VFX

Visual effects are becoming the new standard for all the new up and coming films and other video productions. These effects are what make these films and other compositions recognizable and remember able. Most notably of these would be movies like Transformers, Harry Potter, and 2012. These visual effects are not just limited to major motion pictures, with some practice you too could use these skills to create your own home movies, create advertisements for television, or even create motion graphics for you company. In order to create these visual effects you will need the following: A video camera, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe After Effects, any high-end video editing software (Final cut pro, Premier, etc…), and a computer strong enough to run all of these programs together. After shooting your footage, you take your footage into Final Cut Pro for example, and lay out the footage, as you want it to be seen in the final product. Once you have your footage laid out to your liking, you can then go into Adobe after effects and create your special effects such as color correction, adding in lens flares, explosions, and many other effects. (Use Photoshop to create any textures or effects you will use, like for example, you can create a fake muzzle flash in Photoshop, and then use it as an effect in after effects.) After you have added your effects just reopen your project in whatever video editing software you are using and render the final footage!

By adding visual effects to your ads, home videos, and other projects your projects will be more interesting and will grab more people’s attention. What are some other projects you can think of adding visual effects to in order to make them more interesting?

Written by: Joey Harrell