Best green screen material on a budget?

[Halsu]

There is also Reflecmedia. It used to be drastically expensive, and didn't have available adapters to fit smaller filter sizes (ie hv20/hv30) but they just dropped the [URL="http://www.dvcreators.net/reflecmedia-microlite-with-8x8-chromatte-curtain/"]

Yep, that looks good. At around a thousand dollars you can get the base package, which is nice, if still not cheap... of course, making a backdrop that's the same size as ours (roughly 13x25 feet) would cost quite a bit more.

The other thing is shadows - when making wide shots, it's actually a GOOD thing to have the talent cast a shadow on the greenscreen - when properly lit and keyed, it helps to make the shot believable. There's no shadows at all (AFAIK) when using reflectmedia.

Anyway, it's an option worth considering, and for many situations, it might be the best there is.

[randomhero]

Shadows definitely do lend themselves to adding realism, however if you're after a good key that's easy to pull, it can make things difficult. You can always add shadows in later (although it's extra work) but especially for talking heads or above the waist bits where a shadow isn't needed, it just saves so much time! However, it's obviously a bit more than other suggestions, although it is as you said, a lot cheaper now. Good luck out there!

[Halsu]

Shadows definitely do lend themselves to adding realism, however if you're after a good key that's easy to pull, it can make things difficult. You can always add shadows in later (although it's extra work)

It depends on the case. For example in a shot like this...



...where there's multiple people, soft lighting and moving camera, it would be very tedious indeed to do convincing shadows as a post effect (this is a final frame from the larger greenscreen studio shoot that i used as an example earlier in the thread).

But you're right, if the feet don't show, it's much simpler to not have shadows at all.

[randomhero]

True, it'd be harder with multiple people. But check out this clip that Guy Cochran did using just reflecmedia.. shadows look pretty good to me, and no extra lighting was needed.

[Halsu]

True, it'd be harder with multiple people. But check out this clip that Guy Cochran did using just reflecmedia.. shadows look pretty good to me, and no extra lighting was needed.

Yep, looks pretty good - post production shadows work fine, as long as the talent or the camera don't move.

The closeups are pretty fugly, there's a black halo around the hands. The camera is too close to the subject i guess.

Here's a link to the actual music video i've referenced to earlier - look i.e. at the wide shots where the whole band is playing and there's big camera motion: making those shadows in post would have been a nightmare... or impossible.

http://www.poetsofthefall.com/videos/lift/

[randomhero]

That's an awesome video, big props!

[Halsu]

That's an awesome video, big props!

Thanks - i shot that with HVR-Z1, no adapters or other fancy stuff. Could have been done with plain vanilla HV20 just as well (okay, maybe a wide angle lens would have been needed for some shots, but you get the idea). All greenscreen, save for one or two closeups.

[randomhero]

The quality of the footage is what really got me. I honestly expected you to say you were using a higher end camera or at least a 35mm adapter or something... I just caught footage of a new music video shot on a Red, and it looks fantastic! Definitely gives me something to aspire to, as a fellow music videographer. Check it out

[Halsu]

The quality of the footage is what really got me. I honestly expected you to say you were using a higher end camera or at least a 35mm adapter or something...

It's not the camera - it's what you put in front of it.

And what you do in post ;-)

Here's what the footage looked like straight out the camera:

I just caught footage of a new music video shot on a Red, and it looks fantastic! Definitely gives me something to aspire to, as a fellow music videographer. Check it out

Nice!

[black_fx_35]

Thanks in advance for any assistance. MODS: Sorry if this is posted in the wrong place, feel free to move it as appropriate.

I have been asked by my company to pull together a few videos to be put on our corporate website. I primarily use my HV30 for family and vacation videos, and my manager has seen a few that I have put together. Anyhow, because of this, she has asked if I could do a few to highlight different opportunities that we recruit for.

Here is an example of what I would love to do:

http://careers.thomsonreuters.com/Ou...&videoid=map_2

This is obviously a professionally put together video. My thought it to do something similar, interview style with various employees, but I am most interested in having a static background for the video as I think the quick cuts of people saying a line or two would be way less distracting if the background was static, vs changing all of the time.

Anyhow, any suggestions? Is this doable? I edit using iMovie, but have access to FCE or FCS (although I haven't used them before).

I would have an opportunity to shoot a test video to figure some things out before we do the real deal. Any thoughts? Thanks so much.

