I didn't know you can change the shadow color directly through viewport in Maya. This is not possible in Blender unless you do compositing. Glad there are good tutorials like yours in UA-cam, because I am switching to Maya to get into industry. Best Regards, Alexis
I am just getting back into Maya and 3D after being away for 15 years (yeah, I'm old and I used Maya when it was 3.0, released by Alias/Wavefront. I just purchased Maya 2019). This is just what I was looking for. I will integrate this type of VFX into some of my videos, which is probably a little bit too much production for a simple UA-cam vlog. But hey, I want to offer unique and unusual videos - something with a bit of flair. Thanks for uploading this. Okay, it's been a year and a half since the upload and I hope this comment will find you.
Well it looks like all of my classes will have to go online for the fall so I will be making more tutorials both free and maybe some more advance ones for a very nominal fee. Stay tuned.
The software I used, PFTrack, generates a .FBX file that has a camera with the tracking data attached. I simply import the .FBX file into my Maya scene and then use that camera to render. This is how most FX artists do this with Maya. At the time I did this AE did not have 3D tracking. They do now but I've not used it in conjunction with Maya. If this is what you have you should search YT for a tutorial on how to export your camera out of AE and into Maya.
This is amazing, but what do i do if an object in the footage moves in front of the ball and the ball needs to partially vanish for a moment? I can proxy the foreground object in Maya easy enough, but how do I mask out the ball when the proxy moves in front of it?
There are a number of ways to accomplish this depending upon the complexity of the object in the scene you wish to place your 3D object behind. The most obvious is to process your footage in a compositing tool such as After Effects and the you would rotoscope around the moving object which will isolate it and the allow you to place it in front of your 3d object. This also then means you would do all of your final compositing in After Effects. Nuke can do this easy too but is way out of the price range for us plebs ;-).
@@PhilFXPhoenix thanks for the quick reply! I had a feeling this was going to be a composition issue, not a Maya one. Thanks. I’ll head down that path next.
Additional software is used to track the camera. After Effects has the ability to do this. In this video used a product called PFTrack from The Pixel Farm
Thanks for the tutorial. I have a problem, I would be very grateful if you could help me. When I render my camera view, I can see the sequence of images but the objects added in Maya are rendered black. I have already tried with different types of materials, it is not the light either (if I add light it affects the sequence of images but the object is still black). I have tried everything and I don't know what to do. :(
There could be a number of reasons why your objects render black. One might be that your objects are "inside-out". This happen typically when you use an extrusion along a path to generate geometry and you don't pick the direction for the extrusion correctly wrt inside/outside geometry. Your objects will show up, however, as black in the viewport too if this happened. If you are not seeing this then that is not the issue. If you do then you need to select all of the faces that are showing up black then go to Mesh Display -> Reverse which will flip the normals on your geometry. Next I would assume you are using Arnold to render. You MUST use Arnold materials to render. Arnold does not render lambert or any of the other standard Maya (blinn, phong, phonge, lambert) materials correctly. See if that fixes your issue.
@@PhilFXPhoenix thanks for your answer! it was neither of those things. I couldn't find the solution in the end. The problem was only in that file, arnold worked fine in other files. I ended up using v-ray and that was it. It will remain a mystery. xD Thank you very much anyway!
I'm sorry but at 3:04 I checked Use Image Sequence but when I press play button, Image is stuck on first frame. Error message said Unable to load the image file bla bla bla for Camera_1_ImagePlane1
What kind of images are you trying to load and how is the file sequence named? Maya ONLY likes foo.xxx.ext for background image sequence. If you are using tiff or tga files for a background image sequence those can also be problems. Use jpg or png for background images. You never render out with the backgrounds. They should be loaded only for reference. You should always render out with no background enabled and then you load your real background images in the composite program of your choice (Nuke, Fusion, After Effects, etc.)
I use an application called "Better File Renamer" for renaming large image file sequences. Don't know if you are on a Mac or PC but there are versions for both. Good luck.
When I'm rendering with skydome , light interfering with reference footage and shows white. After some rendering test it somehow fixed and now it rendering like that again. Any idea how to fix that?
Hmmm that is an interesting problem. My first guess, what I would try, is to just delete your Maya preferences and try again. Assuming you know where these are located, don't delete the directory, just rename it. Maya will create a new one and see how that works.
