- For this simple technique, choose a photograph that has several obvious depth planes (foreground, mid-ground, background) and NO objects touching the ground plane (people, trees, buildings, and other free-standing foreground and mid-ground objects should be cropped before they touch the ground plane).
- In Photoshop, separate the foreground, mid and background into different layers. Name the layers appropriately.
- Use the stamp tool to paint out the foreground elements from the mid-ground layer and the foreground/mid-ground elements from the background layer.
- Import the file into After Effects as Composition (not Retain Layer Size). All layers should be the same size when in the composition.
- Resize the automatically-generated comp to 1920 x 1080 or 1280 x 720.
- Turn the layers into 3D layers.
- Space them out in the Z dimension (Z is the 3rd value in the position pro
- leave foreground at 0
- put mid-ground at 500
- put background at 1000
- Scale up the mid and background layers until their edges match the edges of the foreground layer (the resulting composition should look just like the original photograph)
- Create a camera
- Move the camera around and see the parallax! If you don't see parallax (especially between the foreground and the background), check your steps.
Week 8: Oct 16
Bringing a photograph to life using 3D layers.
