Client: The Voice (TV music channel)
Service: 3d modelling, lighting, animation, compositing
Software:

The client asked for a morning show package containing openers, text/graphic inserts and closers. According to their actual styleguide the elements were based upon primitive shapes (cubes, spheres, pyramids). The animation is used for the four countries Denmark, Sweden, Finnland and Boulgaria with different show titles.

Idea / Workflow

When working on the graphical concept I first thought about how to introduce the primitves, because all shows of the Voice have to start and end with their logo in the center of the screen. Some time before working on this project I stumbled upon a cinema 4D plugin called thrausi, which can cut polygonal objects into random shapes whilst preserving their UVs and automatically asigning textures to the newly created objects.

My idea then was to visualize that The Voice is literally made up off music. Therefore I cut up the logo primitive into pieces and transformed them into Objects related to music. For easier interchangeability I then chose to setup the show titles in After Effects, rather than cinema 4d.

Client: The Voice (TV music channel)
Service: 3d modelling, lighting, animation, compositing
Software:

The client asked for an on air TV package containing openers, text/graphic inserts and closers for a clip driven show without a host. Stylewise they were asking for a rather urban approach to the graphics. The animation is used for the four countries Denmark, Sweden, Finnland and Boulgaria with different show titles.

Idea / Workflow

Shortly before the clients request, Nick Campbell (Greyscale Gorilla) released the City Kit, a Cinema 4d Plugin to procedurally generate a city scape. As a big timesaver fitting the clients request we chose to give it a try.

Due to the fact that the mesh would not hold up for closeup shots we chose to use it in a rather bigger scale, with a camera farther away. Because of that the show titles had to look big themselves in compared to the city, therefore I used closeup shots and low camera angles in the establishing shots.

Because the package relies havily on the typo I chose to do it in 3D (Cinema 4D) rather than in 2D post (After Effects).

Client: The Voice (TV music channel)
Service: 3d modelling, lighting, animation, compositing
Software:

Every year the TV music station The Voice organizes some concerts in their broadcasting countries Finnland, Sweden Norway, Denmark and Bulgaria. This time also they had already prepared some Posters and other print products, so I had to stick to their visual concept which was made of a white striped background and red, white and black rings. Due to the fact that their onair TV elements are mostly 3d nowadays I translated those elements into 3d objects and started animating.

Project Setup

I started working on the style frames directly in Cinema 4d because the animation I planned doing relied heavily on their MoDynamics / rigid body dynamics. As it turned out especially the part where the background spheres are attracted by the black sphere and then all spun together at increasing pace got kind of tricky. Because balancing the forces can get tedious quiet fast if you are looking for a specific effect.
After finishing the animation and importing the passes in After Effects I added the backround, some color grading, grain etc. In the end I dublicated the master comp to split its RGB channels and get an chromatic abberation effect.

Client: The Voice (TV music channel)
Service: 3d modelling, lighting, animation, compositing
Software:

Their core show needed an opener, text/image inserts and a closer. During the phase of the TV stations overall visual relaunch the cube deriving from their logo got some more emphasis in all their onair and print tools. Therefor I was wondering what to make up of just only cubes and stumbled upon the greeble effekt quiet fast.

Project setup

For those details on the cubes I used the free greeble plugin, which subdivides and extrudes polygons randomly. I then put several cubes and boxes into a particle emitter which I animatad along a spline, added some hand animated Cubes here and there and that was mostly it. The compositing in After Effects was just about cutting several cameras together, filling in a background and colorgrading all of it.

Client: The Voice (TV music channel)
Service: Illustration, animation, compositing
Software:

For a clip show only running RnB and some other spicy music videos a logo, opener, text inserts and closer were needed.

Project setup

First of I drew several poses of the women for a simple stop motion animation. I also drew several logo outlines (to mimik z-depth) and some background shapes in Illustrator. The rather simple After Effects setup was mainly about animating the vectors in the After Effects z-space. Although the logo looks like a 3d rendering its just a bunch of layers.

Client: The Voice (TV music channel)
Service: 3d modelling, lighting, animation, compositing
Software:

The client asked for an on air TV package containing openers, text/graphic inserts and closers for a clip driven show in Denmark without a host.

