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Home ? Tips & Tricks ? Depth of field and layers

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12/10/2015 08:20:01

ukBertyMuvizu mogulExperimental user
ukBerty
Posts: 975 		Now layers are pretty mush sorted I thought I'd post a "How To" on creating depth of field in a compositor rather than using Muvizu...

When rendering your layers tick the "depth pass" option. This creates an additional TGA sequence which looks like this…….



The darker the image the closer it is to the camera.

I use HitFilm as my compositor so I will demonstrate the effect in that.

Add a grade layer and apply a lens blur effect. Set the depth pass layer as a source for your lens blur effect (setting the source channel to Luminance).




You then get this effect on the layers below......



Focus is quite subtle in this shot, but you get the idea. There must be something similar in other compositors.

If I don’t need any compositing then I just do everything in Muvizu.
edited by ukBerty on 12/10/2015
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12/10/2015 09:56:13

JamieExperimental userMuvizu staff
Jamie
Posts: 151 		Nice post ukBerty, if you have time - could you add it to the wiki?


Here's a tutorial on setting up Muvizu to output your Depth and Shadow passes:


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12/10/2015 12:50:01

ukBertyMuvizu mogulExperimental user
ukBerty
Posts: 975 		I'll try......
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12/10/2015 19:28:04

ziggy72Muvizu mogulExperimental user
ziggy72
Posts: 1988 		ukBerty wrote:
Now layers are pretty mush sorted I thought I'd post a "How To" on creating depth of field in a compositor rather than using Muvizu...

When rendering your layers tick the "depth pass" option. This creates an additional TGA sequence which looks like this…….



The darker the image the closer it is to the camera.

I use HitFilm as my compositor so I will demonstrate the effect in that.

Add a grade layer and apply a lens blur effect. Set the depth pass layer as a source for your lens blur effect (setting the source channel to Luminance).




You then get this effect on the layers below......



Focus is quite subtle in this shot, but you get the idea. There must be something similar in other compositors.

If I don’t need any compositing then I just do everything in Muvizu.
edited by ukBerty on 12/10/2015

Had to read this 3 times till it sunk in - that is actually an awesome feature. So the lightest bit would be the furthest away, and Hitfilm's just using the depth pass as a variable mask for the blur effect on the actual footage? There must be something like that in Vegas, I'm sure, I'll report back if I find out - it just so happens I have a problem shot that could be fixed by using this very technique...
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12/10/2015 20:01:35

ukBertyMuvizu mogulExperimental user
ukBerty
Posts: 975 		ziggy72 wrote:
Hitfilm's just using the depth pass as a variable mask for the blur effect on the actual footage?


Bang on - note that my depth layer containing the depth pass TARGA sequence is set to not visible (the little eye next to the name). You need to import it into the composite so that the effect can use it as a source, but you don't want to see it.
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20/10/2015 21:07:02

theotherguy
theotherguy
Posts: 176 		I am going to try this out in Sony Vegas soon, I have been deliberately avoiding shadows up until now but I would like to use a variety of (live video) environments aside from dark gloomy days! I'm guessing you can have more than one shadow layer in case I change the camera angle?
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30/05/2016 04:16:56

Rocque
Rocque
Posts: 359 		Does anyone have anything to update to this topic? I can not understand the Muvizu tutorial at all since I do not have the Adobe software, and was going to try it with HitFilm, but none of the images show up in this post.

I am stuck on the tutorial part where the character is in front of the fountain. How do you get something like that to take the whole scene? Is it layers or a green screen?

I am in the experimenting phase right now, so want to try a few things out.
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30/05/2016 07:15:22

ukBertyMuvizu mogulExperimental user
ukBerty
Posts: 975 		Rocque wrote:
Does anyone have anything to update to this topic?


Have you seen my Wiki on this....

http://www.muvizu.com/Wiki/wiki/163/creating-depth-of-field-using-layers-in-a-compositor

Might give you a pointer. If not let me know where you're stuck and I'll elaborate - the Wiki does seem quite brief.
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30/05/2016 07:15:31

MrDrWho13Muvizu mogulExperimental user
MrDrWho13
Posts: 2220 		Do you need with depth of field, layers, or both?
I've made a couple of wiki guides for layers but they might not be very clear:
http://www.muvizu.com/Wiki/wiki/161/how-to-use-layers
http://www.muvizu.com/Wiki/wiki/168/how-to-use-layers-advanced
Here is the one at the top of this page with images: http://www.muvizu.com/Wiki/wiki/163/creating-depth-of-field-using-layers-in-a-compositor
Here's some useful info about exporting layers individually: http://www.muvizu.com/Wiki/wiki/173/how-to-render-your-video-using-the-image-sequence-output

