Silhouette city Skyline?

Hi folks,
Just watched the iTunes clip for the movie "Creating Central City". Cool, but it didn't tell me anything.
I liked the shots of the character running over the rooftops with the city in silhouette beyond. The skyline reminded me of pictures of the Smoky Mountains where each mountain range is a different hue of blue.
They may have used actual shots of the city and just made them black but it got me thinking ....

Let's say you wanted to make a clip using 4 different skylines on 4 different tracks. (this would simulate rows of city blocks) You make each track successively darker or lighter. Each track moving to the left at a slightly different speed to create the illusion of the camera moving to the right. Sounds simple enough.
Ah, but how do you position the image tracks to create a sense of space between the city blocks? You don't want them to look like they are simply sliding on top of each other, but rather that there is a dimensional space between them.

Any suggestions?

Rick

Why not just spread them out in z-space?

yes z space.

create your parts in ps. then import to motion. It will come in looking like a regular picture rather than the multiple layers you thought you had.

>add a camera, you will be asked to switch to 3d ( make the switch to 3d) in the canvas upper left corner will be text saying active camera

>switch that to perspective and maneuver your camera angle using the directional buttons in the top rite of the canvas.

>move the layers apart quite a bit and then look at it from the active camera view

>use the same keys (upper rite canvas) to move the camera around .

Then you will see the effect. you will also see a camera which also can be moved like most other objects.

then weak and key till you have what you want.

""" What you do with what you have, is more important than what you could do, with what you don't have."

> > > Knowledge + Action = Wisdom - J. Corbett 1992 """"

here is a quicky i did to show the distance and the perspective view.

EDITED: IMAGE TOO LARGE

""" What you do with what you have, is more important than what you could do, with what you don't have."

> > > Knowledge + Action = Wisdom - J. Corbett 1992 """"

Corbett,

Please keep image posts to 800 pixels wide. Resize & repost.

Thank you.

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

Quote

You make each track successively darker or lighter.

Hiya Rick,

As Mark mentions, spread the images out in Z-Depth. Rather than making each track darker / lighter, add a light to emulate the sun / moon (depending on desired effect). You can even create street lights with multiple instances of the light and control the falloff cone to fall on certain areas of your composition.

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.