I needed to create some clouds to fly through for a shot. Visual effects is such a broad field, that it is really difficult to be ready to do everything. There are a ton of very different kinds of skills, tasks and tools. So, whenever I get freelance work, there is usually a bunch of figuring out and piecing it together.So, you look at the shot, figure out which tools are likely best for the work, time and budget, then brush up on them if needed and start working on tests to break down the possible steps to get the result you need.Now for clouds that you need to fly through, there’s the volumetric particle route in a 3D program or some simpler particles in a compositing program. Both were areas that I would need to brush up on, but the volumetric particles can take hours per frame to render, much less the time to get it working correctly, so if we only had a week to do all the visual effects for the commercial, it would not be feasible. After Effects it is then. I brushed up on some tools before coming in, then got to work, doing some tests. By the end of the day I had some tests to show and I felt pretty good that I had got it working.