NEW TUTORIAL: Futuristic HUD
January 28th, 2009

In this tutorial we will be creating a Futuristic Heads Up Display inspired by the film Iron Man. This 30 minute tutorial includes building self-animating components in 3D space and reactive lighting.

Watch Tutorial

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Andrew Kramer
POSTED:
16 years ago
90 Comments
carlito de loskarios
14 years ago
I have to use any plugins to create a futuristic scene?
Germán
16 years ago
Hi Andrew, Did you know that la Sexta, a leading television channels in Spain, has used this tutorial and others for their ads? I liked that videocopilot is increasingly known in my country.
LotcheZ
16 years ago
Really nice i have Adove After Effects CS4... how can i make the file from after effects to be a file as you can look on like not in the after effects program? :S
example in VLC so the file is like AVI or something like that :S or put it up on youtube

Witch Program are you useing when you are recording you're tutorials?
16 years ago
Brilliant work Andrew!!! as Always
16 years ago
Oh no! The awesome San Francisco studio that created the Iron Man effects, The Orphanage is closing:

http://2-pop.com/articlenews/78998

Crap!
Scott
16 years ago
Hey, great tutorial Andrew! I have Riot Gear and several other discs from VC. One problem I keep having - as soon as I make the 1st 2 circle masks, then draw the 3rd mask and make the layer 3D, when I rotate the masks, they change from circles to ellipses! Anyone else have this issue? I can't figure it out, I am step-by-stepping with the tutorial on 1 monitor and AE on the other. It's driving me buggy!
José Silva
16 years ago
Awesome tutorial! Will definitely give it a try
Thanks!!!
Andam
16 years ago
Thanks for the tutorial, love all you stuff...keep them coming...if you wanna see what i did with this tutorial here is a link: http://youtube.com/watch?v=v9muMmDMVHA&feature=channel_page
stephen
16 years ago
un trabajo exelentemente brillante felicitaciones andrew
Raj
16 years ago
Thanks AK...... you just rock
Thomas
16 years ago
Tutorials not playing anymore
Flash Player 10,0,12,36
bilal
16 years ago
it it's not only gooooood it's crazy....!
bilal
16 years ago
that is very good ..........!
Daunte
16 years ago
Hey Andrew...that was HOT! I am desperately looking forward to you doing a ipod type feel sam moving things around with his finger on the screen. Do you know what I mean? You know the famous Ipod roll?
Brent
16 years ago
Lumin Design,

Saw your site... it's great. About the tutorial, (I know you know this) think free.

Brent
Brent
16 years ago
Another thank you here to you Andy. Thanks for tackling stuff like this to inspire us!
Question:
Does anyone know how you would parent or use an expression to change the color of the "shield" display from green to yellow to red to indicate status like in a video game?? Thanks!
Brent
16 years ago
Hey Andrew,
Cool tutorial.
I just wanted to stop by and say thank you. Not only for everything you do for the AE community....but you just gave me an idea with your latest tutorial that will actually effect a multi-thousand dollar stage-production that I am stage-manager for.

We've decided to create a psuedo 'HUD' for our characters, which play out on a projection screen during the live action scenes. It's hard to explain, but it is going to look amazing in the final show, and if it wasn't for me stopping by a seeing the 'HUD' tutorial, I never would have thought of that.
We'll probably design our HUD completely differently to your tutorial, but still, it's the inspiration that got this ball moving, and I thought I would thank you for that!
Cheers from Florida
- Simon (Small Island Productions)

side note: love this site....seriously. if there was ever a way i could marry and have a kid with video copilot....i would sooo, do it. anywho, im off. thanks.
Luc D.
16 years ago
Thanks AK! Because of this tutorial, I decided to go beyond and figure out eye tracking with rotation (meaning that the targeting circles follow the path of the eye). Thanks again to VideoCopilot.
pvsciteach
16 years ago
Sam's gotta keep that stash!
Willem
16 years ago
Man, i would know **** about After Effects without VC.
Lawrence
16 years ago
Wow! There's so much good stuff in this one... Love it!
tim
16 years ago
Very cool
SimonD
16 years ago
Can you please post the original footage WITH SOUND!
I really want to hear what he's talking about!
Moca MX
16 years ago
What is the font on this image??? Please i need it badly!
16 years ago
Hi Andrew... I know this is free tutorials and I have been a huge fan for along time.. But it does seem that you have tons on your plate right now and it is really showing in your tutorials.. I have seen great samples all over youtube with HUD vfx... and was so waiting to see how you would do yours.. but after seeing the video I was so shocked and bummed out.. I know your busy busy but I'm sure we can all wait for the good tutorials to come in.. Sorry for the bummed post.. I just wanted to be honest..
FJ
16 years ago
Simply Kramericious!!!
Thank you!
Kirk
16 years ago
Fantastic tut. You are truly a wiz with the AE.
Donvv
16 years ago
super
16 years ago
Andrew You are mine private King of special effects. Thenk you for this tutorial. Greetings from Poland - Opole.
leith
16 years ago
very cool tutorial, you awesome, nice work