I assume what you are talking about is you would like, for instance, to make a clip of yourself swinging around a light saber. There are a number of ways to do this, each with more complexity. A very simple way is to video yourself with a "green" sword. Make a mockup of the physical shape of what you want to use as your sword and paint it with true green. You can buy green paint the color that video keying software will key to. Then simply put that video into something like After Effects or Primer Pro and key out the the sword and key in a picture of what you want. That gives you a fast, cheap way to do it. The tradeoff is you lose perspective that will be noticeable as you swing the object in 3D space. The next is to again use a green sword but now you need to capture your camera as I did and then within Maya you build and manipulate a sword in the users hands. If you move slow you may be able to do this without 3D capture of the actor. For complicated action however you most likely need to perform 3D capture of the actor as well as capture of the camera. It gets complicated fast.
@@B-Century Off the top of my head, no. The problem is, to do what you requested requires the skills of far more than just one tutorial. I teach an entire semester of advance Maya and we only touch the surface of the knowledge base needed to perform this task well. It can certainly be done but not in a single tutorial. Google "mixing CGI with video" and see what comes up on UA-cam and go from there. Good luck.
FBX export from what? The way you worded your question makes me think you used some other application to generate a captured camera and you want to import that into Maya. My guess is the app you used either has a default export directory or it is using the last location you saved to. Open the app back up and load your last scene you worked with and try an export again but this time take note of where it is wanting to save the file. It should prompt you. Take note of that location and your previous export is probably there. If that fails, well Mac or PC you do have a search bar to drill through your directories assuming you named it with something unique. If not just search on *.fbx and while you will most likely get a number of these you should be able to find what you are looking for.
Ah no. I pay for every license of all software I use. I purchased my original license for Maya in 2008 for about $3800 and I have paid maintenance for every year since then. I don't steal.
I didn't know you can change the shadow color directly through viewport in Maya. This is not possible in Blender unless you do compositing. Glad there are good tutorials like yours in UA-cam, because I am switching to Maya to get into industry.
Best Regards,
Alexis
I am just getting back into Maya and 3D after being away for 15 years (yeah, I'm old and I used Maya when it was 3.0, released by Alias/Wavefront. I just purchased Maya 2019). This is just what I was looking for. I will integrate this type of VFX into some of my videos, which is probably a little bit too much production for a simple UA-cam vlog. But hey, I want to offer unique and unusual videos - something with a bit of flair. Thanks for uploading this. Okay, it's been a year and a half since the upload and I hope this comment will find you.
You made me subscribed!! Thanks man! Please do more videos like this!
Maybe fluid simulations 😁
Well it looks like all of my classes will have to go online for the fall so I will be making more tutorials both free and maybe some more advance ones for a very nominal fee. Stay tuned.
I'm looking forward to that man! Thanks a lot! Stay safe!
how did you import the tracking data and camera? did you use something like livelink or AE3D?
The software I used, PFTrack, generates a .FBX file that has a camera with the tracking data attached. I simply import the .FBX file into my Maya scene and then use that camera to render. This is how most FX artists do this with Maya. At the time I did this AE did not have 3D tracking. They do now but I've not used it in conjunction with Maya. If this is what you have you should search YT for a tutorial on how to export your camera out of AE and into Maya.
@@PhilFXPhoenix damn that program looks so cool. harsh price though aha, thanks for the info its much appreciated!
This is amazing, but what do i do if an object in the footage moves in front of the ball and the ball needs to partially vanish for a moment? I can proxy the foreground object in Maya easy enough, but how do I mask out the ball when the proxy moves in front of it?
There are a number of ways to accomplish this depending upon the complexity of the object in the scene you wish to place your 3D object behind. The most obvious is to process your footage in a compositing tool such as After Effects and the you would rotoscope around the moving object which will isolate it and the allow you to place it in front of your 3d object. This also then means you would do all of your final compositing in After Effects. Nuke can do this easy too but is way out of the price range for us plebs ;-).
@@PhilFXPhoenix thanks for the quick reply! I had a feeling this was going to be a composition issue, not a Maya one. Thanks. I’ll head down that path next.
is it no possible to use HDR domlight to ger more realistic lighting. by using 360 and even come android camera can capture 360 hdr photos
How did u add a video as background? And how did u track the camera?
