Demo Reel 2018 - a sample of some of my work through early 2018.
First Alert Doppler Net is a new network of Doppler radars giving our viewers faster, higher resolution, detailed view of storms passing through our area using 3 radar sites. It’s quite a challenge illustrating a concept like radars with no actual footage of the radar sites, and the scan itself is invisible. We used Unreal Engine and Google Earth to give viewers a sense of what exactly this is, in a fully graphics driven promo.
In addition to the promo, we had an explainer style animated news package to run during shows, delving in a little deeper on just what makes Doppler Net special.
We needed a way to promote our newly designed weather graphics package, showcasing our new hyper-real weather conditions. For this promo, I created a virtual environment in Unreal Engine, featuring large LED walls, and an open green space outside with varying weather conditions.
This segment from our 2023 First Alert to Severe Weather special takes viewers through the process of identifying dangerous trees around your house and what can be done to avoid damage. Unreal Engine was used to create a photo-real environment in a very short production timeframe, enabling us to tell stories and reach audiences in new ways.
This trailer is a combination of of multiple promos strung together with a little extra on the ends. The environment was created in Unreal Engine 5, with talent shot on green screen and final compositing in After Effects.
Unreal Engine enabled us to create an enormous amount of fully animated 3D content for this show, including unique 11 day countdown animations for each day to add variety to promotion leading up to the event, vertical format social versions, multiple sponsor variants, and more.
Using a virtual school environment for this promo gave us a tremendous amount of flexibility when building the final shots. Talent could be repositioned, sun angles changed, walls and lockers repainted at the click of a button. Talent is filmed on a locked off green screen and an iPhone was used to capture realistic camera movements. Environments are in Unreal Engine and final composite in After Effects.
A collection of experiments and projects built using Unreal Engine over the last year.
This fun digital piece was created just in time for the first snow of the year. Referencing the hit HBO series Game of Thrones, we created a 3D version of the throne room, which reveals Chief Meteorologist Chris Hohmann on the throne. The "release date" at the end was the actual date of the incoming snow. This particular piece was a lot of fun to make, and did tremendously well on our digital platforms, garnering loads of positive feedback and shares.
Halloween ID created primarily in Cinema 4D, composited in After Effects. The skyline in the background is the city of Raleigh, a core market for ABC11.
For the 2017 Raleigh Christmas Parade we created a new package featuring many Christmas themed elements, playing up imagery of flying ribbons and presents. Cinema 4D was used for all 3D aspects, giving the project a fun, modern look, differentiating it from previous years. There's a certain richness and depth we were able to get from 3D that would just be difficult or impossible with more flat styles.
American Heart Association Go Red campaign. The concept was to have individual hearts slowly form the outline of a red dress, reinforcing the concept of individual people coming together to make a difference. The hearts were animated using Trapcode Form within After Effects.
This trailer was created for the launch of Breach & Clear developed by Mighty Rabbit Studios. Using in-game assets enabled me to create more compelling graphics quickly, such as the gun part swap, quickly and easily using Cinema 4D and mograph effectors. The 3D environment text was tracked onto a provided plate shot in post. By calculating and recreating the movement of the camera, 3d text could be rendered and composited into the shot with recreated lighting and shadow mattes without requiring re-creating or rendering the background plate.
The graphics created as part of this "Eyewitness the Difference" spot lend energy to the edit with yellow accent colors, referencing the ABC11 logo's unique color scheme, and animation to keep the energy high throughout the piece.
This trailer was created for the launch of a digital version of the widely played card game Quarriors, by NECA. We wanted to capture the energy and fun of the game while highlighting key selling points such as the art and it's connection to physical cards.
The callouts read well on a smaller device screen, a likely platform for viewers, and the green flashes and particles pay homage to the magical aspects of the game. Flying cards provide energetic transitions between shots.
Directed, Produced, Animated - Zach Abrams
I produced this trailer to promote a game my studio, Tailspin, had developed. I leveraged many of our in-game models and environments, lighting and rendering them in Cinema 4D, and compositing in After Effects.
The music was part of our original score created for the game.
Script - Relevant Games
Models,Textures - Donovan Valdes
Animation, Rendering, Lighting, Production - Zach Abrams
This was filmed and edited for an upscale Italian restaurant "The Garden" located in New Berlin, IL. After posting, the client more than doubled their facebook page's likes, seeing hundreds of shares, and exposure to a massive local market. Shot on a Canon T5i / 55mm lens, iPhone 6, edited and color corrected in Premiere, logo in After Effects.
Chef - Justin Richardson
Photography, Editing, Color, Animation - Zach Abrams
Music: The XX - Intro
This video was produced as part of a Kickstarter campaign to create a coffee table book detailing over 30 years of completely unknown US / Mexican history discovered in the National Archives. The book art primarily uses original scans of rare photos contained in the National Archives, as well as a never before published one on the rear jacket featuring 1930's Naval Aviators on a secret military airbase bordering Mexico.
In addition to the campaign video, I developed a full website to break down the immense amount of research into a consumable narrative; One that was also visually compelling drawing readers in. Given the time frame we were able to utilize large amounts of stock media to draw readers in and paint a picture of the time period. Research and copy by Jason Abrams.
Created for the Burroughs Wellcome Fund, this short video seeks to inform viewers about a broad range of requirements to apply to this particular grant, with the hope of reducing the number of underqualified applicants.
Animation, editing - Zach Abrams
Fully 3D Story Trailer created for Scrap Squad. This was one for the first fully 3D story driven projects I've worked on and really enjoyed the project.
Animation - Scott R
3D modeling, Texturing - Donovan Valdes
Concept - Joshua J. Mills
Concept, Rendering, Compositing - Zach Abrams
A fully 3D animated story trailer created to promote the launch of the game Fat Chicken. Finding the right balance of render time and quality, especially with lighting, was very tricky as there was a short runway to complete the project.
After extensive experimentation to optimise the scenes and render times in order to hit the client's pressing deadline, I used 4 macbook pro's to build a small render farm and get the frames rendered in time to composite for the final project.
Animation - Scott R
Director - Joshua J. Mills
Rendering, Lighting, Production, Compositing - Zach Abrams
The opening sequence for Foodie, a short, dark comedy horror film by Christopher Moore about a food service industry professional who receives an invitation to an exclusive, underground dinner party and finds out there's much more on the menu than he bargained for.
Animation, Compositing, - Zach Abrams
The title sequence for Abandoned Allies, a documentary film by Camden Watts covering the story of the Montagnards, the native people in the central highlands of Vietnam who aided American Special Forces during the Vietnam War.
Animation, Compositing - Zach Abrams
Created for Burroughs Wellcome Fund, this piece promotes their Career Awards for Medical Science program.
Animation, editing, 3D compositing - Zach Abrams
This trailer was created to promote an update to the game Breach & Clear. It features a few highlights of new features such as British S.A.S. using in-game assets for characters and weapons. The subtle smoke elements, particles, and lighting give it some energy and theme it with the other trailers. Gameplay is shown from an iPad, and a few "kill cam" shots provide some added depth.
Animation, compositing, design, rendering, production - Zach Abrams