Idea / Workflow

The logo was given by the client, so I chose to use some of its shape as background elements to integrate the rather pointy shape of the logo better into the rectangular visual style of the voice. Also I added some not to concrete video footage of fashion shows, to better support the theme.

Client: The Voice (TV music channel)
Service: 3d modelling, lighting, animation, compositing
Software:

The client asked for a seasonal and localized package containing openers, text/graphic inserts and closers. The animaition is used between commercials and shows to separate those elements visually and also promote events, other shows etc. I also produced the other three season packages each for the four countries Denmark, Sweden, Finnland and Boulgaria.

Workflow

First I started with modelling the planets and produced some still frames, so that the client was able to comment on the style. After their approval I started working on the animation itself doing lots of low poly test renders to check just the timings. When they were to my liking I started the full resolution renderings which I then imported to After Effects and did the Postproduction there.

Project setup and postproduction see making of

Client: The Voice (TV music channel)
Service: 3d modelling, lighting, animation, compositing
Software:

Their core show needed an opener, text inserts and a closer with a simple approach. Whats great about that client is that most times their guidelines on the look of their packages are rather loose. Often they just give us the shows or tools name and what its about, the rest is up to us. In this case we thought about building a stylized city/planet as core element.

Project setup

I created the logo with simple box modelling in 3Ds Max. The Stripes in the back are made of extruded splines wich I formed roughly like a circle arround the camera, so that I could loop its animation.

Client: The Voice (TV music channel)
Service: 3d modelling, lighting, animation, compositing
Software:

For the sponsored show Latauslista an opener, text / pic inserts, top100 rundown tools and closer were needed. Due to the fact that they had an existing logo I derived the look of the tools from it.

Project setup

The dot matrix of the backround is derived from the logos peakmeter, which I setup in Illustrator so that I could zoom in and out on that vector footage without getting aliased borders. The rest of the tools like the top100 number bumpers, text inserts etc. were also done in illustrator. In the end I just animated all together in after effects and exported lossless quicktime animations with alphas when needed (like in the text inserts).

Client: Uwe Gerkens e.K.
Agency: neusite GmbH
Website: www.uwe-gerkens.de
Service: Screendesign
Software:

Uwe Gerkens is a TÜV certified traditional fitter / plumber company, which has been founded in 1928.

Service

Because their running website was outdated (design and content wise) they were looking for a relaunch. Most of the content was reused but partly restructured.

The main updates concerned a more streamlined navigation, by decreasing the number of Buttons on the main navigation and deleting the second navigation bar. Also a search engine, a connection to social media portals and better - because on every page visible - contact info were introduced.

Besides their logo and blue tone I had no stilistic advice and therefore was free to design what felt appropriate for a fitter / plumber company.

Client: Mediagrill GmbH & CO KG
Website: www.mediagrill.com
Service: Flash animation, Actionscript / HTML / CSS coding
Software:

Mediagrill is a cut and post production agency based in Cologne Germany. They have been working for clients like Esprit, The Voice, ZDF, Nickelodeon, Kika, Viva etc.

Workflow

First I started with the layout of the restaurant in 3Ds Max. After determining the proportions we send those layouts to Rene Alejandro Hernandez (www.pixelfreak.com) who did a great job on pixeling the buildings and characters in photoshop. I then cut those parts into pieces to be able to animate and layer them in seperate PNGs. After importing almost 500 PNGs to Flash I started animating and actionscripting the events. I also added a custom XML driven content management system to drive the video clips and text sections.
Besides the popup screens I pixeled some charakters, events and props myself later on to enrich the scene. God I always loved looking for those kinds of easter eggs in old school games like Monkey Island and Larry Laffer :)

Client: Krah und Burghof Rechtskompetenz
Website: www.kb-rechtskompetenz.de
Service: Screendesign
Software:

Krah und Burghof Rechtskompetenz is a Cologne based lawyer´s office.

Workflow

After discussing the sitemap and contents with the client I started working on three main screendesign layouts from which one has been chosen. Derivations of the chosen design have been made for several subsites like news, kontakt, team etc.
The category icons have been made in 3Ds Max which is a kind of overkill considering their size but I was doing some tests on this software anyway...

