Create Animated Organic Backgrounds in After Effects, Premiere Pro, Final Cut Pro, Motion, or Final Cut Express
The Boris Continuum Materials Unit can be used to create a nearly infinite variety of animated backgrounds. The plug-in suite includes 15 Boris Continuum Complete filters that can be stacked or used individually to create abstract animated backgrounds or lifelike footage.
In this tutorial, we will use the Reptilian filter to create a background that looks like a flyover of the moon. The Reptilian filter is designed to simulate the appearance of scaly or spotted animal skin. By adjusting the colors, textures, and lighting, you can create an amazing variety of effects.
We'll start with a 30-second NTSC composition in Adobe After Effects. (The Boris Continuum Materials Unit also supports Adobe Premiere Pro, Apple Final Cut Pro, Apple Final Cut Express, and Apple Motion.)
Next, we'll create a new Solid Layer by selecting Layer>New>Solid… or by pressing Ctrl-Y. We'll apply the Reptilian filter by selecting the Solid and then selecting Effect>Generators>Reptilian. You can see that the default setting has automatically created the look of spotted animal skin.
To change the settings, we'll click on the layer and then the Effect Controls Tab. If we click on the arrow buttons, we can scroll through the other presets. We arrived at the following settings by playing around with the parameters until we came up with something interesting, so feel free to tweak any of these settings to create your desired look.
We'll start by changing the three color swatches:
• Base Color: F7F4E3
• Spot Color: D5D5D5
• Spot Boundary Color: 767676
Next, we'll change the following parameters to these values:
• Scale: 220
• Spot Density: 100
• Spot Blur: 27
• Spot Boundary: 100
• Color Variation: 100
• Spot Variation: 100
Already, the color and pattern resemble the surface of the moon. Now, we'll twirl open the 3D Bump Mapping parameters and check the ‘Use Bump Map' checkbox. Suddenly, a 3D look has been achieved. We want to make it appear as though the surface is being lit from above by a spaceship, so we'll change the ‘Light Type' to ‘Spot'.
Next, we'll change the following parameters to these values:
• Light Z: 0.70
• Light Intensity: 50
• Spot Light Angle: 98
• Spot Light Fall Off: 50
• White in Specular: 25
• Ambient Intensity: 23
• Diffuse Intensity: 85
• Specular Intensity: 75
• Shininess: 0.20
• Bump Height: 80
Now we have a pretty convincing lunar surface. There's one last thing to do, which is to animate the parameters so it looks like we're flying over the moon's surface. With the CTI at the beginning of the timeline, we'll hit the Stopwatch Icon on the Offset XY parameter to create a keyframe. Then, we'll move the CTI to the end of the timeline (End key). Now we'll set the Offset XY parameter to 360, 1500. We could change the X parameter if we wanted it to look like we were moving over the surface from side to side or on a diagonal trajectory and we could increase or decrease the Y parameter to make it appear as though we were going faster or slower.
Finally, we'll preview the animation by hitting the spacebar or add the composition to our Render Queue.