| Magazine > 2008 > July - August > Going Grunge |
Going Grunge
by Chris "Ace" Gates
Lately we've seen a resurgence of the Grunge look. The secret to getting grungy is applying organic texture treatments to your images. Digital Juice's Juice Drops are a great source for grunge mattes. Since Juice Drops are layered files, it's easy to pull off a layer for a fast-and-dirty grunge composite. For this example I'll borrow a layer from Juice Drop 4835 from volume 48: grungeCUTS (Figure 1) to show you how it's done, step-by-step in Adobe After Effects.
MAKE YOUR MATTE
1. Open After Effects and create a new project. Then import Juice Drop 4835 as a composition, keeping the layers separate.
Fig. 1: Juice Drop 4835
2. Make a new composition, name it "Grunge_Matte", and enter your settings. I’m working with DV settings, 720x480, 29.97 fps, for fifteen seconds (Figure 2).
Fig. 2: Create a New Composition and define the settings.
3.Drag Layer 4 of Juice Drop 4835(Figure 3) into the "Grunge_Matte" composition, and rename the layer "texture."
Fig. 3: Juice Drop 4835, Layer 4.
4. Scale the layer to 50% (Figure 4). Notice that it has a great deal of overlap, outside the bounds of the composition; this is necessary for the texture to fill the screen when the image is animated.
Fig. 4: Scale the texture to 50%.
5.Desaturate the "Texture" layer by applying a Hue/Saturation filter and dropping the "Master Saturation" slider to -100 (Figure 5).
Fig. 5: Apply Hue/Saturation settings to the “Texture” layer.
6.Apply a levels filter to "Texture" (Figure 6). Adjust the "Input Black" setting to approx 20, making a substantial number of pixels in the image deep black. Then adjust the "Input White" setting to approx 165, to create some bright white highlights. Finally, drop the "Gamma" to approximately .65 to lower the levels of the grays (Figure 7).
- Fig. 6: Apply Levels settings to the "Texture" layer.
- Fig. 7: “Texture” layer after desaturation and levels effects are applied.
7.Place the play head in the timeline on the first frame of the comp (0:00:00:00), and set a keyframe for the "Exposure" setting under the Master control of the filter. Move it to the last frame of the comp (0:00:14:29) and set another keyframe for the "Exposure" setting (Figure 8).
Fig. 8: Apply Effect/Color Correction/Exposure
8.Select both keyframes and open "The Wiggler" from the "Window" menu (Figure 9).
Fig. 9: Open The Wiggler from the Window menu.
9.Set the Wiggler settings to read: Apply To: Temporal Graph, Noise Type: Jagged, Dimensions: All independently, Frequency: 5.0 per second, and Magnitude: 4.0 and hit Apply (Figure 10). This causes the brightness/luminance values of the "Texture" layer to vary over time in a somewhat random fashion.
Fig. 10: The Wiggler settings for a random Exposure effect over time.
SHAKE IT ALL ABOUT
10.Next, open the position property of the layer, place keyframes on the first and last frames of the layer in the comp. With both keyframes selected, again open up "The Wiggler."
11.Change the Wiggler settings to read: Apply To: Spatial Path, Noise Type: Jagged, Dimensions: All independently, Frequency: 5.0 per second, and Magnitude: 100.0. We can move the layer this drastically because of the size of the layer, and the overlap it has outside the bounds of the comp. Apply these settings and notice that the "Texture" layer now lurches all over the screen.
12. As the clip plays there is some movement between the keyframes. We want to cut this down to give the clip a staccato/random feel. Pre-compose the clip, moving all attributes into the new composition, and name the pre-comp "Grunge_Layer." Apply a Posterize Time filter to the "Grunge_Layer" comp and set the Frame Rate value to 12. Now when the timeline plays, the image jumps around even more (Figure 11).
Fig. 11: Apply a Posterize Time filter to the “Grunge_Layer” comp.
APPLY TO VIDEO
13. Create a New Composition the size and length of the clip you want to grunge up. Import the clip to be "grunged," place it in the timeline and duplicate it.
14.Place the "Grunge_Matte" layer in the timeline above the two clips. Set the Track Matte option for the middle video layer to Luma Matte "Grunge_Matte" (Figure 12).
Fig. 12: Set the track matte to Luma Matte “Grunge_Matte”.
15.Color correct and adjust the levels separately for each instance of the duplicated video clip making sure that the settings are different for each one so they appear to contrast each other with the "Grunge_Matte" layer applied as a luma matte (Figure 13).
Fig. 13: Final timeline settings
16.Render the freshly grunged clip and open it in your editing application.
The original VideoTraxx clip #08072
Video Layers 1 & 2 color corrected
Video Layer 2 with Luma Matte applied
The final grunge effect applied to video clip.
The great thing about “grunge” is that it’s okay for things to look rough. Whether you decide to dismantle a Juice Drop, or shoot a picture of your dirty driveway, you can create cool grunge textures using this simple step-by-step approach. Just don’t be afraid to soil your hands.
Chris Gates is an Emmy Award Winning Editor and the host of DJTV's Cutting Class Series. He currently lives in Colorado Springs where he serves as the Creative Video Director at New Life Church.
