Hasta La Motion!

Hi there guys. Just to start off, a tiny bit about myself. I’m 20 years old, live in the UK and am an ex university student. I studied at University for one year and dropped out, not for any negative reasons, I loved university life and would advise it to everyone (only if they asked, I’m not saying you’re wrong to not go) but the course I was in was poor, and I really didn’t enjoy it and didn’t want a job in any of the areas I was being taught in. I never see it as a waste because of the experience and because it’s led me to knowing what I actually want to do. I researched a lot on the internet, picked up various programme trials and fell in love with the thought of being in the VFX industry. I just love how creative it is, even though I’m not a great artist, I very much enjoy art itself.

I’m now living back at home and have a hell of a lot of free time. I saw the stickied thread on what programs to use which was very helpful, but I would love some guidance on what exactly I should be doing with my time.

I love the effects side of VFX, as in, creating realistic particle systems and the idea of incorporating them into live footage, but this is where I get a little stuck. I’m currently using Fusion and have enjoyed learning about it but, for what I want to achieve, what should I actually be doing?

Should I be recording my own footage, and trying to incorporate effects in to them? How is this usually done to create a realistic effect? would you normally create the particles within Fusion to use or another application? I looked on the Video Copilot website and the free tutorials there look pretty cool but after hearing a lot (although I know not all) people saying that for Film Nuke is the more generally used program so I wanted to stay away from AE but a lot of the things from that site (Video Copilot) are similar to the things I would like to achieve. (I’m obviously aware I don’t have Nuke but Fusion is quite similar no? So I’m hoping if needed I can make the transition). There doesn’t seem to be any tutorials on actually creating effects and putting them into a video so I just feel kind of stuck on what to do.

So basically, I’m just sat here, I really wanna dig into the program but also don’t want to be doing things that may not be neccessary for me. Where should I go from here?

I appreciate anyone who’s actually read through that so thanks in advance.