Project Dogwaffle Howler
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Gosh! Well, get to it! lol. I still need some comments on where people want me to go with this, what needs more explanation, kinds of things you all want to see. All the videos are up and watchable. Hopefully they are clear enough and I don't have repeats!
Okay, first I need to admit that I really Love Philip's pdhowler vids... I really do! I've spent hours and hours watching him demonstrate, teach, make me laugh, and getting acquainted with the Dogwaffle Way!
That being said, I did come from a Photoshop background, but I'm no longer interested in how Adobe sells their products. In switching over to Howler, I did ave a hard time getting started. I used layers extensively - the Photshop way. Now I use the compositing techniques built into Dogwaffle and enjoy it so much, I'm a lifetime subscriber now!
So watching these tutorials is really, Really cool! It's a great way to teach folks how to work in Dogwaffle from the beginning. As a note to those learning this stuff for the first time, pay attention but don't worry if something seems a little confusing right now. As she continues, all will become clear.
Very important to learn the things she's talking about here. If it seems really basic... that's because it is. But it's this simple stuff that's absolutely vital to working with Dogwaffle - and it become an extension of your imagination, and even better... it inspires your inspiration to new things - helps things come alive on the page! Hang in there!
I really enjoy watching these because I've certainly missed - or passed over some of this stuff, which I immediately realize how important and handy these things are - so I'm ever grateful to have picked up on them now! Thank Tiffanie! Really nice presentations! ;)
I love Philip's videos, too! I'm always learning something new or remembering something that I've forgotten! There are SO MANY things "under the hood" that it's hard to remember them all! When I first started learning Dogwaffle (Back when it was Dogwaffle), I would just "play" to see what I could find. There were tutorials in pdf format on the dogwaffle yahoo site, and I would read them over and over, and slowly begin to understand/remember how to do various things. (My first "real" paint program was called PhotoStyler, it was bought out by Adobe and rebranded PhotoShop and improved....became more expensive). As the various versions progressed, there were areas that I wasn't interested in, so I never learned them (Such as animation), But there were STILL plenty of things for me to learn and grow with! I know a little about animation, but have never done more than a "gif" type thing, and I've made 2 ani-brushes, I know, we haven't even talked about them much yet in the videos!
I don't want to compete/supplant Philip and the PD Howler channel. I want it to be a suppliment, to hopefully make it a little easier for people to find what they are looking at and how to do it the basic way. Then, as they have an understanding, they can move on to the more advanced stuff that Philip does more easily. He does have a LOT of videos, spread over many versions.
Yes he does... constantly! Funny... when I first started Howling in Dogwaffle, I e-mailed him a few times and he was always very helpful. Next thing I knew, he had new videos up to help me out! LOL
Yeah, I agree. I see your tutorials as an excellent supplement, and I love what you're doing. Can't wait for Philip to see them and come commenting... he'll love them too - I know it! ;)
I have a question for those who have watched. Are the videos very fuzzy? I have low bandwidth and bad eyesight, and they look pretty fuzzy for me, so just wondering how clear the picture is for you all. Thanks.
Let's get this over onto this page ;)
Yeah. They're blurry. That's likely in the screen capture's settings. My monster computer tht I built doesn't care what setting I use, so I always go with full clarity when I record. Then I edit it down in an editor, which compresses it a bit to get the file size smaller. This compression can be played with to get the results that we like best.
I'm a goof-ball in that regard. I already had Vegas, but when I went to buy PaintShop Pro (which I almost never ever use now that I've (finally) learned the Dogwaffle Way, LOL), for just a few bucks more I could get VideoStudio Pro bundled with it - so I did. I still love Vegas (cheap home version - now owned by Magix (but mine was still made by Sony)) for editing. I guess we get used to some things.
Well now I've gotten into using HitFilm 4 Express which is a compositor and an editor! Just tinkering with it for now... but it's a really powerful (and Free) option. Not sure if it screen captures though.
Before I got Corel's VideoStudio Pro, I used Camtasia Free, I believe it was.
