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Yoavier
Participating Frequently
November 10, 2017
Answered

Golden Touch Effect

  • November 10, 2017
  • 2 replies
  • 477 views

Heya!

I am looking to create a golden touch effect - based on Midas' golden touch story, for a short film I am making.

I was wondering if there is an easy way for making a good golden look to everyday objects using AE.

I assume I can mask out the hands and the person touching the objects and track it to exclude him from the effects, but I am struggling to find good effects to make the objects seem golden.

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance!

    This topic has been closed for replies.
    Correct answer Rick Gerard

    The adjustment layers are for creating the mattes and emphasizing different parts of the blend modes. The gold color is just a yellow or orange solid with a mask and an overlay blend mode.

    If you want to get reflections you'll need to pick some footage or paint something, make it black and white then mask it to fit and use the multiply or screen blend mode to create the fake reflections. If you want to do something advanced like make your Midas actors face show up in a reflection you'll have to film the face, distort it so that the distortion matches the object that has turned gold, make tie footage black and white then use a blend mode to add it to the gold colored layer already put on top of the object in the scene.

    If your camera is moving you have just added to the complexity because you are going to have to do some tracking, maybe camera tracking, maybe motion stabilizing and then adding the motion back into the scene so the "gold" stays stuck. If you have used a zoom lens you now have other problems pulling off the composite.

    This kind of composite is created using multiple layers, blend modes, roto (masking) and opacity changes. A little color correction can also go a long way to making it work. There is no "effect" you can just apply and get the job done with one or two layers. I did a complex composite the other day that had 94 layers in a six-second comp by the time I was done. Almost every one of those layers used some kind of masking and a blend mode in addition to effects to pull off the composite. The master shot had 8 different objects that needed to be tracked and I needed to camera track the shot also to match some perspective. Just an actor walking down a sidewalk, but almost everything around him needed to be changed.

    2 replies

    R
    Community Expert
    Rick GerardCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    November 10, 2017

    Adding the color is a matter of roto, blend modes, adjustment layers, maybe some track mattes from the original footage to emphasize shadows. This step gets me the first pass at a basic gold color. Imagine that her sleeve had been turned to gold and it was slowly spreading.

    Creating a fairly convincing color change is pretty easy. Now comes the hard part. If something really turned gold it would be reflective. This means not only would it be bouncing light on to my actor's face and clothes, but you would expect to see some specular highlights as her arm moves around. The bounced light would require some more roto, blurred masks and adjustment layers of overlays with blend modes and opacity adjustments. The real challenge would be the reflections and specular highlights. These could involve some displacement maps, more blend modes, some more masking, blurs and maybe a little hand painting. Fortunately, you could use the original rotoscope of the arm to do your masking. It all depends on how you want the shot to look when you are done.

    I guess my point is that there is no one click one layer solution.

    Y
    YoavierAuthor
    Participating Frequently
    November 10, 2017

    Hey, firstly thanks - this gave me a good idea with the color part

    I'm actually only looking to do it on solid objects and not actors - so the reflection and highlights changing shouldn't be a problem as everything is solid as soon as it turns gold.

    Do you have any recommendations for making the solid objects reflective?

    Also with the beginning part - what exactly do I need to do to give the object the basic gold color? is it a mix of 1 or more adjustment layers with different colors or are there any other tricks for it?

    Thanks!

    R
    Community Expert
    Rick GerardCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
    Community Expert
    November 11, 2017

    The adjustment layers are for creating the mattes and emphasizing different parts of the blend modes. The gold color is just a yellow or orange solid with a mask and an overlay blend mode.

    If you want to get reflections you'll need to pick some footage or paint something, make it black and white then mask it to fit and use the multiply or screen blend mode to create the fake reflections. If you want to do something advanced like make your Midas actors face show up in a reflection you'll have to film the face, distort it so that the distortion matches the object that has turned gold, make tie footage black and white then use a blend mode to add it to the gold colored layer already put on top of the object in the scene.

    If your camera is moving you have just added to the complexity because you are going to have to do some tracking, maybe camera tracking, maybe motion stabilizing and then adding the motion back into the scene so the "gold" stays stuck. If you have used a zoom lens you now have other problems pulling off the composite.

    This kind of composite is created using multiple layers, blend modes, roto (masking) and opacity changes. A little color correction can also go a long way to making it work. There is no "effect" you can just apply and get the job done with one or two layers. I did a complex composite the other day that had 94 layers in a six-second comp by the time I was done. Almost every one of those layers used some kind of masking and a blend mode in addition to effects to pull off the composite. The master shot had 8 different objects that needed to be tracked and I needed to camera track the shot also to match some perspective. Just an actor walking down a sidewalk, but almost everything around him needed to be changed.

    P.M.B
    P.M.B
    Legend
    November 10, 2017

    It really depends on what you mean by "objects".  Are they 2d, 3d, photographs, cartoons, do they have alpha channels, etc...?

    You need to be specific.   Simply asking "what's the best way turn an "object" gold is a fail.  Ae does not use "objects" it uses various types of digital media

    files and the characteristics of those files are critical.   Try again.

    ~Gutterfish
    Y
    YoavierAuthor
    Participating Frequently
    November 10, 2017

    I am talking about footage - I want to apply this effect to camera footage, a hand touching an object and the object turning into gold.

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