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Shake, Combustion or After Effects?

M

magicjames92

macrumors regular
Original poster
Apr 15, 2007
228
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I want to make a video with green screen, and lightsaber style effects. I have a macbok 2ghz intel core 2 duo with final cut express. I assume that the only extra software i need is shake or after effects (correct me if im wrong), and will they work with fce? Which should i get for my needs, etc? thx!
edit: or combustion
 
Either of them would work and the question you should be asking yourself is what else you are going to be using the software for. My guess is that After Effects would be better for you and it is a good all around program. Shake is designed with compositing in mind, so it's green screen plug ins are much more robust than After Effects', but it does not work as well with motion graphics.

P-Worm
 
the only problem was that i was hoping to get it soon so i could use it over the summer, and after effects doesnt run on intel macs till july...
 
Shake is good but a big learning curve is needed, After Effects isn't that great for Chroma Key, rubbish infact, I've been producing weather graphics in After Effects all Chroma Keyed and it doesn't look good at all.....

Try Motion or Combustion they are far superior and do a much better job at Chroma, they have been designed for advanced compositing and they are still completely supported and developed by the developers.
 
ezekielrage_99 said:
Shake is good but a big learning curve is needed, After Effects isn't that great for Chroma Key, rubbish infact, I've been producing weather graphics in After Effects all Chroma Keyed and it doesn't look good at all.....

Try Motion or Combustion they are far superior and do a much better job at Chroma, they have been designed for advanced compositing and they are still completely supported and developed by the developers.
Click to expand...

Both motion (in fc studio) and combustion are a little too high priced. What is chroma key? (im a newb still learning) Have you tried shake? Is it pretty tough to teach yourself?
 
magicjames92 said:
Both motion (in fc studio) and combustion are a little too high priced. What is chroma key? (im a newb still learning) Have you tried shake? Is it pretty tough to teach yourself?
Click to expand...

Chroma Key is just blue or green screen.

Shake I have found has a pretty steep learning curve, Motion might be the better option because it intergrates with Final Cut very well and it will do Chroma very well (from my understanding).

If you're a student you should be able to get a copy of Combustion at a student or educational price (which hopefully is a lot less), any pro software will have some sort of a learning curve associated with it the choice to make is to pick one that can do what you need easily and has good resource (e.g. tutorials and manuals) with it.
 
ezekielrage_99 said:
Chroma Key is just blue or green screen.

Shake I have found has a pretty steep learning curve, Motion might be the better option because it intergrates with Final Cut very well and it will do Chroma very well (from my understanding).

If you're a student you should be able to get a copy of Combustion at a student or educational price (which hopefully is a lot less), any pro software will have some sort of a learning curve associated with it the choice to make is to pick one that can do what you need easily and has good resource (e.g. tutorials and manuals) with it.
Click to expand...

im in 9th grade going on 10th, so usually no discounts... It's horrible how many different apps there are and how expensive they are, it's like they want u to use a torrent, lol.
 
magicjames92 said:
im in 9th grade going on 10th, so usually no discounts... It's horrible how many different apps there are and how expensive they are, it's like they want u to use a torrent, lol.
Click to expand...

Yeah thats what I use to do at University......

I was a bad little boy :D


Still you can get a tryout version of Combustion from the Autodesk web site which you can use for up to 30 days if that's any help.
 
A friend of mine uses after effects for his light saber effects and they look great. I'm sure shake could probably do the trick also, it comes down to personal preferance.
 
So here's my options:
Combustion - Good for __? $1000 Is this app universal? (intel compatible)
After Effects - Easy to use, lightsaber effects, doesn't come out till july , hopefully can get education price $350 or full $1000
Shake - Good for green screen, tough to learn $500

Which do you guys think I should get? :confused: :apple:
 
I personally love Shake, but I am guessing the After Effects is the right program for you because it is easier to learn, powerful, and very versitile. You have the added benifit of having a load of tutorials on the internet for After Effects that you can't find as easy for porgrams like Shake and Combustion. I would recomend After Effects to you.

P-Worm
 
ezekielrage_99 said:
Shake is good but a big learning curve is needed, After Effects isn't that great for Chroma Key, rubbish infact, I've been producing weather graphics in After Effects all Chroma Keyed and it doesn't look good at all.....
Click to expand...

I'm surprised you are having trouble w/AE as it's widely used for pulling keys.


Lethal
 
I would go with AE if I was you, and if you can find some kind of free update to AE CS3 if you buy AE7 now, I would go for it as AE7 will run fast enough on your intel machine to accomplish what you are looking to do.
 
It seems AE is preferred. Can anyone confirm it works on intel macs or explain to me what won't work. Thx!
Ps- of what you showed I liked the shake tutorial cause it had pics :D :p
 
magicjames92 said:
It seems AE is preferred. Can anyone confirm it works on intel macs or explain to me what won't work. Thx!
Ps- of what you showed I liked the shake tutorial cause it had pics :D :p
Click to expand...

I'm running the AE CS3 beta on my Mac Pro at the moment and it's blazing fast. AE 7 on the other hand... was not so blazing fast. :p However, the beta is available from Adobe Labs, you just need to sign up and you can download it and try it out.
 
killmoms said:
I'm running the AE CS3 beta on my Mac Pro at the moment and it's blazing fast. AE 7 on the other hand... was not so blazing fast. :p However, the beta is available from Adobe Labs, you just need to sign up and you can download it and try it out.
Click to expand...

can u tell me more about the beta? (how long you get it, is it buggy, etc)
EDIT- i looked and u have to have ae 7, which i dont
 
After Effects option

If you decide to go the After Effects route, the best tutorial I've found for Lightsabers can be found at:

videocopilot.net

Scroll down to tutorial #20 (you'll see that you can download a preset which will do some of the work for you). Haven't used Shake or Combustion.

There's actually a chroma key tutorial (#10) but it assumes some familiarity with After Effects.
 
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