned this option ON, you will only see
one model and the Object tab will say “Layer Cycling Object.”
You’ll also notice extra controls in the Object tab for controlling
the playback options.
The type of object is identified at the top of the Object tab
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The Layer Cycling Controls
The controls for a Layer Cycling object will appear in the Object
tab once this type of object has been selected. The only differences between a regular Vector Object and a Layer Cycling object
are the controls for playing back the models. All other controls
are the same. Edge Profiles, Depth, Object Faceting and Material
application are all the same.
It’s important to note that a Layer Cycling object uses
the same group of settings for every model in the cycling
object. For instance, each object will appear with the same
Depth, same Edge Profile and the same Materials.
You can, of course, have many Layer Cycling objects in the same
Invigorator scene, and each one can have its own Depth, Edge
and Material settings. It’s just that all of the models that are part
of the same Layer Cycling object will share the same Shape and
Material settings. Changing the Shape or Material settings on the
model used in frame two will change all the other models in all
the other frames as well - for that one particular Layer Cycling
Object.
These are the only controls that are different between a regular
Vector Shape Object and a Layer Cycling Object
The Frame Controls
These are the controls that let you adjust which frame of the
animation you are looking at when you are inside the Set-Up
window.
The Frame Controls
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Total Frames Field
The length of time that an Invigorator effect will last is based on
the duration of the layer it is applied to. This field shows you the
duration of the layer (in frames).
The Total Frames field
If you export the models of a layer cycling sequence you will get
one model for each frame, for the duration of the effect. So if you
have a sequence that loops every 10 frames but the duration of
the layer is set to 300 frames you will export 300 models. By setting the duration to 10 frames and then exporting the models you
will then only export the 10 models needed.
Frame Counter
This edit field lets you change the current frame while you are
inside the Set-Up window. This way you can inspect each model
that will be created and make sure the cycling sequence is working properly without having to exit back to the main part of After
Effects. You can type numbers into this field to skip to a particular frame or you can click on the forward / backward buttons to
step your way through the sequence of models.
The Frame Counter
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The Frame Counter is a global counter. As you advance through
frames every Layer Cycling object in your scene will advance
too. For instance, going to frame 10 will show you the state of all
Layer Cycling objects at frame 10.
The Playback Controls
The rest of the controls specific to a Layer Cycling object let you
decide how a sequence of models is “played”.
Start Frame
This determines when the sequence of layers is to begin cycling.
If it is set to 1, the model sequence will begin to cycle at frame
1. If set to 10 the model sequence will wait until frame 10 before
it starts to play. The Start Frame is relative to the beginning of
a layer’s duration. Setting the Start Frame to 10 will start the
sequence 10 frames after the layer begins, not 10 frames after the
Comp begins.
The Start Frame field
Show Before Start Frame
This ON/OFF option either shows the first model of the cycling
sequence prior to the starting frame or keeps it hidden until the
counter reaches the starting frame.
For instance, if the start frame is set to 5 and this option is OFF
the model won’t be shown (created) until frame 5. The model
won’t exist for frames 1, 2, 3 or 4, then on frame 5 the model will
appear and the sequence will start “playing”.
On the other hand if this option is ON, the model will appear in
the scene from the first frame, but it will hold on the first model
until it’s time to begin “playing”. So the same model seen at frame
5 will also be seen in frames 1-4.
The Show Before Start frame checkbox
Show Before
Start - OFF
- - - - - - - 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
Show Before
Start - ON
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
The playback order with Start Frame set to 8
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Change Every
The Change Every setting controls how many frames each model
will be held during the animation. This is similar to cell animation where only 10 or 15 actual pictures are drawn and then each
picture is photographed 2 or 3 times when the film is shot.
With cell animation this is done as a way to keep from having to
draw a picture for every single frame. The same applies here.
This keeps you from having to create a layer for every single
frame of an animation. However, it also has creative implications
too.
The Change Every popup
1 2 3 4
Original layers
1 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 4 1 1 1 2 2 2 ...
The playback order, with Change Every set to 3
By setting the Change Every setting to higher values you can get
an interesting stuttering look. Stuttering looks are almost never
seen in 3D. If anything, 3D has a problem with being overly
smooth and too controlled, so stuttering, strobic animations can
lend a new quality to 3D animation that may make your work
stand out.
Another use for the Change Every setting is for timing purposes.
If you want the model to change once each second, there is no
reason to create a layer for every frame of the animation when
you can simply change the layer once every 25 or 30 frames,
(depending on the frame rate of your final output.) This makes
number countdowns a snap to set up.
There is an interesting cell animator’s trick where you take two
or three frames and alternate between them over and over. This
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technique keeps things alive that otherwise go dead when all motion stops. This same trick can be done with a simple file of two
or three layers where the vectors are similar but slightly different.
Create a Layer Cycling object out of the file and set the Change
Every rate to hold for 5 or 10 frames. With the Sequence set to
loop, the models will cycle over and over giving you the same effect, but now in 3D!
Sequence
The Sequence options let you pick the order that the models appear when they are played.
The Sequence Options
Play once - Starts at the first layer in the file and plays
through all the layers in order once. After the last layer, no other
models are created
1 2 3 4- - - - - - - - - -
Play once and Hold - Starts at the first layer in the file
and plays through all the layers in order once, then holds the last
model until the Total Frames number is reached.
1 2 3 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 ...
Loop - Starts at the first layer in the file and plays
through the layers in order. Once it reaches the last layer it goes
back to the beginning and plays from the beginning again. This
pattern repeats until the Total Frames number is reached.
Ping Pong - Starts at the first layer in the file and plays
through the layers in order. Once it reaches the last layer it
Play once
Play once and Hold
1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 ...
Loop
1 2 3 4 3 2 1 2 3 4 3 2 1 ...
Ping Pong
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4 3 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1...
Reverse Play and Hold
3 1 2 4 1 3 2 4 3 4 1 2 2 4 3 1
Randomize
1 2 3 4
2 1 4 3 4 1 3 2
Original layers
All four layers are used every four frames
reverses the direction and plays the layers from last to first until
it reaches the beginning. It then reverses and plays the layers in
forward order again. This pattern repeats until the Total Frames
number is reached.
Reverse - The Reverse sequence options work the same
as their non-reversed counterparts except that playback begins
from the last layer in the file and proceeds to the first.
Randomize - This playback option picks a layer at
random, then picks another layer at random, then another, etc. It
will continue to do this until the Total Frames number is reached.
The order of the random picking can be changed with the Random Seed value.
The Invigorator’s Random function works in multiples of the
number of layers in the file. This means that if you have four layers in the file, each model will be shown every four frames. If you
have eight layers in the file, each model will be shown every eight
frames. This insures an even distribution of the models throughout the animation.
The Random Seed field
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Random Seed
This value changes the random pattern. It’s useful if you want to
use the same layer file more than once in an animation. This way
the squiggles, or numbers, or other elements in the file are the
same, but the same layers don’t appear at the same time.
Example 1: To create a 00-99 random number generator
without having to make 100 separate layers in the Illustrator file,
use a sequence of the numbers 0-9 and create a Layer Cycling Object. Next duplicate the 0-9 layer cycling object and place the two
Layer Cycling objects side by side. By using a different Random
Seed for the two Layer Cycling objects you will get random numbers between 00 and 99.
Example 2: Pick a specific starting model by changing
the seed value. Try different seed values until you find one that
picks the layer you want to use as your starting object. Then set
the Start Frame, turn on the Show Before Start checkbox, and
you will see that the starting object is held at the beginning of the
animation before the random sequence starts to cycle.
1 2 3 4
2 4 3 1
3 2 1 4
Original layers
Random Seed = 1
Random Seed = 2
To pick the starting layer, choose different Random Seeds until
the layer you want to start with appears first.
Exporting Layer Cycling Objects
If you export models for use in another 3D program, the other 3D
program may have its own controls for model sequence playback,
so you may only need to export one loop’s-worth of models, or
you may not need to export any extra models that will be shown
before the Start Frame.
1.- Make sure the Total Frames field is set to the number of models you want to export. To change the Total Frames,
change the duration of the layer.
2.- Pick the objects you want to export.
Set Total Frames field to desired number of models to Export.
The above example will create 12 complete models.
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3.- Invoke the Export 3D Object... command from the
Object menu.
4.- Choose the file format you will export the models in.
5.- Choose any other options you desire.
6.- Name the file and click Export.
Use the Export command to save your
Invigorator models to a file.
Sequence #1
Sequence #2
Combining sequences
When you want one sequence of models to change into a
second sequence you can combine two separate Layer
Cycling objects. Play one cycling object first and delay the
start of the second one by setting the Start Frame value to
when you want the change to occur.
Using Layer Cycling Objects Inside ElectricImage
Sequence two will start playing after sequence one is done
because its Start Frame is one frame higher than Sequence #1’s
Total Frames. Also note that Sequence #2’s “Show Before Start”
option is turned OFF so that the first model in Sequence #2
won’t be visible until frame 13 is reached.
Once a Layer Cycling Object has been exported as a FACT file,
it will open in ElectricImage as a standard model. To make the
layers cycle you will need to duplicate one of the objects and link
the rest of the models to this duplicated object so it becomes the
parent and all the others are children.
You cannot use an Effector as the parent. The parent must be an
object. Which object to duplicate is up to you. This object will
never be shown in the final animation. Only the children will be
cycled, which is why ElectricImage calls it Child Cycling.
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The next step is to put two tildes (~~) at the beginning of the Parent object’s name. This will make ElectricImage cycle through all
of the children in order with one child model being used for each
frame in the animation. After the last child, ElectricImage goes
back to the first child and continues the cycling. The Parent is
not used in the cycling sequence.
Since ElectricImage has no controls for Ping-Pong-style cycling,
Random cycling or using a single model for multiple frames, these
effects must be set up inside the Invigorator and the total frame
count adjusted so that ElectricImage’s standard looping won’t
interrupt the cycling.
Example 1: If you had a sequence of four models and
you wanted the sequence to Ping Pong so the models would be
played back 1-2-3-4-3-2-1, you would set the Invigorator to have a
total of seven frames and you would then see seven models inside
ElectricImage. If you only exported the four original models,
ElectricImage would play back 1-2-3-4-1-2-3-4 so you would loose
the Ping Pong sequence.
A Layer Cycling object ready to go in ElectricImage
Note the two tildes (~~) in front of the parent’s name.
Example 2: Inside the Invigorator you set the “Play
Every” popup to 2, so the Invigorator sequence is 1-1-2-2-3-3-44. Total frames should be set to eight during the export. If total
frames is only set to four you will get 1-1-2-2 inside ElectricImage,
missing the last four models.
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Example 3: Inside the Invigorator you have four layers set to the Random sequence. ElectricImage doesn’t have a
Random sequence of it’s own, so you need to set the Invigorator’s
total frames to a number that is large enough that a loop in the
random sequence won’t be noticed. Remember, the Invigorator’s
Random sequence works in multiples of the number of models in
the cycling object, so if you have four layers in the Illustrator file,
set the Total frames to a multiple of four for the best result.
Example 4: You want the model to remain the same
for the first eight frames, before the cycling begins. Inside the
Invigorator you set the Start Frame to 8 and turn on the Show Before Start checkbox. When you export the models the first eight
models will all be the same so as ElectricImage uses a new model
for each frame, it looks like the model is not changing.
Note: If ElectricImage gets to the last child model before
the animation ends it will go back to the first child and start the
cycling over from the top. If the first model is duplicated to act as
a hold, you will get another hold. For these types of animations
it is better to export the entire model sequence from the Invigorator. One model for each frame of the entire animation. This will
make for a large FACT file, but it’s very easy to do and making
changes is nothing more than exporting a new FACT file.
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Using Layer Cycling Objects Inside Other Programs
If your program supports object replacement either through a
plug-in or as a host feature, this will be how to get the Invigorator’s Layer Cycling models into the host.
If your program doesn’t support object replacement on a frame by
frame basis, perhaps it supports expressions or scripts, and you
can write a script that will only show one object at a time.
If your program doesn’t support scripts you can still animate the
visibility of each object so only one model is shown at a time.
In either case you should link all of the child objects to a main
parent. That way you can animate the parent and it will carry the
children along with it.
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Importing 3D Models
The Invigorator PRO will let you open 3D models created in other
programs.
There are three ways to open the Import dialogue. Either click
on the Import 3D Object button when the program first opens,
or select the Import 3D Object option under the Object creation
popup, in the Effect Controls Window or the Set-Up window.
Many popular file formats are supported such as LightWave,
Cinema 4D, ElectricImage, Wavefront OBJ, 3D Studio and the
ubiquitous DXF.
The Invigorator will attempt to determine which file type you are
choosing and set the Format popup automatically for you. However, sometimes it can’t guess correctly and you will have to pick
the format by hand in order to get the model to import properly.
If the model still doesn’t import, the file format may have changed
from what the Invigorator can read, or else it contains unknown
data. If this occurs try resaving the file in an older version of the
format, or try using a different format.
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Once Imported, the objects will appear in the Object List along
with the rest of the objects in your scene.
Imported models respond to the same drag and drop procedures
for applying materials as regular Invigorator objects do. An Imported model however, cannot be split into sub-sections so only
one material can be applied to each 3D object.
Once a material is applied to an imported model it acts the same
as any other material in the Invigorator. So, for instance, if you
applied the same material to all the parts making up the body of a
car, changing the color of the material itself will update all models that have used this same material. In other words, a single
color change can change the color of a whole car!
(See more about how materials work by reading the section
called “How Do Materials Work?” in the Special Topics section.)
3D Model courtesy of Viewpoint
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Exporting 3D Models
Models can be exported in several different 3D file formats.
ElectricImage, Cinema 4D, LightWave, 3D Studio, DXF, and MayaOBJ formats are supported.
Use the Export command to save your Invigorator
models for use in other 3D programs.
The way the Invigorator creates its models is unique and most
general purpose 3D modelers don’t support the way it applies
multiple materials to a single object. When the models are
exported they have to be split into something that the target 3D
program can accept. Usually the best way to split an Invigorator
object is by material. So a single object in the Invigorator that has
three materials assigned to it will become three separate objects
when exported to the destination 3D program.
If the same material is used by more than one part of the
model, all of the geometry that uses the same material will
be put into the same destination group of polygons.
This object will be exported in five sections since
five materials were used to color it.
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For example, if the front and back bevels are each assigned the
same material, the geometry for both bevels will be in the same
group of polygons when the model is exported. If the two bevels
each have their own material, each will become a separate model
once exported. If the front, front bevel, side, back bevel and back
are each assigned a different material, the exported model will
contain five separate models each with a piece of the whole.
If the file format supports it, these extra model parts are made
children of a main model part. The main model is usually the geometry colored by dock #1 in the Material Palette. The geometry
colored by docks #2 through #6 are made children of the dock
#1 geometry. This helps organize the file. If a dock isn’t used to
color any objects, it will be skipped.
Exporting All, Selected or Visible Objects
The Export window has an option to export all of the models in
the current scene, or only some of the objects in the scene. To
export only some of the objects you must select them before you
use the Export command, then choose the “Selected Objects” option in the Export dialogue before you save the file. Alternatively
you can decide to export only the objects that are visible in the
scene.
Baking Transformations
Some file formats, such as DXF, OBJ, and LWO, don’t support
object transformations such as rotations and scaling. This means
that if you have moved or rotated your objects inside the Invigorator, they will be in different positions when you open them in
another 3D program. “Baking” the transformations insures that
the models will look exactly the same in the other 3D program as
they did inside the Invigorator.
The “All Objects” option will export every single
object in the scene, whether visible or not.
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Meshing
The meshing controls are seen inside the Object Stats window
when you are running the PRO version of the Invigorator. Meshing adds extra polygons across the flat faces of objects so the
model can be deformed (bend, twist, shear etc.). The Invigorator
doesn’t yet have the ability to deform objects, but many other
3D programs do have this ability. We have given you meshing
controls so that the model may be properly prepared for deformations in the event that you will be exporting the models for use in
other 3D programs.
The Meshing controls
The units of the meshing controls are in points, just like the original vector file the object came from. Think of the Meshing value
as a distance between mesh divisions. If you have a square that’s
100 points across and you set Meshing to 10, you will see the
object chopped up into little 10x10 point squares. So the smaller
the number, the more polygons produced.
Notice that there are separate controls for the X, Y and Z directions. Quite often you’ll need a much finer chop (a smaller mesh
division) in the Z direction than in X and Y because of the deformation being performed on the object.
There are also separate controls for the models created for Draft
and Best renderings. Like the Object Faceting control, two
separate models are built. One model is used for Draft quality
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renderings which are what you see in the Scene Preview window,
and in the Comp window when in Draft mode. The other model
is used for Best quality renderings which are what you get when
you switch the layer quality to Best or make a movie using the
Best quality setting.
Meshing turned OFF
The idea behind Draft and Best quality models is that the Draft
model can have much fewer polygons (set the Meshing to a larger
number) which makes the drag interaction speed stay fast. But
then when you do the final, Best quality, rendering the model is
rebuilt with many more polygons so the edges of the model are
completely smooth.
When you mesh a model you will see no difference in what it
looks like, except when you look at it in Wireframe mode. Turn
on Wireframe display by clicking on the Solid/Wireframe display
button in the middle of the toolbar.
Meshing using Draft settings
Meshing using Best settings
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What’s New In 4.0 PRO?
Version 4.0 PRO of the 3D Invigorator for After Effects contains
many new features that will appeal to the designer and the fast
paced production artist alike.
