Professional look with After Effects...
 

Hi folks,
I'm a total newbie to live-action so if I've missed an faq about getting a great look with After Effects filters or plug-ins then feel free to ignore my questions and just point me in that direction.

Anyway, I'm an animation director so I'm used to dealing with simple colours etc and I usually do my post work on Adobe After Effects. I'm looking to shoot a no-budget live-action short at the moment with a cheap second-hand camera (most likely a Canon XL-1). Obviously how it is lit and set up will really create the look but I'm wondering if there are specific things that I should be doing in After Effects that I might not realise as a newbie?

Are there basic rules about colour correcting for live-action? How it is done and how to get the best results? Any essential filters that I should be using?

Thanks very much in advance for any assistance,
Jay.

Hi Jay, welcome to the DVInfo.net Community!

This sort of question gets asked often enough that it should be a part of this board's FAQ (currently a work-in-progress)...

In the meantime, you might have a look at this tutorial written by DVInfo.net member Daniel Broadway. It covers basic color timing/gamma curve tweaking in After Effects--a very handy guide.

There are also professional plugins, such as Magic Bullet, that perform many of the same filmlooking functions. They tend to be very expensive, and they should be evalutated before deciding to purchase one of them. You might try finding someone in your area who has access to one of them and taking a look.

(Speaking from my own experience with watching Magic Bullet in action, I wasn't impressed with it. Without careful use it tends to degrade video more than improve it.)

Thanks!
 

Thanks for that link Robert. Much appreciated!

Jay.