well because you are a great man, keep it coming.
Peter C
16 years ago
Great tutorial Andrew! Didnt know it was so easy to generate random text.
Fabiola
16 years ago
And let's don't forget the HUD for an episode of Stargate Atlantis and an other HUD for an episode of Middleman, that used similar tricks to these HUD shots in the Iron Man movie (they appeared months before this tutorial appeared).

Middleman: http://swizzmizz.com/gallery/
In the gallery, see "1.11 The Clotharian Contamination Protocol".
http://swizzmizz.com/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=206

Stargate Atlantis: http://stargate.wikia.com/wiki/Heads_up_display

or

http://morjana-subductionleadstoorogeny.blogspot.com/2008/11/stargate-atlantis-mgm-stargate-new_13.html

Sorry for my english here.
John Paite
16 years ago
I like the tutorial.. one thing that would make it better would be if the shot was closer... i,e: Sam's head could be closer to the cam.. that way it wont look like all these things are happening inside a room instead of inside of a helmet.
Tim
16 years ago
By the way, is there anyone here that has a Netflix account that didn't just add the Ironman Bonus DVD to the top of their queue? Or just me? haha

Thanks again!
Tim
16 years ago
I learned a few new tricks in this tutorial.

Thanks Andrew
pat
16 years ago
very very nice....this will definatly come in handy
16 years ago
OMG, TKSSSS

Sam Loya to President!
mohamed ez eldein
16 years ago
veryyyyyyyyyyyyyy goode
AndrewYY
16 years ago
"andrew kramer built this in a caveâ???¦ from SCRAPS!!!!!!!"

lol. Amen to that.
richard
16 years ago
Here's the technology.. ok! all i want you to do is to make it smaller.... but i'm not mr kramer.. heheheheh.
thanks mr. kramer and to the VCP team.
16 years ago
yes yes yes !

from Thailand
16 years ago
Eh...ive seen better. HAHA jk
Sinjadis
16 years ago
Simply Amazing! You guys over at Video Copilot bring the fun back into editing and even better allow for some amazing creativity. Your tutorials are perfect, comprehensive, humorous, and the end products are nothing less than astounding. After following the concepts in your tutorials I often sit back and marvel at the work you have helped create. Truly you do the world of media creation a wonderful service and I would like to express my sincerest thanks and appreciation for your all your hard work!
JAX5121
16 years ago
Wow kwl this has really inspired me got 2 work the instant i saw the tutorial Gr8 wrk as always Andrew
Jorge Bolivar
16 years ago
Nice work Andrew, excellent tutorial!.. talking about huds, definitely the robocop's one is the grandparent of the iron man's shown here... but the most bizarre of all is the one in the helmet of the predator... is such a shame hollywood wasted a nice character like that. Now these day we can do that hud simply putting a little bit of colorama in AE, but back in those days of the original movie... man.. that was mind blowing LOL... cheers pal...
AndrewisGOD
16 years ago
Haha the video ends while you are talking lol.Do you do this on purpose?
Pat Norman
16 years ago
andrew kramer built this in a cave... from SCRAPS!!!!!!!
Vladimir
16 years ago
I always comment how great this is and how great your tutorial is... however, although this tutorial is again the great, the result looks quite stupid - admit it

For Seth: Image Lounge plugins from Red Giant have a Mirage plugin doing exactly effect you want.
16 years ago
Hi,its true andrew
We must have to focus on your great stuff.
please why you give us an advace for upcomming products.
I think that sometimes not everybody is intresting in all the stuff, this new tutorial i guess is not so usefull like many many others.

thanks
littlejim
Daniele
16 years ago
Thanks Andrew, as usual!!
Now I know how to make cool stuff from one of my favorite 2k8's films!
AndrewisGOD
16 years ago
Wohooo thx andrew kramer!!!!!!!
16 years ago
Very cool! I don't think I'll be using this tut to create the same scene, but maybe some day I'll need it to create something futuristic, like a robot eye
Lewis
16 years ago
looks epic, one again great job!
Phill Jinks
16 years ago
Nice to see that you mentioned the reflection in the eyes.... really sells it!