Following is a short overview of the new additions. Be sure to
read the rest of the manual as each chapter explains the feature
in detail and includes many creative ideas and suggestions.
3D Text Creation
Version 4.0 PRO contains a full-featured text editor. Each letter can have its own font, size, kerning, tracking, baseline shift,
horizontal and vertical scale, color, bevel, position and depth.
Building editable text into the plug-in means that changes to the
spelling of a title, adding words or creating multiple versions can
be done without ever leaving After Effects.
Motion Blur
Version 4.0 PRO brings 3D motion blur to After Effects. Anything
that can be created or imported into the Invigorator PRO can be
motion blurred. This includes models made in other programs
such as Maya, 3D Studio and LightWave.
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3D Primitives
Spheres, cubes, planes and cylinders can be created without leaving After Effects and images can be mapped onto their surfaces to
create effects like spinning globes, and video boxes.
The Zaxwerks Object Import/Export Format
The addition of this new file format enables you to create 3D design elements which can be reused over and over in new projects.
Layer Map Animation
There is a new Layer Map Offset control that enables you to keep
reflection maps moving even once the objects have come to rest.
This keep graphics “alive” and interesting.
Render Farming
Version 4.0 PRO supports render farming using the standard After
Effects render engine. This gives you unlimited rendering power
without having to buy additional licenses.
Highlight Mapping
Highlight (or Specular) mapping is a professional level feature
that brings enhanced photo-realism to the final rendering. High-
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light mapping shows surface texture in the glare and hot spots
that appear on objects.
Wireframe And Hidden Line Coloring
These new types of materials make objects look like they are
drawn by lines rather than solid 3D objects. The lines can be
single-colored or they can be affected by the lights and reflections
in the scene. You can even texture map them if you want multicolored lines. The Wireframe style shows all of the lines in an
object. The Hidden Line style only shows the lines that are facing
the viewer.
Cartoon Coloring
This new material type paints objects with a bold graphic look
similar to how cell animators paint their artwork.
Absolute Coloring
This new material type paints objects a single color that is unaffected by light or shadow. It is very useful for creating 2D-colored graphics out of 3D models. Also good for giving a corporate
client the company’s colors exactly per spec.
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Matte Coloring
Matte Coloring makes a 3D object act like a mask. This is useful
for creating 3D transitions, and 3D traveling mattes.
The Shadow Catcher Material
The Shadow Catcher material option makes the shadows from
your 3D objects appear to fall onto the objects in a piece of
background video. It is very useful for merging 3D imagery with
existing footage.
Tracking AE’s 3D Objects
Invigorator objects can now track, or mimic, what an AE 3D
plane is doing. This enables all of AE’s manipulation tools, velocity graphs, animation assistants and expression scripts to be used
to control Invigorator objects.
Changes To Swatch Handling
Version 4.0 has made significant changes to the way swatches
are handled. Swatches are now based on a global library system
which keeps the file size down and speeds up the save process.
It also means that once a material or object style is saved it is immediately available to use in all other Invigorator plug-ins, which
is great for keeping projects consistent and speeding up work.
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Creating Text Objects
3D models can be created completely inside the software by using PostScript or True Type fonts installed on your computer. 3D
Text objects are created either by clicking the “Create 3D Text”
button on the StartUp screen or by using the “Create 3D Text...”
menu item from the Object menu. After that the Text window
opens. NOTE: The delay you experience before opening the
Text window is because the Invigorator is building the font list.
By removing fonts you do not use regularly, the Text window will
open much faster.
The Block Size Arrow
Text Entry
The large white area is where you type your text. Letters can
be selected by dragging with your mouse. Once selected, letters
can then be edited. Each letter can have its own font, size, scale,
kerning, and other attributes.
Setting The Block Size
The text entry area
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The
inactive
area
The size of the text block is controlled with the arrow at the right
side of the Text window. You can see that to the left of this arrow
is the white text entry area. To the right of this arrow is the dark
inactive area. The Block Size arrow sets where the letters will
wrap, and the alignment point for the justification options. You
will see the text wrap change as you drag the arrow.
It is usually a good idea to adjust the Block Size arrow so the
Block Size is as small as possible. Extra white space on the right
side of the block may force your models off center.
Font Menu
The Invigorator can use almost any font that is installed and
recognized by your system. Both True Type and Type 1 Postscript
fonts can be used. To change the font, first select the characters
that you want to change, then select the new font from the font
menu. Each character can use a different font.
Move the Block Size Arrow to the edge of the
letters for the best fit.
After a new font is selected you can use the up and down arrow
keys on your keyboard to step through the font list. Each click
down will apply the next font down on the list to the selected
characters. This is an extremely useful feature! It means you
don’t have to know what a font looks like to use it. Just type the
text, and step through the font list until you find a typeface that
looks good to you.
Size
This sets the size of the text objects. It is best to make the text
large, like you would if you were setting type for large displays.
The default size is 72 points. 72 is the smallest we recommend
that you make the type. Sizes smaller than 72 can be used but the
models may require extra fussing to make them look right. Each
letter can have a different size.
Click the large arrow to the right of the Size field to
select from a list of popular presets.
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Leading
Leading is the amount of space between the baseline of one line
of text and the baseline of the line of text above it. If you set the
leading for a single character it will influence the whole line that
that character is on.
When Leading is set to “Automatic”, the leading value is written
with parentheses around the numbers. Automatic Leading will
set the leading to 120% of the Size value.
Spacing
The little up/down arrows next to the edit fields
can help you fine tune the values. Each click
on one of these arrows will increase or decrease the value by one. If you hold the Shift
key down each click changes the value by a
larger amount.
Kerning and Leading can be done from the
keyboard. Click the cursor between two letters,
then hold down the Option (ALT) key and press
your keyboard’s left/right arrow keys to adjust
Kerning, and the Up/Down arrow keys to adjust
Leading.
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Letter Spacing is also known as Tracking. It is extra space that
is inserted between the letters. The letter spacing applied in the
text window does not animate. If you want to animate letters
getting closer together or spreading apart, use the Spread/Bunch
slider in the Transition controls of the ProAnimator.
Kerning
Kerning is letter spacing that is applied between individual characters. Negative values move letters closer to each other. Positive values move them away from each other.
Width Scale
The Width Scale enables you to make a character fatter or thinner without changing its height. The value is in percentage, so
a scale of 100% keeps the character its original size. A scale of
50% makes the letter half the width that it normally is, and 200%
makes it twice as wide.
Height Scale
The Height Scale enables you to make a character taller or
shorter without changing its width. The value is in percentage, so
a scale of 100% keeps the character its original height. A scale of
50% makes the letter half the height that it normally is, and 200%
makes it twice as tall.
Baseline Shift
This feature lets you raise a character above its baseline, or lower
it below its baseline. The value is in points so a shift of 10 will
raise the character above the baseline 10 points. A value of -10
will lower it below the baseline 10 points.
Justification
The Justification option works on a paragraph basis. The characters in each line can be made to align with the left or right edges
of the text block, or each line can be horizontally centered within
the text block, or can be distributed so that the first and last characters of each line will both align with the left and right edges of
the text block.
The 102 has been baseline shifted.
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Cleaning Up Problems With Font Models
Sometimes fonts can create problems when turned into 3D models. For example here is a letter “k” from the font New York. You
can see that part of the letter looks goofed up. This is because
some paths were left open when the font was created. The
Invigorator has a way to fix this that works automatically most of
the time.
Poorly created fonts can cause this type of problem.
When you see this type of problem all you have to do is to set the
Edge Offset slider to a small positive value, such as +0.1. This
will cause the internal boolean engine to clean up the overlaps,
loops and missing parts of the vector paths. Sometimes a different value will do the trick, such as -0.5, or -0.1. Depending on the
size of the font you will find a range of values that don’t appear to
have much affect on the font but may help clean up the problem
of a poorly created font.
If the Edge Offset technique doesn’t fix the problem, try changing
the setting for Object Faceting.
This same technique can be used to clean up problems with
poorly created Illustrator artwork too.
The Edge Offset slider often fixes problems automatically.
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3D Text Editing Tips
You can change text at any time and the new text will take on all
the colors and shape settings of the existing letters. Usually this
is a simple matter of just typing new text. However when there
is more than one Object Style being used in the same text block,
you need to know the way the Invigorator applies Object Styles to
new objects.
Say we have the words “Coming Up Next...”, colored as you see
in the picture, and we want to change the words to “Appearing
Tuesday...” We want the look of the new title to match the look of
the old title; meaning we want the first “A” to be black, the rest of
the word pink, and the word “Tuesday” to be gold and silver.
If we open the Text Window and erase all the letters, when we
type in the new ones they will all be colored the same as the “C”
because the “C” was the first letter in the text block.
Double click on a letter to open the Text window..,
When only some of the letters are selected at a time, the Invigorator uses the first letter in the selection as the “Master” and all
the new text is made to match the master. So by selecting the letters in three groups, it will keep all three of the Object Styles used
in this title. Here’s how to do it...
1- In the 3D window, double click on one of the letters. This will
open the Text Window. You can also click the “Edit Text” button
in the Object tab.
...or click the Edit Text button.
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2- Select only the letter “C” in the word “Coming”.
3- Type an “A”, which is the first letter in the word “Appearing”.
4- Select the letters, “oming Up”, which are the rest of the letters
on the top line.
5- Type “ppearing”, which are the rest of the letters in the word
“Appearing”.
TROUBLESHOOTING TIP!
If you make a selection then hit the delete or backspace
key before typing the new text, the attribute matching won’t
work as described in this section. All you have to do is to
make a selection and start typing.
6- Select the whole bottom line. (“Next...”)
7- Type “Tuesday...”
Do not drag the Block Size arrow. If you change the position of
the block size arrow, it will change where the text is inserted into
the scene. This may push the text off the screen.
8- Click OK. You will see the new title in the 3D window with the
same “look” as the old title.
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3D Primitives
Primitives are simple geometric shapes such as spheres, cubes,
planes and cylinders. The Invigorator PRO can create these
shapes all by itself. Images can be mapped onto primitives to
create things like spinning globes, and video boxes. You can also
create planes to be used for shadow catcher objects which help
to merge 3D objects into live video footage. (See the section on
The Shadow Catcher Material for more on this.)
Making A Primitive Object
Primitive objects are created by using the Create 3D Primitive
button, or the Create 3D Primitive menu item.
When you use this feature a sphere is created at the center of the
scene.
Cubes, Spheres, Cylinders and Planes are all 3D Primitives.
Materials can be drag and dropped onto Primitive objects, but
Object Styles cannot be used as they are only for text objects and
objects created from Illustrator files.
The dimensions of the Primitive can be adjusted in the Object
Tab. The dimension sliders will appear below the Primitive Type
popup and change based on which Primitive is selected.
Creating a Primitive.
Adjusting a Primitive’s
dimensions.
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Changing The Primitive’s Shape
You can change from one Primitive to another by selecting a different type from the popup menu. You don’t need to delete the
old Primitive first, then add a new one. Materials and settings are
transferred to the new Primitive, when appropriate.
Coloring A Primitive Object
Primitives are colored by dragging material swatches from the
Material Bin or Material Editor and dropping them onto the Primitive.
Because each Primitive object has a different number of faces,
the number of docks in the palette will change depending on
which Primitive is selected.
Apply a Material to a Primitive by dragging a
swatch and dropping it onto the Primitive.
For instance, planes and spheres are colored with only a single
material. Cylinders are colored with three materials; one for each
end, and one for the curved surface. Cubes are colored with six
materials; one for each face.
Animating A Primitive Object
Primitives are animated just like any other object. From inside
the Set-Up window assign the Primitive to a Set, and then animate
the Set using the controls in the Effect Controls Window.
A Set can contain any mix of objects, whether they are Primitives,
text objects or objects created from Illustrator files.
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Making A Primitive Look Faceted
One of the cool things you can do to change the look of your
objects is to make them look faceted rather than smooth. For
instance, usually a sphere is smooth. By making a sphere faceted
it will look like it was carved with a knife.
To do this select the sphere and then press the Stats button on the
Object Tab. In the Object Stats window you will see a field called
Hard Shading Angle. Enter a small number such as 5 and hit the
Apply button. You should see the sphere become faceted. Click
the OK button to exit the Stats dialogue.
Click the Stats button.
Enter a 5 in the Hard
Shading Angle field.
Now you can play with the Draft Faceting slider to add or remove
facets. Once you have it the way you like it, set the Best Faceting
slider to match the Preview slider so that the final rendering looks
the same as what you are seeing in preview window.
How To Squash Or Skew A Primitive
The way the Invigorator works with After Effects enables some
interesting uses. For instance if you want to squash or skew one
of your Primitives all you have to do is to assign it to its own Set,
rotate it off axis and then use the Depth Scale feature, located in
the AE Effect Controls Window, to scale the objects. Since the
Primitive has been rotated off axis the scale function will skew a
cube, or squash a sphere into an ovoid shape. (See the section on
Tracking AE’s 3D Objects for information on squash and stretch
and multi-axis scaling.)
When a low value is used for Hard Shading,
the facets appear on an object.
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The .ZXO Import/Export Format
Version 4.0 PRO adds a new file format for importing and exporting 3D objects. The “Zaxwerks Object.zxo” format enables you
to save model files containing 3D logos, live text and other 3D
objects, complete with all colors, materials and object settings.
These model files can be reused over and over in all your other
Zaxwerks projects. This is a huge time saver for repetitive work.
How To Save A .ZXO Object
Start with everything in its final form.
To save Zaxwerks Object files do the following.
1- Set up your 3D objects exactly the way you want them to be
saved. Colors, textures, and positions will all be saved into the
file.
2- Select the objects you want to save.
3- Choose the Export 3D Object command, and choose the .zxo
file format in the Export window.
4- Name and save the file.
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Adding .ZXO Objects To Other Projects
Add a Zaxwerks 3D object to a project the same way that you
would Import any other 3D object.
1- Open the project that you want to add the Zaxwerks Object to.
2- Choose the Import 3D Object command.
3- Select the file you want to import. Click the Import button.
The 3D objects will come into the scene in the exact same position as they were when saved.
TIP: If maps are missing, the program will ask you to locate
them. That’s why it’s important to keep your maps in a central folder, such as the “Zaxwerks Maps” folder, or a central
project folder, such as “Client Project Maps.”
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Making .ZXO Objects Larger Or Smaller
When you combine objects from different scenes sometimes their
sizes don’t match. You have to scale one set of objects to match
the size of the other objects. To do this...
To scale objects, switch to Object
mode and select the Scale tool.
1- Open the Invigorator’s Set-Up window.
2- Import the objects.
When objects are imported they will all be selected. Leave them
selected. (If they are no longer selected you will need to select
them before going to step 3.)
3- Switch to Object Mode, and select the Scale tool.
4- Click in the preview window and drag to scale the objects.
Hold the Shift key and drag along a 45 degree angle to
scale in the X and Y directions proportionally.
Hold the Shift+Control keys and drag along a 45 degree
angle to scale in the X, Y and Z directions proportionally.
Dragging close to the horizontal or vertical directions will
constrain the scaling to horizontal or vertical.
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Motion Blur
When objects are moving fast, motion blur is used to fill in the
gaps between successive frames in an animation. In After Effects, 2D motion blur looks like the pixels have been smeared,
but 3D motion blur looks like eight in-between images. This isn’t
really a blur but it does a great job of smoothing out the motion
anyway. The Invigorator creates motion blur the same way as
After Effects.
There are no buttons in the Invigorator to turn motion blur on.
The Invigorator looks at the After Effects settings for Motion Blur
and if they are turned on in After Effects then the Invigorator
turns them on too.
The amount of blur is taken from the After Effects settings. To
make the blur longer go to the Composition Settings > Advanced
Tab and increase the Shutter Angle.
Choose the smoothness of the Motion Blur from this menu.
The smoothness of the blur is controlled from inside the Invigorator’s Set-Up window. The Motion Blur popup, located on the
Camera Tab, lets you choose how many “passes” or steps are
used to create the blurred image. The more passes, the longer the
rendering will take, but the smoother the blur will be.
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Layer Map Animation
Version 4.0 PRO adds a new control for texture maps that will
let you animate the wrap of a texture as it is applied to an object.
This feature is especially useful for reflection maps.
1
2
3
For example, once a 3D title comes to rest, the reflections stop
moving too. This can make the graphic look “dead” and uninteresting. By animating this new parameter the map will continue to
move so the graphics will remain alive and visually appealing.
A reflection moves across the face of a star.
How To Animate A Layer Map
To use this feature do the following.
1- Click the Layer Maps arrow to reveal the eight possible layer
maps.
Select the layer you want to use as the Layer Map.
2- From the Layer Map 1 popup menu, select the After Effects
layer you want to be the layer map.
3- Below the Layer Map 1 parameter is a setting called Offset.
Animate this setting to animate the movement of the layer map.
Animate the Layer Map Offset to make the map move.
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4- Use the Layer Map as part of a Material and apply the Material
to an object. If you don’t know how to do these things see the
two sections called Layer Map Popups and Layer Map Selector
Popups in the regular manual.
NOTE 1:
The Offset parameter only moves the layer map horizontally.
NOTE 2:
The Offset parameter is a percentage of the map being used. A
value of 25 will offset the map 25% of its width, not 25 pixels.
Doing offsets by percentage enables you to change maps at any
time during the production process and not have to change the
animation values of the map Offset, even when the dimensions of
the maps change.
