Skip to main content
Foamboard
Foamboard
Participant
January 4, 2017
Answered

How to: retro style lo-fi graphics

  • January 4, 2017
  • 3 replies
  • 4489 views

Hi all…

I'm a bit of a newbie in after effects so my apologies right off the bat if this is a simple/dumb question…

How would I go about achieving the effects found in this music video? I am particularly interested in the white star graphic on the left side of the screen and the multicolor outline of the subject on the right side of the screen at 3:33 into the video.  Here is the link…

The Asteroids Galaxy Tour - Around The Bend - YouTube

Thanks!!

Shawn

    This topic has been closed for replies.
    Correct answer Mylenium

    Straight to the point: Those appear to be effects based on GenArts Sapphire, a commercial third-party plug-in suite. There are plasma effects in there and a temporal echo/ feedback effect with color shifts. It would not be impossible to re-create them natively in AE, but to be honest "I'm a bit of a newbie" would make any elaborate explanation like pulling teeth because you won't understand much we are saying. For the colored contours you would have to start by isolating your talents and that alone would require studying some tutorials. You might want to start with those basics. Even if you had Sapphire (feel free to explore and exploit the time-limited demo), those prerequisites would still persist.

    Mylenium

    3 replies

    Foamboard
    FoamboardAuthor
    Participant
    January 5, 2017

    Awesome. Thank you both for taking time to give a reply. I've been working with the Adobe creative suite programs (e.g. - photoshop, premiere, dreamweaver, etc) for quite some time, so I'm familiar with the "feel" of the Adobe programs. After Effects clearly has quite a steep learning curve, but the results are too fun not to attempt to climb it.

    Cheers!

    Shawn

    Mylenium
    MyleniumCorrect answer
    Legend
    January 5, 2017

    Straight to the point: Those appear to be effects based on GenArts Sapphire, a commercial third-party plug-in suite. There are plasma effects in there and a temporal echo/ feedback effect with color shifts. It would not be impossible to re-create them natively in AE, but to be honest "I'm a bit of a newbie" would make any elaborate explanation like pulling teeth because you won't understand much we are saying. For the colored contours you would have to start by isolating your talents and that alone would require studying some tutorials. You might want to start with those basics. Even if you had Sapphire (feel free to explore and exploit the time-limited demo), those prerequisites would still persist.

    Mylenium

    R
    Community Expert
    Rick GerardCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    January 5, 2017

    Mylenium gives some good advice. I was trying to point out in my explanation that this kind of stuff is not for the faint of heart or those not willing to spend some serious time figuring out how visual effects and compositing work. If learning to edit is like driving a car in the church parking lot on a Saturday afternoon with your mom giving you advice then visual effects and compositing can be like flying an F-18 off the deck of a career in a hurricane at night. You can do both efficiently and safely but one requires knowing where all the switches are and a bunch of practice. I'd say it would take most newbies about a week of dedicated study to just find most of the switches in AE. Pardon my plagiarism....

      R
      Community Expert
      Rick GerardCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      January 5, 2017

      There are dozens of effects in your sample. It would take a week to outline the steps required for all of them. Most are simply repeated graphics (shape layers), echo, and channel effects. None of them are one click wonders. They all require some procedure.

      The first step in breaking down an effect is to analyze the frame and see what is going on. Here's the frame:

      The most obvious is that the actor is cut out of the background. The second is that there are different color channels trailing behind the actor as he moves. The third is the repeating star, the fourth is the vertical lines. The edges of the star and the vertical lines are interacting so there are some blend modes going on. Here's how I would start:

      1. Key out the actor or rotoscope (depends on how the footage was shot) and put that on the top layer
      2. Make a duplicate copy of the actor only layer and experiment use shift channels to isolate the RGB colors so you only have one color on the layer (colorama would also be an interesting thing to try)
      3. Duplicate the copy two more times and set to the other colors
      4. You might even want to experiment with the echo effect
      5. Move on to the star layer when you are close to being done with the actor
      6. Create a star shape layer and use a repeater to create and move the duplicates
      7. Add Venetian blinds to a light colored solid and set it up to give you the horizontal lines you want
      8. Start adding blurs and experimenting with the screen and add blend modes to copies of the star shape layer and the venetian blinds layer
      9. Start polishing the color grading of all the layers as needed

      There you go.. That's how to get started.

        Terms & ConditionsAccessibility statement
        Using the community Terms of use Privacy Cookie preferences Do not sell or share my personal information ad choicesAdChoices