Edit: berty beat me to it by 9 seconds.
edited by MrDrWho13 on 30/05/2016
edited by MrDrWho13 on 30/05/2016
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30/05/2016 14:17:33

PatMarrNCMuvizu mogul
PatMarrNC
Posts: 1738 		My wish for Muvizu layers is that they followed the Z-order paradigm that layers follow in video editors. In other words, the top layer moves to the front, and the bottom layer recedes to the back. It would make it easier to make it all work together without having to troubleshoot positioning in my video editor.
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30/05/2016 14:37:19

Rocque
Rocque
Posts: 359 		This has helped me, and I will go back to experimenting again, and then add more questions and screen shots to show where I am getting confused.
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30/05/2016 16:42:32

ikesMuvizu mogul
ikes
Posts: 282 		PatMarrNC wrote:
My wish for Muvizu layers is that they followed the Z-order paradigm that layers follow in video editors. In other words, the top layer moves to the front, and the bottom layer recedes to the back. It would make it easier to make it all work together without having to troubleshoot positioning in my video editor.


Hi Pat,

That would actually make no sense, because you allready work in 3d where you have a "stack order" and video editors are 2d. If something in 3d space is behind a tree for instance on a layer and you move that layer to the top, it would be before the tree. But what happens than if you rotate around that tree? I think the word layers is a bit confusing in 3d. To call it channels would make more sense.

Ikes
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30/05/2016 17:21:11

PatMarrNCMuvizu mogul
PatMarrNC
Posts: 1738 		Ikes,

I agree that in the 3D realm, "channels" is a term that makes more sense... especially since the term "layers" is already understood to have Z layering in the worlds of 2d graphics and animation. I think my current inability to wrap my brain around the task of using Muvizu layers is partly due to my expectation that the layers will have a Z-order.

Having said that... in a 3D world, I'm struggling to understand why I'd need layers or channels at all.
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30/05/2016 19:08:57

ikesMuvizu mogul
ikes
Posts: 282 		PatMarrNC wrote:
Having said that... in a 3D world, I'm struggling to understand why I'd need layers or channels at all.


Well, you could see it as a replacement for the blue- or green screen, exept you don't have to filter out the blue or green. Also to have the shadows and depth field seperately is quite handy for post production.
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05/06/2016 21:32:55

Rocque
Rocque
Posts: 359 		My next question. I made a 15 second clip and have some layers in it. I tried to load it into HitFlim4 Express. I could not get the layers to go in. I could not get the depth of field to go in. Is this something I would just have to edit frame by frame or image by image?

I at least got to see how saving something with layers works due to all the help everyone gave me here.

I used ukberty's link to attempt to set up HF4E, but I am not getting anything worthwhile yet. Here is the link: http://www.muvizu.com/wiki/wiki/163/creating-depth-of-field-using-layers-in-a-compositor.

I am still not at the point of duplicating the fountain scene in two tutorials. It is still beyond my level of using Muvizu.
edited by Rocque on 05/06/2016
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05/06/2016 21:35:19

MrDrWho13Muvizu mogulExperimental user
MrDrWho13
Posts: 2220 		Do you mean you can't import the layers as an image sequence or just because they're layers? I don't really understand what you mean by not being able to get the layers in.
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05/06/2016 21:37:22

Rocque
Rocque
Posts: 359 		MrDrWho13 wrote:
Do you mean you can't import the layers as an image sequence or just because they're layers? I don't really understand what you mean by not being able to get the layers in.



Thanks MDW13. I can import the whole background folder into HitFilm, but not import Layers folders, or the depth folders as image sequences.
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05/06/2016 21:41:53

MrDrWho13Muvizu mogulExperimental user
MrDrWho13
Posts: 2220 		In the import menu there should be an option for image sequences. Are you using this? The other layers should be identical in format to the background so I'm not sure why it's getting treated differently.
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05/06/2016 21:45:26

Rocque
Rocque
Posts: 359 		I will try it again to see. Maybe the file size is too large to load all the layers. I will attempt it once more since I have HF4E open and then edit this.
Now I feel stupid. It worked today, or now. Thank you for your reply. Now I need to figure out what to do with them. LOL. This will be interesting.

For anyone else who runs into this situation. I am not sure what happened yesterday, but now I import one folder at a time as an image sequence and it is working. I think that the 15 seconds might be too much of a time length to edit but once I have them all loaded in I will experiment with it. If I discover anything exciting I will share it.
edited by Rocque on 05/06/2016
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