
As with all graphics on Fox Classics, the palette for this spot was restricted to orange, black and white. Being that this is Sunday “Night” at the Movies, it made the most sense to use black as the base color. Most of these movies are from the 60’s/70’s and when I heard the music (The Supremes) I thought of one of those old 70’s-style beaded door curtains and decided to use that as the basis of the design. Instead of beads I made an old-style TV screen shape in Illustrator and copied it as a mask into After Effects. Each bead layer was positioned in 3D space with the following expression applied to the Y-Rotation property to make it spin gently back and forth:
offset = index;
Math.sin(time + offset)*50
Making “index” the offset means that when one layer is duplicated it won’t rotate identically to the next. Change the “50” value for more or less rotation. You can also adjust the Y-Orientation value separately for more control over the look.
This next expression was applied to the Scale property of the rotating TV screens. This flips a layer depending on whether it’s facing the camera or not and ensures a text/image layer isn’t presented backwards when it spins around:
[(toCompVec([0, 0, 1])[2] > 0 ? 1 : -1) * scale[0], scale[1], scale[2]]
I wanted these movies to look like new releases so color graded them heavily to freshen them up. To add glamour I used Knoll Light Factory for the background flares and Tinderbox Starfield (now obsolete) combined with After Effects Camera Lens Blur for the blurred lights – which also add depth to the spot.
I get 1st post cause I pay attention to good shit. Finely done old man, looks sweet. One day you will catch up to me… lol
can you make a tutorial for this
No plans to write a full tutorial but I’ll post some more info including the expressions I used.
excellent spot. nice and simple yet catchy.
i noticed that as you move on, in the distance, the tim curry character from rocky horror picture show disappears. that dont on purpose? or did the layer end a tad bit short?
i LOVE that frame blending look on paul newman and robert redford.
Really awesome! Simple yet so effective!
Fantastic J!!! You’re always a big inspiration for me.
Did you link the flare to the camera or was it hand keyframed?
Thanks Andy,
The flares were keyframed manually.
Does anyone know what the actual theme song for Fox classics is? It’s stuck in my head since I saw the new commercial, which is how I happened upon this site. Great artwork by the way, I really like the new ad.
The song is called “Forever Came Today” by the Supremes.
Thank you JD.
Hey jd when i saw the ad the song is a more upbeat version any idea who sings the new one i love it, by the way artwork rocks!
what is that theme song? i have not heard any lyrics on the ad,so can’t look it up and it’s not forever came today.
I love the new ad by the way. it really is great art work
It is definitely “Forever Came Today” by the Supremes, but it was reworked for this spot.
Awsome, a tuto (or maybe the project file) would be very very gratefull
Beautiful! I just love the fluidity and color treatment. So, Master John, will there be a tut or eSeminar? Or perhaps a dvd product for sale that would include five of your top designs and the tuts behind them? I’ve got my credit card out now!
Best,
Gwendolyn
Nice idea Gwendolyn! Beautiful Gravatar by the way, are you a model? Best, John.
Hi John,
(Blush) Thanks for your comment. No, I’m not a model. I only play one on TV. Seriously, if you’d consider
selling a disk of your top designs, your thoughts behind it, work flow, etc., I’d buy it and so would many others.
Thanks for being an inspiration.
G.
Thanks for your input Gwendolyn, I’ll keep it in mind. Best, John.
The work is obviously wonderful, but what I can really appreciate is the quality of your render. Can you tell us how you are rendering out of AE and then how you are compressing it to flash – that would be a very useful information.
I think I speak for most of us that some more info on how to show our work on the web at top clarity as you have here would be very welcomed!
Thanks in advance.
Hello Aviv, I render to mp4 (h264), resave that in Quicktime as .mov and simply change the suffix to .flv. Now that Flash can read h264 it’s as simple as that. Hope that helps, John.
Well done JD!
Thanks Hussin. Best, John.
Awesome John, i love watching your work Sir. Thank you for sharing hwat you, your creativity, is in my opinion – unrivaled!
Thanks for this JD
Looks great.
Your super talented!
John
Any specific reason you didn’t add some ease into the end of the camera moves?
Lou …
you are so great man .and i i thank you very much for your nice and freindly training . may God protect and be gracious to you
kamal from iran
Thank you Kamal. Best wishes, John.
So classy, so classic! I think the optimum speed of the animation helps it look so classy.
John, 2 questions.
1. When do you decide the speed of the animation? Do you keep the music in mind for that?
2. In what format do broadcast folks prefer? Mov – Animation?
Thankx so much.
Hi Hafeez, the speed is completely dictated by the audio track. I generally render to Quicktime Animation, Quicktime PNG or TGA/TIFF sequences. Best, John.
Looks great man!
Thanks Chris.
hope can have a this video tutorial for us….pls!! your tutorial really good and i like it so much!! really helpful!!! Good Job!!!
Sorry Sky, not tutorial planned for this but if you have specific questions let me know. Best wishes, John.
very nice work I hope to publish a toturail of this work