LA SIGGRAPH @ Zeiss introduces CinCraft

VFX Sup's and those who work with a cinematographers, learned what can be requested or suggested with all of the new tools by CinCraft.

Almost all movies today have some digital manipulation, as well as many, if not thousands, of VFX shots inserted as well. The task of creating those images of the real world, that will finally be manipulated, rests on the camera lens as its "eye". It's at that first point where the light from the analog world makes its way in and becomes encoded digitally.

Los Angeles Professional Chapter of SIGGRAPH gathered to look at several of the CinCraft tools, as well as look at some examples of them in action. At this year's SIGGRAPH conference, Zeiss debuted a flexible camera tracking solution,?Scenario, another in a series of?CinCraft tools?which works indoors and outdoors, on film sets, with green and blue screens and in LED volumes.?Scenario?uses natural markers, reflective markers, and even digital markers on LED screens, providing camera tracking data for real-time use and records it for post-production.

With?CinCraft Mapper, ZEISS presented a new digital service that quickly and easily provides frame-accurate lens distortion and shading data for the VFX industry. This data is essential for digital compositing and match-moving in order to achieve a cinematic result that is as realistic and precise as possible.

Normally, lens grids must be recorded and processed in order to obtain this data – a process that is not only very time-consuming, but also error-prone and limited in scope, With just a few clicks,?CinCraft Mapper?now provides this data directly. Lost clip metadata can also be added without difficulty. For compositing and match-moving artists, this means that they can be sure they are not only receiving accurate data without having to rely on the preceding capture and workflow procedures, but also that the entire VFX process will be simplified and accelerated. The VFX studio also benefits directly from the more efficient workflow.

ST Maps are created by simply dragging the footage into the software client. By providing lens distortion and shading characteristics for every single frame and focus distance of a shot,?CinCraft Mapper?eliminates guesswork and makes the workflow easier and faster.?CinCraft Mapper?delivers industry standard ST Maps for distortion and Multiply Maps for shading. These can be used directly in compositing and matchmoving software such as Nuke, Flame and 3DEqualizer.

VFX artists no longer have to rely only on eXtended Data generated by lens and camera equipment on set. Now additional and historic lens family shading and distortion data can also be provided by the?CinCraft Mapper?service. At the same time, the service is also compatible with the existing XD technology.