When I do the original capture, it does great, very clear, but when I edit and compress, that's when it's introducing issues. I don't know if you can put up an "edited" version of a video as a correction and not lose the comments and likes. It's just the videos are 200-400+MB before squashing, and ..... Well, I guess if I'm only doing about 1/week now for a while, I'll just wait the extra upload time and put them up at full size. Any one else want to weigh in? I'm doing it for you all! lol.
Oh, and 6 and 7 are up now, 7 is a Project video.
Milo mentioned Handbrake for video compression recently over on the Free Software that Makes life Easier Forum. Yes its free ... at handbrake.fr
Thanks! I'll check it out. I hate doing these and then no one can actually see what's going on.
I have been following the thread! I haven't been posting because I have only watched one of the videos so far. I liked it very much and was able to follow along. I don't think it was the first intro tutorial that you posted for download. It was the first project tutorial with the landscape and the lake on youtube.
Just don't want you to think that no one is paying attention. I intend to watch them all - more than once. I appreciate your willingness to do these very much.
EDIT: I started with 7!!!!!!!
Also, that huge black border is eating up space/file size for no reason. Not sure why it's there.
I never worried about squashing them much before uploading to YouTube - just the default MediaPlayer format settings - but I don't have the uploading issues. Yeah... try that hand brake thingy. But it would be better if we could get rid of that outer blackness - perhaps have the editor "Use resolution of original footage", sort of thing?
Bravo!!!
First of all, lesson 6 has shown me a whole bunch of brush features that I've been accidentally overlooking. I'm very comfortable with how I use brushes in Howler. Many of the things that we can do with brushes we can also do with selections (alpha). I've been doing a lot of stuff with alpha and now I'm seeing that I can simply turn this stuff on in my brush! Very cool!
I'm constantly using the swap buffer to paste images into, making selections, blurring those selections either a lot or a little, and then using that as a custom brush - storing the brush and manipulating it from there. It's a blast, and it's very effective for getting the job done for ALL kinds of situations! ;) I am very enlightened by this lesson and will now be going through that Brush menu a lot more carefully and checking out all of those options... Thanks for that!
Next, Lesson 7 is a really nice adventure into using everything - or most of - what you've shown us so far to make a really nice image. You made a landscape, but using those same techniques and, perhaps, some different brushes and their settings, we can make pretty much any sort of image we want - cartoony or not. I make great use of that wonderful interactive undo! I love that thing! I also use the Light Wash (well, all of the washes) bristle brush (right-click the brusk icon > Bristles > ...) a Lot for things like those light horizontal reflections you were doing toward the end on the water. There are so many brush options in this software... and we can always make our own too... it's great! I Love Howler!!!
Also, as an FYI to those whom may not yet own Dogwaffle, everything she's been doing so far can also be done in the Artist edition of the software as well. It does everything (including animated brushes) as Howler except for the Animation menu, which is for bringing in and saving animation footage.
Tiffanie... Bravo girl! I love the job you're doing! Keep this going!
I think it's because I'm filming at 19xx X 12xx and then converting to 11xx X 7xx. It keeps asking me if I want to get rid of the border, but the resultant edit they preview is utterly unwatchable, so I decline. I'm going to do the next one without any conversion, and hopefully without having to edit...(yeah, right! lol), and then load up and see if it's better.
I'm going to cover alpha/selections much more thoroughly in the next video and how to make a custom brush, and likely a little more about adjusting custom and internal brushes.
The brushes and techniques I've started developing for the realistic landscapes/oil landscapes (they don't look realistic up close, but do look more like oil paintings) are a lot of fun, but it's also more advanced, so those will have to wait till later.
I'm intending to do an overview/comparison of Artist and Particles to Howler, so that people know where to find things, since many things are the same.
I also intend, later to do one on the hidden "gems", like the media player (what, you didn't know there was one there?), The Lua browser and editor for making your own filters, and many others.
Thank you! I really appreciate the feedback.
