Creating Hollywood Spot Lights Effect

Hi Everyone,

I have some static video of a stadium sign that I would like to add some life to by adding a Hollywood Spotlight effect. I would like to make it look as if two spotlights are moving over the sign, meeting and crossing in the middle, forming an X. Is there an easy way to create this?

Thanks,

ShelleyRae

ShelleyRae,

There are some plugins that do this, Sapphire and FxFactory being two.

A cheaper alternative would be to draw the light spotlight shape, blur it and then superimpose it ontop of your graphic and experimenting with the blending options, like lighten.

Peter

Try this:

[www.lafcpug.org]

I don't think that's what she's after, Ed. That tut is to hilight portions of a still - not make animated spotlight beams.

shelleyrae,

"easy" usually means "cheesy". If you have After Effects or Motion, I can walk you through it (without buying plug-ins). If you want realistic spot lights, Trapcode's LUX is the perfect thing for this. It makes After Effect's 3D Lights volumetric & visible - they even interact with each other. You just animate the lights as normal. Here's a frame I worked up in 5 minutes:



- Joey

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

5 minutes? Man, you really are grafixjoe.

That's the look I'm after. I don't have Trapcode's LUX. I've tried to achieve this in Motion by experimenting with the "Light Rays Overlay.mov" but can't get the beam positioned at the bottom of the frame. Also the rays are moving too frantically. I can't see where to slow the movement down.

Thanks, Ed. That's not the look I'm after this time, but I did watch the tutorial you suggested on the Highlight techniques. Those will come in handy in the future, I'm sure. Thank again.

shelleyrae,

I worked up a quick 2 minute Motion version with a simple filled mask (white) / feathered. Using the "Adjust Anchor Point" tool, select the Mask Layer and pull the anchor point to the bottom of the page (or wherever you want your beam to rotate from). Go back to the "Select/Transform" tool (black arrow), select the layer with the mask in it, grab the anchor point controller ad rotate it to the right (or whatever) and click the red "Record" button at the bottom of the comp window. Move your time marker down a few seconds, rotate the beam to the other side...and so on.

With your mask layer selected, go into your Keyframe Editor / select all your keyframes (click & drag around them) / right click (Control click) & select Interpolation Bezier and play with the handles and the spacing of the keyframes for speed & Ease In / Ease Out.

This won't look as realistic as LUX IMHO, but maybe if you play with the blending modes / opacity / multiple masks / etc, you may find something you can use. My specialty is After Effects - I basically use Motion like a big AE plug-in to make elements that I composite in AE.

If you ever want to get into After Effects, I would be glad to help. That LUX animation took 5 minutes and looks pretty darn nice. The light beams don't just go left to right, they go in circles in Z-Depth when you animate the 3D Light Point of Interest. Very cool stuff

Good Luck

- Joey

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

That looks really Nice Joe It makes me want to go swim at bayshore drive Fort Lauderdale
Glad the cold snap is gone.

------------------------
Dean

"When I see you floating down the gutter I'll give you a bottle of wine."
Captain Beefheart, Trout Mask Replica.

Thanx, Dean.

I love the cold snap, BTW. I thought Bayshore Drive ran through Downtown Miami past the American Airlines Arena to the cruise ships?

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

Quote
I thought Bayshore Drive ran through Downtown Miami past the American Airlines Arena to the cruise ships?

You know it might be Bayshore Ave or Road in Fort Lauderdale. Anyway I could have done without the cold snap as it's been cold enough in California.

------------------------
Dean

"When I see you floating down the gutter I'll give you a bottle of wine."
Captain Beefheart, Trout Mask Replica.

Thanks a lot, Joey -- I'll give it a shot..