iTunes recent plays

Working hard this week… the whole team is slamming out a ton of videos / pieces over the next few weeks at NewSpring. As Perry often says, something coming up here than you've probably never seen before. Today, I'm behind After Effects building some scenes for …

tech overkill.

I'm all about screen space, but this is ridiculous.

old and new art

Just a few pretty things I found on the internet: You can't smell these, but it's a nice comprehensive digest of scratch 'n sniff stickers from the past. I remember sweet corn, leather, and dill pickle… those stand out from my childhood.

Next, the belt buckles …

America?s Idol open

Enjoy the America's Idol open, and as promised last week, here are the design notes. (note, quite a bit changed when I started working on it from what I had in my notes, but it's about the process).

Pierre Michael

I saw a clip created by Pierre Michael on Trapcode's site today. This clip (careful, it's a large Quicktime video) is a work of beauty. And to know that he built it entirely in After Effects (using Trapcode plugins) amazes me.

After Effects CS3 beta.

It's here, get it now. (did I mention it's a 1 GB download).

youthoughtwewouldn?tnotice

You Thought We Wouldn't Notice, a blog of design rip-offs.

new york to paris

This is great. Google Maps give you directions from New York to Paris. Be sure to read direction step number 23… it's crucial.

AE CS3

Today's news in After Effects CS3 beta… I got it installed. Installation relatively easy, no crashes or hangups. I've been digging into the new features. These aren't pretty, but do show some of the new features.

The Shape layer:

Allows you to draw vector elements …

Streets comp 01

Here's a comp from a piece the team is working. You may recognize the hand writing from our walls of NewSpring. Wanna see the rest, get here next week.

pig roast

Today, we're hard at work getting the house ready for the pig roast. The entire production team is descending upon my house on Saturday to dine on swine, and the cooking festivities kick off tonight with an elite team of expert pig cookers staying up all night to tend …

Team Board.

Meet the team board. We have a saying (or not really, but I say it). "You're not just a name in a database, you're a name on a big white board." We started using this board for several reasons a few months ago and it's proving successful. Why do we have the team …

obelisk chairs

Too bad my birthday has already passed (and I don't have $9k to spare)… these Obelisk Chairs would make a great addition to, well, anything.

Pig Roast 2007

Pig Roast 2007 was a huge success. I'll be blogging the finer points later, but for now I'm totally exhausted and ready for bed. In the meantime, this photo says it all.

(or was it this photo?)

(or the CSI shot of the evening)

In the end, everybody was served and had …

tronic / target

What a beautiful, great piece by tronic for Target.

AE tip. fade object with camera distance.

I'm building a piece at the moment that requires some 30-40 layers to be positioned in 3d space. I want them to fade in to view as they approach the camera. Sure, you can do this by hand, but that would be tedious, and what if you want to change it as the composition …

Final cut to AE script.

Nice free script for exporting Final Cut sequences to After Effects. That's all I have time for today, but it's a time-saver if I ever saw one.

screenwashes.

We call them "prereels" or "announcements." Turns out, the proper term is "screenwashes" and you can read about the art of screenwashes here.

new techerie

I got some new Techerie delivered today, a bluetooth apple mighty mouse. Mmmhmm

workin' it up

Today, workin' it. I'm playing catch up from this week, as I had some family business to attend to. I'm putting on the final gloss layers of the America's Idol open at the moment. Come see, www.avclub.us