NOTE 3:
The Offset feature can only be done to Layer Maps 1 and 2. So if
you plan on using this feature be sure to leave these slots available. It’s perfectly fine to skip Layer Maps 1 and 2 and use other
Layer Maps for general purpose mapping. That way you always
have 1 and 2 available when you need them.
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Finding The Perfect Reflection
Another great use for this feature is to help you find the perfect
reflection. When you apply a reflection map it doesn’t always create highlights where you want them. For instance, perhaps you
would like the highlights to fall across the center of some letters
right at the 2 second mark in the animation. Normally this is a hit
or miss operation. You pretty much end up using whatever you
can get because it’s so difficult to get a highlight to land in just the
right place at the right time.
However, the Offset parameter enables you to slide the reflection
back and forth until you see exactly the part you want at the time
you want it. To do this...
1- Set up Layer Map 1 to be a reflection map.
2- Move the After Effects time marker to the point in time where
you want the reflection map to highlight the letters. In the above
example this means move the time marker to the two second
mark.
NOTE: You must have Dynamic Previewing
turned ON in the After Effects Preferences to
see the highlights move as you scrub.
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3- Scrub the Offset parameter back and forth until you see the
highlights of the map appear on your objects where you want
them. Value scrubbing is done in After Effects by clicking down
on the numerical edit field, holding down the mouse button, and
then dragging the mouse left and right.
Highlight Mapping
Highlight Mapping, or Specular Mapping as it is known to the 3D
savvy, is a type of texture mapping that only affects the highlights
on an object.
Much of the textural feel of a surface is contained in the highlights. The base paint job on an object may be fine, but over the
top of the paint job the surface may be worn or dirty, and this
type of surface detail isn’t seen until you line your eye up with
the glare from a light. Adding a highlight map gives your work a
subtle touch that can make it look much more professional.
Without a Highlight Map
With a Highlight Map
How To Make A Highlight Map
Highlight Maps are made like any other texture map. They are
pixel-based images made in Photoshop or some other paint program. The image should be grayscale. A color Highlight Map can
be used but only the luminance of the colors will be used. If the
map is four-channel, the RGB channels will be ignored and only
the alpha channel will be used for the highlights.
In a Highlight Map the dark pixels reduce the highlight and the
white pixels keep the highlight. The Highlight Brightness slider
sets the maximum brightness of the highlight, and the map only
reduces it. The map does not increase the brightness of the
highlight.
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How To Give A Material A Highlight Map
An image is applied as a Highlight Map in the same way that all
other surface attributes are assigned a map.
1- Find the Highlight Map thumbnail box, located next to the
Highlight Brightness and Highlight Sharpness sliders.
2- Click on the thumbnail box to open a file picker.
3- Find the image you want to use as the Highlight Map and click
Open.
4- Adjust the Highlight Brightness and Sharpness sliders. The
lower the Sharpness value the wider and more obvious the highlight will be.
5- Apply the Material to the object.
NOTE: Since Highlights are dependent on the angle that the light
is bouncing off of an object’s surface, you may have to move the
lights around to find the best effect.
By turning on the Use Comp Lights feature you can keyframe the
positions of After Effects lights, and make the highlights sweep
across your objects at just the right time.
Highlight maps only affect the highlights.
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Creative Uses For Highlight Mapping
• Mixed Surface Types. If the surface is constructed of two
different materials, such as Tile and Grout, one surface may be
very shiny and the other may not catch highlights at all. In the
above case the highlight map is white for the tile and black for
the grout.
Another case of mixed surfaces is where there are rivets and
welds on metal. Rivets and welds don’t show highlights the
same way the base metal does because the surface is uneven.
In this case if you don’t use a highlight map, the shine will slide
right across the rivets making it look like a glossy clear coat was
poured over the rivets and polished to a smooth finish.
• Hidden Messages. By starting with a black background and
writing a message in white letters, the message won’t be seen
until the highlight passes over the object.
• Wear And Tear. Chips, dings, scratches, scuff marks and dents
do not show highlights. By putting these details into the highlight map a surface will show wear and tear.
• Fingerprints, Hand prints And Smudges. Start with a white
background, then add fingerprints and smudges in black. When
the highlight passes over the object the highlight won’t appear
where the surface is smudged or printed.
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• Streaks. The surface paint job may be fine, but a streaky highlight map gives the surface a rained-on appearance.
• Unfinished Patches. If there is a “repair” area on a picture of
some metal plating, the patch is usually done with a darker highlight map so the highlights don’t shine off of it. This is popular for
spacecraft surfaces.
• Wood Grain. Another example of mixed surface type is the dark
and light areas of a wood grain. Usually the dark lines shine more
than the lighter ones.
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Render Farming
Version 4.0 PRO supports render farming using the standard After
Effects render engine. To use this feature refer to the instructions in your After Effects manual about installing and rendering
on remote computers. Then install the Zaxwerks folder on the
remote machines the same way you installed it on your main
machine. That is, copy the Zaxwerks folder from the CD into the
Plug-ins folder. The Zaxwerks folder contains the plug-in and all
of the factory preset support files.
One extra bit of information you need to know is that After Effects does not automatically copy source files, that the Invigorator plug-in may be using, onto the remote machines during farm
rendering.
This means that if you have used a picture or a movie as part of a
material, and that picture or movie is not one of the factory presets or is a layer map, then you will need to copy that picture or
movie to the Zaxwerks folder prior to rendering the final movie.
Pictures and movies are the only source files you need to remember to copy to the farm computers. The data used to create the
models such as Illustrator files, fonts and imported 3D models is
carried inside of the project.
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Additional Material Types
For the visual designer, Version 4.0 PRO has many new ways to
paint the final picture and broaden your options for being visually
creative. The new types of materials include the ability to draw
your objects out of lines or paint them like cartoons in addition to
the traditional photo-real rendering styles.
Other material options include features for advanced compositing
effects such as making the shadows from 3D objects appear to
fall onto the objects in another piece of footage, and the ability to
create traveling mattes out of 3D objects in your scene.
The new material types.
Wireframe And Hidden Line Rendering
Wireframe rendering is that “Techno-looking” style where 3D objects are rendered only as the lines that define their shape. This
has a unique appeal because objects look like 2D drawings rather
than big clunky 3D objects.
A Wireframe Sphere.
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A Hidden Line Sphere.
Hidden Line rendering is a special kind of wireframe where you
only see the lines that define the visible parts of the objects. In
standard Wireframe you see all of the lines no matter if they are
on the front or the back of the objects. But with Hidden Line the
back lines are hidden and you only see the lines that fall on the
part of the object facing you.
Something very exciting about the way Zaxwerks has implemented line rendering is that our lines respond to lighting! This means
that the lines will get brighter or darker depending on the placement and intensity of the lights. This gives shading and highlights
to the lines rather than having plain solid-colored lines.
Another unique ability is that the lines can be texture mapped.
This lets you do things like see reflections dance across your
line-objects, or apply texture maps such as brushed metal to the
lines. All of the standard maps (color, reflections, bump, etc.) can
be used.
Line weights can be controlled to the tenth of a pixel and are fully
antialiased for professional results. You can even use the Meshing controls to create a grid of lines across your objects for a
really cool look.
Lines not affected by lights.
How To Give Objects A Wireframe or Hidden Line Look
To give an object a Wireframe look do the following:
1- Create a new Invigorator effect. Click the Create 3D text button and type the word “Wireframe”. Use Arial Black as the font or
some other thick typeface.
Lines affected by lights.
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2- In the Material Editor, use the New Material command. Then
click the color box and use the color picker to pick a medium red.
Close the color picker.
3- Still in the Material Editor, click the radio button in front of the
word Wireframe.
4- Drag the material onto the objects.
The object will still look solid. It will not appear Wireframe until
you do a Best Quality rendering.
5- Hold down the Command (Control) key and click the Test button.
This will do a Test rendering in Best quality while you are inside
the Set-Up window. You will now see the objects drawn in Wireframe.
Wireframe lettering is often difficult to read.
Notice that Wireframe shows you all of the object’s lines, even the
ones on the back side of the object. This can sometimes clutter
up the image making the object confusing to look at. To simplify
the drawing, use the Hidden Line style of rendering.
6- In the Material Editor, click the radio button in front of the
word Hidden Line. Then do a Test rendering.
Changing the material to Hidden Line improves the legibility.
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Now you will see only the lines on the front side of the object.
The lines on the back are no longer there, so the drawing is easier
to read.
Making The Lines Thicker Or Thinner
The lines of a Wireframe or Hidden Line material can be drawn
very thick or very thin.
(continuing from the last step)
7- At the bottom of the Material Editor click the Options button.
This will open the Hidden Line Options window.
8- Find the Line Width slider and drag it to a value of 0.5. Click
OK. Then do another Test rendering.
See that the lines are half the width as they used to be. This is
how you make very delicate line work.
9- Reopen the Options window and set the Line Width value to
2.0. Click OK. Then do another Test rendering.
See that the lines are now very thick. When the lines get too thick
they will start to fill in the object and loose the “drawn” quality.
Very thin lines
Thicker lines
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Setting The Color Between The Lines
By default you will see “between the lines” when you use Hidden
Line materials. In other words the space between the lines is not
filled-in so you will see the other layers behind the Invigorator’s
layer.
However, there is an option to fill in the space between the lines.
Turn on the Fill With Color option to
fill in the space between the lines.
1- In the Material Editor click the Options button to open the Hidden Line Options window.
2- Put a check in the Fill With Color box.
3- Click on the color box to open the color picker and change the
color to black. Then click OK to exit out of the color picker.
4- Click OK to close the Hidden Line Options window.
5- Do a Test rendering.
This material creates red lines with a
black fill, in the Hidden Line style.
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See how the object is now rendered as colored lines with black
between the lines.
Making The Lines React To Lights
In the Invigorator, lines can respond to lighting. This means that
the lines facing a light will be lighter and the lines facing away
from a light will be darker.
1- In the Material Editor click the Options button to open the Hidden Line Options window.
2- Put a check in the Respond To Lighting box. Then OK out of
the Options window.
Turn on Respond To Lighting to make the lines
brighter or darker based on the lighting.
See how the lines are no longer flat colored but have a very interesting 3-D look to them?
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Making Lines Shine With Reflections
Another unique aspect of the Invigorator’s line rendering is the
ability to give the lines a reflective quality. This is done the same
way regular materials are made reflective; with reflection maps.
In fact you can turn a regular material into a wire rendering very
very easily.
1- In the Material Bin, drag the Punchy Gold swatch into the editing area.
Drag Punchy Gold down to the Materials Editor.
2- Click on the Hidden Line radio button.
3- Click the Options window and turn on the Fill With Color
option, then make the fill color black. OK out of the Options
window.
4- Select the objects and drag the Hidden Line Gold material onto
the objects.
See how the lines have bright and dark streaks in them? Those
are the highlights. When you create an animation, those highlights will pass across the lines making them look really nice.
To see the difference, do the following:
The Map Enable Button.
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Line rendering with reflections turned off.
6- Turn off the reflection map enable switch, then do another Test
rendering. See that the lines now look flat and less interesting.
Applying Grid Lines Across Object Faces
You may have noticed that lines are drawn around the front faces
but no lines appear on the front faces themselves. It does not
have to be this way. To create a grid of lines that appear on the
front faces, use the Meshing controls.
1- Select the objects and click the Stats button on the Object tab.
2- Turn ON the meshing option, then set Meshing for Best to 5 for
all three directions. OK out of the Stats window.
3- Make a blue, hidden line Material and apply it to the objects.
See that there is now a grid pattern of lines across the faces of all
the objects. However, since the lines of the faces are the same
color as the lines of the sides it is a bit hard to read. We can fix
that by giving the faces a different color.
5- Make a red, hidden line Material and apply it only to the faces
of the objects. Do this the standard way, by clicking on the Material Set-Up button, loading the red material into dock 2 and then
dragging the red swatch up to the color chip next to the front
face.
When all wires are one color it can be difficult to read.
Now the grid lines across the faces are red and the bevels and
sides are blue. This makes it much easier to read the words.
Making the front face wires a different color adds to the legibility.
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Cartoon Coloring
The Cartoon Color type of Material renders 3D objects as though
they were drawn by a poster artist or an animator painting animation cells.
Standard 3D rendering has a smooth, photo-real look. Smooth
shading paints the objects in continuous tones so curved objects
gradually get brighter or darker. But Cartoon Coloring shades
the objects in bands of color. The bands block-in the color of the
highlights, shadows and base, giving you a big bold look with lots
of punch.
How To Give Objects Cartoon Coloring
Cartoon Coloring gives objects a punchy, graphic look.
To give objects a Cartoon Colored look do the following:
1- In the Material Editor, create a new material. Then click the
color box and use the color picker to pick a medium blue. Close
the color picker.
2- Click the radio button in front of the words Cartoon Color.
3- Drag the Material onto the objects.
Cartoon colored objects in draft mode have three colors.
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The objects will immediately change to Cartoon Colored shading.
Draft mode Cartoon Coloring has only three levels of shading.
During Best quality rendering, a fourth is added where highlights
appear.
4- Hold down the Command (Control) key and click the Test button.
This will do a Test rendering in Best quality while you are inside
the Set-Up window. You will now see the objects drawn with full
quality Cartoon Coloring. Notice how there is a dominant base
color, which is the medium blue you chose earlier, then there is a
light, highlight shade of blue and a darker shadow shade of blue.
This is the basic cartoon coloring look. It gives the final images
a very graphic punch. If you don’t want the extra highlight shade
just set the Highlight Brightness slider to 0.
Cartoon Color responds to lighting so multiple lights can create
multiple highlights. Too many lights can also wash out the image
so if an image looks overly bright and washed out, turn off some
of the lights in the scene.
Cartoon Coloring also supports all levels of texture mapping so
you can do bump mapping, and reflection mapping to create cartoon versions of your regular photo-real renderings.
TIP
When using Cartoon Coloring it is recommended
that you only use one light source in the scene.
It is so easy to turn your regular materials into cartoon versions
(just click the Cartoon Color button) that you can try it out just to
see if the design would look better using the more graphic look of
the cartoon style of rendering.
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Absolute Coloring
The Absolute Color material type is useful when you want a color
to be absolutely what you specify. For instance use Absolute
Coloring when you are doing a job for a corporate client who demands that their exact corporate colors be used. The colors can’t
get lighter as the objects turn toward the lights and they can’t get
darker when the objects turn away from the lights. They can’t
have highlights, shadows or reflections on them. The colors are
absolutely, 100%, the exact color specified. Got it?
How To Give Objects Absolute Coloring
Creating an Absolute Color material is very easy.
Make a material render with Absolute Coloring by
turning on the proper option.
1- In the Material Editor, use the New Material command. Then
click the color box and use the color picker to pick a medium
green. Close the color picker.
2- Click the radio button in front of the words Absolute Color.
3- Drag the material onto the objects.
Notice that when you apply Absolute Coloring to 3D objects, they
will look flat, as though you cut paper in the shape of the silhouette of the 3D objects. For instance a sphere will stop looking
like a sphere and just look like a circle of color. By itself, Absolute Color is pretty boring. The treat comes in how you use it.
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2D Graphics In A 3D World
The first creative use for Absolute Coloring is for making 2D
graphics out of your 3D elements.
1- Select the objects, then give them an Absolute Color material.
2- Set the Depth for all objects to zero, (0).
Set the Depth to 0 to get flat, 2D text in a 3D world.
Setting the depth to zero removes the sides and bevels from your
objects. This creates flat 2D cutouts that will look exactly the
same as After Effects text on a 3D layer.
The difference however, is that text done in the Invigorator can
interact with other 3D elements in the same Invigorator scene.
This lets you mix 2D text and 3D elements. The 2D text can appear in front, in back, or go right through the middle of any other
3D element. The design implications for this ability are huge.
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Absolute Coloring For Pop Art Looks
You can use Absolute Color materials to create cool Pop Art
looks.
1- Create a new project.
The Pop Art look with bevels.
2- Create a text object and type the word “Pop Art”. Use Arial
Bold Italic as the font. If you don’t have Arial, any San Serif font
will work. Click OK.
3- Create bright yellow and medium orange materials and set
them to Absolute Color.
4- Apply the yellow to the faces of the letters and the orange to
the sides.
The Pop Art look without bevels.
Examine what you’ve created. The bevels no longer look like
bevels. they make the letters get fatter and thinner in some
places but they loose some of their effect.
5- Set the bevel for all objects to Bevels > Basic, Flat Sides.
Use a wide angle lens to push the perspective.
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Now you have the traditional Pop Art 3D look. Orbit the camera
around the objects to get a feel for this very graphic look. Notice
that although there is no shading you really get a sense of the 3D
nature because of the perspective. Use a wide angle camera lens
to really push the perspective.
The Stroked Pop Art Look
Continuing from the last project. Do the following...
6- Set the bevel for all objects to Inset Face > Outline.
Now you have Pop Art text with a block background. By using
the Edge Scale and Depth sliders you can control the size of the
block background outline around the letters.
The next step is to create a stroke around the letters.
The Pop Art look with a parallel outline.
7- Duplicate the orange material swatch and slightly brighten the
color of the duplicate.
8- Go to the Material Set-Up window and drop a split point on
the front corner of the Outline bevel. Then drag the new brighter
orange material into dock 3 and apply this material to the sides of
the bevel.
Split the Outline bevel at the front corner so a different material can be applied to the sides.
