I have a bunch of shots of a DMP sitting at 1st or second floor level above a busy night time street. The dmp is good and has bright neon lights that match some in camera lighting but i need to bring it to life with some moving atmosphere and general hubbub from the lively street below.
Im just asking if theres any new Matchboxes I might not know about or if anyone has a tried and tested method for making this kind of thing.
Ive got my own ideas obviously using noise textures and mattes / blurs / glints etc, I haven’t started yet but if anyone has done this exact thing before I’d love to hear from you
I’m not sure what a DMP is, but there’s a twinkle MX that I’ve used for city atmosphere. And of course ls_glints, haze, etc.
sorry Digital Matte Painting, aka a giant photoshop still for a background
I don’t know if it is appropriate for the content, but I’ve made some nice heat haze by creating a particle animation of a bucketload of wobbly little spheres which vary in size, rising from the bottom of frame with a light on it to give it dimension, and using that as a displacement map. And if you have ever watched @Jeff Kyle hosting a logik live, his neon sign in the background has a slow moving hum rising through it.
There’s also a heat haze MX that I’ve used. Works great and fast.
Have you a layered version of the DMP and if not could you get one. If it were me I’d be flashing some of those neon signs slowly at different rates. I’d put a mist type matte through the back ground lights as that’s what makes them twinke. Also if you can see the street then a traffic light changing is always good. Oh and you can’t beat an aircraft going through to give the shot some life.
Do you have any 2D atmosphere textures? There are plenty of free ones online if you don’t.
You can also utilise a folding texture with a very slow speed if not with some blur and grain to get you something similar to atmospheric noise
Or create a noise pattern of some kind (once again, folding can be good) that feels a subtle colour correct luminance and/or glow adjustment so there is a subtle luminance change (on the highlights only of course)
Adding noise/grain obviously helps as well
I’m not sure heat haze is the right approach for fluoros at night. Wouldn’t the distortion look weird, even if used subtly? All for it on a day shot
Yep Ive got a bunch of 2d elements was mainly just seeing if there were any new tricks I wasnt aware of that I could steal haha.
Was gona do some stuff with slow textures / noise with some mattes and maybe some soft rays for lighting and also some specific stuff on the lights in the dmp