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This video is on the tvpaint website gallery. Go to 1:17. During this scene, pay attention to the sky in the background. Then RIGHT when it hits 1:17 in the video, the camera seems to "look up at the sky" as if it were a dome, instead of a 2D plane. I know how to use the basics of multiplane camera FX, and I get the concept. But in the video, it looks like the camera literally tilted upward and the background plane was somehow a dome. Any tips?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPNMHNYcg1M" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Oh and another question that's not related to the first one. In the same video i linked, at 1:48, which FX allows those sun rays shining down from above? I thought maybe the Lighting > Spot FX would do the trick, but it doesn't look all that close to what's in the video.

Answer to both: it's drawn that way.

At 1:17 ofr me it's only a dezoom of a multiplane camera, the background is drawn on multiple layers that you can clearly discernate

Uhm, no. It's really just 1 painting of a sky. Only the horizon is animated to indicate the distortion of a wide angle lense pointing upwards. Everything else is just a camera pan plus some glow and lens flare FX.

See: (This way of painting in distorted perspectives is demonstrated several times in "The Illusion Of Life". Seems that not many artists today still know how to do this.)

As for the rays of light: of course there will be dozens of plug-ins out there to do that. But it's much faster to just animate it by hand, like I did it here (it's supposed to be under water):

I wasn't talking about this part of the video. I was talking about the black and white layout at 1:17. I guess i misunderstood something somewhere

Tanks for the explanation anyway. You see it a lot in japanese animation i think

I bet they used After Effects (maybe even Nuke) for both effects...