Going back to the Scene Preview you will see that you now have
a medium orange stroke around yellow letters with bright orange
sides. Again by adjusting the Edge Scale slider you can make this
stroke very thin or very thick.
Once you get your pop art look just right, save it as an Object
Style so you can use it again.
The Pop Art look with a darker stroke.
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The Modified Pop Art Look
The Modified Pop Art look combines absolute coloring and regular photo-real shading.
Continuing from the last project...
9- In the Material Set-Up window, double click on the darker of
the two orange materials to load it into the Material Editor.
10- Click the Standard Color button.
This will make the darker orange respond to the lighting.
11- Change the bevel to Bevels > Medium Front. Then adjust the
Edge Scale so you can easily see the bevel.
What you have now is a combination effect. The front and sides
are absolute colored, but the bevels are shaded with highlights
and shadows. This can be a very interesting alternative to the
standard Pop Art look.
The Modified Pop Art look has Absolute Colored
front and sides, but Standard Colored bevels.
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Making TV Screens
The Absolute Color material type is also useful when making TV
screens. Since the color of the pixels are exactly the same after
rendering as they were before, texture maps end up looking like
they are creating their own light.
For example: build the TV cabinet and screen then apply a Layer
Map of an AE movie to the screen and give it the absolute color
option. The TV cabinet will be shaded realistically by the lights in
the scene but the screen will render the movie at full brightness.
The “pre-lit”
texture map.
Making 3D Environments
The really cool moody lighting seen in video games isn’t done
with lights at all. Rather, it is painted into the texture maps used
on the walls, and then absolute color rendering is used to render
the scene.
To do the same thing in the Invigorator PRO, start with a picture
you want to use as your wall, take it into Photoshop and put
lighting effects onto the image. Darken up the corners and part
near the floor. Paint shadows around the edges of doors and wall
hangings.
Paint lighting right into the texture maps, then use Absolute
Coloring to render them exactly as you made them.
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Then in the Invigorator create a plane and create a new material.
Use the wall image as the color map for the material and turn on
the Absolute Color option. Then apply the material to the wall.
What you’ll get is the exact colors of the wall image in the final
rendering. Moody lighting and all!
The Matte Color Material
The Matte Color material option makes a 3D object act like a
mask. When an object with this material is visible it blocks out
other 3D objects that you don’t want to see. It can also be used to
create transition effects, such as creating a hole in the movie that
lets other background video show through.
Making Transition Effects
This example shows how to use a 3D object as a device for a
transition.
1- Apply an Invigorator effect to your foreground image and turn
on the Composite On Original option.
2- Inside the Invigorator, create a 3D star.
3- Color the star gold. Then apply the Matte Color material only
to the back face of the star.
Apply the Matte Color material to the back face of the star.
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4- Finally create an animation where the star flies to the center of
the screen, flips over and then flies straight at the camera.
When the star flips over it reveals the back side that has been
given the Matte Color material. This will create a “hole” in the 3D
animation which will reveal a background layer behind the layer
containing the Invigorator effect.
As the star flies toward the camera the hole gets bigger and bigger
revealing more and more of the background image. Once the star
has covered the camera the transition is complete.
Masking Out Unwanted Objects
On more of a problem solving level, an object colored by the
Matte Material can be used to cover up objects that you don’t
want to see.
For instance say you have some bars that you are using to cast
shadows onto other objects in the scene. You want the shadows
to be seen but you don’t want the bars to be seen. Unfortunately,
at one point in the animation, the camera moves and you end up
seeing the bars.
Rather than moving the bars and goofing up the shadows, you
can simply create a plane using the Primitives feature, color the
plane with a Matte Color material, and then position the plane so
it will block the bars from view. When the movie is rendered the
shadows from the bars will be seen but the bars themselves have
been masked out.
Using Matte Coloring as a Transition device.
Visible bars
Place a Matte plane in
front of the bars.
The final movie masks out the bars.
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Making 3D Objects Circle Around 2D Elements
A wooden mask plus a background image.
Another use for 3D masking is when you want a 3D element to
interact with a 2D element. For instance, say you have a picture
of a wooden mask and you want to make some 3D stars tumble
onto the screen and circle around it. Since the wooden mask is a
2D element, and the stars are on a separate layer, there is no 2D
compositing trick to make the 3D stars appear to circle around
the mask.
To do this effect, just make a 3D cylinder and place it in register
with the wooden mask. Then give the cylinder the Matte Color
material. Finally animate the stars to circle around the cylinder.
When the movie is rendered the stars will disappear as they go
behind the cylinder, and reappear when they come out the other
side.
3D stars plus a 3D cylinder in register with the wooden mask.
This technique enables you to put 3D elements both in front of
and behind another layer at the same time.
When the layers are composited together the 3D stars appear
to be circling the wooden mask.
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The Shadow Catcher Material
The Shadow Catcher material option enables you to create visual
magic. It makes the shadows from your 3D objects appear to fall
onto the objects in a piece of background video. The magic here
is that the background footage has already been shot and the
objects in it are only pictures, so how can the shadows fall onto
those objects in a realistic manner?
The way you do this is to build 3D objects that mimic the shapes
of the objects in the background footage then give those objects
the Shadow Catcher material.
For instance say you have a video of a package on a table, and
you want to animate a title that flies in and lands on the table next
to the package. As the title comes near the table, you want the
shadows to fall onto both the package and the table top.
The original image in need of titles.
Normally this is an impossible problem. If the title, the table and
the package were actually in the same space at the same time, the
shadows from the title would bend as they crossed over the edges
of the package. If the shadows landed only on the table you
could fake a fairly realistic shadow, but when the shadow has to
bend there is no way to stretch and warp it that will look realistic.
There is a solution, however, and that is to use the Invigorator’s
Shadow Catcher Material.
A flat shadow doesn’t take the package
into consideration and looks “pasted-on”.
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Start by building objects that mimic the shapes of the package
and table top. The Primitives modeler built into PRO 4.0 works
well for this example, but you can always build fancier objects
out of Illustrator objects.
Create a rectangular shape out of the cube primitive. Adjust
the cube to match the size of the package. Create a plane as a
placeholder for the table top. Then position the placeholders in
register with the background image of the real package and table.
Position placeholder objects in register
with the objects in the picture.
The last step is to give these placeholder objects the Shadow
Catcher material. Now when you render the animation, the shadows from the title will fall onto the placeholder objects which will
“catch” their shadows. The placeholders themselves won’t be
seen. Only the shadows that fall onto them will be seen. When
composited with the background video, the shadows of the 3D
objects will look as though they are falling onto the objects in the
video, merging the two images into one very realistic image!
Important Note: Read the next section on Setting Up The Camera For A Shadow Catching Project.
The final shadow flows over the package making the two
elements look like they are part of the same scene.
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Setting Up The Camera For A Shadow-Catching Project
When doing a shadow-catching project the position, angle and
lens of the camera are very important.
These two edges
are aligned...
...but these edges
don’t match.
The first placeholder object you put into position should match
to the largest rectangular object in the background. Position the
rectangle so it is close to matching the background image, then
adjust the camera angle and position until the placeholder object
registers with the rectangular object in the background.
Sometimes the largest rectangular object in the background image isn’t going to catch shadows. This is fine. Create a placeholder to use for the registration phase, then delete it once the camera
has been positioned.
This image is close but the perspective of the camera
needs to be changed so the edges will match better.
Oftentimes the perspective of the camera needs to be changed to
match with the background image. A wider angle lens (shorter
focal length) increases the perspective and a telephoto lens (longer focal length) reduces the perspective.
Examples of large rectangular things in the background image
would include: table tops, picture frames, books, doors, windows, rugs and even whole walls.
Here, the placeholder and image are perfectly registered.
Once the camera has been positioned and the lens set correctly,
all other objects you add to the scene will fall perfectly into place.
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Tracking AE’s 3D Objects
Another great new feature in Invigorator PRO 4.0 is the ability for
Invigorator objects to track, or mimic, what an AE 3D plane is
doing. On the surface this feature might not seem that significant,
however for the advanced After Effects user this feature opens
the doors to incredible new abilities.
Invigorator 3D objects can track an After Effects 3D plane.
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By tracking AE’s 3D planes an AE user is now able to use the
standard 3D manipulation tools within AE to create motion
paths and keyframes for the Invigorator’s objects. This means
that everything you can do to an AE 3D plane can now be done
to Invigorator objects. You get visible 3D paths, function curve
control, animation assistants and even expression-based control
over your 3D animations!
What Kinds Of 3D Objects Can Track An AE Plane?
Any 3D object that you can get into the Invigorator can track an
AE 3D plane. If you use the Primitives generator to create cubes,
spheres, or cylinders, they will perfectly track along with an AE
plane. You can also make regular Invigorator objects out of fonts
or Illustrator files, or you can import 3D models and track them
too.
When you look closely at it, the tracking is being done by Sets
not individual objects, and since a Set can have any number of
objects in it you can have more than one thing tracking the same
plane. This enables you to do things like set up an entire logo,
put the whole logo into a Set, and then track the Set to an AE
plane. This will make the whole logo move around as one big
group. Another use would be to put a sphere in Set 1, and the
words Universal Pictures in Set 2 and have the letters all orbit
around the sphere in the middle.
Tracking - Illustrator logos
Tracking - 3D text
Many many uses will come to mind once you get a handle on how
tracking works.
Tracking - Imported objects
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How To Make A Set Track A 3D Plane
It is important for you to understand how this works before you
try to use it in a real project. The first time you try this, start
with a new AE project containing the following:
- A camera
- A Solid that is Comp size. Name it “Zaxwerks Objects”
- A Solid that is 150 pixels by 100 pixels. Name it “Controller”.
Create a Primitive.
The small plane, named “Controller”, is going to be the thing that
gets animated. The Invigorator objects are going to track the
motion of the small plane.
1- Add an Invigorator PRO effect to the “Zaxwerks Objects”
solid. Choose to Create a 3D Primitive.
Change the default sphere to a plane.
A sphere will be created and placed into Set 1 at the center of the
world. Let’s change the sphere into a cube.
2- Click on the red ball button in the Effect Controls window to
open the Invigorator’s Set-Up window. Select the sphere and on
the object tab change the Primitive type to Plane.
The plane is centered on the origin (the 0,0,0 point). This is
important. Moving a 3D object in this window will move it off
center from the Set causing it to not track the Controller plane
correctly.
Leave the plane centered on the origin.
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3- Click OK to close the Set-Up window.
4- In the Effect Controls Window, click the triangle in front of
“Sets”, then click the triangle in front of “Set 1”.
5- The first parameter under Set 1 is called “Set 1 Track 3D Layer”.
Click on the popup menu next to this parameter and select the
“Controller” layer.
Tell Set 1 to track the Controller layer.
6- Also in the Effect Controls window you will see the checkbox
called “Use Comp Camera”. Turn it ON.
This is also important. If you don’t do this, the objects won’t look
like they are tracking each other because each object is being
viewed from a different camera.
7- Turn on the 3D switch for the Controller solid.
At this point, if you look in the Comp window, the Invigorator
plane and the AE controller plane should be centered on each
other.
Turn on the Use Comp Camera option.
8- Select the Controller plane and use the tools to drag it around
in the Comp window. Rotate it. Move it. The two planes will be
locked together!
Notice that the Zaxwerks objects don’t update until you release
the mouse button. Once you’ve released the mouse you sometimes have to click on the Effect Controls window, or even flip
the visibility switch OFF and back ON again to get the Comp
window to update. This can get annoying but it is a limitation of
the interaction between After Effects and plug-ins.
Turn on the 3D switch to make the Controller a 3D layer.
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9- Open the Invigorator’s Set-Up window and change the plane to
a cube. (Be sure not to drag the object while you are inside of the
Set-Up area!) Click the OK button to close the Set-Up window.
Change the Plane to a Cube.
10- Drag the Controller object to manipulate the cube.
Since the Invigorator’s layer is always in front of the Controller’s
layer it will look a little strange at times. The cube has thickness
and the Controller plane doesn’t.
Moving the plane will move the cube.
One thing that you can do is to make the Controller layer 20 x 20
pixels rather than 150 x 100. Then only pay attention to the XYZ
crosshairs because the image of the Controller is mostly hidden
behind any Zaxwerks objects. Once you’ve done a few projects
you’ll find your own best working method.
By the way, we suggest that you do NOT use a Null as the Controller. With a Null it is very easy to accidentally drag on a scale
handle which will also scale the Zaxwerks objects.
If you have After Effects 6.5 or higher you can use the
Guide Layer feature which will keep the Controller object
visible when setting keyframes in Draft mode, but prevent it
from rendering in the final movie.
Turn the Controller layer into a Guide Layer
(in AE 6.5) so it won’t render in the final movie.
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Animating With A Controller Plane
Creating an animation using a controller plane is done exactly the
same way as animating any After Effects layer.
1- Move the Controller layer to its starting position/orientation.
2- Set the Time marker to time 0.
3- Turn on the animation stop watches for the Transform parameters.
Setting keyframes for the Controller.
4- Move the Time marker to a new time, (such as 2 seconds).
5- Move the Controller layer to a new position/orientation. This
causes a keyframe to be set at the new time.
Now when you play the animation, the Zaxwerks Cube will move
along with the Controller plane.
6- Adjust the bezier control handles of the Controller plane to
make the path curvy, and add some 3D rotation.
When you play the animation the cube still tracks the Controller
plane. The cube will track the controller plane no matter what
you do to it. You can apply animation assistants and expressions
to the Controller and the cube will track it nice as you please.
The animation path of the controller becomes
the path of the tracking object,
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Adding Objects To The Tracking Set
If you have to add objects to a Set that is tracking a controller
plane there are a few steps you should do to ensure success.
Move the Time Marker to a time where there are no keyframes.
1- Move the Time marker to a time where there are no keyframes
set for the controller plane.
2- Click the Reset button for the controller plane’s Transform
parameters. This will move the controller back to the origin and
add keyframes for all parameters. The Zaxwerks objects will also
move to the origin. (Remember that you may have to flip the visibility switch OFF/ON to get the Comp window to update.)
Click the Reset button to move the Controller back to the origin.
3- Open the Invigorator’s Set-Up window and add the objects.
Remember not to drag or otherwise move the existing objects
while in this window. You may have to drag the new objects to
get them into proper position, but you will be fine as long as you
remember that the origin will be the rotation point.
4- If needed you can select all objects and use the Move To Center
command. Doing this step is only to insure that the objects will
rotate around a pivot that looks normal. You might want to play
the animation, to check how it looks with the new pieces, before
doing this step.
The origin will be the center of rotation.
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6- Select the keyframes that were created during Step 2 (when
you clicked Reset) and delete them. The objects will snap back
to their proper positions in the animation.
Play the animation to make sure that nothing got goofed up and
that the objects are rotating around the correct center point.
What To Do If Objects Are Rotating Off Center
There are three places that the pivot point can be moved. By
putting the objects at the origin and resetting the three pivots,
everything will re-align and rotation will be predictable.
For the following example let’s assume that we have Set 1 tracking the motion of an AE 3D plane called Controller.
1- Move the AE time marker to a time where there are no keyframes set for the Controller plane.
Move the Time Marker to a time where there are no keyframes.
2- Click the Reset button for the Controller plane’s Transform
parameters. This will move the Controller back to the origin and
add keyframes for all parameters. The Zaxwerks objects will also
move, although they may not move to the origin. (Remember that
you may have to flip the visibility switch OFF/ON to get the Comp
window to update.)
Click the Reset button to move the Controller back to the origin.
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3- Open the Invigorator’s Set-Up window. Choose the FRONT
view from the Camera Views menu. Select all objects that are
assigned to Set 1, change to Object mode and click the Move To
Center button. This will center all of the objects on the origin. If
everything looks fine at this point go to step 5. If the objects are
not facing front, but are rotated at some odd angle, go to step 4A.
4A- If you are only trying to fix a single object, click the Reset
button, then click Move To Center again. This will fix the odd
rotation and you can skip to step 5.
If you have several objects that had to be hand positioned to
make the starting position, like for a 3D logo, you can’t use the
Reset button because the hand positioning will be erased.
The Reset button
Object Mode
The Move To Center button
The Manipulation tools
4B- If you are trying to fix a logo made of several objects, or some
other multi-object group, you have to use the object manipulation tools in the Set-Up window to make the group of objects face
front.
Do this by switching between front and side views and using the
manipulation tools while in Object Mode. Rotate the group of
objects little by little until they are facing straight forward. Then
select them all and click the Move To Center button one last time.
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6- In the Effect Controls window select Set 1, then choose the
Recenter Pivot command at the bottom of the Set popup menu.
This will place the pivot point at the center of the objects in case
it had been moved to a different location.
7- In the AE Timeline select the keyframes that were created during Step 2 (when you clicked Reset) and delete them. The objects
will snap back to their proper positions in the animation, and the
Zaxwerks objects should now be in register with the Controller
plane.
NOTE: You MUST do the steps in the proper order to get
the desired results.
Troubleshooting Tracking Problems
Here is a list of tips and possible problems that you may run into
when tracking.
• Be sure that the transforms for the Controller layer are all Reset
to zeros when you begin to set up the tracking. If not then the
center of the Set won’t match the center of the Controller causing
the objects to rotate off center.
The Reset button
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• Be sure to have all Zaxwerks Objects set up and sitting in their
beginning positions, centered around the Invigorator’s origin,
before you tell the Set to track a controller plane. If you move objects inside the Set-Up window once tracking has begun, objects
can start to rotate off center.
The Reset button
• The workflow to insure the best results is this...
