Im making a star wars fan film and I wanted to use this cool picture of coruscant. But a plain, flat, non moving picture isnt good for whats supposed to be real. I have adobe after effects and I know how to make a 3D building but im not good at it. I was wondering if some one could help me. It would be greatly appreciated.
I did a fan film way back when, and we used an old trick similar to the way the old "Viewmaster" slides work.
If you have a decent photo editing package like Photoshop, you simply cut out the different "levels" or depths of buildings you would like to see movement on and place them on separate layers. Make sure to keep the clear or empty space in your cutouts as you will need that for the alpha channel in your video comp. The movement between you layers will undoubtedly show the clear space behind so you will also want to paint/ clone/ redraw some of the building behind your separate layers to hide this fact.
Now, if your looking for a realistic fly through then your gonna need a real 3D model and I'm way off base here. But if this is just to serve as a glamor shot with a bit of movement then this should suffice.
Exactly!
A matte painting (or that very pic you posted) cut in layers applied on "planes" at the right (virtual) distance from the camera and you'll get a very convincing pan (after effects works best for these tricks, check the site of Andrew Kramer for great tips and tutorials at videocopilot.net)