Client: Afra El-Scheich-Schmidt
Website: www.afra-schmidt.com
Service: Concept, Screendesign, HTML/CSS coding
Software:

Afra El-Scheich-Schmidt is a Cologne based nutrition consultant. She does personal training as well as inhouse seminars and trainings for clients like AOK, BEK, IKK Nordrhein, Bayer, Berlin Chemie, antwerpes ag, BBDO Düsseldorf GmbH, DocCheck AG, Grey Healthcare GmbH and lots more.
Besides a logo she needed business cards and a website, which I designed in that order.

Workflow

After discussing the contents and sitemap of the website with the client I started working on the layouts in Photoshop. One or two presentations later I was able to start with coding the site in simple HTML/CSS without a CMS. Nowadays I almost always let the programming be done by other freelancers or agencies which enables me to keep my focus on the design part.

Client: A+M Architekten
Website: www.am-architekten.de
Service: Concept, Screendesign
Software:

A+M Architekten is a Cologne based architect bureau which has been doing urban development, construction supervision and planing for almost 35 Years.
They needed a relaunch of their website, because their current site was made of static HTML and they wanted to be able to update its contents easier.

Workflow

First we had some meetings with the client discussing their needs and sitemap. According to those statements I developed two different layouts and presented 2 pages each. Although they chose the lighter version I still prefere the darker one which I present here. For the one chosen I developed other subpages and after their approval I sliced the design for the web developer who did setup the CMS and the site itself.

Client: medicalpicture GmbH
Website: www.educational-pictures.net
Service: Screendesign, HTML/CSS coding
Software:

Medicational Pictures GmbH is a stockimage agency specialized in medical images. They wanted to build a subbrand with another target audience. In this case they wanted to address students, teachers and institutions.

Client: pixelasm
Service: 3d animation, lighting, Screendesign, Actionscript, HTML/CSS coding
Software:

When I started working as a freelancer flash was quiet popular and attracted my attention a lot, so did 3Ds Max. So I thought why not learn more about those software packages by building my startup portfolio with it.

Workflow

I started with the logo in Illustrator, which I then imported to 3Ds Max where I built up all the elements with the rounded rectangular found in the logo itself. Every single object in that scene is a scaled / skewed / rotated rounded cube deriving from the logo.
Due to the fact that at that time bandwith was a big deal I did the animation and exported single frames for a 12fps animation. The rest was more about actionscripting to which I was quiet new at that time. But exactly that was the reason I developed it in flash and 3Ds Max.

Until this very day I prefere jobs where I can learn new styles, techniques and programs...

Client: medicalpicture GmbH
Service: Concept, Layout
Software:

Medicalpicture GmbH is an image stock agency, specialized on medical images and animations. They were looking for a special kind of flyer to promote their service. Hence they had a special theme (Faces of blood) on their mind the time they contacted me I thought about ways to promote that.
First I thought about ways blood is transported, stored, collected etc. and found blood collecting tubes best conected to the theme and able to transport a message.

Workflow

Because only small ammounts were needed I searched ebay for lidded tubes similar to blood collecting tubes and did some quick flyer size testing on the sizes I found. When we were happy about the sizes I bought several hundreds of them.
Lucky me I only had to do the testing on how to fold the flyer and setup everything with the cord so that the flyer pops out easily when pulled. The handy work was done by the coworkers of medicalpicture. Great thing about small clients and especially that one is that they are more willing to support ideas.

Client: Various
Service: Concept, Design
Software:

You can find a selection of logos I designed here and some more on my logopong portfolio.

Client: Personal interest
Service: filming, 3d modelling, animation, compositing
Software:

Equipment

• Go Pro HD
• Dye i4
• Planet Eclipse Etek 3

Setup

First time I ever used the GoPro. Good thing it comes with several different mounts, so that I was able to attach it to my helmet and paintball marker quiet easy. Unfortunately the hand filmed parts got very shaky instead. In order to adress that problem I bought a flycam already but have not tested it yet ...

Postproduction

Due to the fact that I did this animation for my personal tutorial purposes I was able to play arround with some effects I haven´t done before, like the metaballs / blob mesh in the intro, filming in generall and some minor effects like the LED style boards etc.

