Look at this and tell me how it is done...

[Chris Moore]

I found this website that does very good graphics.

Will someone look at these examples and maybe direct me in the right direction as to how these are done and how i might learn to do this myself.

Is it to complicated?

Links to examples

http://www.retrospectvideoalbums.com/index.html
http://www.retrospectvideoalbums.com/albumsamples.htm
http://www.retrospectvideoalbums.com/albumextras.htm

They are all kinds of really cool things they do.
Im sure they are at a highly profesional level but if you can do it i can learn it.

Can anyone help?

[Rhett Allen]

What exactly is it you are asking how to do? The graphic intros? You could do that in almost any program you want. After Effects comes to mind as the obvious one, but a little Photoshop or Illustrator and any decent editing program could manage about 80% of it. Nothing very complicated going on there. It's just some titles and still images with transitions applied to them sitting on a colored background.

[Chris Moore]

I have very little experince. I was just wanting a reference point on where to start my learning. What programs i need to learn. I wouldn't want to buy expensive programs and take the time to learn them if i dont need them. So photoshop,Illustrator, and after effects. What format would you need to have to put in NLE. ( I use Vegas 5) would these be flash?( .swf )

[Edward Natale]

The first link shows a flash animation that is more like a commercial for their services. That could have been done in two ways. Either it was done in Macromedia Flash, which is a program used to make .swf animations like the one they put together, or they could have used Adobe After Effects and exported a .swf.

As far as the geometric title and credit sequences, that can mostly all be done in Premiere Pro with a little patience and using Adobe Photoshop for the graphics. Just create a bunch of squares or circles in Photoshop and keyframe their movements and opacity in Premiere to suit your taste.

Or, if you want to get even more creative with the sequences you can use After Effects, but that involves a bit of a learning curve.

Eddie

[Rhett Allen]

After Effects would be a very good place to start learning. Adobe used to have a good value with the Digital Video Production Bundle which included After Effects, Illustrator, Photoshop and Premier but they got cheap and moved everything around so now you don't get Illustrator and you have to buy the "Pro"version to even get Photoshop! Kinda sucks! If you already have Vegas you could start by exploring it's capabilities but if you are looking for another program to learn, you can't lose on AE.

Yes their site has a lot of Flash work but Flash is really only useful for web stuff. (not really, but for your sake, it's true... unless you want to be a web developer)

[Chris Moore]

If vegas can import flash then couldnt i use it in my video?

[Rhett Allen]

I don't know if Vegas "can" import Flash. You would have to convert the Flash animation as a .mov file because Flash isn't designed as a video application. It is designed to be a web animation program (and most Flash files play at 12fps). And for the price (Flash and AE are about the same price) After Effects would be the more flexible program for "video" use because it IS designed for video compositing and animation. Unless you are strictly doing web video and animation Flash has a much steeper learning curve and has far fewer uses for practical video.
I have both applications and wouldn't dream of doing ANYTHING related to video editing or special effects in Flash, of course I can say the same thing about doing web animation in AE.

... one step at a time grasshopper. Shoot-edit-composite-compress-deliver to web (but you can even do this without Flash)

http://www.adobe.com/products/aftereffects/main.html
http://www.macromedia.com/software/flash/

[Glenn Chan]

If you have Vegas already you can do the pictures moving around stuff.

Read the manual about the pan/crop tool and parent motion. They will allow you to size images any size you want and move them around.

[Rob Lohman]

Just so you know: Sony Vegas can import flash files, depending
on the content (ie, it might not [properly] read all files).

[Chris Moore]

Thanks all who helped. I will check into after effects.

[Greg Boston]

A really good Flash clone I use is called Swishmax. It is relatively cheap and comes with a lot more effects and stuff pre-made. For photos and animation I like Paint Shop Pro Version 8. It comes with a great little companion program called Animation Shop 3.0 that can do some very impressive stuff.

Anyway, those programs would get you on the learning path without a hefty dollar investment. Later, if you find you need the other programs, you can always step up.

Good Luck,

=gb=

[Chris Moore]

would these programs be only for web? I need to put them in video.

[Devlyn Hukowich]

This explanation might be some what simplistic, so I applogize in advance for any slight against anybodies intelligence.
These are done a simple multi layer effects in Premiere, Vegas, FCP or any editing software that can deal with more than a couple of video layers.
Everything you see move independently of everything else is on a separate layer.
The Hollywood style credits use about 6 or 7 layers, each line of text is another layer, the lines are each a layer and the image is another layer. The image could also be moving video.
The layers must be organized so that what you want to be on top of the video is on top of the timeline. Most timelines use a drilldown where video on higher layers will cover video on lower layers. You can also adjust the transparency of the various layers for different effects. Also other effects are possible on each layer or shot.

[Greg Boston]

No Chris, these programs will also work for video. Just set the canvas size to 720x480, the frame rate to 30fps and output your project to AVI. Voila!

regards,

=gb=