Researching 2.5D space
Development
The biggest question most people ask is why not just create it in 3D? what is the point of 2.5D if you are trying to replicate a 3D scene. There’s a number of reasons for this:
Firstly creating a 3D scene requires a lot more work to be done. I have to create the objects in 3D then texture them and rig them if needed. I would then need to bring them into my scene in 3D space and manipulate the light to get the corresponding shadows etc.
Secondly is style, some people may think i’m trying to simply replicate what 3D is. However, what I’m actually trying to accomplish is a playful feel. Like when you go to a pantomime and watch a play the curtains drawback and you watch the 3D things move around in a very very narrow depth of field. But still, it’s able to capture you and make you feel like you are in an immersive world.
Lastly is time, creating anything in 3D takes a long time, alternatively creating things in 2D and 2.5D take a lot less time. This is great when it comes to development and research.
What is everything made of?
There are 3 main components making this picture come to life. We have a static image of a tv inside a house. We then have 4 lights around the image and a camera.
Image processing
The image itself is a stock photo from adobe. Unfortunately, the photo is no longer available so I’m unable to post a link. It is a scene inside a house with a blank tv-set and some basic furniture around the outside.
The scene itself has 2 light sources coming from it. 1 is a lamp on the far right-hand side and the other being the tv itself. I first had to cut the image into 5 layers.
The tv set
TV channel controls
TV volume controls
Right-hand lampshade
background
After cutting out the layers I lined them on top of each other bar the lampshade that was pulled forward in z-space to allow for a light to be placed behind it.
Light set-up
There are 4 light sources that made this picture come to life. We had the light source from the lamp on the far left. We had a tv light that would shine brighter when the tv turned on, and we had 2 lights on either side of the picture itself.
Camera movement
The camera was set-up to make it feel as if the scene was being recorded from a tripod and the camera operator removed the camera from the tripod and moved closer and closer to the tv screen. To do this I used a wiggle that suddenly jolts the camera and then slowly wiggles as the cameraman moves towards the tv.
Sound design
To match the sound of the scene, we took every element that was moving and also any ambient sound that would appear in a home. As there was a large amount of light coming in from the right-hand side we could presume this was from a window. However, the light wasn’t bright like the morning sunrise but was faily dark. From that assumption we knew the outside would probably be slightly wet, so we added some ambient noise that replicated rain falling on a window and the sounds from outside. We also added sound for footsteps being taken when the cameraman moved and sounds for the lights being turned on and set-up. We then added the final touches for the tv and as the cameraman got close all other sounds slowly faded out. This created a very immersive feel to the video.