Nuke Tutorials by Compositing Academy

Nuke Tutorials by Compositing AcademyNuke Tutorials by Compositing AcademyNuke Tutorials by Compositing Academy

Nuke Tutorials by Compositing Academy

Nuke Tutorials by Compositing AcademyNuke Tutorials by Compositing AcademyNuke Tutorials by Compositing Academy
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  • Beginner Tutorials
  • Intermediate / Advance
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    • Home
    • Beginner Tutorials
    • Intermediate / Advance
    • Full Courses
  • Home
  • Beginner Tutorials
  • Intermediate / Advance
  • Full Courses

Free Nuke Tutorials

This is a curated beginner Nuke tutorial list from the channel Compositing Academy.   You can follow along directly by subscribing to the channel on the button below!

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Nuke Beginner Tutorials Playlist

3D Tracking Concepts for Nuke Beginners

Learn about how Nuke's 3d CameraTracker works, with topics such as parallax, 3d solves, 2d tracking, and more.


Also covered are the basics of when to use different types of tracks, such as planar tracking.

Compositing Beginner Tutorial (1/8): Roles of Production

A multi-part beginner series.

What are the roles of production?  This video covers the general overview of a visual effects pipeline, and where you sit as a VFX Compositor.  


Digital Compositing is about combining elements from a lot of different sources, whether that be 3D or 2D.  This helps you see a birds eye view of the entire visual effects process.


This video is part of a multi-series course which is a great introduction to Nuke.  If you want the full set of courses, check the link below

Explore the full course

Compositing Beginner Tutorial (2/8): 3 Point Lighting

Understand 3 Point Lighting!  Light is a big part of being a VFX Compositor.  Whether that be Re-Lighting a scene, grading footage, or doing full CG Compositing, it's important to grasp these beginner concepts of light and photography.

Rotoscoping Techniques for VFX Compositors

  1. One of the most essential skills as a Compositor for feature films or television is your ability to create mattes.  Rotoscoping is the manual process of isolating objects by cutting them out by hand using Bezier curves (the Roto node in Nuke).


This informational video includes a few key techniques for improving your rotoscoping, which may not be obvious when you're starting out.


This video covers topics such as:

  • Identifying motion paths (Breaking down complex motion for Rotoscoping into smaller parts, and using Ease-In Ease-Out curves to create less keyframes.)
  • Separating objects using multiple Roto shapes in Nuke
  • Mixing 2D Trackers in Nuke with Rotoscoping (Stabilizing the footage using Nuke)
  • Identifying primary and secondary forms, as well as rotational pivot points.  This will speed up your rotoscoping significantly.



Beginners guide to Keying Greenscreens in Nuke

Another way to create mattes is using Keying.  This video covers the essential concepts that a VFX Compositor must understand to get a job in the visual effects industry.


Learn compositing topics such as:

  • Keymixing (Combining multiple mattes together to create a better alpha)
  • Garbage Matting (Cutting areas out from a key that are unkeyable
  • Holdouts (Filling in holes in your alpha so you don't have see through areas)
  • Despilling (Getting rid of green or blue bounce light from the actor or environment, replacing it with a more neutral color)


If you want a full comprehensive course on Keying, you can learn from a Senior Compositor on the link below.

  

Full keying course

Beginners guide to Cleanplating (using Camera Projections) in Nuke

Invisible effects are the unseen effects in films or television.  Compositors and Rotoscoping / Paint artists are responsible for a lot of these effects.


This process is called Cleanplating.  It's achieved mostly through using 3D Camera projections and painting from different angles to remove objects.


This video is an in depth tutorial talking about 3D reconstruction from Nuke's Cameratracker, as well as using Lidar (a laser scanner from your phone)


The project files are included in NK202, which is a 3D Masterclass in Nuke 


Get the full course

Compositing Beginner Tutorial (3/8): Exposure

Understand camera exposure and how it relates to digital compositing.  We discuss contrast, HDR Tonemapped Images, and more.

Compositing Beginner Tutorial (4/8): Shadows

The basis of CG Compositing is understanding light.  This video discusses shadow attenuation, and uses a CG render example to demonstrate the concept.
Also discussed is matching black levels with atmospheric perspective, which is important for CG integration and making things look real in Nuke.

Compositing Beginner Tutorial (5/8): Reflections and Fresnel Effect

Knowing when to reflect objects is important for a nuke compositor.  Light behaves differently at different angles, so we look at a few of those properties in this tutorial.

Compositing Beginner Tutorial (6/8): White Balance and White Point

What affects the white value in an image?   Understanding a camera's white balance, as well as the other factors that affect colors in a scene, are explained here.


VFX Compositing ties in a lot of photography and light understanding.

Compositing Beginner Tutorial (7/8): Glows

VFX Compositors are constantly dealing with optical qualities in a shot.  Glows are one of the basic fundamentals for CG compositing, and this tutorial goes into the layering techniques for glows.  

Compositing Beginner Tutorial (8/8): Lens Artifacts

Chromatic Abberation, Bokeh, and Edges.  Important to understand these concepts when integrating CG into live action footage in Nuke.

Compositing 3D Reflections in Nuke

How do you create a 3D Reflection inside of Nuke?  This tutorial covers that process, as well as including a free nuke tutorial with project files and footage.  This is a good practice for beginners and will give you a feel for the 3d system in Nuke.


Project files available here:


Free project files

Preserve Quality through Projections

This tutorial covers 3D Projections in Nuke, and also how to preserve quality through the Scanline render.  The tutorial is primarily focused around creating a basic CG patch (this is a "clean plate"), but cutting out that patch with the created alpha channel to maintain detail.

How to use the Shuffle Node in Nuke

Understanding the shuffle node as a beginner can be tricky.  This video does a deep dive tutorial on Shuffle, as well as understanding Nuke's channel and layer system.


If you want more advanced CG Compositing Tutorials, check out Compositing Academy's NK303 course (which is almost 9 hours!)

Full Nuke Course

How to use the Card3D in Nuke

So you've made a color correction - but you want to stick it to your scene so it moves with your camera.  This tutorial covers Imageplanes (a custom node) which is using Nuke's Card3D.


This is a very useful VFX Compositing technique, and used often in VFX Production.


Another free nuke tutorial with project files included.

Free Project Files

UVs / ST Maps in Nuke

A free nuke tutorial, project files free download!


This video covers a fundamental computer animation concepts, "What are UV's?"


We explain this concept in the context of Nuke, and how we can utilize 3d object UVs to wrap textures on them using the STMap node in Nuke.

Free Project Files

UVs / ST Maps in Nuke (Intermediate)

A free nuke tutorial, project files free download!


This is a more intermediate nuke tutorial, but a follow up to the previous.  This explains using nuke projections with expressions to bake projections.


If this sounds like gibberish to you, we recommend checking out some of the other beginner tutorials first!

Free Project Files

More tutorials coming soon!

This page will be updated as more tutorials are released on Compositing Academy. 

Are you looking for more advanced Nuke tutorials? Check out the link below.

Advanced Nuke Tutorials

Want a more structured Nuke Training experience?

Compositing Academy offers A-Z nuke training from a top VFX industry professional.  

Find out more

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