STUMP the video editor

Does green screen count? I wanna learn what I need (hardware/software) to do green screen shots.

Sure no prob, I actually do alot of greenscreen. But just to let you know, Greenscreening is an art all in itself. First thing I gotta know is : what do you plan on doing with the greenscreen? (face shots, full body, etc) and how much time are you willing to spend on it

Is there a way to edit wmv clips without just using a splitter - nothing extreem, just take a encoded 2 min wmv, cut out 4 or 5 - five second scenes, pull them together, add crossfades and audio fades, and export/re-encode them to a wmv???? or do you have to use the original avi file. (This would be with Premiere Pro and Cleaner XL)

I want to set up a "news anchor" like setup. head and torso. Time...well, I'm looking for an easy solution if there is one. I'd sacrifice some quality for ease at this point.

is this freakin luck or what? answer me this riddle boy!

I'm using Avid Xpress Pro and it is only exporting track 3 & 4 into my renders. I am not using any special software for the audio, so there isn't any cross patch issues that I know of.

In the Avid it's self, the buttons from track 1 & 2 are all highlighted with the solid speaker on the right of the button. Trach 3 & 4 have just the edges highlighted and the speakers are not solid, just an outline.

How do I get it to export track 1-4.

Also why does Avid take so freakin long when exporting? I mean come on, Vegas rips it in an hour, this is taking 6+ hours!

thanks dude

Ahh thats simple bro, import your files into Premiere, and treat them like regular avi files. They are not rendered, so Premiere will be slower at showing you whats on screen. But its basically the samething. Once you're done editing, just export it using the built in WMV encoder. (I've never exported a wmv to a wmv before, so I don't know if there will be a loss in quality, but if there is, export your wmv as an AVI through FILE, EXPORT, MOVIE. Slap the avi on the timeline and then use WMV encoder to recode without losing quality)

Ok, making a makeshift greenscreen :


Well to achieve such an effect, you need 2 very important elements :

1 - A greenscreen that has 1 cingular color (it can also be a bluescreen) and make sure that the green is a bright green (or blue)... like you see in the movies. Anything too bright or too dark will imply that you will spend alot of time in Post correcting flaws.

2 - A lighting setup that creates a well distributed light. The trick to greenscreening is to EVENLY light the whole screen INDEPENDANTLY from the subject. Basically, you have a lighting setup that lights up the screen by itself and a 4 point lighting setup for your subject (news anchor) that won't cast (or won't cast too much) shadow onto the backdrop. In the end, what you want to tell your editing program is to take THIS COLOR (the green) and take it out of the picture... if you have shadows on your backdrop, well, the computer will see it as a different color and won't take it out.


Lighting the greenscreen :

1 - Get yourself some neons if you can (kinos) and try to avoid spot lights, unless you can get alot of them (i.e CYC lights). Spot lights will create light gradients as for neons cast an even light everywhere. If you must use spots, try to find diffusers (either gels, or use a transparent shower curtain if you're really building this without any budget).


I usually setup my greenscreen lighting overhead, that way you have alot of room to move, make sure the lighting for the backdrop does not hit your subject.

If you have a lightmeter, test different spots on your backdrop to see if the light level is equal everywhere.



2 - Light your subject with different lights than the ones you use to light the backdrop. Try to use a 4 point lighting system (if you don't know what it is, google it or ask me in a reply). The important thing to remember when lighting your subject is to avoid casting shadows (so light from the side) and use you backlight to create a light halo around your subject for easier matting.




Post :

Well now that everything is filmed, bring it into your editing prog for compositing. I prefer to use After Effects for this.

Now what I do for a better greenscreen is I will create 2 mattes, 1 to define the edge of your subject and one to evenly matte him out. I call these mattes the EDGE and CORE mattes.

Use a Difference Matte for your edge matte and use a Color Difference Key for your core matte. This will create a black and white image that you can use as a final matte. You will prolly need to fine tune this stuff by adjusting your levels and Choke.

Now take that black and white matte into another comp, take your original clip, place it over head and set the black and white image as that original clup's matte!

There ya go, add a background and you should be done.


now I know this is alot of info and I had to abreviate the whole process, but this should give you an idea of what to do. Do some research mate, you should be able to figure things out

I've used alot of editing software in my time and let me tell you that I've never met a more complexe and genuinely piss-you-off-more editing program lol. I know its an industry standard, but I hate going through 5 menus just to add a fade! lol


I tried using it for awhile and gave up after too many frustrations like the one you've encountered. Quite honestly I don't have enough working knowledge of Avid to directly answer your question. My best bet is that there is something you didn't click in your render options... when you preview the thing, do you hear track 1 and 2? If not, then your tracks are turned off.


