LogInIf you haven't played Jet Set Radio in a while, look at this awesome case and consider going back. It looks like 3D magic, but in reality, it's an impressive animation set up in After Effects by the talented creator TempusWare.
Jet Set Radio is a 2000 action game developed by Smilebit and published by Sega for the Dreamcast. Last year, TempusWare saw a similar effect by Motion Mill for Sonic Adventure 2 and decided to recreate it.
I know you're dying to know how to achieve this result, and thankfully, the artist has shared its breakdown.
First, they found the original art, separated each character into parts, and "filled in bits of torsos and legs that were hidden by limbs and the spray can." Then, they lined up each asset in a composite shot in After Effects, used the Puppet tool to mark joints, and keyframed movements.
"The animated sparks flying out from the wheels were also iterated on. I extended the line of sparks in the cover to form a horizontal loop that could infinitely scroll, and drew an alternate frame to place in front to hide where the sparks appear from."
After that, TempusWare recreated the logo animation from the game's title screen and traced its bitmap in Inkscape to create a vectorized version, where they also drew the 3D extrusion. The letters and backdrops were animated in After Effects and recreated frame-by-frame from the reference video.
The hardest part was not to make the animation, it turns out, but to find an affordable Dreamcast game case. As they were $70, the creator simply took a video at a store, used Mocha to track the cover inside the case and After Effects to track the camera. The assets were eventually placed into the 3D space, moved on the Z-axis to set different depths, and the miracle was born.
Interestingly, TempusWare has never actually played Jet Set Radio. But if you want to, you're in luck: Sega announced a new game in the series in December.
You can try to recreate the cool 3D effect by following TempusWare's steps. Also, join our 80 Level Talent platform and our Telegram channel, follow us on Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn, where we share breakdowns, the latest news, awesome artworks, and more.