Hi,
I would like to make a transition/fx. It would involve creating small 16:9 pieces of video, (not the whole video, only small rectangles of it) and flying them out. Like the video is breaking apart and whizzing past the camera in 3D. I use CS2. Any ideas on how to "cut up" the video into these small pieces? I'm thinking maybe 9 pieces across in 720p, don't know how many vertically yet.
Many thanks,
Jon

Hi Jon,
I can imagine dozens of ways to do that.
The first that comes to my mind is:
1. import the footage
2. drop to a new composition
3. go to composition settings and set the size of the comp to the size you want fot the piece
4. close that comp and duplicate so many times as pieces you need
5. for each one adjust the position of your footage to show the part you need for each piece (is a very simple math using a calculator, you only have to sum to horizontal displacement for each, I mean the width of the first comp you made and the height for each new row)
6. make a new comp with the final size you want
7. drop all the comps you made to this new comp
8. adjust the position of each comp to put together the original image
9. set each layer to 3d
10. make a new camera
11. animate the layers

and thats it

I should think more about to come with a simpler solution but it should be possible.

Cheers

Martin

Do you have After Effects 6.5 or 7 in that CS2 bundle?

If you do, you can load up your video clips into AE and use the Shatter simulator or the Card Wipe transitional effect. Personally, I really like some of the things you can accomplish with the card wipe effect.

Thank you both for your time.
The built in FXs are cool, but not quite what I need.
Martin, Thanks for the step by step, it did the trick...I'll post it when it's done.
Thanks again,
Jon

So here are the results. I think it was a good test. Gives me plenty to think about for the final version. Again, thanks for the help.
Jon

http://www.fotgfilms.com/video/goTime.html

nicely done, I was trying to figure something along these lines out. Thanks for the step by step.

Great job! I would speed it up a bit, though - it seems a little slow and laborious.

Yeah, it's a bit slow, but I can see what is going on, and what animations look better than others. This was a simple POC.
Thanks,
Jon

Good job!!