1- Start the project and immediately set up all colors, bevels,
depths, etc. inside the Invigorator’s Set-Up window.
2- Also inside the Set-Up window, position all Zaxwerks Objects
relative to each other. In other words if you need to move objects
forward or back to make a nice looking starting position, do it
before you turn on tracking.
3- Select all objects and use the Move To Center command.
4- Keep the objects selected and assign them to the same Set.
This will center the objects on the Invigorator’s origin, which is
going to be the rotational pivot for the Set. You are still in the SetUp window when doing steps 3 and 4. The objects should now be
in their starting positions.
5- In the Effect Controls window, choose the Controller layer
from the tracking popup menu.
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If you followed the above steps the objects will rotate around
the center of the controller plane. If they don’t then perhaps the
Controller plane was not Reset before tracking was enabled.
• If the Invigorator’s image is not updating in the Comp window
check for the following:
1- The Invigorator’s Preview in the Effect Controls Window must
be open.
2- You may have to flip the visibility switch OFF/ON for the
Invigorator’s layer.
3- The Set-Up window must be closed.
4- Tracking must be turned ON, and the proper controller layer
must be used. In other words, if you are moving Controller Layer
A and the Invigorator is set to track Controller Layer B, then it’s
no wonder why the Invigorator’s objects are not moving.
Using 3D Tracking To Scale In All 3 Dimensions
There is a nice by-product of the 3D tracking feature. You can
use 3D tracking to animate object scale as well as position and
orientation. Using the base Invigorator parameters you can only
animate the Depth Scale. But when you tell a Set to track an AE
plane, you can use the scale parameters of that controller plane
to animate the scale of the Invigorator objects.
This enables you to do things like animate the width over time,
make objects bounce, or even do squash and stretch effects. Any
direction, X, Y or Z can be animated.
When Tracking is turned ON you can
scale Invigorator objects by scaling the
Controller plane.
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Special Topics
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Special Topic - Changes To Swatch Handling
As of version 4.0 PRO and 3.1.0 Classic, of the Invigorator for
After Effect, we have made some significant changes to the way
swatches are handled. Since these changes may affect your work
you should be aware of them.
The main change is that swatches are now handled as a global
library system. Previously, swatches were held inside of each
instance of an Invigorator effect, this caused file size to get huge
and Save times to get very slow, especially when several Invigorator effects were being used in the same project. For instance,
prior to 4.0 it was not uncommon for the AE project size to inflate
to 20+ MB and take nearly a minute to save. All of this time and
file space was being taken up by the swatches. The new global
swatch handling keeps the file size down to a few K per Invigorator effect and project saves are now extremely fast.
The Zaxwerks Swatches folder is now the
central storehouse for all swatches.
How Swatch Handling Now Works
Swatches are now stored in a central folder called Zaxwerks
Swatches. Inside the Zaxwerks Swatches folder are other folders,
one for each of the swatch types.
This central collection of swatches is used for every Invigorator
effect added to an After Effects project. Each time you open the
Set-Up window the swatches are read from the central library and
loaded into the bins. This keeps all projects up to date.
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Every time you save or delete a swatch it affects this central library of files. For instance, if you save a new Object
Style it gets added to the Object Styles folder. This makes
that Object Style available for every other Invigorator.
Likewise, if you delete an Object Style swatch it is deleted
from the Object Styles folder, meaning that that swatch
is not just deleted from one project, it is deleted from all
Invigorator projects.
This last statement sounds dangerous. However, you
don’t have to worry about deleting swatches and hurting
your existing projects. Materials and Object Styles that
are actually used by objects in a project, not just sitting in
the swatch bins, are always carried as part of the project’s
data. Think of a swatch bin like an artist’s palette full of
paint waiting to be applied... and think of the 3D objects
in a scene as the artist’s canvas. Once the paint has been
applied to the canvas, throwing the palette into the trash
does nothing to hurt the picture.
For more information see the section on Regenerating
Deleted Material Swatches.
Benefits Of The New Swatch Handling System
So all of this “behind the scenes” information is nice, but
what does it mean for YOU? Well there are some signifi359
cant benefits. The first ones we’ve already discussed: AE
file sizes are much smaller, and the time to save a project
is much faster.
Here are others...
1- When swatches are saved, they are immediately available to all other Invigorator effects.
This is probably the best benefit. In the past if you saved
an Object Style in one Invigorator effect you had to go
through a process of saving it to a library, and then appending the new library to all other Invigorator effects.
Now all you do is save the Object Style and you’re done.
As soon as you open the Set-Up window in another Invigorator effect, even if it is in a different AE project, that
Object Style is sitting in the bin waiting for you to use.
2- Swatches can be easily shared between users and computers.
Each swatch is a single file, and those files are located
in the appropriate swatch folders. All you need to do to
share a swatch with a friend is to find the swatch, attach
it to an email or copy it to disk, and give the copy to your
friend. If you have used maps as part of the swatch, you
will have to give those maps to your friend too.
Special Topic - What is A Set? What Is An Object?
Here’s a little info that may help you understand the difference
between a Set and an Object.
What is a Set?
(Industry Jargon Version)
A Set is a Parent object which can contain
any number of Child objects. The parent
is called the Set, the children are called
Objects. The parent has no surface geometry and no material attributes of its own.
Children will inherit position, rotation and Z
scale from their parent but nothing else.
Think of a Set like it’s a big house. Think of Objects like they are
furniture within the house. You can arrange the furniture any way
you like inside the house. You can place them on any floor, rotate
them any way, even stack them on top of each other. The one
thing you cannot do is animate them. You cannot animate individual Objects. You can however, animate the house.
Objects can be independently placed and
rotated inside their parent Set and when
the parent is animated all the children
come along for the ride.
When you move the house around, all the furniture inside the
house moves too. If you rotate the house all of the furniture
rotates as one big locked together group of Objects. They won’t
rotate individually, they’ll all rotate around a single pivot point,
the house’s pivot point.
Each child object can have its own materials, shapes and texture maps.
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If you have 3D experience, scan quickly through the next section
and then read the Industry Jargon sidebar. If you are new to 3D
continue on.
So, a Set is a container for Objects. You can put as many
Objects into a Set as you want. This is done by selecting them inside the Set-Up window, and picking a Set number from the Set’s
popup menu, (the tiny popup with the numbers 0-8 in it.)
Each Object can be positioned and rotated inside the Set, but
they won’t animate inside of their Set. If you go into the Set-Up
window, and change the position of an Object at the end of an animation, the Object will stay in the same position (relative to the
other Objects in the Set) throughout the whole animation. This is
because you just did what amounts to rearranging the furniture in
the house. If you move a chair into a new room it will stay there
for the whole animation.
How do you animate a single object?
Assign that one object to its own Set.
How many Sets can be animated?
Eight per Invigorator effect.
Assigning Object 2 to Set 2.
Two Invigorators added to the same AE project can animate
sixteen total Sets, however they will not interact with each other.
For instance they won’t cast shadows on each other, or intersect
each other.
Be careful when adding multiple Invigorators. Each one is like
opening a whole 3D animation program inside of AE’s RAM, so
more Invigorators = more RAM. We’ve added 100 to a single AE
project, but we’re sure there’s a limit somewhere.
Set 0 is a non-animating Set where you can put all the Objects
that are scenery. The stuff that doesn’t move.
Set 0 is a non-animating Set.
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Special Topic - How To Place The Center Of Rotation
For A Set
You can see a Set’s pivot point as a red crosshair when the Set is
selected. However, you cannot drag it. Even though you cannot
drag it you can put the pivot anywhere you want if you know how
the program sets the position of the pivot point.
First off, if you want the pivot to be at the center of all objects
within a Set, use the Recenter Pivot command which is located
at the bottom of the Sets menu in the Effect Controls window.
This command will move the pivot to the average center of all
objects in the Set.
If you want to choose a pivot point that is not at the center of the
objects, then you need to understand how and when the program
sets the pivot. The program sets the pivot point whenever :
1. There is nothing inside the Set, and then
2. Object(s) are assigned to the empty Set.
This means is that if a Set is empty and you assign objects to it
one by one, the pivot will be set at the center of the first object
assigned and then it won’t move as the other objects are added.
On the other hand, if you select several objects and assign them
to an empty Set all at once, then the pivot is placed at the average
center of all those objects. Following are two examples to help
make this more clear.
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Example 1
Say you had the word Hello and you wanted all the letters to rotate around the letter H. What you would do is select the H, then
pick Set 2 from the Set Assignment popup. This will assign the H
to Set 2, and as long as Set 2 had nothing else already assigned to
it, the pivot would be moved to the center of the H.
Then you would select the rest of the letters, assign them to Set
2, and the pivot will stay at the center of the H, because once the
pivot has been assigned it won’t move anymore.
Example 2
Say you had the word Hello and you wanted everything to stay
still except for the “o” and you wanted the o to rotate around the
H. This is a little trickier, but see if you can follow the process.
Step 1 - Make sure that Set 2 has nothing in it.
Step 2 - Assign the H to Set 2 (as in Example 1). This will put the
pivot at the center of the H.
Step 3 - Assign the o to Set 2. The pivot won’t move because it
has already been set.
Step 4 - Select the H and assign it to Set 0 (zero). This will
Step 2: Assign the H to Set 2
remove the H, but leave the pivot for Set 2 at the center of the H
because the Set didn’t get emptied out.
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Now the o will rotate around the H but the rest of the letters will
stay where they are because they’re in a different Set.
Caution: If you remove the H before you assign the o, then the
Set is empty when the o is assigned and the pivot will then move
to the center of the o. The key thing is to make sure that
once the pivot is where you want it, do not empty the Set.
NOTE: Set 0 is a non-animatable Set. It is used as a place
to put objects that you aren’t animating. This way you
don’t waste one of the animatable ones.
Step 3: Assign the o to Set 2
This whole idea of assigning a temporary object to a Set just so
the pivot point ends up in the right spot can be used whenever
you want the pivot to be in an exact spot.
For instance, if you want the word Hello to rotate around the left
edge of the H instead of its center you could make a little rectangle in the same Illustrator file as the H and place it at the left edge
of the H. Then when you bring the file into the Invigorator, you assign the little rectangle to Set 2 first, then assign the other letters,
then delete the little rectangle, or at least make it invisible.
Step 4: Assign H to Set 0 (zero).
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Special Topic - How Do Materials Work?
The 3D Invigorator takes a completely different approach with
materials than is usually taken by most 3D programs. This different approach is what enables you to make such speedy changes.
However, if you don’t understand what’s going on you can accidentally change things you might not have wanted to change.
With most 3D programs the material settings applied to each object are part of the object’s own personal settings. For instance,
each object has a color setting, each object has a highlight setting,
each object has a setting for every material attribute there is.
When a program is set up in this way, making a change to one object won’t affect any other object. Unfortunately, this means that
if you are using a particular color on a hundred different objects,
and you want to change that color, then you will have to make the
change a hundred different times.
The Invigorator however, considers a Material Swatch to be an
entity in itself. It’s a scene element the same way that a light, a
camera or an object are scene elements. With the Invigorator,
when you set up the color and highlights on a Material Swatch
you are, in a way, mixing the paint in a “paint can”. The “paint
can” exists as a holder of the paint settings and can then be applied to objects over and over again.
Most 3D programs keep separate material settings
for each object.
A Material Swatch is like a paint can that holds material settings.
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With most 3D programs there is no “paint can”. You mix the paint
right on the object by adjusting the object’s various material settings. If you need to make changes you have to edit the material
settings for every object that has to be changed.
With the Invigorator, on the other hand, changing the material
settings means only re-mixing the paint in a single paint can, (the
“paint can” remember, is a Material Swatch). Once the change is
made, every object that is using paint from that paint can inherits
the changes automatically.
In the Invigorator, when you apply a Material Swatch to an object
you are making a link between the object and the paint can. You
are telling the program to apply the paint in this paint can to
any object it is linked to. The object doesn’t carry the material
settings which created the paint, all it carries is one bit of information which is the name of the paint can. During rendering
the paint in the paint can is applied to the object and that’s what
colors your object.
When you make changes to the paint in the paint can, (Material
Swatch), it affects every object that is being colored by that Material Swatch. So if you’ve used this Material Swatch on a hundred
different objects, changing the color of the Swatch automatically
updates every object that uses that Swatch. Got it?
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This is a very important point. One change updates all uses of
that material no matter how many times that material was used.
This is of huge benefit when making changes during production
deadlines.
So, now that you understand how Materials are applied to Objects, there is one possible problem you might run into. It’s the
case where you have applied the same material to many different
objects, but then you decide you want to change the material on
only one of those objects without it affecting any other object.
If you need to change the material on only one of those objects
you will need to unlink the object style which links all of the
materials together.
1. Select the object you want to change.
2. Show the Object Styles tab.
3. From the Swatches menu select the Unlink Object Style command.
4. Show the Material Palette so you can see all of the Material
Swatches applied to that object.
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5. Drag the swatch you want to change from the palette into the
Material Editor.
6. Now you can edit the new material without the changes affecting any other material or object.
WARNING:
You cannot simply change the name of the Material
Swatch, by typing a new name or number into the Material’s
Name field. That will just change the Material’s name and
all objects that have been using that material will keep on
using it. What you have to do is to Unlink the Object Style.
This will create new materials that aren’t being used by any
other objects. Then assign this new material to the object
you want to make the change to.
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Special Topic Understanding Vector Shape & Text Objects
The shape of a vector shape or text object can be thought of in
two parts: 1 - The front and back and 2 - The sides.
The front and back faces of an Invigorator object are determined
by the shapes of the vector artwork drawn in your vector drawing
program such as Illustrator, FreeHand or Corel Draw.
The sides of a vector or text object are determined by the shape
of the Edge Profile. This is the part that gives an object thickness,
and makes the 2D shape into a 3D shape.
The Vector Artwork
The simpler the shapes of your vector artwork the nicer they appear in 3D. The Invigorator does not care whether you use long
curves or short curves, but generally speaking the fewer the number of vector points used to make your shapes the more graceful
the resulting models.
The Edge Profile
In the Classic version, the Edge Profiles are all presets. They are
designed to cover a wide range of possible looks and uses. There
are about one hundred Edge Profiles. They cannot be edited, but
you can adjust their thickness with the Edge Scale slider, and
their size with the Depth slider.
(With the PRO version you can design your own profiles, which
really unlocks the door to 3D fontography.)
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What Is An Edge Profile?
The bevels along the edge of your object can range from simple
to complex. Since most of them don’t resemble what you would
consider a classic “Bevel” we call them “Profiles” instead.
An Edge Profile creates the sides of your model. It is what connects the Front face to the Back face.
Seeing Which Profile Is Applied
If you looked at your model from above, the front and back faces
would look like straight lines and the Edge Profile would be the
shape connecting the ends of those lines. The Material Set-Up
window shows you what the Edge Profile looks like.
Reveal the Material Set-Up window by clicking on the Material Set-Up radio button above the preview window. From the
illustration you can see how the front face is at the bottom, and
the back face is at the top. This is because we are looking at the
model from the top as though it were a cross section.
Notice that the Front and Back faces are between the dotted
lines. The Edge Profile starts at the dotted lines and extends out
to the sides. The Front and Back faces will always be the same
size as the original vector artwork. The Profiles add to the width
of the vector shapes.
The Material Set-Up window
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The Profile that is applied to an object around that object’s outside perimeter is called the Outside Profile and is shown on the
left side of the Material Set-Up window. The Profile applied to
the insides of Holes is called the Hole Profile and is shown on the
right side of the diagram.
Outside
Profiles
go here.
Hole
Profiles
go here.
Most of the time the Hole Profile is drawn as a dotted line because it’s being controlled by the Outside Profile. If you want to
give the Holes their own Profile, then you need to uncheck the
“Use Same Profile for Hole Edges” checkbox. When you do this
the Hole Profile will be drawn as a solid line, indicating that it’s
active.
Changing The Edge Profile
The 3D Invigorator has about one hundred different Edge Profiles
to choose from. The styles range from simple to extreme. Refer
to the Appendix of this manual for a picture of each one. Edge
Profiles are selected from the popup menu at the right side of the
large Object tab.
Experiment with them. Some are made for special purposes and
might not work for your current project, but may look terrific on
your next project.
To apply a different Edge Profile to an object…
1. Select the object you want to apply the new Profile to.
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2. Click on the Outside Edges popup menu and drag up or down
until you’ve highlighted the profile you want to use.
3. Release the mouse.
If the Material Set-Up window is showing, you’ll see the Profile
you’ve just selected.
If the Scene Preview is showing, you will see the objects rebuild
using the selected style.
Browsing The Edge Profile List
Once you have selected an Edge Profile from the menu, you can
browse through the list by pressing the up or down arrows on
your computer keyboard. Doing this will step you through the
Profiles list.
Once you’ve selected a profile you can use the
up/down arrow keys to step through this menu.
If the Material Set-Up window is active, you will see each profile
as you click. If the Scene Preview window is active, you will see
the selected objects rebuild using each new Edge Profile.
In this way you can browse through the various profiles, experimenting with design ideas, and observing the effect on the look of
the object. When you find a look you like, simply stop browsing
and you’re done.
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Special Topic - Creating Spheres And Other
Primitives
You can make spheres, cones, cubes, truncated cones, doughnuts (torii), and pyramids inside the Invigorator. If you have
the PRO version it has a primitives modeler built into it. But
some of the following shapes have to be built by hand.
.
