Back in September, Escape Studios and The Foundry joined forces to run a series of free MARI tutorials. To start with, there were two training programmes on offer, but due to an overwhelming demand we scheduled in a third. The aim for the tuition was to introduce professional artists working in the industry to some key features available in MARI, that are fast becoming an integral part of the modern pipeline.

The latest version of OCULA has arrived. Last Thursday, 3^rd November 2011, The Foundry announced their release of OCULA 3.0, a leading live action, stereo-3D correction and integration toolset for compositors. A production proven tool, OCULA is a plug-in that has been used extensively on major productions such as Avatar, TRON: Legacy, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides and Transformers: Dark of the Moon. For these films, working in stereoscopic 3D had many undiscovered challenges. Over a course of trial and discovery, OCULA has developed into a reliable tool that meets the demands of artists to mend polarisation issues in photographic plates or correct common stereo-3D defects with precise speed and ease.

When we caught up with Maxwell Smith about his new position as a Matchmove Artist at Framestore, he wanted to make it clear that he owed a lot of his success to his tutors Gideon Corby and Dan Shutt. They were ‘his greatest influence’ while he studied here at Escape Studios and according to him are ‘Masters of their craft’. Max proved to be a very talented artist and once he completed his VFX Production course, he actually came to work with us as a studio assistant.

Are you an After Effects user, looking to progress over to NUKE? If so we have a free training workshop that could help you.

One foggy day in London town, a gaggle of our compositing students congregated for coffee at Oxford Circus.

Last month Henry South, lead texture artist at Framestore, kindly shared 23 MARI tips via twitter over 23 days. For those of you who followed these feeds over the 23 days, thank you for your positive feedback. Your encouraging messages let us know that these little projects are welcomed and necessary.

My cousin - David Itzcovitz - went to Israel last month and he took a series of photos, which he then processed to give this strange look. The process he mimicked in After Effects is called tilt-shift and is usually achieved by using a tilt-shift lens (lensbaby). This puts the focal plane at a strange angle to the film and as a result, you get this strange depth of field effect which makes big things seem like miniatures.

It seems there is an abundance of technology conferences to choose from this year. For fellow technology enthusiasts out there, this is an exciting time, as we are treated to an ocean of updates, new releases and ground breaking developments. One conference we give a particular seal of approval to is the much anticipated CVMP (Conference for Visual Media Production), now in its 8^th year running. This is a conference dedicated to the geeks of the visual media production industries, whether that is in film, broadcast or games.

Though a very powerful compositing tool NUKE has been missing a component many artist could benefit from. HIERO is a new product in development at The Foundry that hopes to provide the missing link for a more efficient shot management system in your VFX pipeline.

A few weeks back, I presented a webinar on the ‘Key Concepts in Compositing’ and lots of you asked when the video was going to be made available online. Well, now it is and you can watch it here. If you’re not registered on our website, you'll need to sign up first and then log in to watch the video.