Archive notice: This article was originally published on September 12, 2013. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
For "Star Trek Into Darkness", J.J. Abrams personally brought Mr. Video Copilot on board. Since a real shoot in space, which J.J. would certainly have preferred, was not possible, Andrew Kramer designed the title sequence with the After Effects plug-in Element 3D and many other plug-ins such as Optical Flares.
To do this, he first created several planet, moon and asteroid assets, imported them into Elemet 3D and was able to work with them there in real time. The camera was then determined, along with color grading and lighting.
But it is not only the workflow that is interesting; his attempt to perform the Trekkie greeting and assemble a Lego Enterprise ship are also very entertaining.
Incidentally, in the upcoming DP issue 07 : 13, we will speak with German artist Thorsten Hary, whom—thanks to his music video, which he created using Element 3D among other things—Andrew Kramer and J.J. Abrams noticed. He was given the opportunity to work with Kramer at Bad Robot on "Star Trek Into Darkness", and he told us how he created this impressive music video.
You can watch the tutorial here:
http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorial/main_titles_star_trek_into_darkness/
You can find all further information about Video Copilot here.