Cube: Make a square and apply the Basic, Flat Sides edge to
it. You’ll have to tweak the Depth to get it right but remember
that the Depth is in points just like Illustrator. So if you have a
Square that’s 100 points to a side, then make the Depth 100 and
you’ll have a perfect cube.
Cube
Rounded Edge Cube
Sphere
Prism
Rounded Edge Cube: Start with a rounded rectangle
shape and apply the Round Edges, Small to it to make a perfectly rounded cube. A 150 x 150 square with a 12 point round
radius and an Invigorator Depth of 150 seems to work well.
Since the round edges take up space you have to compensate
with extra depth.
Prism: Same as cubes but start with a Triangle and apply
Basic, Flat Sides.
Sphere: Start with a circle. A very small circle like in the 12
point (or 1/8 inch, or 3 millimeter) range. Apply the Half Pipe
edge to it and Presto! you get a Sphere. Use the Depth control
to adjust the size of the Sphere. Use the Object Faceting control to increase the polygons, making the sphere smoother.
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If the circle you start with is too big you will get a peppermint
candy shape.
Cone: Start with a tiny circle and apply the Flare, Straight
edge to it. Use the Depth control to adjust the height of the
cone. Use the Edge Scale to adjust the size of the base. Note
that this won’t be a perfect cone as the tip is nipped off a little, but if the circle you start with is small enough, you won’t
be able to see it. Use the Object Faceting control to increase
the polygons and make the cone smoother.
Cone
Truncated Cone
Truncated Cone: Start with a bigger circle. The Illustrator circle becomes the top of the cone.
Pyramid: Start with a tiny triangle or a square or a pentagon. Apply the Flare, Straight edge to it. Use the Depth
control to adjust the height. Use the Edge Scale to adjust the
size of the base.
Torus (doughnuts): This one has a few steps to it.
Pyramid
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Torus (doughnut)
Step 1 - Make a circle (~200 points) in Illustrator.
Step 2 - Give it a 1 point stroke and NO fill.
Step 3 - Use the Object >Path >Outline Path command to turn
the stroke into a tiny fill.
Step 4 - Open this file in the Invigorator and apply the Half
Pipe edge to it. Use the Depth control to adjust the thickness
of the ring. The diameter of the ring is set in Illustrator by the
original circle.
Cylinder: Start with a circle and apply the Basic, Flat
Sides edge to it.
Plane (Floor/Walls): Make a large rectangle the size you
want the Plane to be. Then either set the Depth to zero or turn
off the Generate Model Parts for the Edges and Back
Face, leaving only the Front Face showing.
Pill: Start with a circle and apply the Round Edges, Large
Cylinder
Plane
Pill (capsule)
Pill (tablet)
Light Bulb
Holiday Light Bulb
to it. Use the Depth control to adjust the length of the pill.
Small circles give you capsules.
Large circles give you tablets.
Light Bulbs: Ever think there would be something like a
light bulb primitive? Start with a small circle and apply the
Bulb, Light edge profile. The idea is to spell out words using
small circles and then turn the circles into light bulbs. Use the
Material Set-Up window to split the edge into the glass areas
and the chrome screw base. Apply a lens flare (separate AE
plug-in effect) to each light bulb and animate the intensity up
and down to make the lights “turn on.” Caution: This creates
lots of polygons so render times can be several minutes a
frame.
If you’re in the holiday spirit there is also a Holiday Bulb
edge profile which makes Christmas tree-type lights.
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Special Topic - Creating Grids
The Invigorator considers that Filled paths are solid (meaning
they have front and back faces) and Stroked paths are hollow
(with no front/back faces, although you can always give them
faces by clicking the Generate Model parts checkboxes.)
If you make a stroked path that is left open the Invigorator will
automatically join the beginning and end points for you. The
problem with a grid line is that you have a straight line which,
when closed, overlaps back on itself causing bogus geometry.
So the best way to make grid lines is to give the lines a 1 point
stroke, no fill. Then use the Outline Stroke command (Object>
Path > Outline Stroke) to turn the stroke into thin filled rectangles. These thin rectangles will then Invigorate nicely.
COOL TIP 1
If you start with the above technique of turning strokes into
paths, then apply the Half Pipe edge profile to the lines, you will
turn the grid line into tubes!
Use the Depth control to adjust the diameter of the tube.
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If you want to do something like floating the horizontal lines
above the vertical lines, you can do this very easily by grouping
all of the horizontal lines in Illustrator before bringing them into
the Invigorator. That way they are all one object so it’s easy to
select them all with one click, and then use the nudge keys to lift
them directly up, away from the others.
Other types of objects can be treated this same way. Group them
in Illustrator so you can color and animate them as one object
instead of 40 or 50 separate objects.
If you want just flat grid lines, set the Depth to zero.
The Butt End Cap will create squared-off ends
SUPER COOL TIP 2
Sometimes you’ll want the ends of the grid lines to be rounded
instead of flat. This is done by giving the stroked line Rounded
End Caps in Illustrator before doing the Outline Stroke command.
When you do this the semicircle at the end is very very small so
you have to increase the Object Faceting for Render to a much
lower value to get rid of the chunky look.
The Round End Cap will create rounded ends.
Convert stroked paths to outlines to make a shape
the Invigorator will be able to use.
The Edge Profile used for the example was the Clipped Heart.
And the material was the default Chrome.
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Special Topic - Working With Objects Outside The
View Of The Camera
Here’s a little tip on how to work with objects that are outside the
view of the camera.
Remember, you can always Dolly the camera back farther so you
can see the objects, however that will goof up your Camera position, so here’s what you do.
When the Camera button is active (blue), there is a popup menu
in the toolbar that says Views... This popup has several presets
for Top, Front, High Right, etc. and it also has a menu item that
lets you save your own views. A view is a group of settings for
camera position, camera direction, and lens angle.
Before you Dolly the camera back, pick Save View from that
popup and name the current view. Then you can move the camera freely to animate the off screen objects. When you’re done,
simply pick the saved view from the Views... popup and presto!
you’re back to where you started.
If you forget to save the view before you move the camera you
need to use AE’s Undo feature to back up to where the camera
was in the correct position, save the view, then continue on.
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Special Topic - Preparing Your Vector Files
As you prepare your Illustrator/FreeHand files for use in the
Invigorator, here are a few things to take into consideration to
make the process more successful.
Convert Text To Outlines
Any text objects in your Illustrator files will be ignored unless you
convert the text to vector outlines.
In Illustrator use the Text > Create Outlines command.
In FreeHand use the Text > Convert to Paths command.
A Text Object
Vector Outlines
Convert Text to Outlines
Use Large Type
All of the presets for modeling and surfacing are based on objects
that start out at about 100 points in size. You can work with text
and objects larger or smaller than that, but you will have to fuss
with the settings a little more. Whenever you are laying out type
always remember to make it 100-120 points in size.
Position On Page Is Important
The Invigorator uses the position of the 2D objects on the Illustrator/FreeHand as the position of the 3D objects when they come
into the 3D world. The bottom left corner of the page is the 0,0
point in the Invigorator’s 3D world. This means if you lay out
your artwork so that it’s at the top of the page, it will come into
the Invigorator high off the floor.
The lower left corner of the page becomes the 0,0 point in the Invigorator
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Prepping For Object Replacement
When preparing for using the Replace or Reload Layer features,
the position of vector objects on the page is doubly important. If
the vector objects in the replacement file are in different positions than the objects in the original file, then the 3D objects will
jump from the old position to the new position during the replacement.
Object positions are very important when replacing or reloading vector artwork.
Always put vector objects that are to replace other objects in
exactly the same spot on the Illustrator/FreeHand page.
Spikes
Sharp corners in the vector paths will cause long spikes in the 3D
objects. If you see spikes sticking out of your 3D objects you will
need to repair the vector paths the object was built from and then
use the Replace or Reload Layer commands to fix it. (See the
Special Topic on Spikes for more on this.)
Prepping for Opening By Layers
When preparing a file for Open By Layers, each layer will become
a single object. No matter how many vector paths are on a layer,
they will all be locked together into one big object when they
come into the Invigorator. This means they will move as one
group and can only be given one set of materials or edge shapes.
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Every object that will have its own colors or shape settings needs
to be on its own layer inside the Illustrator or FreeHand file when
the Open By Layers option is used. If Open By Layers is not used
then each vector path will become its own 3D object unless it has
been grouped with other paths inside Illustrator/FreeHand, or is a
hole inside of another path.
Another very important point when prepping for the Open By
Layers option is to name every layer a different name. If you
name two layers the same thing the Invigorator won’t be able to
tell the difference between them and the Reload Layer command
will simply pick the first layer it finds that has that name.
Never name two layers the same thing.
No Overlapping Vector Paths In The Same Layer
When Opening By Layers if you make objects that overlap be sure
to use a Pathfinder command to unite them into one object. Otherwise you will get overlapping geometry that may flicker when
animated.
If you aren’t using the Open By Layer option this won’t matter
because the paths will become independent objects and can be
moved apart once inside the 3D world. If you don’t move them
apart, however, their faces will be on the same plane and will
flicker when animated.
Turn this...
into this.
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Do Not Use Blends In Your Objects
Each step of a blend will become a separate 3D object which creates the problem of overlapping geometry.
Using Illustrator Colors
You can assign colors to your vector shapes and use the “Use Illustrator Colors” option to bring those colors into the Invigorator.
When you do this the stroke color becomes the color of the Edge
Profiles and the Fill color becomes the color of the front and back
faces. Postscript patterns and gradients are not supported.
Grouped Vector Objects Will Be Locked Together
When several vector shapes are grouped together in the vector drawing program they will come into the Invigorator as one
locked-together clump of objects. You will not be able to color
them separately, or move them separately.
There is an option in the Select Artwork window called Dismantle
Groups that will break grouped objects down into separate parts,
but use this only as a last resort. It’s better to ungroup in your
vector drawing program and then group together the things that
should be grouped together, such as letters of a word or the
pieces of a background element.
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Using Clip Art
If you like you can use clip art, as long as it is vector based not
pixel based, and it has been saved in native Adobe Illustrator
format, version CS or lower. If it is not in Illustrator format you
must open it in a vector drawing program and re-save it as such.
If you start with a complex piece of clip art, you should remove
the blends and simplify it. Silhouette style artwork works the
best. (See the Special Topic on Using Clip Art for more information.)
A piece of clip art turned into 3D
Generic EPS Files Do Not Work
Raw Postscript, EPS or PDF format files do not work. The file
must be in native Adobe Illustrator format, version CS or lower.
You must be able to open the file in Illustrator and edit the individual points in the vector artwork. If you can’t select and change
the position of single points within the graphic then you are trying
to use a placed EPS graphic, and that won’t work.
You may be able to get it to work by saving the file in native Illustrator format and trying it anyway. Sometimes the correct data
is locked up inside the file and you just have to figure out a way to
get it out.
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Special Topic - How To Edit An Illustrator File
And Get The Invigorator To Use The Changes
When you load an Illustrator file the Invigorator holds the vector
shapes internally so you don’t have to keep track of the file anymore. It would be a bad thing to save over the top of the original
Illustrator file and have your 3D scene suddenly change when
you didn’t want it to. But when you do want to change the vector
shapes, how do you do it?
Since there is no way inside of Illustrator to name a vector shape,
it’s impossible for us to tell which shape is which in the Illustrator
file. Illustrator doesn’t keep the vectors in any particular order,
and any time you modify a path with a pathfinder operation the
order gets changed.
As much as we tried, and we tried pretty hard, there is no magic
way to edit a whole Illustrator file and tell the Invigorator to
rebuild everything using the new vectors.
So, working with the hand we’d been dealt, we figured out two
ways to swap the old vectors for the new ones. The Replace feature, and the Reload Layer feature. The difference is in how you
load the original Illustrator file.
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Replace
Replace works on one Vector Shape object at a time. It takes any
vector object and swaps the paths used to create it with all the
visible vectors in an Illustrator file. This means you can replace a
letter for a letter, a letter for a word, or a word for a single letter.
By Visible, what we mean is, on a layer with visibility turned
ON. Anything on an Illustrator layer with the visibility eyeball
turned OFF will be ignored when the file is read.
Visibility does not mean “hidden”. As in how you can show/hide
paths inside Illustrator. Visible/Invisible is a Layer property.
Reload Layer
Reload Layer only works if the Illustrator file had the Open By
Layers checkbox turned ON when the file was first added to the
Invigorator. (See this checkbox at the bottom of the Select Artwork window.)
What this option does is very cool. It turns everything on an Illustrator layer into a single object and names it the same thing as the
layer. This lets you name all your objects while you’re still inside
of Illustrator. You would put each object on a different Layer,
name the layer and when you opened it in the Invigorator everything is organized the same way you set it up in Illustrator.
Turn on the Open By Layers checkbox when first opening a file in
order to use the Reload Layer feature.
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Examples: the “Headlines” layer, the “Outer ring” layer, “Anchor’s
name” layer, etc...
More importantly this gives the Invigorator a name to look for in
the Illustrator file. So what you do is edit the paths in the original
Illustrator file and save the file. Then go back to the Invigorator,
select the object you want to update and click the Reload Layer
button. The Invigorator then finds the original Illustrator file, (by
name so you have to keep the name the same), looks through it
for the layer that the object came from, pulls all the vectors out of
that layer and swaps them for the vectors in the object that you
are updating.
In terms of process, Reloading a Layer takes one click only, but
it takes more effort up front to place each object on a different
layer. The Replace feature takes no up front planning, but when
you do the updating you have to remember to put everything
except the target vectors on an invisible layer.
IMPORTANT POINT
Whenever you edit Illustrator files remember that
the position of the vector shapes on the Illustrator
page determines where the objects end up inside the
Invigorator’s 3D space.
If you had the word Hello and you wanted to do a
fancy H, remember to position the fancy H in the same
spot as the old H. Otherwise the H will shift positions
during the Replace or Reload operations.
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Special Topic - Using Clip Art
Not every piece of clip art you have will make good Invigorator
models. For best results the clip art should be relatively simple.
Much of the pizzazz of an Invigorator scene comes from the Edge
Profiles used, the application of textures and reflections and the
interplay of shadows. Silhouette style artwork works the best.
The clip art must be in vector form. Scanned and raster based
clip art doesn’t have the vector information in it so the Invigorator can create 3D models. You can, however, use raster based
artwork as texture maps. Save them in PICT or TARGA format
and bring them into the Invigorator through the Materials Editor.
Click on the thumbnail box to use scans and
raster based clip art as texture maps.
Some clip art is created with dozens and dozens of shapes. This
type of artwork should be simplified in a vector drawing program
before being used in the Invigorator. If you don’t have a vector
drawing program, you can sometimes get acceptable results by
disabling or deleting the pieces that are causing the clutter.
Blends must be removed from clip art.
Do this by clicking on the shape with the selection tool, in the
Scene Preview window. This will select it, put a bounding box
around it, and make its name active in the Objects List popup
menu. Disable it by clicking on the “Make Invisible” checkbox
located under the Objects popup menu. Delete it by clicking the
Delete button or hitting the Delete key on your keyboard.
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Since much clip art is delivered in very old formats, you may
find that some of your objects have been split in half. A “Q”, for
instance, may be made in two pieces, a top half and a bottom half.
This ends up eliminating the hole so the Invigorator doesn’t know
that this object is supposed to have a hole. If this happens, there
is no way to make it work unless you repair the artwork in a vector drawing program. (Illustrator, FreeHand, Corel Draw)
Repair the breaks to make a clean vector shape.
Other times you may find that a hole in a piece of clip art was
made by laying a white object over the top of a black object.
While this method “appears” to create a hole when printed on
paper, it isn’t giving the Invigorator the proper information to
construct a hole. If this is the case, it must be turned into a real
hole inside a vector drawing program.
Special Topic - Overlapping Objects
If you are using clip art, you may have picked an image which
uses separate shapes to simulate gradients, blends and color
changes. Each one of these shapes will become a separate object
in the Invigorator forming a stack of dozens if not hundreds of
overlapping objects, all sharing the same space.
Turn this...
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into this.
This causes the Invigorator to get confused about which object
should be showing and can cause rendering errors such as flickering surfaces, or surfaces with what looks like cob-webs wrapped
around them.
To clean up this problem you must open the clip art in a vector
drawing program and delete all of the pieces except for the ones
you want, which are usually the outside edges. You can also delete them from inside the Invigorator but it takes more time. (See
the Special Topic on Using Clip Art for more information.)
Special Topic - The Holes In Objects Are Filling In
If the holes in your object are covered over, it is most likely because you do not really have a hole. Even if you look at the model
in Wireframe and can see the inside part of the hole, it’s really
just that the vector path for the hole has been left as a separate
object, and needs to be made into a hole inside your vector drawing program.
To fix this problem you must have access to a vector drawing
program. Open the vector artwork in your drawing program.
Click on the outside path, then shift-click so the path for the hole
is selected at the same time. Then use the command that will turn
the inside path into a hole.
This object looks OK,
but it does not really
have holes...
... so the 3D model
looks wrong.
FreeHand: Modify > Combine > Punch.
Illustrator: Object > Pathfinder > Minus Front or Minus Back.
This will create a real hole that the Invigorator will create a
proper 3D model from.
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After doing this operation, always check to see that you really do
have a hole. To do this, draw a red box and send it to the back,
so it’s behind all other objects in the stack, and drag it so it can be
seen through the hole. If it is a hole, you’ll be able to see the red
of the box. If it’s not a hole you won’t be able to see the red.
