"Good artists borrow... great artists steal." Pablo Picasso
Over the years, I have had the good fortune of working with some great artists in our field. I don't pretend to know where or how guys like Ergin Kuke, Tristan Maduro, Ken Littleton and Bill Wadsworth got there skills and inspiration. They each have their own sensibility, style and methodology when it comes to adding the final touches on a project that really put them over the top. I have made the effort to appropriate and employ their techniques and tricks when ever and where ever I can.
Like any footage, CG benefits from a creative color pass. The clip in the example above is part of the "Clean is Better" campaign for Chevron. Our CG team did an awesome job animating the mini robot balls flying through the inside of an engine smashing the gunk off. For most projects, the footage and art direction call for a light touch. In this case however, I was set free to apply a heavy grade, lens crud and aberration, flairs, glows, bokeh, and extra particles and debris. In some cases, more is more better.
My tool of choice when it comes to color and finish is hands down Da Vinci Resolve. In this case however, I chose After Effects. The main reasons driving that decision where the need to comp in debris / particle footage. Also the variety and control of lens looks and flare plugins. Every tool has it's advantages, when you make the choice for one, I find it is best to exploit every bit out of it. With after effects it is easy to comp in and control subtile layers of warm and cool shot footage. I like the technique of pilling everything on, then using the reductive method to dial it back.
On this job I chose to use a combination of stock light leaks and bokeh with Optical Flares from VCP to create the peripheral intrusions. For the lens look, I used a Sapphire plug combined with Optical Flares grime. While the original renders had a blue to orange warm / cool pallet, I really like what happened with some dirty green contrast pushing the saturation.
In the end, the client was stoked with results, and I had some fun getting the final images out.