The sky is *not* the limit... but was almost my waterloo

It is finished! Finally, I have gotten enough control in my life to have completed the first tutorial.

Only 124 to go!

I have determined to spend one night a week working on my After Effects skills and one additional night blogging about it. Tonight is my AE night, but I wanted to go ahead and get this off my chest.

The sky is falling!!!!

Maybe it's the fact that life has royally kicked me in the butt lately or that I really have no motivation, but it has been four months since I started this journey and I've barely gotten out of the driveway.

I am tired of being so caught up in things that I NEED to do that I don't take time for the things I  WANT to do. I deserve some me time that is not spent in the kitchen scrubbing dirty dishes or preparing tomorrows meals.

One night a week dedicated to pure AE bliss.

One night for me to relish in the memories of my lost love.

One night for me to remember who I was before I became who I am.

On that note... here is my first completed project. The sky was a basic blah. Replaced it with some clouds and did some color enhancing. Learned how to do motion tracking and the importance of the order of the layers you are working with. Had to do this completely over btw, could not figure out how on earth I had made the first one blink at the end.

Yes. Somehow I did manage to make a 30 second video with 28 seconds of black.

Replacing the sky (-ish)

First of all, let me just excuse myself by saying life sucks. You think you have everything figured out and just as you were getting the hang of playing golf, it throws you a curve ball.
Yep.
Sounded much better in my head.

I did the first project which is basically a sky replacement and was pretty happy about it even though it looked a little off. My husband came in and I proudly showed off my afternoon's accomplishment and his "Umm, honey, isn't the sky supposed to move with the camera?" wiped the smile right off my face.
"Yes, dear, of course it is. That's why I put all those key frames in with the motion tracking...."

But NO, my sky was not moving. I was finally able to discover that my items were lined up incorrectly when I applied motion tracking. The sky should have been directly above the "motion" selection in order to have that effect applied to it.

I fixed that problem, only to encounter something else. The sky randomly flashes at the end of the scene. I have no idea how to fix this without doing it all over again, so that's what I'm working on now. Not much progress at this point, but I did learn that the order of the layers IS important!

Maybe by the time I get around to posting again, I'll have a video to show.
Maybe.

Complications

I really do blog here, really.
Hit a snag with the first project and wasn't able to post it and THEN

My Grandmother died and we went to her funeral.
I started a new full time job which pretty much takes up all of my time.
We spent a weekend at my in-laws for my brother in laws birthday. (where I decorated a cake that someone said looked like Ray Charles had decorated... ahem.... Thankfully this is not my journey through culinary beauty)
Volunteering at church takes another chunk of time. Tons of cooking and/or planning for Pastor appreciation and breakfast for Sunday School and random get togethers and Live Clue teen night and Fall festival... you get the picture.
My house is a mess and I just don't have TIME to get it all done. I haven't bought groceries in I don't know how long. Days are much too short. I'm supposed to be clipping the coupons in the papers that are piled up just inside my door! My husband and I are now working the same schedule which is WONDERFUL, but has removed my alone time with AE.

That is my list of excuses. I am actively trying to solve my dilemma and publish my first project. I really, really am.

Now I have to run...

Did I mention we are trying to find a house?

9:15am meeting with our realtor.

NO. TIME!!!

Basic Training

...is basically, basic.

And boring.

Really boring.

Ran into a couple problems right away. I set up my little balcony nest and arranged my Ipad and Macbook so that I wouldn't have to switch between applications while following the tutorials. But, the tutorials are in flash and as we all know, Apple and Flash are mortal enemies NOT friends. After a quick search, I downloaded a wonderful little app called SkyFire which forces a kinship betwixt the Ipad and flash videos.

Back to the basic training. I forced myself to pay attention, really. I was eager to get into the first actual project, however, I did listen to all the basics again just as a refresher, mostly.

Do I dare push on to the first hands on project and blog three times in one day? Isn't this akin to working out all muscle groups really hard all at once? Won't I be sorry tomorrow? and the next day?

Ah, what the hay, I'm going to replace the sky...

Jumping In

I've contemplated the birth of this blog for a while now. Mulling it over in the back of my mind as something that might, someday, be brought into existence but never allowing the thought any farther than conception. 

Who am I to start a blog in a world that is filled with blogs full of information from the useful to the useless, the insane to the mundane, just one in a sea of faces? 

However, as I've hit the 2.5 year anniversary of the union of myself and my bachelor of science in broadcasting degree and still find myself dating a retail position worthy of a high school dropout, I've decided something simply must be done to further my broadcasting passion. 

After talking extensively with a dear old friend of mine (who hasn't the degree in broadcasting, but the real life experience. Soon to have his directional debut etc What is a degree in the face of real life? Nothing, I say. His position is definitely enviable to mine) He encouraged me to action, and to action I go. 

Battle plan: I will attempt (sometime within the next two years or so) on a regular basis to complete each of the After Effect tutorials given by none other than Andrew Kramer of VideoCopilot fame. Neither VideoCopilot nor Andrew Kramer have any idea who I am and are not in anyway endorsing this epic venture. 

(Is that enough of a disclaimer? I  hope so....)

Let's put it this way, if Andrew Kramer and I were friends, Im sure that some of the girls I went to college with would immediately become my best friends. I distinctly remember their crushes on Andy, I, however, am only in awe of his knowledge, tricks, and over all amazingness when it comes to using After Effects (and maybe his very unusual green eyes). Seeing how those girls won't even reply to my emails only proves how much I don't know Andy... 

ahem... 

Mr. Kramer.

That's the premise of Repercussion: My journey through After Effects. And now that I've made my first blog post to add to the millions of other blog posts, I'm off to my balcony to enjoy some crisp fall air as I tackle my first project: Basic Training.