Why does it take so long to export? What are you exporting exactly? Do you have unecessary effects in your project that aren't turned on (some programs will render effects even though they are not activated) Are you compressing when you export? Frame blending? Could be alot of things you know... I'll need a bit more details to answer that one correctly.



If none of this corresponds to your problem... try the avid forums for help : http://www.avid.com/cgi/forumscgi/ul...i?action=intro

why is a blue screen not purple?

Wow! Great freakin info. THANK YOU

i had asked this question in another thread earlier today.

what is the best way to go about storing tons of raw video content, with backups. Firewire 800, External Sata?

The reason why they use blue and green screens is for the simple fact that those 2 colours are the least dominant on a person's skin and in nature.


When performing greenscreen, you're telling the computer to eliminate a certain color from the image, well, if you were to use a white backdrop, everything that is white (including glares, eyeballs, teeth, etc) would be taken out of the image.

But green and blue are less likely to be found in images (especially the blue and green they use), so you have less chances of unwanted artifacts being lost.

Its that simple

Well, what do you mean exactly? Do you want to know what would be the quickest way to store all that stuff? Or WHAT to store the stuff on (i.e tapes, hardrives, DVDs, etc.)?

But a lot of peeps have blue eyes.

The most reliable way. I know i want to store all the stuff on hard drives

Its not the same Hue. Chromakeying depends on a very certain green hue, all other greens will not be keyed out. But you can specifiy which blue/green you want to remove.

AND, if you have a model that has blue eyes and are afraid they are gonna get keyed out, just use a greenscreen instead


and even if by some miracle the eyes get Keyed out, just layer a mask over it to get them back (photoshop/after effects mask, not a halloween mask...)

Well if you're storing your stuff on a hard drive, any method is good. USB, firewire, whatever, as long as it gets on the hard drive. But when you store the hardrives, make sure its in a safe place (no temperature changes, no moisteness, no magnets, etc.) Preferable something that is air tight also.


But I think I've answered in the other thread already. I had talked about just saving your edit jobs and keeping your original tapes so as to save on HD space

Thanks. I will.

I'm off to the gym for a few hours, keep posting, I'll answer your questions by tonight

Congrats on a chock full useful industry relevant thread! :glug

in terms of backups would this be the way to go. Raid1 backup and another backup using some backupsoftware to a NAS device.

wtf?????????

For my video storage drives i would be using raid1 with would mirror my hard drive. Then for a second backup i would use some backup software to do incremental backups to a Network Attached Storage Device.

whats an easy way in vegas video to blue out someones face in a 5 minute video

Exporting 01:31:00:00 at NTSC 720i @ 16x9

It's a rough edit so the only effects are a few fades and some text.

Avid is pissing me off to no end. The client wanted it in Avid because of the industry standard, but it could have saved them alot of money and had a better product if they stuck with final cut or vegas.

Why is it that one some systems when you inport raw footage from a mini dvd into it, it looks like it is interlaced with small line on it. Sam video card as another system that works fine.

Any ideas? This has been stumping me for about 6 months.

first of all great thread...
heres my question..
im looking for a good program to grab frames from a dvd... and it must deinterlace them...

I'm not sure what you mean by blueing out someone's face... you want to JUST make his face blue??? do you want a blue dot over his face or just his skin to be the color blue?

Well first off I'd say, as an editor, your client should not be the one to choose on which platform you are to edit on. A final product is the result of an editors talent and not the program he uses. One thing I have learned over time while dealing with clients is to get them to be on YOUR terms or drop them. If you leave them an inch of leeway, they will push you around, especially when it comes to editing cause most clients will think they know what the hell they are talking about.

So as a tip, next time they suggest using Avid, tell them it would be more cost effective to do it on the platform of your choice, if they're not happy, let them find some other schmuck to do it for them and avoid yourself the hassle.


Now as for your problem, I'd say that your shit is simply to long to export into one big ass file. Export it in 3-4 small segments, then take those segments back into AVID, and export them into 1 big file. That might solve your problem. If not, go see the Avid forum, lol, like I said, Avid pisses me off so I don't even bother troubleshooting with that prog.

Are you importing at the same settings? Lower field first etc?

If this is a recurring problem, try switching fields or interpreting your footage or ask to capture without fields.

