Arty set using 2-3 channel chromakey and other color effects.

xgenei wrote on 10/14/2004, 11:03 AM
Well my vision is probably bigger than what I can chew, but the look I am after is comparable to Edward Scissorhands with both a CG background and foreground at the same time. 8^)

I am planning to use a chromakey backdrop for a high resolution still image background. IN ADDITION I need a small chromakey "projection screen" in front of the set that will be pretty much visible all the time, with either a disguise (still image) or motion video on it. I pretty much have to run both simultaneously and it has to look good.

I am planning on doing a blue and a green screen for two channels, and maybe a third channel for enhansed color. Has anyone tried multi-channel CG (chromakey)?

I need to "project" floating eyes, floating hands, and video scene previews, on the front chromakey surface. I think I can forego fancy compositing software since it's a 2D surface, although there are mutliple camera angles and distances. Although perspective close to 90-degrees can be fudged, I think the new 3D Track Motion might be able to keep the perspective exactly right for these clips. I don't know how easy this will be in practice. I only plan to use fixed camera shots but I am as yet clueless on doing this.

I am planning on producing the "floating eyes" clips using the new animated keyframable Beziere masking. If these clips have a background matching the final background, I think I can simply swap out the chromakey-cover clip for the image clip. I think this will work well.

The enhansed color channel I will use chromakey "makeup" -- probably a wicked looking orange or something.

I am mainly concerned about quality losses for multiple render passes and would love some advice on how to combine steps and minimize the recalc of otherwise untouched video. I hope I am being clear here. Masking and chromakey replacement is not changing the underlying video, except for scaling of the CG images up and down, but how is it in practice? I don't know. I'll comment when I can do the experiments but there are a lot of options on approach, software, etc.

I am planning to get the overall film look via quality medium (DV-cam?), lighting, and diffusion at capture. Then color balance, partial desaturation, and chromakey in post.

I am looking forward to a little collaboration on this!

BR, -John

Comments

Spot|DSE wrote on 10/14/2004, 11:35 AM
I've done 2 channel stuff, but recently saw some mapped 2 or 3 channel stuff that Vic Milt did a few years back, and it was spectacular with walk behinds, fly-thrus, etc. Maybe you can get Vic to chime in.
Remember, you can build a single or dual color set, and mask out areas, filling in the masks.