Water Fluid Effects

[David Sander]

I've used EI since 1997, but I don't use it full time. I am a VFX artist for films and TV, and use Adobe After Effects as my primary tool. I use EI whenever I need to do 3D, and for the most part it performs admirably.

I've had a look through this forum, and as it's 3am my brain's probably not coming up with the right search terms, so I figured I should ask, as in all my time I have never had to think about this particular detail of a job.

I have a film sequence with a guy slashing at enemies with a sword. The director wants splashes of blood to fly out of the wounds as they're inflicted (effectively a "splatter" effect - during the shoot they opted to not have blood-pack squibs). I have already experimented with an unlit water bottle full of paint shot against a lit white backdrop (so I can extract a luma-key). My next thought is to try some 3D, but neither Psunami or the various blob tools really seem appropriate to create the effect of a fluid flying through the air. I've never managed to master Dante enough for this sort of exercise, and Dante's not really designed to deal with viscosity controls and breaking up of larger blobs into smaller ones.

I've seen very nice fluids clips on iStockPhoto created in Maya or Max or possibly even Blender, my enquiry is if anyone has a sure-fire way to create cool moving fluid effects in EI that I could use to create gushing blood/gore from wounds in 3D?

[Tomas Egger]

Ola,

Are the shots filmed in Slow motion?

Right now, I can think in animate Ubershape Spheres and use Blob maker (meta balls).

http://www.eias3d.com/products/konkeptoine-plugins/blobmaker/

or a more complex one, use realflow and Blair’s free importer plug-in.

http://www.northernlights3d.com/

Thanks

Tom

[David Sander]

Ola,

Are the shots filmed in Slow motion?

Right now, I can think in animate Ubershape Spheres and use Blob maker (meta balls).

http://www.eias3d.com/products/konkeptoine-plugins/blobmaker/

or a more complex one, use realflow and Blair’s free importer plug-in.

http://www.northernlights3d.com/

Hi Tom,

All the sequences are shot in real time, which is a mercy.

I haven't got Realflow and can't actually find where to download it on the NorthernLights website.

David

[RichardJoly]

David, RealFlow is from NextLimit technologies. www.realflow.com

NorthernLights provides the import/export plugin, you will find it in the Download area (fill up the form) www.northernlights3d.com

You can also do it in post, do you know about Video Copilot? They have fantastics tutorials and a product that might do the job you need: https://www.videocopilot.net/products/action2/

There is also Particular: http://www.redgiantsoftware.com/products/all/trapcode-particular/

[David Sander]

David, RealFlow is from NextLimit technologies. www.realflow.com

NorthernLights provides the import/export plugin, you will find it in the Download area (fill up the form) www.northernlights3d.com

You can also do it in post, do you know about Video Copilot? They have fantastics tutorials and a product that might do the job you need: https://www.videocopilot.net/products/action2/

There is also Particular: http://www.redgiantsoftware.com/products/all/trapcode-particular/

Thank you for that.

RealFlow looks amazing, but for a price tag of $4k I'll just use a bottle of coloured water against a backlit white cyc shot with my Canon 5D (the client just isn't paying enough to justify that expense). I have Trapcode Particular, so I can certainly add some additional drops and stuff where necessary, but I felt it wasn't up to the challenge (whereas RealFlow would certainly be).

Thanks so much for the heads-up though, there's some beautiful looking clips on YouTube featuring work done using RealFlow.

David

[bwcc]

it sounds like you might be able to use Dervish linked to BlobMaker. I also use resequencer to randomize the polygons to the source model. the With Dervish you can set the how and where the blobs land and they will stay put.

I wish there were better controls in Dervish to affect the transition. And, if the S. Factor in Blobmaker actually worked I think the result would look much more fluid like.

bw

[S. Houtzager]

Some people are using the free Blender to do fluid animations and then importing that into EI. There is a video in the tutorials section of someone using an older blender fluid animation and importing into EI.

http://www.eias3d.com/category/video-tutorials/eias-workflow/

[Frankg]

Some people are using the free Blender to do fluid animations and then importing that into EI. There is a video in the tutorials section of someone using an older blender fluid animation and importing into EI.

http://www.eias3d.com/category/video-tutorials/eias-workflow/

Yes, blenders fluid simulation works fine. The vid is by me:)

The newer blender has a more common GUI.

regards

Frankg

[Guest supernova]

my go to software is particle illusion... they have dozens of presets you can tweak and composite in ae and add details where needed... ive had luck with splatter and fluid effects with shade shape from reel smart applied to it to add additional specular liquid reality...