Customer Reviews

Adobe After Effects 7.0 Studio Techniques

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Do you want to know how to create visual effects in detail?Then buy this excellent book that demistifies the realm of visual effects,this book is full of magic (isn't that what you'll want to be "a visual effects magician?")
Section I "Working foundations" reviews fundamentals of AE ,from page 4 till 133 he revisited the effects toolset,the timeline,selections(the key to compositing)and in chapter four(page115)"Optimizing the pipeline"the author examines the flow of data trough AE in specific detail;understanding how to use multiple compositions,knowing when to pre-compose and optimizing the rendering time;this is a great chapter while he explains you the workflow of your project(s) and time saving techniques to organize multiple compositions.
At the end of section I you'll be able to wring the most out of AE and continue in Section II with "Effects Compositing Essentials"(page 137-353)Color and light:adjusting and matching,color keying,rotoscoping and paint,effective motion tracking,virtual cinematography,expressions and issues specific to film and HDR images(chapter wrote by Brendan Bolles).
After this section(where you learned all the stuff and tips and tricks) jump to the final "Creative explorations"(page 375-497)
and meet the "real world"where you apply all the techniques you learned in the 371 previous pages.
Work with light and then create natural elements: replacement skies,mist,fog,smoke,effects of wind and water; create fire effects and explosions,sci-fi weaponry a.s.o(all believable footage!)In the final chapter wrote by Stu Maschwitz)"Learning to See" he focuses on some techniques for honing your eye; this means no compositing techniques but "lifestyle techniques" seeing the shot every time as if for the first time and using the left brain to understand what the right brain sees.
AE Studio Techniques is an amazing book,extremely well colour illustrated and full of notes and tips in the margin and the author Mark Christiansen, the number-one beta tester for AE6.5 gives you a professional approach from within the program,he knows what a visual effects artist needs and he tells it all to us like a magician who want to deal with his public all his knowledge.Thanks Mark!
ps:demo versions of professional tools like AE 6.5 ,Andersson technologies,Red Giant,Artbeats and Trapcode are on the companion cdrom to enhance our work.

Buy this book; its cost (particularly here at Amazon) is trivial compared to the software, and you'll get some important independent opinions and expert advice that, from what I understand, isn't available anywhere else.

In general, I've found the book to be pedagogical, informative and entertaining at the same time. What makes the book unique is Mark Christiansen's opinions. You get the voice of a great deal of experience, giving an independent evaluation of features and organization of After Effects itself, and how this impacts real-world usage. Reading that how certain features were implemented were "weird" was a pleasant surprise in a book published by Adobe Press. In contrast with the user manuals and canned tutorial materials, the book does not automatically assume that how After Effects works is the best way to accomplish certain tasks---in some instances, other software applications are better (e.g. rotoscoping), and Christiansen doesn't hesistate to point that out. What makes the book so useful is that you get an evaluation of After Effects, instead of an automatic assumption that it must be all things to all people. That being said, Christiansen does give it a fair Shake (pun intended :), and the general thrust is that After Effects is no younger sibling to node-based compositors, and it's capable of a lot more than typical users think.

The other major strength to the book is that it's NOT a user manual. Those books, and many about how to use software in general, are feature-descriptive, and organized like the software program in how things are explained. This certainly makes the organization easy to follow (and, I daresay, easier on the authors to write), but isn't necessarily useful for working professionals. What Christiansen has done is give his take on what After Effects can do, as related to a real production environment, and then describes how to do it. Again, it's his evaluative paradigm coming into play here, as he's made a number of decisions on what to cover. This is particularly evident at the beginning, as he explains all of the basic features as relating to how they influence real production. It's eminently practical, and an extremely useful addition to any set of reference materials, since it provides a real-work-driven guide to the entire program.

The shortcomings to the book are few, and ultimately may just be matters of taste. The flipside to having so many opinions is that people will inevitably disagree. My personal preference is to try to have all of the information and opinions at my disposal, which I'm then free to accept or reject, but others may find his opinionated style to be too judgmental; you have been warned. Also, the choice of topics in this book is, as clearly stated in the introduction and its subtitle "definitive guide to creating visual effects", heavily weighted toward visual effects. You will not learn much more about the traditional motion graphics, such as how to apply text effects, than what's in the Classroom-in-a-Book targeted toward absolute beginners. As such, entitling the text "Studio Techniques" may be a bit broader than the book actually delivers. And, finally, the language is strongly weighted toward the jargon in the visual effects community, and is used from the beginning of the book, which total beginners may find somewhat difficult to navigate at the outset.

That being said, I strongly recommend this book to anyone using After Effects at all. It's a detailed reference with a lot of information that will teach you how After Effects is operating beneath the hood. And all of this information, really the entire book, are geared practically toward getting the job done in a real production environment. That will surely be useful, no matter how you choose to operate the program. And, to me, the independent (and entertaining) opinions are extraordinarily valuable in judging both what After Effects can do, and how well it does them.