The holes in this object
are not really holes.
The holes in this object
are constructed properly.
Clip art supplied in Illustrator 88 format will not have true holes.
This format does not support holes. Holes were simulated in the
88 format by placing a white object over the top of a black object.
You must use clip art in Illustrator 3.0 or later format for true
holes to appear in your Invigorated objects.
Special Topic - Spikes On Smooth Curves
Sometimes a vector object is created that has a sharp point in it.
When this object is brought into the Invigorator you will see what
appears to be a spike sticking out from your model.
This is because the Invigorator is trying to apply an Edge Profile
to a point, and if the two edges of the point come together at too
sharp of an angle it takes a long distance for the outside edges of
the profile to meet. (This is called mitering, like the miter joint on
a picture frame. Postscript has the same problem when you apply
a fat stroke to a sharp miter. This is why there is a miter limit setting which will chop off the mitered point if it gets too long.)
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There are two ways to fix this. (1) Open the vector file in a vector
drawing program and adjust the control handles of the point so
they aren’t so close together. This will minimize or fix the problem. (2) Use the Invigorator’s Spike Buster feature which will clip
the ends of sharp points for you.
Auto-trace programs are notorious for creating many small sharp
points. Often times these points will end up as spikes. They will
need to be cleaned-up or “Busted”, or you can trace the artwork
by hand instead of using the auto-trace feature.
Remove the spike by straightening out the control handles.
Blending between shapes inside the vector program is also another source for spike points, and so are some fonts.
Special Topic - Spikes On Points
Another case where you’ll get spikes is at the end of pointed
objects. This is the same problem as above where the mitering of
the Edges Profiles creates a very long point. The only difference
is that in this case you really do want a point, you just don’t want
it to be so long.
Add a small curve to the end to remove a spike.
There are two ways to fix this problem. One way is to open the
vector file in a drawing program and make the corner point into
a smooth point with small control handles. This will add a little
curve to the end which will reduce the length of the spike.
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You can also add another point very close to the end point and
join them together with a straight line segment. This will clip off
the end in a blunt cut instead of a curve.
Adding points to clip spikes.
The last way is to use the Spike Buster feature which will clip the
ends for you. Using Spike Buster, however, you will clip every
point on the object whereas you might only want to clip one or
two.
Sometimes spikes are being caused by a part of the file you don’t
even want, or wouldn’t notice was gone if it were deleted. Select
the object with the spike and disable all other objects except this
one. Then look at it and decide if deleting this object would ruin
the scene. If not, then just delete it.
Special Topic - Using Scanned Artwork
A scanned photo is only made of pixels.
There are no vector outlines to make a 3D model from.
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A scanned photograph or scanned piece of line art is only a bitmap. It is made up of pixels and does not have any vector outlines
in it. Because of this it cannot be used to make models inside the
3D Invigorator. Even if you open it in Photoshop and save it as
an EPS, it still will not have any vector outlines. In order for you
to make the scan usable, you must convert it to vector outlines.
There are several ways of doing this.
One way is to use an autotrace operation to convert the scanned
image to vector outlines. Adobe Streamline and Macromedia
FreeHand are two programs with fairly good autotrace functions.
Autotrace programs work well enough for straight 2D print work,
but they can cause problems when you turn the vectors into 3D
models. The vectors produced by an autotrace program usually
have many small points scattered throughout the image which
turn into spikes when Invigorated. This is especially true when
the tolerance on the autotrace is set low. However it is possible
to clean up the sharp points, and once cleaned up the spikes
go away and you’re all set. (See the Special Topic on Spikes for
more about what they are and how to fix them.)
Another way to convert the scan is to trace it by hand. This takes
more skill but it produces vector outlines that will Invigorate with
fewer problems. Also, because the clean up of an autotraced
piece of artwork can take a long time, hand tracing is sometimes
the better idea.
Usually, if a client has a stat or other piece of artwork that they
want you to use, chances are they will also have a FreeHand or
Illustrator file too. Remember to ask for the vector file. You will
save yourself a lot of time and frustration.
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Special Topic - The Tiny Camera And Light Buttons
Inside the AE Effect Controls window, next to the red ball icon,
are two tiny buttons. One with a Camera on it and one with a
Light on it. These are called the Update Camera and Update
Lights buttons.
What these buttons do is to let you bring a Camera view or a
Lighting set up from the Set-Up window interface, into the AE
Effect Controls window.
Inside the AE Effect Controls, pick the High Left view from
the Views popup. Then click the Set-Up button.
Regarding the tiny Update Camera button:
When you enter the Set-Up window (red ball button) you can
freely move the camera and move the lights. However, when you
click OK to get back to the AE Effect Controls you will notice that
the camera view is back to the same position as it was before you
entered the Set-Up window. In other words the view from inside
the Set-Up window did not “stick” when you left that window.
Do a quick test:
Inside the Set-Up window select the High Right view
from the Views popup.
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Step 1 Inside the AE Effect Controls, pick the High Left view
from the Views... popup.
Step 2 Click the red ball icon to enter the Set-Up window.
Step 3 Pick the High Right view from the Views... popup inside
the Set-Up window.
Step 4 Click the OK button to exit the Set-Up area.
Step 5 You will see that the view is the same High Left view that
was last seen in this window. The High Right view did not stick.
Now click the tiny Update Camera button. What happened?
The view changed to High Right! So what this button does is it
takes the view that’s inside the Set-Up window and puts into the
AE Effect Controls window. Got it?
The reason we made this a separate step is because if you’re doing a camera animation you might not want the Set-Up view to
mess up your beautiful animation. This feature allows you to use
or discard the Set-Up view at will.
There’s one other little trick that the Update Camera button does.
When you first load an Illustrator file you will notice that the view
is a bit off. The objects are usually small and off center. When
first loading an Invigorator like this, you have not yet entered the
Set-Up window so the Update Camera button acts as a shortcut
for the High Left camera view preset.
Click on the Update Camera button in the AE Effect
Controls window.
Remember to hit the Update Camera button
when you first start a project.
Now regarding the tiny Update Light button: Same deal.
If you set the position of a light or change its color while inside
the Set-Up area you will return to the AE Effect Controls window
to find all of your changes are gone. But they’re not really gone,
they’re just in “storage”. All you do is click the Update Light
button and the lighting changes will be brought into the Effect
Controls window.
Click the Update Light button to bring the lighting changes
made in the Set-Up window into the AE Effect Controls window.
This includes using the Lighting Styles feature. You will not see
the changes made by a Lighting Style until you click the Update
Light button.
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Special Topic - Making Projects Render Faster
Classic & PRO Versions
- Don’t over smooth the objects. Set the Object Faceting slider
to the highest number possible. The faceting number is too large
when you can see chunkiness around the edges of the model.
(See the section on Object Faceting for details.)
- Shadows make the scene look really really good, but they add
significantly to the rendering time. Shadow softness is especially
good at increasing the rendering time. Keep the softness as low
as possible.
- Transparent objects also look really good but, likewise add to
the rendering time.
- If you are using very large texture maps or lots of small ones,
you should turn on the User Preference called “Keep textures in
memory between renders”. This will use more RAM but increase
rendering speed.
- Turn off the backfaces of objects as a way of decreasing the
number of polygons.
- You may have some problem vector objects. Check the Illustrator file you used to make the 3D models you may find that you
have extra junk grouped to the main paths causing the Invigorator to do thousands of unnecessary calculations.
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Special Topic - Making Projects Render Faster
PRO Version Only
PRO- Change the Renderer popup from “Invigorator Render” to
“High Quality OpenGL” this will disable some rendering features
but give you a huge increase in rendering speed. The faster the
OpenGL accelerator on your computer the faster the rendering.
Typical rendering time using this option is 1 second per frame or
better at 3x3 antialiasing.
PRO- When using the Hi-Quality OpenGL renderer, increasing the antialiasing level seriously affects rendering time. A
3x3 antialiasing level will take twice as long to render as 2x2
antialiasing.
On the other hand, increasing the antialiasing level when using
the Invigorator Renderer causes only a small increase in rendering time. This is due to special algorithms we use that only
antialias the areas that need it.
Setting the Hi-Quality OpenGL renderer to anything higher
than 3x3 will start to slow it down. If you need higher than 3x3
antialiasing then you should use the Invigorator Renderer.
PRO- Keep the text objects simple. Don’t create paragraphs worth
of text. Limit your 3D text to only what’s necessary.
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TROUBLESHOOTING
IMPORTANT! Use “Save As” often. Changes in
the host, the operating system, and your personal
computer configuration can cause quirks in how
the Invigorator operates. If you find problems you
MUST tell us in order for them to get fixed. We
WANT to fix them. We want the program to be
completely stable when in production. Call or write
when you find something, and send us the file that
demonstrates the problem.
Check our website for the latest updates to the
Invigorator software and updates to this Troubleshooting document. Some of the following issues
may no longer be problems, and sometimes new
ones come up.
Q- My Materials aren’t showing up in the Materials
Bin.
A- The Invigorator is not just the plug-in but several
support files as well. You are missing the support
files.
The default Material libraries are loaded from the
Zaxwerks Swatches folder. This folder is inside
the main Zaxwerks folder which is inside of the AE
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Plug-ins folder. This main Zaxwerks folder should
contain the Startup file, the Swatch folders and
the Plug-in itself, plus two other folders one called
Zaxwerks Maps and one called Zaxwerks Environments. These two folders contain pictures used in the
default material libraries.
Most likely what’s happened is that when you installed
the plug-in you dragged only the plug-in into the AE
plug-in’s folder. What you should have done was
dragged the main Zaxwerks folder into the plug-ins
folder which would have copied the plug-in and all the
supporting files. (See the installation instructions.)
Q- I get the error message: Invalid Authorization
Code.
A- The Invigorator is authorized to run on only one
copy of After Effects. Check to see if you are installing the Invigorator on the copy of After Effects it was
authorized to run on. Make sure you are entering the
code exactly as given to you.
A2- If you’ve upgraded recently, make sure you are
using the Authorization code for the version you are
trying to install. (e.g. PRO vs. Classic)
Q- When I open a saved project it takes a long time
A2- It’s also possible that you have a very compli-
before the image in the Comp window appears.
cated project and AE is running out of RAM. (See the
“Invigorator and RAM usage” section.)
A- You left the Quality switch for the Invigorator’s
layer set to Best. Change it to Draft mode and the
Comp window will update quickly.
Q- The Comp window image looks like video noise
Q- When I open a saved project the Invigorator image
that appears in the Comp window is different than the
one that appears in the Effects Controls window.
A1- The driver for your video card is out of date.
A2- Leave more RAM for OpenGL. (See the “OpenGL
and RAM usage” sections.)
A- Move the Time Thumb to a new position and the
two windows will get back in sync.
Q- The 3D Scene Preview is blank
Q- When I render a movie out of the Render Queue I
A1- You may have the Caps Lock key on or the visibil-
get a “Rendering Failed” message from After Effects.
ity eyeball for the layer is turned off.
A1- Take off the Caps Lock key. The Caps Lock Key
means “Abort Rendering” to the Invigorator.
A2- Leave more RAM for OpenGL (See the OpenGL
and RAM usage section.)
If you want to stop the Comp window from redrawing
during a Render Queue rendering, just close the Comp
window before you hit the Render button.
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OpenGL And RAM Usage
(Mac OS9 only)
OpenGL is a system extension and needs its own
RAM to run. You can’t manually assign it RAM, it will
grab RAM as it needs it, and if it doesn’t have enough
RAM you will see problems with your images. The
amount of RAM needed, changes based on the size
of your rendered image and the complexity of your
3D scene, but a good rule of thumb is to leave at least
20 megs of RAM free once After Effects and all other
programs have been opened. You can check for this
by looking for the “Largest Unused Block” size in the
“About This Computer” message window. (First item
under the Apple menu.)
The RAM OpenGL uses must be in a contiguous block
so when you are opening and closing applications the
RAM can fragment and you will start having trouble
with your Scene Preview window and the Draft mode
image. If this happens save your AE project, quit AE
and all other programs and launch AE again.
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The Invigorator And RAM Usage
The Invigorator is a full 3D application that runs inside
After Effects. It’s not an ordinary plug-in. Because
of this there are a few things you must keep in mind
when using it.
Every Invigorator you add to a project takes from 5
to 10 megs of RAM. This RAM is allocated for every
Invigorator effect in the entire project. It doesn’t matter that all of your Comps in your AE project may be
closed. The memory is set aside as soon as the project
is opened.
If you have added 10 Invigorators to a project you are
eating up 50 to 100 megs of RAM. Additionally every
Comp you have open will allocate its own OpenGL
RAM which takes up even more RAM. This may seem
a high price to pay, but remember you are trying to run
10 full 3D programs all at the same time!
It’s better for you to break your projects up into a few
Invigs per project. That keeps things faster and more
stable.
Q- If I close the twirly arrow in front of the 3D Scene
Preview window, it won’t reopen.
Q- My rendered images get clipped off. Usually at
A- Follow these steps to get it open again:
A- You are rendering to a codec that doesn’t support
- Save the AE project
- Open the same project you just saved. Don’t
click on anything.
- Pause and let all rendering and redraws
stop.
- Click on the twirly. It will open.
You can open and close the twirly for the entire effect
with no problem, just not the twirly for the Scene
Preview.
the top and bottom.
image sizes larger than standard video sizes (such as
648x486). Switch to the QT Animation compressor to
render the full, oversized, movie.
Codecs known to have this problem are:
*ImMIX video codec
Q- My objects are all named the same thing and the
Invig is getting confused about which one is which.
Q- The three tabs on the right side of the Set-Up window that say “Objects, Materials, and Object Styles”
are appearing as video noise.
A- You have a video card driver that is incompatible
A- You have used the Open By Layers option and
have named your Illustrator layers the same name.
Change the names of the Layers in the Illustrator file
and start over.
with the current version of OpenGL. Get the latest
version from your manufacturer’s website.
Video drivers with known problems are:
*Twin Turbo Acceleration
*9600 graphics accelerator
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Q- When I open a saved AE project I see an error that
says, “Unknown Scene Command for ...” I click OK
and my Invigorator scene is empty.
A1- Do not use slashes (/), backslashes (\) or double
quotes (“) in the name of any Invigorator-related item.
This includes texture maps, layer maps, Illustrator
files, Object names, Object Style names, Light names,
Lighting Style names, and Material names. Version 2.2
traps for these special characters so update to 2.2.
A2- The file has gotten corrupted. Version 2.2 will
open the scene.
Q- The Invig crashes when I try to save the project.
A- Upgrade to the latest version and send this project
to Zaxwerks.
Q- The Invigorator crashes when I use the Replace
command.
A- You have guides visible inside the Illustrator file
you are picking during the Replace operation. Either
delete the guides or place them on a different layer
and turn off the visibility of that layer.
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If you have a crashing problem carefully step through
the following sequence to help Zaxwerks Tech Support figure out what’s wrong.
1. Open AE and set up a new comp.
2. Add a New Solid. Select it.
3. Add Effect > Zaxwerks > 3D Invigorator.
4. When you get the dialogue asking you to “Select
an Illustrator format vector file”, hit CANCEL.
5. Now you are in the Effect Controls with a blank
scene preview.
6. Click the red ball icon to open the Set-Up window.
7. Now you’re in the Set-Up window with a blank
scene preview.
8. Click on Object mode button, (the cube button.)
then click the Create Object button. (If you have the
PRO version click the Object popup and pick Open
Illustrator File.)
9. The “Select a file...” window will open again.
10. Double click on an Illustrator native file.
(Not an EPS file, not a FreeHand file.)
11. This puts you back in the Set-Up window with a
model in the Scene Preview.
Let Zaxwerks Tech Support know which step you
successfully completed.
Keyboard Shortcuts
The following keyboard shortcuts operate only inside
the AE Effect Controls window.
Shift = Constrains dragging to X or Y axis only.
Double-clicking the Zoom tool is a shortcut for the
camera’s Fit All command.
The rest of the keyboard shortcuts operate only inside
the Invigorator’s Set-Up window.
Camera Shortcuts
(Temporary overrides. Only active while the keys
are held down. These enable you to manipulate
the Camera while in Object mode. Very useful.)
Macintosh
Spacebar = Track Camera parallel to screen
Spacebar + Command = Tumble Camera
Spacebar + Option = Roll Camera
Spacebar + Control = Dolly in/out
Windows
Spacebar = Track Camera parallel to screen
Spacebar + Alt = Tumble Camera
Spacebar + Alt + Control = Roll Camera
Mode Selector Shortcuts (Mac/Win)
C = Activate Camera Mode
L = Activate Lights Mode
O = Activate Object Mode
Tool Selector Shortcuts (Mac/Win)
T = Tumble Tool
R = Roll Tool
M = Track Tool
D = Dolly Tool
S = Scale Tool
V = Selection Tool (Double-clicking the Selection
tool is a shortcut for the Select All command)
Z = Zoom Tool (hold down Option/Alt key for Zoom
Out)
Command/Control Key Shortcuts
Use Command key for Macintosh
Use Control key for Windows
Command + A = select All objects
Command + N = New scene (dumps current scene)
Command + O = Open scene file
Command + S = Save scene file
Command + Z = Undo
Command + Z + Shift = Redo
Command + OK button = Test Render
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Nudging
Nudging is applied to the selected Camera, Object or
Light based on which mode is currently active and
which tool is currently selected.
