Pic in Pic Shape

OhMyGosh wrote on 5/31/2007, 11:20 PM

Wow, did I get lost this time! I am trying to basicly do a pic in pic, but with a different shaped track motion frame. I would like to have a thought bubble with video running in it, in the main track. I couldn't tell if the mask I made in PhotoShop should be black or white, png or tga, or what level it should go on, alpha or multiply, etc. I have studied everywhere trying to get a better understanding of compositing, masks, parents, children (if I had a child that difficult, I'd ..........oops) anyway, if someone had some help or easy to understand reference material I would sure appreciate it. Thanks. Cin

Comments

Chienworks wrote on 6/1/2007, 3:49 AM

Generally the mask should be white where you want to see the masked image and black where you want to see the background image. File type isn't really much concern. For simple masks i often use .GIF because it will produce the smallest files. JPG, PNG, TIF, BMP, PSD all work fine too. No need to play with the alpha channel at all.

Place the mask image on track one, the video to go into the mask on track two, and the background video on track three. Just to the right of the level slider in the track one header is a green button that has the Greek letter alpha in it. Click this button and from the dropdown list that appears choose Multiply (Mask). Some versions of Vegas also require that you add the Mask Generator effect to the clips on the mask track. 7.0e seems to have done away with this requirement, but i don't believe that Vegas Studio has this update yet.

If you really want to have fun, the mask can be a video clip. That way the mask can change shape as it plays! Note also that various shades of grey will make the PIP clip various amounts of transparent. You can use this method to get some really interesting or very odd transitions. I made a couple little demos a while back. You can see them here:

http://www.rchv.com/transitions/transitions1-demo-512.wmv
http://www.rchv.com/transitions/tp02-demo-256.wmv

OhMyGosh wrote on 6/1/2007, 9:37 PM

Thanks Kelly for all the great advice. With your help, and a couple of hours, I got it done. The deal maker was when I made the mask with a transparent background, and a white shape. As good as it works, I wish I could say that I understand how, and why it works :( I have a recipe book that I am making with all the tips and tricks from you and the other people from this board so I can just refer to it when I need to do something out of the ordinary. Thanks for the links, you do some truely amazing things :) Keep up the good work, and thanks again. Cin
PS. Don't mean to get greedy, but.............is there anyway to put a black border around the shape so that it stands out more in the lowest track? I have tried it in PhotoShop, but when I bring it in and do all the mask stuff, it disappears :/ Cin
PS. PS. Think I stumbled onto it! If I don't use the 'mask generator' it leaves the black outline! :)