I am already bored over break so I decided to take the Loras commercial and turn it into a graphic spot. It still needs tweaking and this is a low quality render but you get the point. I think it could work if you swapped out some of the words and put in a VO.

I used music from Shockwave Sound.

Here is the real one:

Digital Juice has released a groundbreaking new line of elements for editors and compositors alike. The new line is call Compositor's Toolkit. The elements are all in 2K, so even HD will give you room to move and resize elements. The set comes with 28 DVDs and is around 160 GB with over 250 clips.

As with any stock element I hope that editors and especially compositors do not over use them and try and pass them off as original, but never the less they are great tools for making quick, professional looking graphics on a budget and on time constraints.

If anyone wants to buy my poor college self this nice package of elements shoot me an email. (haha I only wish)

What is the one tool that I think college students are getting little to now training on that is key to finding a job in the changing world of media? No it isn't a nonlinear editing program such as Apple's Final Cut Pro or Avid Media Composer, but rather an in depth graphic application usually associated with designers; Adobe After Effects.

Now many of you are wondering why in the world would I need to know After Effects to be in the media world? Well, here's my case. In the ever changing world of media: any form of print, video, audio, creative or journalism firm; new tools that allow people to be creative and distance their product against all of the others is key.

After Effects is a great tool that extends your creativity, whether it's from building a title intro for a new online newspaper video, to a television station building news graphics, to a season production firm looking to expand their creative juices. To top all of that off, it is the one tool that I haven't learned in school. We have it on our computers but I am one of the few people that has even attempted to use it... very sad, every student should at least get an intro to this program.

With all of that said I won't go into an overview of the program but you can read about it here. I tell people to think of After Effects as photoshop.

On the next page I will discuss the essential tools for any beginning after effects student.

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This is just a little preview of a blog I will be writing tomorrow about using 3rd party plugins in After Effects. I made this short animation today using Trapcode's Flux- a very powerful 3D particle generator.

The song is the killers new single released today called Human.