Tumble/
Roll
Track/
Dolly
Scale
Arrow Keys
Shift+Arrow Keys
Rotate 5 degrees
per click
Rotate 15 degrees
per click
Slide 1 point
per click
Scale up/down 1%
Slide 10 points
per click
Scale up/down 10%
Inside the Material Set-Up Window
Temporary overrides: only active while these keys are
held down. Enables you to leave the Split tool selected, then temporarily turn on the Grabber or Dolly tool
to change the view in the window.
Spacebar = Grabber hand
Click a key to activate this tool:
S = Split tool
G = Grabber Hand tool
D = Dolly tool
Z = Zoom tool (hold Option key for Zoom Out)
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Object Axis Mode Shortcut
Holding down the Command key (Mac) or Alt key (Win)
with any tool selected while in Object mode will temporarily turn on Drag Using Object Axis mode. This enables
you to switch back and forth between Object Axis manipulations and World Axis manipulations very easily.
Complimentary Tool Shortcut
You’ll notice that tools are in sets. It takes two tools to
manipulate the three axes of a 3D program. For instance
the Tumble tool rotates the X and Y axis while the Roll
tool rotates the Z axis. The Track tool slides in the X and
Y direction while the Dolly tool slides in the Z direction.
This shortcut turns on the “other” tool in the set whenever
the Control key is held down. (Mac & Win)
Say you are manipulating an object with the Tumble tool,
when you decide that you want to Roll the object a bit.
Instead of clicking on the Roll tool you can hold down the
Control key. This will activate the Roll tool letting you do
the Roll manipulation. When you let up on the Control
key the tool will again become the Tumble tool.
There is only one Scale tool which does X and Y scaling,
so holding down the Control key makes Scale work in the
Z direction. Holding down Control+ Shift, with the Scale
tool, gives you proportional scaling where all three axes
scale the same amount larger or smaller.
— The Effect Of Modifier Keys On The Tools —
Shift
Control
Shift+Control
Command (Mac)
Alt (Win)
Constrains to
X-only or Y-only
rotation
Activates the
Roll tool
Activates the
Roll tool
Activates “Drag
Using Object
Axes” mode
Shift has no
effect on the
Roll tool
Activates the
Tumble tool
Constrained
tumbling
Activates “Drag
Using Object
Axes” mode
Track
Constrains to
X-only or Y-only
tracking
Activates the
Dolly tool
Activates the
Dolly tool
Activates “Drag
Using Object
Axes” mode
Dolly
Shift has no
effect on the
Dolly tool
Activates the
Track tool
Constrained
tracking
Activates “Drag
Using Object
Axes” mode
Scale
Constrains to
X-only, Y-only or
XY proportional
scaling
Activates Z
scaling
Makes scaling
XYZ proportional
No difference.
Objects always
scale on own axes
Tumble
Roll
When inside the Effect Controls window, only the Shift
key works.
The Control key activates
the “Complimentary” tool.
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The Edge Profiles
406
Profi l e s - B e v e l s M e n u
Basic, Flat Sides
Basic, Highlight Edges
Bevel, Small Front
Bevel, Small
Bevel, Medium Front
Bevel, Medium
Bevel, Large Front
Bevel, Large
Bevel, Flat
Bevel, Flatter
Bevel with Point
Bevel with In-Point
Zaxwerks 3D Invigorator for AE - Appendix - Edge Profiles
407
Profiles - Bevels Menu
408
( continued )
Bevel with Scoop
Round Edges, Small
Round Edges, Large
Round & Grooved
Round, Double
Round, Bumper
Round Edges + 3 Grooves
Profi l e s - I n s e t F a c e M e n u
Bevel, Power
Bevel, Power Grooves
Circle, Rim
Halo
Heart
Heart, Clipped
Outline
Outline, Box
Outline, Pressed Box
Outline, Rounded Box
Round, Bubble Rims
Round, Butterfly Rims
409
Prof i l e s - I n s e t F a c e M e n u
Round, Mushroom Cap
( continued )
Star, Overhang
Steps
Wacko
Wavey
410
Profi l e s - P i p e s & H a l f P i p e s Menu
Half Pipe, Double
Half Pipe, Small
Half Pipe, Medium
Half Pipe
Half Pipe, 3 Stripe
Half Pipe, 5 Stripe
Half Pipe, Grooved
Half Pipe, Scooped
Shallow Half Pipe
Shallow Half Pipe, Flanged
Shallow Half Pipe, Scooped
Pipe, Small
411
Prof i l e s - P i p e s & H a l f P i p e s Menu
Pipe, Large
( continued )
Pipe, Full
Prof i l e s - S h a r p M e n u
Pleats, 2
412
Pleats, 3
Pleats, 4
Pleats, 10
Profi l e s - S h a r p M e n u
( continued )
Point, Small
Point, Medium
Point, Wide
Point, Full
Scallops, 2 Point
Scallops, 3 Point
Star, Overhanging
Star, Shallow
Star, Sharp
Threads
413
Prof i l e s - S t a c k s M e n u
414
Fins, Thin
Fins, Thin Stepped
Fins, Medium
Fins, Medium Stepped
Fins, Large
Fins, Large Stepped
Tiers, Beveled
Tiers, Rounded
Profi l e s - C h i s e l e d M e n u
Chiseled
Chiseled, Beveled
Chiseled, Double
Chiseled, Small Lip
Chiseled, Medium Lip
Chiseled, Large Lip
Chiseled, Rounded
Chiseled, Steps
415
Prof i l e s - S p e c i a l P u r p o s e M enu
416
Bowl, Crescent
Bowl, L
Bowl, T
Bulb, Holiday
Bulb, Light
Constructionist 1
Constructionist 2
Corrugated
Deco 1
Deco 2
Flare, Curved
Flare, Straight
Profil e s - S p e c i a l P u r p o s e M enu
Shrinkwrap
Thrashed
( continued )
VexCave
VexCave, Pouting
417
Prof i l e s - Wo o d w o r k M e n u
418
Grooves, Beveled
Grooves, Small
Grooves, Large
Grooves, 3 Inlaid
Round, Half
Round, Quarter
Scoop, Full
Scoop, Half
Tongue, Beveled
Tongue, Small
Tongue, Large
A
Adding (see Creating)
Animating
Animation 23, 32, 33, 43, 45, 78
Camera (see Camera, Animating)
Lights (see Lights, Animating)
Sets (see Sets, Animating)
Alpha Channel 132, 213
Antialiasing
of the rendering 131, 184-185
in Decal Maps 214
ASCII (see Saving Project Data)
B
Background Color 133
Best Quality 35, 43, 50, 114, 185
(See also Draft Quality and Rendering, Test)
Bumpiness 217
C
Camera
Animating 47, 96-103
Changes not sticking 87, 394-395
Controls 52
Lenses 129
Linking to AE’s 89-95
Manipulating 43-48, 121-127
Manipulation Shortcuts 126
Mode 43, 79, 120
Objects outside of View 378
Type of... 96-103
Views popup 41, 44, 47, 85, 128
Cartoon Coloring 330
Centering Objects 75, 173
Caps Lock key 114
Clip Art 383, 387-389
Clearing
Bins 152, 201
Maps 229
Objects 175
Scene 60, 70, 175
Splits 246
Comp Window 41, 43
Composite On Original 113
Corel Draw 29, 40
Crease Angle (see Hard Shading Angle)
Create Object 72, 174
Creating
an Invigorator 40
Objects (see Objects, Creating)
Materials (see Materials, Creating)
Object Styles (see Object Styles, Creating)
Light swatches (see Light swatches, Creating)
Lighting Styles (see Lighting Styles, Creating)
Text (see Text Objcts)
Cubes (see Primitives)
Custom Edge Profiles 260-271
Changing/Editing 265-266
Examples 269-271
In Menu 261
Layers and ... 261
Reloading 265-266
Setting Proper Size 262
Starting Point 266-268
That cross the X-axis 265
419
(Custom Edge Profiles)
That cross the Y-axis 264
Updating 265-266
What can be a ... 263
D
Deleting
Material Swatches 201, 247
Selected Objects 172
All Objects (see Objects, Clearing)
Scenes (see Clearing, Scene)
Depth (see Objects, Depth)
Dismantle Incoming Groups 74
Docks 199, 248
Dolly tool
Camera 82-83, 125
Material Set-Up window 245
Numerical Entry 178
Objects 158
Sets 82-84
Draft Quality 34, 185
(See Best Quality)
Drag Using Object’s Axes 155, 159-161
Duplicate 172-173
Duplication Offset 252
E
Edges 191-196
Applying Maps to 208-209
Custom, Making your own 260-271
(See Best Quality)
Holes 195, 241
Offset 189, 258
420
Outside vs. Holes 192
Profiles 193-194, 195, 241, 369-372, 407-418
Scale 194-195, 196
Splitting 242
Effect Controls window 41, 42-50, 78-114
Export 3D Models 285, 292-293
F
Faceted Objects (see Objects, Faceting)
File Name 184
Fit All 85, 122, 128, 246
Fit Selected 122, 128
Foloowing AE’s 3D Planes 344-355
FreeHand (Macromedia) 29, 40, 72, 379--383
G
Generate Model Parts 186-187
Grabber Hand 244
Grids, Creating 376-377
Ground Plane 255
Groups
in the vector file 63, 74
in Invigorator (see Sets)
H
Hand Held Camera 100-102
Hard Shading Angle 253
Help 86
Hiddenline Rendering 322-329
Highlight Mapping 317-319
Highlights 214-216
Highlight Washout 216
Holes (see Objects, Holes)
I
Illustrator (Adobe)
colors (see Use Illustrator Colors)
format 29, 40, 72
groups (see Groups, and Dismantle Groups)
layers (see Open By Layers)
paths 379-383
Import 3D Objects 290-291, 310-312
Installation
Mac 14
Windows 17
Invigorator
Adding 40
L
Layer Cycling Objects
Creating 278
Example Uses 273-276
Exporting 285
Frame controls 279-280
Layers in Vector File 277
Playback Sequence 281-285
What they are 272
Layers as Custom Edges 261
Layer Map Animation 314-316
Layer Maps 110-113, 211-212
Lights
Animating 45-46, 103, 106
Applying 148
Bin 147
Changes not sticking 87, 106, 394-395
Coloring 46, 104, 141
Controls 52, 103-106
Creating (Saving) 146
Delete 149
Direction 105, 134-137
Duplicating 148
Editing 52, 137
Intensity 105, 141, 142-143
Linking to AE’s 89
List 139
Manipulator Ball 135
Mode 52, 79
Naming 141
Point Lights 136-138
Previews 145
Saving 146
Selecting 86, 139
Shadows 140, 143-145
Shadow Quality defaults 251
Spot Lights 136
Swatches 52, 146, 147-150
Turning On 139
Lighting Styles
Applying 53, 151
Bin 150
Delete 152
Duplicating 152
Saving 151
Swatch bin 53
Local Axes (see Drag Using Object’s Axes)
Look At Camera 98-99, 101, 123
M
Make Invisible 170
Manipulating objects and sets 65-70, 78, 80
421
Manipulation Tools
(see Tumble Tool, Roll Tool, Track Tool, Dolly Tool,
Scale Tool, Nudging)
Masking in 3D 338-340
Material Set-Up
Button 58, 193, 240
Toolbar 242
Window 58, 240-241
Materials
Absolute Color 332-337
Applying 32, 57-59, 241
Bin 197-198, 199
Cartoon Color 330
Color 204
Creating 228
Deleting 201
Duplicating 201, 228
Editor/Editing 56, 197-198, 199, 201, 202-205
Eyedropper 205
for Holes 196, 241
Hiddenline 322-329
How Materials Work 365-368
Matte Color 338-340
Moving 200
Naming 204
New 228
Palette 58, 199, 203, 241, 247, 248, 249
Saving 229
Shadow Catcher 341-343
Tab 55-57, 197
Understanding 365-368
Wireframe 322-329
(also see Texture Maps, Bumpiness, Highlights, Reflectivity and Transparency)
422
Meshing 294-295
Modeling 21
Models, 3D (See Objects, Importing)
Motion Blur 313
Move To Center 75, 173
N
New Solid 30, 40
Nudging 67
(also see specific tools)
O
Object List 61-63, 165, 167-168
Object Stats 178
Object Styles
Applying 233
Defined 232, 360-361
Deleting 237, 238
Duplicating 236-237
on duplicated Objects 172
Moving 238
Naming 234
Notes 234
Recreating 254
Removing 236
Saving 235
Select All Unused 237
Swatch bin 232
Unlinking 235
Object Styles Tab 57, 232
Object Tab
large Object Tab 54-55, 176
small Object Tab 166
Objects
Adding (see Creating)
Assigning to Sets 169-170
Centering 75, 173
Coloring 32, 57-59, 241
Clearing 175
Creating 29-31, 40, 60, 85, 174
Deleting 172, 175
Depth 187, 194
Duplicating 172, 252
Edges (see Edges)
Exporting 285, 292-293
Faceting 184-186
Holes 62, 195-196
Holes Filling In 389-390
Importing 290-291
Layer Cycling (see Layer Cycling Objects)
Manipulating 153-162
Mode 54, 153, 176
Naming 64-65, 177
Nudging 154
Primitives (see Primitives)
Reloading (see Reload Layer)
Replacing 182-183, 380, 384-386
Resetting 68, 171
Shape 369-372
Smooth Shading 253
Stats 178
Visibility 170
Understanding 369-372
Offset 252, 255
Orbit Camera 97, 101, 121-123
Open By Layers 73, 180-181, 380-381
OpenGL 15
Enabling Textures & Reflections 230
Hi-Quality 130, 397
P
Palette checkbox 249
Palette Commands popup 245
Pivot Point
of a Set 109, 170, 362-364
of an Object 155
of multiple Objects 155
Pop Art looks 334-336
Primary selection 55, 61, 163-164, 168-169, 176, 240
Previewing
Animation 49
Final render quality (see Rendering, Test)
Primitives 307-309, 373-375
Profiles (see Edges, Profiles)
R
Raster images
as input artwork 29, 263, 392-393
(also see Texture maps)
Red Ball button 88, 118
Recenter Pivot 86, 155, 362-364
Reflections, Moving 316
Reflectivity 221-222
Reload Custom Edges 265-266
Reload Layer 73, 177, 180-181
Rendering
Aborting 35, 114
Final 50
Hi-Quality OpenGL 130, 347
423
(Rendering)
RAM Previews 49
Test 35, 119
Size 40
Render Farming 321
Replace (see Object, Replacing)
Reset button
in AE 114, 171
in Set-Up window 68, 171
Resetting
objects to original position 68, 171
animation parameters 114, 171
Roll tool
Camera 81, 124
Numeric Entry 178
Objects 156
Sets 81
S
Saving
Camera Views 85, 129
Project Data ASCII/Binary 254
Projects 36
Light swatches (see Lights, Swatches)
Lighting Styles (see Lighting Styles, Saving)
Materials (see Materials, Saving)
Object Styles (see Object Styles, Saving)
Scale
Numeric Entry 178
Objects 88, 162, 370, 371
Sets 83
Scans, using 392-393
Scene Preview button 59
Scene Preview window 42, 43, 48, 57, 78, 119
424
Scene Set-Up 22
Secondary selection 61, 163-164
Selecting
Deselect/Select All 165
Lights 86
Objects 64, 67
Swatches 200, 201
Sets 84, 86
with the Manipulation tools 166
Set-Up window 42, 51-59, 88, 118, 176
Set Mode 79
Sets
Animating 33-34, 106-110
Assigning Objects to 106, 169-170, 250
Default Assignment 250-251
Defined 360-361
Position 107-108
Resetting 114, 171
Rotation 108-109
Scale 110
Selecting 84, 86
Setting Pivot Points 362-364
Shadows (see Lights, Shadows)
Show Ground Plane 255
Shortcut keys 403-405
Solid (see New Solid)
Spheres (see Primitives)
Spikes 390-392
Spike Buster 188-190
Split Point 59, 242-244
Split Tool 241, 242-244
Spot Lights 136-138
Surface Set up 22
Swap Materials 246
T
Test button (see Rendering, Test)
Text Objects 29, 72, 300-305, 379
Texture Maps 202, 205, 206-231
(also see Layer Maps)
Bump Maps 217-218
Choosing/Changing 200
Clearing/Deleting 229
Decal Maps 213-214
Enabling 210
How Color Channels Are Used 226-227
Highlight Maps 317-319
Image Maps 212
not stored in project 174
Reflection Maps 221, 222
Seeing in Draft mode 230
Sizing 207-208
Transparency Maps 219-220
Wrapping 219-220
Time Layout Window 48
Toolbar
for Scene Preview 43, 119
for Material Set-Up 242
Track tool
Camera 124
Numeric Entry 178
Object 156
Sets 81
Tracking AE’s 3D Planes 344-355
Transparency 219-220
Troubleshooting 398-402
Tumble Tool
Camera 48, 80, 121-123
Lights 134-135
Numeric Entry 178
Objects 155
Sets 80
TV Screens, making 337
U
Undo/Redo 43, 244, 378
Use Comp Camera 89-95
Use Comp Lights 89-90
Use Illustrator Colors 74, 382
User Prefs
button 175, 250
defaults 251
window 250
V
Vector files 379-383
Views... (see Camera, Views popup)
W
Wireframe 80, 322-329
Z
Zoom tool
in Scene Preview window 84, 127
in Material Set-Up window 245
425
NOTES
426
NOTES
NOTES
NOTES
427
NOTES
428
NOTES

AE 4.0 Invig. Manual TOC.03z.indd

Transcription

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