And by the line, are you talking about that small little line that flickers at the top or bottom of your video? Or is the line in the middle of your images?

Try IMTOO software, its a DVD Ripper. set it to the frame you want to rip, and set the work are to that frame. I'm also pretty sure there is a deinterlace option in there, if not, send it to me bro ;) I owe you a few favors so I can do it for ya hehe

Cheers

Yo, Nowhere.. I'm a fellow Video Editor. Yo, I still need advice. I've always wanted to be a Music Video Editor so I copy there techniques. I'm looking to do this effect where two tracks flip back and forth like a split second at a time. If you wanna get down to the nitty gritty of what I'm talkin bout I went to www.launch.com and found a video where they are applying the effect. Go to Kanye West Page http://music.yahoo.com/ar-304131-videos--Kanye-West and check out the vid "Gold Digger". The effect is applied 14-16 seconds in the video (It has a time reader)... I use Sony Vegas... How is that done?

Hey bro, well I can't see the video, but I'm pretty sure what you're talking about. Its a pretty standard effect in music videos.

Well you've got 2 options you can use.

1 - If you use after effects, just layer one video over the other and apply the Strobe effect (in the stylise menu) to the top layer. Change the layer value to Transparent, this will make the top layer disappear and reappear per the settings of the effect. Just set the effect to the speed that you want and of course add some keyframes if you want the speed to be variable.

2 - If you wanna stick with Vegas, well, you<re gonna have to do it the nitty gritty way. Put both tracks one on top of the other. Zoom in to see the frames and start cutting out every other frame of the top video. That way, when you play it back, its going to switch back and forth every frame. It makes for a pretty groovy effect, I've used it a bunch of times!

Enjoy

sorry i meant blur

where can I find a wmv splitter for Mac OS X...

Well I'm going to be honest. I don't do MAC.

and logically, wmv stands for WINDOWS Media Player... so I doubt Mac has much support for it.

I googled it a bit and found mostly junk. The only thing I found that could possibly help you is http://fileforum.betanews.com/detail...o/1107589979/1


But if you're editing on a MAC, your editing program should allow you to import a WMV, cut it up and export it in the format you want.


Worse comes to worse, just ask anyone here to do it on a PC for you.

How do you export a .wmv file on a mac?

Quite honestly I don't know. As I mentioned, I don't do MAC. And WMV is designed for Windows... I'm pretty sure there are some converters out there, but its late, I'm knee deep in work and don't feel like searching for it

Use Cleaner.

NoWhere I figured this thread would be filled with bullshit answers as I am the self proclaimed king of premiere/after effects/Final cut but I'm actually impressed.

good stuff, im actually learning some shit.

what software produces the best screen caps off MPEG videos?

Ya, Premiere and After Effects are my main tools. And thanks for the compliment. People have helped me out throught my career, now's my time to give a little back.

Plus I guess it proves I actually know what I'm doing lol, that I'm not just a surfer.

If ya got any questions, go ahead and ask

I thought that question was answered in your other thread. The guy gave you a pretty decent solution too.

Just thought I'd add that the best and cheapest way to go about the green screen is to hit a local fabric store. Spray on adhesive and a nail gun on a piece of sheet rock or plywood. Thats how I set up my last one anyways.

Yup, thats one good way. There alot of sites that give you ways to do cheap greenscreening. The problem I've always encountered after the is the tremendous amount of post you have to do for the "touch ups".

So to save time, make sure you have good lighting and use that backlight!! lol It saves u so much time trying to eliminate that green aura around your subject and helps alot when it comes to keeping detail in someones hair .

I thought he was talking about when shooting your own content. I'll go back and re-read.

Never tried the blacklight. Next time I do some keying I'll definately give it a shot. So far I've only used the green screen for foreground and object effects. Have only fucked around with human subjects.

Greenscreening is a gem! Best thing you can do is setup a permanent (or easy to install) greenscreen set. You can do SO many things with it AND make tons of money with it (lots of lower quality production companies don't have the budget to rent a real greenscreen studio and would kill to have access to one already setup).

Thats what I did near I live, something really basic... and its a bloody gold mine

I'll help you dewd.
It sounds like you don't have tracks 1 and 4 enabled to export. Most non-linear editors rip Avid with their interface so most likely if you look to the beginning of the timeline you'll notice that the actual track marker is either subdued or has some other way of marking it active. It should be that easy... although I haven't cut on an Avid system in a while.

SixNine