Nice job
Some Guy
16 years ago
Great tutorial! Can you maybe write a couple of words about lighting the actor? How many lights did you used and how were they set up? Thanks.
Bo
16 years ago
haha sweet! I've not watched it yet and I already know it's gonna be cool lol. Thanks for doing this stuff guys.
Seth Johnson
16 years ago
Cool!

This may not be the place to ask, but maybe you could consider doing an effect of heat waves like you see in the desert. It seems like it could be one of your cool small tutorials.
16 years ago
Hey Andrew, now that I have watched the tutorial, I gotta say: Amazing, one of the best tutorials because it not only teaches you the effect but it also inspires you to add stuff in. I also like the way you covered things faster, without explaining too much some things you already explained in other tutorials (I am glad you didn??´t waste time motion tracking and instead you showed the cool lighting tip). Anyways, another classic tutorial and soon we will be seeing lots of YouTube attemppts on the HUD Effect. Thanks Andrew.
16 years ago
Lol... Sam has two right eyes...
illd
16 years ago
Great tutorial AK, the way you present this makes it really look easy. I think you forgot more about AE then we all together ever knew
I got one question about your workflow, I never see you use shape layers in AE. Shortly I had a lot of problems using them in a 3D AE-comp, although I stagered them nicely in z-space (about 50) and precomped them they started to flicker and pop up randomly.

Is that the reason you dont like shape layers?
16 years ago
Awesome stuff! This is really great.
16 years ago
Another awesome tutorial from the funny man, thanks Andrew!
16 years ago
YES! I was wondering how the tutorial would be called...
Thanks Andrew.
Justin
16 years ago
OHHH YESS!
Terence Ho
16 years ago
cool!
Brian W.
16 years ago
Man another great tutorial from the master. I love this one so much because you used some simple techniques to make something that looks just amazing. Great job AK.
Sander S.
16 years ago
Finally! Totally amazing!
Joe
16 years ago
AWESOME!..I'd say the best tutorial yet!!!I loved it!!oh, BTW sweet Robocop reference!!
16 years ago
It's here! It's here!
David W.
16 years ago
Wow, another great tutorial from the master! If this was the Star Wars universe you would be the the ultimate Jedi master(or Sith lord). Well, I hope you'd be a good guy! By the way,when are you going to start making tutorials with CS4?
16 years ago
Yay! Another great tutorial!
blake
16 years ago
Robocop oh yeahhh! I worked with a grip from that movie
16 years ago
Wow year very impressive. It inspire me to do a lot of HUD Test videos

Now the next thing I would like to see, is how to create the effect of Iron man, where Toni Stark is trying to building up the design of the suit. This holographic body where he is adding parts, and moving some parts to the recycle bin ^^

How did you shoot that scene? So probably a spotlight with a black background?
Greetings from Germany. And Iam so sry because of my terrible english.
16 years ago
Very, very, cool!

Thanks!!!
Infaas
16 years ago
COOL
Kael
16 years ago
OHHHHHHH, YEAH! Absolutely incredible, Andrew, and once again just in time to teach me techniques I can use to put the smexy in our project! Thanks so much!
Prasanjit
16 years ago
Thanx Andrew 4 this Nice Tutorial....
You have done it again 4 us.......
Onemore milestone crossed........
Farhan
16 years ago
Awesome. <3 Andrew, but do you <3 me?
Suvir
16 years ago
Great one...
This effect could be used to create the MINORITY report virtual screen effect too.. i wanted to do tht for a long time.
thanks andrew...
Nikolaus
16 years ago
Thanks for this. Now i will watch..
16 years ago
ooleeey! hoopaa! hahahah!
16 years ago
Nice Man, looks sweeet!!!!
Wow! 6th post! that's a first for me.
thanks once again.
To bad it is Sam's face though. ; )
Dave
16 years ago
Hawt, you rock so much.
WOW
16 years ago
Fantastic!
16 years ago
NICE. another excellent tutorial by the MAN! You rock AK
Iranian
16 years ago
juhu my first comment
nice work as usual andrew
Jan Grohn
16 years ago
love it
Ethan
16 years ago
Wow !! Thanks alot.
16 years ago
OH MY GOD!!!
16 years ago
I am SO excited!