GB Proton Stream AE Tutorial

...Let me explain the picture before getting on with the tutorial. The scene involved me testing out the proton pack and learning that it has a bigger kick than I expected. When I acted out this scene I acted so well that I hit myself in the head with my proton gun. I'm fortunate that I didn't break my ecto goggles doing so...

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Anyway, this wasn't really meant to be a tutorial, but that's what I've categorized it as, so here goes nothing...

After I did the normal movie version of the proton stream, I studied some proton streams as seen on the cartoon Extreme Ghostbusters. I noticed that they basically reversed the colors of the orange main core stream and the elecricity - well, basically. The episode I was watching was back in the saddle part one and the streams that came out of their guns had a blue core with red electricity. I tried that, but purple electricity just looked better. Anyway, so here goes...

The above image shows you what was used to create the proton streams in After Effects. See that? Yes, that's right, both the main core stream and the electrical arc of the proton stream were created using the Advanced Lightning tool. Before I go any further, taught me how to make this, so think of me as his young Jedi padawan awkwardly trying to take on a student of his own ... or something like that, because I'm honestly not the biggest Star Wars fan. Anyway, moving on...

This should be how you make the main core and electrical arc, although this is based on memory alone:
1. Create a new black solid - make sure it's COMP SIZE!
2. Set the new black arc's mode to "SCREEN" so that the black disappears.
3. Use the Advanced Lightning preset on both. However please note that this is where the step gets a little different than what you'd expect. Make sure that the orange main core's origin is wherever the beam hits and its direction is coming out of the proton gun. Turn on "Decay Main Core" You should also make the main core coming out of the gun as large as the gun's nozzle. You could also decay the the electrical arc and reverse its origin and direction, but I believe it looks better with its origin coming out of the gun like it should.
PLEASE NOTE: As D.M. Ozzy revealed to me originally, the orange main core for some reason reacts differently - the entire beam strangely and annoying disappears if the origin tip goes off the screen. This may have to do with the origin not being present on the screen, so it's possible that you may want to sacrifice the neat change in size by not switching the origin and direction nor setting it to "Decay."
PLEASE NOTE #2: If your stream is being shot off into the distance instead of at the audience, then it may look best to keep the origin at the gun tip and have the "Decay" option make the stream shrink as it goes off into the distance.
4. Now, you'll need to make the main core really big in radius so that it doesn't look like jagged lightning anymore. I have mine above to 40, but this will depend mostly on the distance of your proton gun to the camera... However if you need to you can simply avoid this dilemma by resizing and shrinking the black solid that it is on.
5. If you haven't yet, color your main core. And yes, this could be used to make the official movie proton stream colors. All you have to do is switch out the colors. About the colors... I noticed that simply switching out the colors did not work entirely. I had to switch the core color and the glow color. The original movie stream color would have a white or yellow core color and an orange or yellow glow color. Just fiddle with the colors until you get something you like. The electrical arc is an easier decision. Although I have it purple above the movie is blue like normal lightning, so the best option is to leave that one with the Advanced Lightning's original color settings. Trust me, it's lightning pure and simple.
6. Now this is where we make it move. Simply move the origins and directions around the screen at the right places in your time line. It's easy but extremely repetitive and takes forever to do. You'll need to fiddle with this to get it close to perfect.

I've left in this image a glimpse at the number calculations of the Advanced Lightning for each the stream's main core and electrical arc.

About the colors... I noticed that simply switching out the colors did not work entirely. I had to switch the core color and the glow color. The original movie stream color would have a white or yellow core color and an orange or yellow glow color. Just fiddle with the colors until you get something you like. The electrical arc is an easier decision. Although I have it purple above the movie is blue like normal lightning, so the best option is to leave that one with the Advanced Lightning's original color settings. Trust me, it's lightning pure and simple.

The flare is something I don't show the information for in the picture. But here's the deal: I used a different tutorial on the web for the flare lighting, but it's a little ... wonky... The tutorial, by the way, only worked really with After Effects 7.0 due to the major revisions of menu options and names between version 7.0 and version CS3. Getting back to the task at hand, the flare is simple to make:

1. Create a new black solid layer. Again, make sure that it is "Comp Sized."
2. Set the new black solid layer to SCREEN mode, which will make the color black invisible in the layer (just like when we created the proton stream core and arc).
3. Use the camera flare tool from the preset menu. You know, just search for it in the Adobe After Effects preset search menu.
4. You don't want to standard camera flare. Try out the different camera flares. You'll probably want one of the blue or white ones. I think I used the 35MM camera flare, but I'm not sure.
5. Putting it on a layer above your proton stream is what I did, but try different things. Maybe making it more transparent than mine would be a good idea?
6. As your actor moves his proton gun make sure that the camera flare, just like the main core stream and electrical lightning arc, follows the gun tip.

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Last of all, if you are confused, go watch lots of After Effects tutorials on the basics so you know what I'm even talking about, lol. I did. Try Video Copilot DOT com, videocopilot.com .