spherevfx was the worlds first Foundry certified Nuke Training centre.

Working alongside fxphd and The Foundry, spherevfx has designed the
'Official Nuke Trainer Certification' program.

We have literally trained and certify all the other international Nuke trainers!

Our Nuke training is designed to be extremely flexible giving you the ability to pick exactly what you want to cover. We can train to any level from the complete beginner up to the more advanced user.

The way this course works is that if you want to cover everything then it will be a 5 day course, however you can pick just the areas you want and we'll let you know how long it will take to train you. The complete list of everything we can cover is below.

Like all our courses we will train on site at your facility and along side a live project if required. All our staff are production trained and able to work with you to train your artist quickly and efficiently.


Example shows Digital Domain's work in Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen
and the use of the Dope Sheet, NukeX 6.3 (Custom screen layout).

Understanding Nuke

  • Finding Your Way Round NukeX
  • Understanding Nuke's Multi-Channel, High Dynamic Range Layering System.

The Maths of Nuke

  • Basic Image Manipulation
  • Basic Image Compositing
  • Log vs Linear
  • Gamma, LUT’s and Colour Management
  • Premultiplied Images
  • High Dynamic Range Images
  • File Formats, Compression, Channels and Colour Depth

General and CGI Compositing

  • General Compositing
  • Audio
  • CGI Multipass Compositing 
    • Diffuse, Secular, Reflection, Indirect, Occlusion, etc
  • Compositing using Additional CGI Channels 
    • UV, Normal, Point, zDepth, Motion Vectors, Fresnel, RGB Mattes, etc
  • Understanding and Working with the Bounding Box

2D Techniques

  • Image Manipulation
  • Image Distortion
  • 2D Morphing and Warping
  • Colour Correction
  • Morphing and Warping
  • Lens Effects (Blurs, Lens Blurs, Flares, Glints, God Rays, etc)
  • Effects and Filters
  • Denoise
  • Time Manipulation and Editing
  • Curve Editor and Dope Sheet
  • Working with Film and LUT’s
  • Working with Metadata
  • Utility Nodes

Roto, Paint and Keying

  • Roto
  • Paint
  • Working with Keyers (Keyer, IBK, Primate, Keylight, Difference, Hue, etc)
  • Using Soft Mattes and Core Mattes inside Nuke
  • Lightwrap and Edge Blur Integration Tools

Lens Distortion, Tracking and Matchmoving

  • Camera Lens Distortion
  • Tracking, Stabilisation, Matchmoving and Corner Pinning.
  • Planar Tracking

3D Techniques

  • An Introduction to Nuke’s 3D Environment
  • Lights and Shaders
  • Deformation
  • Pan and Tile Setup
  • Camera Projections
  • ProjectionSolver
  • Retouch and Rig Removal Techniques
  • Modeler
  • Set Extensions
  • Rotoscoping in 3D
  • Texturing, Lighting and Fake Shadows in 3D
  • Coverage Mapping
  • Environmental Mapping Techniques including Cubic and Spherical
  • Pixar Renderman Integration: Shaders and Rendering
  • Working with 3D Data from 3rd Party Applications 
  • Camera Matchmoving and 3D Model Position Integration
  • Dense Point Clouds and Meshes

Deep Compositing

  • Understanding Deep Compositing
  • Creating Holdouts
  • Modifying Deep Data
  • Cropping, Reformatting and Transforming Deep Images
  • Creating Deep Data

3D Particles

  • Emitting and Spawning Particles
  • Editing Particles
  • Modifying Particle Movement
  • Common Controls
  • Customizing Particles

Stereoscopic / 3D

  • Basic Overview to Stereoscopic Production and Compositing
  • An Introduction to Stereoscopic Compositing

FurnaceCore, Gizmos and Python

  • FurnanceCore
    • Align, Degrain, DeNoise, Kronos, MatchGrade, MotionBlur,
      ReGrain, RigRemoval, Steadiness, VectorGenerator, WireRemoval
  • Gizmo Creation
  • Basic Python Techniques

Optional Extras (call for details...)

  • Tweak Software's RV Integration for Nuke
  • The Foundry's Hiero Integration for Nuke
  • The Foundry's Mari Integration for Nuke


Example shows cleanup, 3D roto, cg roof replacement, 3D room and sky pan n' tile,
all composited into tracked background plate, NukeX 6.3 (Custom screen layout).

Per days Nuke course £500 (+VAT @ 20%)

Recommended course books:

  • Nuke 101: Professional Compositing and Visual Effects (Ron Ganbar)
  • The Art and Science of Digital Compositing (Ron Brinkmann)
  • Professional Digital Compositing (Lee Lanier)
  • Digital Compositing for Film and Video (Steve Wright)
  • Encyclopedia of Visual Effects (Damian Allen & Brian Connor)
  • Visual Effects in a Digital World (Karen Goulekas)
  • Bluescreen Compositing (John Jackman)
  • Greenscreen Made Easy (Jeremy Hanke & Michelle Yamazaki)
  • The HDRI Handbook (Christian Bloch)