Jason Fletcher of the Hayden in Boston has started a great new blog of production techniques at thefulldomeblog.com So far it tends towards the advanced end of the scale, but very worth a look for any skill level. (Meanwhile, I’ll likely be sticking to more of the budget / beginner side of things!)
The good folks at Ott Planetarium have posted an entire online course on 3D modeling in Blender, including production for planetariums and Science on a Sphere. It’s complete with instructional videos, lesson files, and a discussion forum. Take a look!
OK, this has nothing to do with fulldome, but I can’t resist linking to this tutorial for using After Effects to create TOS/TNG style phaser beams, as well as the kind preferred by that lens-flare guy.
(In fairness, I hear that the new Trek movie has 75% less lens flare. I’m waiting for confirmation of it having a discernible plot…)
For those of you cool enough to be working with 6-camera GoPro video rigs, Kolor Autopano Video looks like an interesting application to stitch the six camera views together, using the audio signal as a synchronizing cue.
The video samples look impressive – and don’t forget to click the tiny button on the lower right to select different mapping views, including Fisheye and Little Planet!
One of the samples, taken on a hike in the Pyrenees, suffers from the camera being handheld – you definitely see tearing with the footsteps. Not sure if that is a limitation of the physical rig or the software. Still, pretty cool looking.
(I couldn’t get the videos on the site to run on the Safari browser. Try Chrome or Firefox.)
This is a sample project demonstrating a method to create editable scrolling credits using After Effects and a fulldome plugin. The credits are scrolled through AE’s “3D” space, and the fulldome plugin stitches together views from a multiple camera rig.
The sample uses the E&S Full Dome Assembler plugin, but should be easily adapted for the Navegar plugin as well.
Jason Fletcher gave his permission for me to post his custom Maya fulldome camera here. Thanks Jason!
Here is a custom Maya camera I’ve made for our fulldome productions. Just import and go!
Notes:
- Uses an aim/up to point the camera. It is applied in a way that allows you to aim the camera and not worry about the camera Z rolling within 180° field of view.
- Hemicube camera parented within fisheye camera (and hidden). It uses the fisheye aim. So if you need to switch over and use hemicube cam for whatever reason, then its there and waiting for ya!
- Includes a dome visualization on camera that isn’t selectable. It just to let you know where the camera is facing. Its also helpful as a guide to see where the springline hits in a scene. I called it the “FYI”.
- Click the camera to see the custom attributes: FYI scale, FYI visibility, FYI Uni Helper, Cam Locator Scale, and Custom Roll. Includes the ability to scale the camera locator without affecting the cam scaleXYZ. Changing scale XYZ changes how textures are affected at rendertime.
- Preset DomeAFL settings
- Its by no means perfect and definitely has a gimbal-lock-camera-flip if you go past 180°, but it works well if you know its limits. Play around with it and you will quickly understand.
Grab it here!
Just out of discussions at IMERSA 2013*, Jason Fletcher of the Charles Hayden Planetarium has started up a new mailing list called FAR – the Fulldome Animators Resource. It’s for the express purpose of sharing techniques amongst fulldome animators. Sign up here:
https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups#!forum/fulldomeanimators
*Wish I could have gone to IMERSA this year. Sounds like it was a great conference. As it was, I was on deadline finishing up my own production work!
As noted elsewhere, Blender now has a 180 degree fisheye ‘lens’, ready for use in fulldome. Dalai Felinto has some details and links. Check out his Blender and Domes tags for more interesting stuff.
A tutorial! Finally!
In my efforts to put up a video podcast tutorial – my first – I’ve so far discovered that I talk too much. Or at least, I wrote too much for me to easily speak without making more voice stumbles than I’m comfortable with. Further, my ability to read and talk and point and click at the same time is severely limited. I never got more than five minutes into a take before realizing how much editing I’d have to do just to get it presentable, and – long story short – many months of procrastination ensued.
So instead I’ll be putting all the details in text, and below you’ll find a quick bare-bones video that just gives you the step-by-step process. One of these days maybe I’ll find my voice for smooth off-the-cuff podcasting. It will take some practice. I’ll even one day record an introduction that doesn’t include an apology for the overall roughness of the finished product. Am I overthinking all of this? Yup. – Drew
So it’s not all that exciting an effect, but I’d like to share the first thing I do whenever I start a new fulldome project in After Effects, which is create the dome frame – the border that defines the circular shape of the fulldome image. (I suppose the word ‘frame’ could be a little confusing because it could also refer to a single frame of animation, but I’m sticking with it anyway. If there’s an ‘official’ name for this thing I’d be curious to know. I looked in the draft specs of the IMERSA standards document and didn’t see it specifically referenced, so maybe there isn’t yet a name.)
The dome frame is the topmost layer in any fulldome project. It helps us determine where the edge of scene is while we’re animating, and masks out anything that falls beyond. Plus, without it, you risk having a little bit of video data spilling over the edge of your dome, if your projectors aren’t perfectly masked off.
The dome frame also happens to provide a handy place to put some metadata about the show: the frame number and time code, the name of the show, your logo, and so on. Added bonus: if you put all of these layers together into one comp along with your audio track, you won’t have to worry about syncing audio with your time code again. Trim or move the dome frame comp around all you like – it won’t matter, your time code and your audio stay together.
Giant Nikon 6mm fisheye lens. Only $160,000.