Jack Tunnicliffe is the owner-operator of two successful companies in Western Canada that serve broadcast clients along both coasts. His post-production facility Java Post Production provides editing and visual effects for broadcast TV, commercials and ad agency productions. Caffeine Commercial Productions is an award-winning production company that works alongside Java Post with their commercial and corporate clients. Sounds like Jack also serves up a mean cup of dark roasted brew.

At Java Post, Jack works as the chief colorist and a lead motion graphics artist. He began his career as a camera operator, then moved into producing/directing a range of media from commercials and documentaries to sports broadcasts including Olympic broadcasts for Canada and world host feeds. In 1995, Jack started Java Post with a business partner, one Media 100 workstation, and self-taught knowledge of After Effects and compositing. His talents and company exploded along with the visual effects industry.

I caught up with Jack to hear about a new Canadian TV series, InSecurity, that Java Post produces the color correction and visual effects for. The show went to air in January 2011 as a comedy about a bumbling group of Canadian intelligence agents. Jack walked me through the effects-heavy opening sequence of InSecurity and also previewed an intriguing scene that involves a composited ‘finger screen’. Both segments use a lot of heavy-hitting Red Giant products, and the ones I will showcase are Magic Bullet Colorista II and Red Giant Warp.

InSecurity-Intro from Java Post Production

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Here’s a new QuickTip from Simon Walker about managing your Magic Bullet Looks and PhotoLooks presets. If you use Looks or Photolooks, and create your own presets, this tip will save you a lot of time.

Red Giant QuickTip #30: Managing Presets in Magic Bullet Looks & PhotoLooks

In this tip Apple Certified Master Trainer will show you how to quickly create and manage custom presets when using Magic Bullet Looks and Magic Bullet PhotoLooks, and how these are automatically shared across the host applications.

Magic Bullet Looks

Set the mood on any timeline

$399 New
$29-$299 Upgrade

Magic Bullet PhotoLooks

Your photo is worth a thousand looks – now available for Lightroom, Aperture and Photoshop

$199 New
$99 Upgrade

Simon Walker’s Weddings & Events for Looks

30 Presets to Make Timeless Memories

$69 New

Hey folks – We just wanted to take a moment to thank Lloyd Alvarez over at AEscripts.com for his help recently. We ran into a problem where our Guru Preset Packs were not working properly in non-English versions of After Effects. Lloyd came up with an ingenious way to convert all of the expressions with effect references for other languages. Lloyd has released this awesome ExpressionUniversalizer script to the public. I’ll let him explain:

This script will convert the expressions in your projects so that they are compatible with After Effects running in any language. If you are an After Effects template author or create projects for international clients you’ve certainly ran into the situation where your expressions break on your client’s machine. This is where ExpressionUniversalizer will come the rescue! Just run the script on your projects before you post or send them and they will be guaranteed to work!

It’s very easy to use, simply choose whether you want to process the current comp or all the comps in your project and click on the Universalize Expressions button. That’s it. There is an option to create a log file in case you want a detailed record of what is being converted or if you run into any trouble.

The script can universalize expressions written in these languages: English, French, German, Italian, Spanish and Japanese. If you would like your language added please get in touch. This is only to support what language the expression is originally written in, once the project has been universalized it can be open by ANY language.

There’s a nice geeky explanation of how it all works on Lloyd’s site, where you can also get the script, as well as many other great tools to make life easier in After Effects.

Watch it HERE.

Red Giant QuickTip #22: Creating Custom Tools in LooksBuilder

In this tutorial, Apple Certified Master Trainer Simon Walker shows you how to quickly create and access your own custom tools in Magic Bullet Looks and PhotoLooks. If you’re working with Magic Bullet Looks in Final Cut Pro (or any other host app) this tutorial can save you a TON of time.

Related Links:

• Buy  Magic Bullet Looks
• Guru Preset Pack: Simon Walker’s Weddings and Events for Looks
• Simon Walker’s Offical Website

Just an FYI folks – we’ve just released an update to Psunami that makes it CS5 Compatible. Psunami generates precise 3D geometry of an ocean surface, then produces ultra-realistic ray-traced output that looks like real water, from flat pools to raging high seas.

Psunami works in After Effects and Final Cut Pro. You can get it HERE.

For people that already own Psunami: All products purchased on or after April 12, 2010 qualify for FREE 64-bit updates (Adobe CS5 compatible) as soon as they are available. We’ll send an email out to you explain how to get your CS5 upgrade, free of charge, shortly.

Customers that purchased products prior to April 12, 2010 and choose to add 64-bit compatibility will need to pay for upgrades.