Client: Personal interest
Service: Shooting, post production
Software:

Equipment

• Canon 40D, 1/250, ISO 125
• Canon 50mm 1.2 @ 1.4
• Canon 580 EX I with Flash2Softbox softbox

Setup

We shot in a hotel room with some natural light from the left and a Canon 580 EX I Speedlite with a softbox from the front. The Speedlite was radio controlled with an Elinchrom skyport so that the sooting was more flexible.

Postproduction

After some color correction on the RAW files I did some minor skin touch ups and retouched the hair. I also recoloured the white background wall to extend the back of the bed, because I found the wall rather distracting. In the end I added an outer shine to the model and turned the whole image to align the back of the bed horizontally.

Client: Personal interest
Service: Shooting, post production
Software:

Equipment

• Canon 350D, 1/250, ISO 200
• Tamron 18-200mm 3.5-5.6 @ 18mm 3.5

Setup

I was on a walk home when the sun went down, so I just took three RAW photos free hand from the other side of the Rhine in Cologne Deutz. No filters or flashes needed here, although a gradient normal density filter might have had come in handy at that time ...

Postproduction

I started with importing three RAWs in Photoshop. At that time I did not know about the stitching plugin of photoshop, so I aligned and transformed the images by hand. When everything matched up I flattened all layers to a single one and cropped it temporarily. I applied a sepia effect and enhanced the contrasts with curves seperately for the Rhine, the City and the sky. In the end the file grew to about 400mb and had a resolution of 6000x2300 pixels

Client: The Voice (TV music channel)
Service: 3d modelling, lighting, animation, compositing
Software:

The client asked for a seasonal and localized package containing openers, text/graphic inserts and closers. The animaition is used between commercials and shows to separate those elements visually and also promote events, other shows etc. I also produced the other three season packages each for the four countries Denmark, Sweden, Finnland and Boulgaria.

Workflow

First I started with modelling the planets and produced some still frames, so that the client was able to comment on the style. After their approval I started working on the animation itself doing lots of low poly test renders to check just the timings. When they were to my liking I started the full resolution renderings which I then imported to After Effects and did the Postproduction there.

Project setup

I split up the animation in 6 main parts: 1. opener planets in front 2. opener big planet 3. opener background planets 4. middle part blocks 5. middle part background 6. closer. Each part contained several render passes for masking and color grading some parts separately as well as ambient occlusion, depth matte etc. Because Only the big planet contained localized typo I only had to render this part 4 times.

The grass was made with the hair plugin which lets the render times explode. Plus I used some displacement mapping for the planets surfaces to give them more depth. After some global illumination tests I decided to just go with ambient occlusion which is much less time consuming than GI.

The texts and images on the blocks were composited in after effects, so that they can be changed rather quickly. After some testings I prerendered most of the comps to speed up later exports with other footage.

Postproduction

After imorting all the passes (RGB+alpha, depth, ambient occlusion, and several object channels for masking single objects). I started with a backround layer which is made of several cloud and sky domes to fake some more depth and movement.
By using particular I added leafes, dust, butterflies and sparks to the planet. The birds in the back were pic whipped to a null which I animated to form a path for them. Whilst the butterflies were moved randomly with a wiggle expression.
In the end I color corrected the footage and tinted everything with some gradients to fit the season better, added a lensflare and a vignette.

Client: Personal interest
Service: Shooting, post production
Software:

Equipment

• Canon 350D, 1/640, ISO 200
• Canon 50mm 1.2 @ 1.2
• Canon 580 EX I with Flash2Softbox softbox

Setup

The shot was taken in a 6x6 meter room with natural light from the left and a softbox from the right front to light up the shadows a bit. Although a reflector might have done the trick as well

Postproduction

Unfortunately I flattened the master PSD by accident years ago, so I can´t show inbetween steps.
First off I cranked up the contrast in the midtones and did some minor skin touch up. To get this more artwork like look I almost overexposed her skin and intensified the colour of her hair and background. The lips were recoloured to match her hair. In the end I desaturated the fleece jacket so that the colour / warmth contrast stands out even more. Last thing to add was a vignette.