Overall, I've read very few books about commercial software that are anywhere near as good. It will be a well-used reference on my shelf for a long time to come.

Excellent book! Good quality examples and excellent instruction for those who are looking for a slightly more advanced book and don't want to read 1/2 book on the interface. The author really knows his stuff and it's evident in the text. There are lost of useful things on the DVD too

Practical is without doubt the best way to describe 'Studio Techniques.' Christiansen has written a book filled with very practical and powerful advice that is sure to delight. Learning to create effects is fundamentally all about two things:

1) Learning to think like a visual effects artist

and

2) Learning to think like After Effects

Christiansen does a superb job of melding these two together. His examples, while very useful for their specific results alone, are perhaps more useful in learning how to approach problems and solve them in the After Effects paradigm.

As an added bonus, 'Studio Techniques' is also riddled with very useful tips and notes that provide additional creative insight and warnings on oddities that occur, their cause, and how to solve them.

This is the only book I've come across that is really pushing me beyond the basics of AE and I know I will be referencing it for years to come. Rather than offering specific tutorials, it addresses the fundimentals of what a good comp is and offers techniques that I readily use every day on my current indie feature "Ocatilla Flat". I originally picked up Studio Techniques for 6.5 and was uncertain if it would be worthwhile buying this edition for 7.0, but this current version is one of the best investment I've ever made in respect to my education in AE.

I found the 6.5 edition so useful that I didn't hesitate for a second to order the 7.0 edition (which came out two months after I bought the first edition.)
If you buy it and can later claim that you didn't get your money worth, you should get your eyes examined!

The Adobe After Effects Studio techniques book takes you in a tour to explore what is inside this magnificent program and how to use its capabilities in creating video effects.
The book focused on the video production techniques. The first section introduces the program and its working foundations. While the second section concerns with the effects composting, the third section talks about how to work with light, air, water, smoke, clouds and fire effects.

The book level is for intermediate/ advanced. So, you need to have a background about the After Effects to enjoy reading this book.

This updated edition improves on the 6.5 book in a number of ways. First, you have tutorials to practice the concepts. AE7 added new features that Mark makes sense of, namely 32 bit float. And he expands on topics and details. I literally compared 6.5 to 7, page by page. Though I owned 6.5, it's worth it to get this update, if for the tutorials alone.

This said, no one else has made easier sense of visual effects compositing. No one. All the other books are really directed at Shake. Which is great if you own or understand Shake. But if you own AE7, or the AECS3, you owe it to yourself to get this. You can live without the Classroom in the Book, not Studio Techniques.

As a final digression, this really is like the source for DV Rebel's Guide. They do not overlap material, but DV Rebel's Guide touches on issues that a crucial, but the author rightfully defers to this book for the indepth analysis and practices. So if you want to go further, look to DV Rebel's Guide. And if you got Rebel's guide and are confused by some issues, look here first.

this is without a doubt one of the best if not the best!! learning guides out there..also check out after effects 7.0 classroom in a book.. this brought back enjoyment in reading instead of the garbage i learn from plain old tutorials and worksheets..BUY THIS you'll be happy

Finally, a book for those of us who are already familiar or even very capable with After Effects but still want to push our knowledge even further. If you fall into this category, at the very least you will learn many new highly valuable tips and tricks and will gain a better understanding of After Effects' inner workings. For those of you who are less familiar with After Effects, fret not. The writing style in this book assumes some prior knowledge but even neophytes will find it entertaining, easy to understand and not so brisk as to leave you hanging. You will be able to follow along with even a cursory understanding of After Effects, and little to no prior experience in compositing or visual effects. It's really that good. And in case you're wondering, Mark, Stu and the whole Orphanage crew are the nicest bunch of artists in the industry, and are some of the brightest stars out there. If you're like me and are sick of buying $50 books written by people who don't even seem to understand the subject matter they are "teaching," this book will be a breath of fresh air. From page one you know you are learning from some of the best.

Studio Techniques primarily focuses on using After Effects for the creation of feature film/television special effects such as compositing of green screen footage, integrating 3D elements with live action etc. While similar material might be out there, make no mistake - none of it addresses it from the standpoint of the industry professional quite like this book does. The techniques and requirements of feature film & television projects are a completely different beast, and this book will prepare you for dealing with those real world challenges like no material I have found to date. Every pixel of your work will be examined and scrutinized in dailies, and this book goes deep into the techniques necessary to produce polished, amazing results.

Unlike many books out there, it doesn't just give you a taste of one subject and then move on before you understand the topic at hand. The authors really made sure that this book was comprehensive and effective, sometimes reiterating points too many times just to ensure that you are establishing good workflow practices and that you understand the key points. This aspect of production work can't be emphasized enough, and oddly most material out there glosses over this most important part of VFX work. I have seen many good artists passed over because their organizational and workflow skills were so chaotic that they were more trouble than their artistic abilities could compensate for.

If you are even remotely interested in using After Effects for SpecialFX and compositing work, this is without a doubt the first book to buy. I highly recommend it.