"Ghost effect"?

jkraus wrote on 4/26/2005, 7:40 PM

I don't know what else to call it, but want to do the effect where when a person walks (assuming background is fixed) there are several ghost like images that folow untl the person stops then the ghosts catch up and fade into the person. Sometime used to imply high speed motion in SciFi flicks.

Anyone with an idea?

Joe

Comments

Spot|DSE wrote on 4/26/2005, 7:45 PM

The EASIEST way to do this is to use the Pixelan SpiceFilters, as it has a temporal/spatial delay that accomplishes exactly what you want.
Another way is to use the motion blur, and combine a master track with several other tracks of the same media at various framerates and offsets. This would be much, much slower than the Pixelan, but it's also much, much cheaper.

jetdv wrote on 4/26/2005, 8:25 PM

The "Stuttering Video" tool in Excalibur 4 will also perform this task. There's a 15 day free trial you can use to create this effect.

Spot|DSE wrote on 4/26/2005, 9:04 PM

I could be wrong, but I think what jkraus is after is a motion trail with varied opacity over the length of the trail so it fades to transparent. The way Excalibur works is basically the same as what I'm suggesting, but with greater elegance and speed. The Pixelan tools with their multilayer resample are a beautiful effect, no stutter, just motion, blur, and ghosting.
They have a demo on their site.

jkraus wrote on 4/27/2005, 8:26 AM

Thanks, all good suggestions!

This is the most responsive and helpful site I have been on, you guys are the experts (to me just a hobby).

Thx

Joe

Xavion wrote on 4/27/2005, 9:05 AM

I second that jkraus these guy's are great!

PumiceT wrote on 4/28/2005, 8:10 AM

Call me simplistic, but couldn't you copy the video to other tracks (above) and shift each of them to be delayed a few (or more) frames, and semi-transparent?

Spot|DSE wrote on 4/28/2005, 8:15 AM

That's what the Excalibur tool basically does, and it's a very nice effect. But it's not the same as ghosting where you not only have delayed vid, but you have motion trails and an increase in transparency. I've tried on a couple of occasions to create what the Pixelan tools do, and can't. Even when I can get it remotely close, the CPU overhead is horrible due to the number of tracks.
download the Spicefilters demo, you'll see what I mean.

PumiceT wrote on 4/28/2005, 8:28 AM

Cool... I'll have to look into them...

DSE/Spot --- Spot --- yet another name change?? :)