Right, so if you don't want the auto-remove black stuff, why not just make the video the same size as the capture instead of converting it to 11xx X 7xx. Just leave it at its original 19xx X 12xx? I just think that it would be a clearer output in the end... but I'm just suggesting. ;)
My pleasure! I really like how you're doing this one step at a time. I certainly was not trying to push that you were missing stuff... heavens no! LOL I think your pacing is about perfect! Talk about too much at once and everybody gets confussed - too little and we get bored! I think you're doing just right! :)
Media Player? <blink blink>
Lol, sorry, Windows Live Movie Maker, not Media Player! *Now where did I leave my brains? They'be got to be here somewhere.*
Yeah, I'm going to try that for the next one, no conversion, and see what happens.
I'm glad the pacing is going well. But, I'm hoping to hear from some of the folks that aren't well acquainted with Howler, to see if it works for them. *Bueller, Bueller?*
I am Bueller.
The pacing is working for me. I went back and watched the actual official first couple, instead of starting at the 7th. Have to say that I have Howler 9_5 installed instead of 10, but no problems thus far. You are coming across loud and clear. And some thanks goes to Dart for posting each of the links into the thread to make it even easier to access.
Thank you again.
Yikes! I haved used Live Movie Maker since it first came out for Windows 7... hated it compared to the XP version that wasn't Live. That was the main reason I bought Vegas.
However, use it if you're comfy with it ;) But if you'd rather try something better, try HitFilm 4 Express (free, but can only activate on one computer at a time), which might be overkill if you're not into making videos, or perhaps the free (because it's the slightly older version than the new 14) CyberLink PowerDirector 13 (never tried it, but I think this is what Philip uses) New version is only $70 USD
LOL! I actually just performed a "quote" action on her original posting to bring them to this page ;) But Thanks anyways!
...and thanks for reviewing them for her. This truly is a heck of a software to try and teach like that, I'd imagine. There's a lot to it! I think she's spot on for going so far, and then doing a small project... very well done in my honest opinion ;)
Thanks! Good to know that it's working. And it does help to watch them in order, since that's the way I'm building the videos! lol. 9.5 isn't much different in the areas that I'm covering, that was why I did the comparison on the first video. Hope you keep following along! You are most welcome! I love to teach, and I love Howler, so it works.
Tiffanie
@ Dart - I have several I've collected over the years, so I'll try some different ones out. I think I have HitFilm and Cyberdirector, have to look. I had used Movie maker before, so it was faster to work with. But, for the sake of clarity, looks like learning something else is in the cards. Maybe I'll just send the raw footage to you and you can fix it all up nice and post it for me! lol.
For those who aren't signed up on the channel, the newest video is up.
I"ve fixed the black border issue. And hopefully it will be clear for you, as I uploaded it at full resolution. (Took 8 hrs! lol)
As, always, if you have questions or commments, let me know!
http://dakorillon.deviantart.com/art/Rocky-Coast-630442800 ; This is a recent Howler picture, the waves were generated in 3d Designer (In Howler). Which as Dart pointed out can be exported as an obj file for use in other 3d programs.
Ooops... the above image link leads to an Ooops!!! ;)
Awesome tutorial (#8) on Selections!!! One of the most important things to get used to doing in Howler... at least for how I work in it. I often load images into my Swap buffer from which I make selections and create brushes, or make selections and go back to the Main buffer and perform Composite with Swap > any number of abilities from that, make a selection, ajust the colors, saturation, value, etc., Invert a selection and apply a flare.... whatever... moral of the story is... selections are EVERYTHING to me in Howler!
Great job on the tutorial. I hate to criticize, but the one gripe that I have is that they're so quiet! LOL I forget at the end that my ear buds are cranked to 100, and then I play something else (I usually have to have this thing on 20 - 30!) and it blows my brains out!!! Ha!!! It's just a small thing - and I really don't mind... just thought you should know ;)
I (and many others will follow... trust me) just so appreciate your doing this... I don't care if I have to crank the volume. I really, truly don't! I really find these things beneficial!!!
To those whom may not know, Philip Staiger himself also loves them and finds them to be a refreshing new take on how to get acquainted with our favorite pixel painting platform!
