3D + Animation › Visual Effects

Learn to create new worlds, both fanciful and totally realistic, for films with digital matte paintings in Photoshop.

Add realism and character to your 3D models with materials in CINEMA 4D.

Learn to rig a car model in Autodesk Maya for use in animation, games, design visualization, and visual effects.

Bring scenes to life by building realistic fluid simulations in Maya, including foam and bubbles, liquid being poured, and volumetric liquid in a container.

Learn to render realistic bodies of water such as ponds and oceans and underwater shots with Maya—essential skills in a visual effects artist's toolkit.

Dive deep into the Hypershade window and shader creation with Maya and the mental ray rendering engine.

Introduces the viewer to the complete range of options available in the 3ds Max MassFX (also known as PhysX) toolset.

Introduces advanced features of the CINEMA 4D rendering and lighting toolsets.

Learn about shading and lighting realistic 3D renders with Cycles.

Demonstrates how to light an object onto a live-action still plate, using Maya, Nuke, and Photoshop.

Covers the basics of the classic dynamics engine, showing how to build a simulation with passive and active rigid bodies, add attributes like bounce and friction, integrate keyframes, and apply constraints.

Take an in-depth look at nCloth, Maya's toolkit for simulating high-resolution mesh cloth for 3D characters and animations.

Discover an alternative to the traditional character rigging workflow with the Character Animation Toolkit (CAT) toolset for 3ds Max, which offers quick preset character rigs as well as custom tools for creating a rig from scratch.

Introduces MoGraph, a toolset that allows you to model and animate objects without keyframes, and shows how to use MoGraph to quickly get your characters up and running.

Introduces particles (used to simulate effects like snow, sparks, fog, or fire) and dynamics (which allow you to define how objects interact with their environment).

Shows how to lend 3D objects color, transparency, and life with materials, textures, and lights.

Covers the basics of rendering images and animation and compositing those elements with effects in a single movie with CINEMA 4D.

Introduces two CINEMA 4D modeling techniques: HyperNURBS, or subdivision modeling, for creating smooth rounded objects, and sculpting.

Covers the basics of the 3D modeling toolkit in CINEMA 4D: splines and polygons.

Focuses on the basics of animating in CINEMA 4D, including setting keyframes, moving the camera, and adding movement and interest with deformers.

Introduces the CINEMA environment and illustrates the importance of the object hierarchy.

Discover how to create render passes in Maya, recombine the passes in After Effects, and motion track the passes to live-action video footage that contains a moving camera or a moving character.

Shows how to turn a daytime summer scene into a nighttime winter scene using Photoshop and After Effects, with illustrator David Mattingly's production-proven matte painting techniques.

Introduces the features of the V-Ray 2.0 rendering engine and demonstrates how to extend the range of 3ds Max with its state-of-the-art tools.

Introduces the features of the V-Ray 2.0 rendering engine and demonstrates how to extend the range of Maya with its state-of-the-art tools.

Explores the new features found in the 3D digital compositor Nuke 6.

Use some source images, a downloaded 3D object, and Photoshop's tools to create a striking composition.

Covers the basics of operating the mocha software, as well as advanced tracking and rotoscoping techniques.

Shows how to generate stunning special effects simulations in Maya, including exploding fireworks, tumbling snowflakes, and burning flames.

Shows how to build, illuminate, and render realistic 3D scenes in Photoshop CS5 Extended.

Drawing six kinds of objects and manipulating them in 3D space.

Covers the most popular tools and techniques for digital painting and sculpting in ZBrush, and explains how to export models and texture maps to other programs for use in games, film, fine art, or 3D printing.

Create textured type and drawing objects that can be manipulated in 3D space in Photoshop.

Create realistic simulations and collision detection effects that can emulate breaking objects, soft body dynamics, cloth simulations, rippling water, and more in 3ds Max animation projects.

Shows how to create realistic landscapes, atmospheres, and natural light effects in Maya 2011.

Create dynamic, randomly generated particle effects that can emulate snow, rain, steam, explosions, and more in 3ds Max animation projects.

Shows how to create a 15-second promotional video that looks and feels like a professional advertisement.

Provides both a solid foundation of the Nuke 5 core functions of keying, motion tracking, and color correcting, and an overview of 3D compositing.

Come along for a peek behind the magician’s curtain at one of Hollywood’s top visual effects houses, New Deal Studios.

Paced comfortably for beginners, this course also reveals numerous advanced tricks and techniques.

Highlights some Maya features including how to reuse MEL expressions as well as how to manipulate paint effects to give particles a final look and feel.

Reviews the new 3D panel in Photoshop CS4, and demonstrates how to use 3D files in other applications.