Additional software is used to track the camera. After Effects has the ability to do this. In this video used a product called PFTrack from The Pixel Farm
Thanks for the tutorial. I have a problem, I would be very grateful if you could help me. When I render my camera view, I can see the sequence of images but the objects added in Maya are rendered black. I have already tried with different types of materials, it is not the light either (if I add light it affects the sequence of images but the object is still black). I have tried everything and I don't know what to do. :(
There could be a number of reasons why your objects render black. One might be that your objects are "inside-out". This happen typically when you use an extrusion along a path to generate geometry and you don't pick the direction for the extrusion correctly wrt inside/outside geometry. Your objects will show up, however, as black in the viewport too if this happened. If you are not seeing this then that is not the issue. If you do then you need to select all of the faces that are showing up black then go to Mesh Display -> Reverse which will flip the normals on your geometry. Next I would assume you are using Arnold to render. You MUST use Arnold materials to render. Arnold does not render lambert or any of the other standard Maya (blinn, phong, phonge, lambert) materials correctly. See if that fixes your issue.
@@PhilFXPhoenix thanks for your answer! it was neither of those things. I couldn't find the solution in the end. The problem was only in that file, arnold worked fine in other files. I ended up using v-ray and that was it. It will remain a mystery. xD Thank you very much anyway!
Thanks man👍
I'm sorry but at 3:04 I checked Use Image Sequence but when I press play button, Image is stuck on first frame. Error message said Unable to load the image file bla bla bla for Camera_1_ImagePlane1
What kind of images are you trying to load and how is the file sequence named? Maya ONLY likes foo.xxx.ext for background image sequence. If you are using tiff or tga files for a background image sequence those can also be problems. Use jpg or png for background images. You never render out with the backgrounds. They should be loaded only for reference. You should always render out with no background enabled and then you load your real background images in the composite program of your choice (Nuke, Fusion, After Effects, etc.)
Thanks for respond I think the number is problem maya is calculating by 1 to 218 but png file name is 1001 to 1218
I use an application called "Better File Renamer" for renaming large image file sequences. Don't know if you are on a Mac or PC but there are versions for both. Good luck.
@@PhilFXPhoenix Wow thanks you very much! I never knew about it. now everything will be easier
When I'm rendering with skydome , light interfering with reference footage and shows white. After some rendering test it somehow fixed and now it rendering like that again. Any idea how to fix that?
Hmmm that is an interesting problem. My first guess, what I would try, is to just delete your Maya preferences and try again. Assuming you know where these are located, don't delete the directory, just rename it. Maya will create a new one and see how that works.
👌👌💐
This is really helpful tutorial. Thank you so much
what if i want to integrate 3d sword? on real time like im wearing it how would you do it
I assume what you are talking about is you would like, for instance, to make a clip of yourself swinging around a light saber. There are a number of ways to do this, each with more complexity. A very simple way is to video yourself with a "green" sword. Make a mockup of the physical shape of what you want to use as your sword and paint it with true green. You can buy green paint the color that video keying software will key to. Then simply put that video into something like After Effects or Primer Pro and key out the the sword and key in a picture of what you want. That gives you a fast, cheap way to do it. The tradeoff is you lose perspective that will be noticeable as you swing the object in 3D space. The next is to again use a green sword but now you need to capture your camera as I did and then within Maya you build and manipulate a sword in the users hands. If you move slow you may be able to do this without 3D capture of the actor. For complicated action however you most likely need to perform 3D capture of the actor as well as capture of the camera. It gets complicated fast.
@@PhilFXPhoenix even you explaining it i still dont know haha if you know a tut that actually shows how to do it please share it sir :)
@@B-Century Off the top of my head, no. The problem is, to do what you requested requires the skills of far more than just one tutorial. I teach an entire semester of advance Maya and we only touch the surface of the knowledge base needed to perform this task well. It can certainly be done but not in a single tutorial. Google "mixing CGI with video" and see what comes up on UA-cam and go from there. Good luck.
does anyone know where i can get the fbx file for my export track? i need it for maya
FBX export from what? The way you worded your question makes me think you used some other application to generate a captured camera and you want to import that into Maya. My guess is the app you used either has a default export directory or it is using the last location you saved to. Open the app back up and load your last scene you worked with and try an export again but this time take note of where it is wanting to save the file. It should prompt you. Take note of that location and your previous export is probably there. If that fails, well Mac or PC you do have a search bar to drill through your directories assuming you named it with something unique. If not just search on *.fbx and while you will most likely get a number of these you should be able to find what you are looking for.
followed this tutorial im getting no shadows
What software did you use for the tracking to create the .fbx file?
I use PFTrack from The Pixel Farm.
your using cracked version 😂
Ah no. I pay for every license of all software I use. I purchased my original license for Maya in 2008 for about $3800 and I have paid maintenance for every year since then. I don't steal.