Tiffanie, I really like these. I like the subject order and especially how well you explain each subject. I like your awesome voice! I always see in my mind your avatar here along with your voice! The two have become who I think of when I think of Tiffanie Gray! :) They just fit so well!
Yeah... those selection effects really, Really come in handy for me. Making just little selections and blurring the actual selection, then I'll use drop shadow. Since the selection is small and I've blurred it, I have to crank the opacity and cut back on fuzziness to get it right - and I still might have to repeat the process - which makes it cool that it comes back with the same settings I've just set up (for this session only). FYI - using the Invert box in Drop Shadow places the shadow inside the selection. I think that the size of offset is in pixels... but I could be wrong. I think that's why it looked small in your example - that must be a fairly large image, eh?
Another technique for adding Glow to the outside of the selection (I've learned from watching Philip) is to make a selection, store the selection, grow the selection by the size of the glow you want, apply Selection > Guassian Blur to the selection, then subtract the original selection, then right-click the "X" (clear screen) icon and choose Clear to Primary (or secondary, white or black - whichever you have set up). This works so well that I'm constantly using this technique with some really crazy selections! LOL
Anyways, Howler (actually All Dogwaffle products) are really fun... and you're (Tiffanie) making it even MORE FUN by showing such a close-up view of the tools. Thank you for taking your time to do this... you'll see... more people will start hitting these videos. Sometimes it just takes a while for word to get out. I'll help with that, too. So will Philip.
OKay, let's try this:
http://dakorillon.deviantart.com/art/Ocean-View-630442381
As for the quiet, I'm not sure what is going on there. It's plenty loud, both when I listen here before uploading, and when I listen on YouTube. So, anyone have any ideas? Yeah, the picture is 3K pixels by 2K pixels, so it was rather large. I really appreciate the nitpicks, it helps me to know what to do better in the next one. I'm glad my voice is clear and easy to listen to and not weird! lol. That is an excellent point on how to do a glow, I've alway just done it my way, lol. But, with Howler there is almost always at least 2 ways to do something, and often even more than that! So you get to use what works for your workflow. There are a whole set of keyboard short cuts for people who prefer those, I'll see if I can dig them up. Most are on the help page if I remember.
Cool... then don't worry yourself over it. They're fantastic tutorials... keep 'em coming! ;)
P.S. I really love the Carrara - Howler connection! I call it that, but it's nothing more than using Howler to post-effect what I do in Carrara - still, or in motion. I know you don't do animations - at least not yet. But Howler is one heck of a compositor - and your lessons are vital essentials to get into ones head in order to do it. When I can, I'll make some supplemental tutorials that link up with yours - taking us into the video compositing side of what you've taught.
Cool! So did you use 3D Designer to create the texture on the whitecaps (and water)? Or how did you do that? Very nice waves!
BTW, I love how you make reflective water in your landscape scenes - and then in our first project in your tutorials. I find myself playing with that(those) technique(s) a lot lately! You are truly helping to elaborate my understanding of Howler! I still consider myself to be fairly new to it - since I've had so little time to play over previous years.
That's where I first saw Tiffanie's work in the Dogwaffler of the Moment (DOTM) galleries, Danis Anis (Jetbird of Carrara Cafe, Carrara Forums, and Carrara 3D Expo Magazine) is featured in there as well - which was one fact that drew me into DOTM. I was having so much fun researching and learning Dogwaffle before buying it, that by the time that magical day came, and I was able to order it, some music and other software, and the Pixelan AnyFX plugin for Dogwaffle, I was so worked into a frenzy I could hardly contain myself! I ended up going on vacation during that same week... I almost exploded!!! So my wonderful wife, Rosie, bought me a tiny laptop I could Howl on during our vacation! LOL
...an excerpt from that first page:
Yeah... it took longer than I expected to get used to using Dogwaffle, coming from a PhotoShop-style background. But I kept at it and now Howler GREATLY EXCEEDS the expectations I had back then... and if you go back and check out some of those early discoveries I was making before I bought it... I was really excited and had huge expectations. Greatly Exceeds... now that's something!