Episode 48: Creating a 1960′s Retro Pop-art Opening Sequence

Hosted by: Angie Taylor

In this Episode of Red Giant TV, Angie Taylor shows you how to create an awesome Retro style motion graphics opening sequence. reminiscent of the 1960′s. WATCH IT HERE.

Show Links:

• Angie’s site: http://angietaylor.co.uk/
• After Effects CS5 – Learn By Video: @ Amazon.com
• Design Essentials: @ Amazon.com

In a previous QuickTip I showed you how you could share your Magic Bullet Looks presets from app to app and from user to user. But did you know you can do something similar with Knoll Light Factory Flares?

Red Giant Quicktip #20: Sharing Custom Flares Across Apps

In this Quicktip, Aharon Rabinowitz shows you how you can easily share Lens Flares/Custom Lenses you Create in Knoll Light Factory between After Effects, Final Cut Pro, Photoshop (and more) – and how you can share them from user to user. This allows you to quickly achieve consistency throughout your project, even if it spans from print to video.

Learn more about Knoll Light Factory HERE, and Knoll Light factory for Photoshop HERE.

Let me just cut to the chase here and say that if you love the iPhone Apps “ShakeIt Photo” and “CrossProcess” but always wanted to work with them on a big screen in Photoshop or your video editor – you’re lucky day is here. Introducing Nick Campbell’s Vintage Film for Looks:

iPod/iPad friendly version on Vimeo.

OK – now for the story behind the product.

I’m one of those people that, when I set my mind on something, I find a way to make it happen. I’ve wanted to find a project to work on with Nick Campbell (also known as the GreyscaleGorilla) for a long time, but there didn’t seem to be an opportunity. He’s incredibly talented as a photographer and designer, and guy who’s always excited about the things he’s working on. It gets me excited to be creative too.

I have both his iPhone apps, and use them all the time. I also watch his tutorials whenever possible, and check out his 5-Second Projects for inspiration.

A recent CrossProcess photo shot on my iPhone.

So, when it became my job to manage the development of the Guru Presets here at Red Giant, the first phone call I made was to Nick.  “How do you feel about making ShakeIt Photo and CrossProcess for Magic Bullet Looks?” I asked him.

At this point, I think you know the answer he gave me (I guess that’s what happens when you put the punch line before the story – but whatever). But it wasn’t enough for Nick to rest on his laurels. And given the vast toolset in Magic Bullet Looks, he was able to greatly expand upon his work to bring you what is one of my favorite Red Giant Products of all time.

Everyone I have shown this too during the beta process has said things like “Damn, that’s awesome” or “That’s truly inspiring” or “I am out of the office, but will be checking email periodically” (OK – that last one was not a winner, but I know that if they were in the office they’d have loved it).

I am really happy with the way it came out. Nick is a great guy to work with and a true artist. I can’t wait to do more cool things with him.

I hope you enjoy this exciting Guru Preset Pack of 32 Looks that (with the exception of the 4 AE-only Templates), can be used in Final Cut Pro, Motion, After Effects, Premiere Pro, Avid, Vegas, and Photoshop – if you have Magic Bullet Looks, PhotoLooks, or Quick Looks. You can share these looks from program to program to create a hip vintage style that you will get nowhere else (except maybe your iPhone).

To make Vintage Film for Looks even more valuable, there are 4 free kick-ass tutorials from Nick, right here.

If you like these Guru Presets, don’t forget we have many others from talented folks like Harry Frank, Nando Costa, Cassidy Bisher, and more. You can find tons of Free presets as well at Red Giant People.

Hi Folks – Next week, I’ll be flying out to  San Francisco to interview John Knoll, for Red Giant TV. Unless you’ve been living in a cave free of VFX news, you know that John Knoll was ILM’s Visual Effects Supervisor for Avatar, Star Wars,  and many other films. He is one of Hollywood’s most in-demand collaborators for VFX, having won many awards (including an Oscar) for his contributions to some of the biggest films of all time.

We’ll be talking about his film work, co-creating Photoshop with his brother Thomas, and the evolution and use of his popular software, Knoll Light Factory,  in motion graphics and films like Avatar, Transformers,  J. J. Abram’s Star Trek, and many others.

I’m incredibly excited. I’ve worked with and met a lot of cool people, but this is a whole other thing. His influence on what we do is so profound, I just hope I don’t forget my own name** when I sit down with him, let alone remember to ask him some worthwhile questions about his work. So I need your help…

If there’s anything you ever wanted to ask this visual effects master, post it here, and I may just ask it for you.

No promises – but make it good, and I’ll do my best.

_____________________________________

** That may or may not have happened to me when I worked with Director Frank Oz (a.k.a. Yoda). I can neither confirm nor deny.