Effects help for video

[fakehand]

Hi, I'm a beginner in After Effects. I'm helping out some guys with a video. They would like a white flash effect to signify memory or a flashback. How would I do that?
Also, they're gonna have a dead guy laying on the ground, zoom into his wide open eye and inside that eye is video footage. It zooms in until the video footage in the eye takes up the entire screen. How would that work?

Thank you.

 

[maruyama]

Flashback.

This is more of an editorial change (just white with transparency), but I would create something based on the image instead.

Try using a combination of LEVELS, BLUR and BRIGHTNESS/CONTRAST (this can be done in an editor as well) on the footage leading into your cross dissolve for your flashback.

------------

Zoom to dead guy.

Here's your homework. Turn on a Disney cable network for kids (or catch ABCKids on Saturday morning). Watch AT LEAST one half hour of the show called "That's So Raven". You may want to record it so you can step through the frames.

I'm not going to reveal how it's done, but it's pretty obvious, and you'll be able to figure it out in a few minutes.... making it look good may be the hard part.

Good luck.


Ko Maruyama
Free Tutorials

http://homepage.mac.com/komaruyama/Tutorials

 

[fakehand]

I'm having a difficult time with the zoom to dead guy part. And I'm on a tight deadline. I feel like I've figured out how it's done on other projects I have, but I can't get it to work on this one. Does it have to do with track mattes?

 

[maruyama]

Sorry I couldn't get back to this post sooner.

I hope it all worked out for the best.

"ZOOM TO DEAD GUY" - we need a reference image or movie.

Ko Maruyama
Free Tutorials

http://homepage.mac.com/komaruyama/Tutorials

 

[fakehand]

It turned out well. The guys seem to be impressed with what I've done. Though, now they're complaining about the render quality. I compressed it too much and the video quality is significantly different from the rest of the video footage.

I can't remember exactly how I made it work. Track mattes, the pen tool, and scale/anchor point/opacity keys were pretty much the gist.

I appreciate the help.