[voodeux]

Greenscreen is relatively easy to do in theory...but in practice, you'll find it a difficult beast to conquer properly. Lighting is key, keep it even across the background and far enough from your subjects so as not to 'spill'. Backlight the subject wherever possible, and you'll want a flattering key light. So, at minimum, you're looking for a 3 light package. Much better with 5 lights of various types (soft/hard). This requires a pretty big room too. Pulling a key off compressed HDV format is not easy either, as you're dealing with limited colorspace information.
Then there is the limitation of what your subjects will be wearing. Despite you 'preparing' them for the shoot, I promise they will forget on the day of, and you'll be dealing with that issue.
So, in other words, I would recommend getting a plain/solid, non-key background unless you have the budget to do it properly. Better than a distractingly bad key attempt.
Just my $.02

[black_fx_35]

Greenscreen is relatively easy to do in theory...but in practice, you'll find it a difficult beast to conquer properly. Lighting is key, keep it even across the background and far enough from your subjects so as not to 'spill'. Backlight the subject wherever possible, and you'll want a flattering key light. So, at minimum, you're looking for a 3 light package. Much better with 5 lights of various types (soft/hard). This requires a pretty big room too. Pulling a key off compressed HDV format is not easy either, as you're dealing with limited colorspace information.
Then there is the limitation of what your subjects will be wearing. Despite you 'preparing' them for the shoot, I promise they will forget on the day of, and you'll be dealing with that issue.
So, in other words, I would recommend getting a plain/solid, non-key background unless you have the budget to do it properly. Better than a distractingly bad key attempt.
Just my $.02

Thanks for the response, really appreciate your insight. I would say I am limited by skill/knowledge, vs having a budget to do this. I am not suggesting throwing money at this is the way to be successful, but the budget to do it properly likely is not an issue. So I guess my question becomes, with the appropriate lighting, etc, can someone with limited skill pull it off (and learn)? Or is this one of those that regardless of budget, if you lack skill, you won't be able to do it? I think the shooting would be relatively easy (not over my head), but not sure if editing or a "key attempt" is very difficult...

[Steve Kahn]

I would try to do the green screen outside and use the sun as much as possible to light the screen but at the same time use indirect light or keep your subjects in a shadow then bounce light on them with reflectors.

Check out my presentation here... www.ninjazombiesmovie.com

If you click on the first panel it "comes alive" - and was ALL shot greenscreen.

The other bit of advise is you will need a good keying program. I used AE CS3 but there may be another free one out there.

Lighting is paramount, though.

[blacktempest07]

I was working on a stopmotion project for school recently and used a DIY green screen to get the job done. The screen was just a simple green cloth flattened out and hung on the wall, but it worked out pretty well. I'll post some screen shots once I get home, I have the footage on my external harddrive.

Anyways, I worked with After Effects to key out my backgrounds. There were some issues and I learned quite a bit. As said before, keep lighting even on the background. If some spots are darker than others, it will make it more difficult to key the BG without eatting up the edges of the subject. Also, keeping the subject a bit further away from the screen helps so the green doesn't spill on the clothes.

If some of these things happen to occur, you can of course deal with them inside the program, but it just makes the process more tedious. It also depends what you use to key. After Effects Keylight 1.2 offers a pretty extensive control scheme to work on keying out the subject. I also used some other filters to get the job done.

It shouldn't be too difficult to get the job done if you put the time and effort. If you have the right setup too I'm sure it will make it a hell of a lot easier. I went at it on my own without any help, limited lighting, DIY everything and it turned out to be great! Good luck

[orchidsofwrath]

You know for a static background you don't need a green screen. If you just take the shots of the people speaking somewhere (so long as its 100% totally static no people walking no wind or anything) and leave the camera in the exact same position on a tripod then cross dissolve each clip together the background will just cross dissolve over itself and appear static. The people will fade away and fade in.
This would work best indoors. Perhaps you could just set up some kind of backdrop with some fabric in your living room. That way you don't have to worry about having totally even lighting for keying and such.

[DaFireMedic]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6brd...eature=related

With a little care, you can do it. I use a simple green fabric hung tightly in my garage and lit with Halogen work lights, As has been said, just take care to light it well and evenly. The hardest part is avoiding harsh shadows on your subject, but its really not that bad if you take a little care to set it up properly.

[Joe M]

Keying Screens are mostly about lighting and placement of subject.

I recommend you experiment with the lighting in the environment and placement of the subject relative to the screen before you begin shooting.

Also... you should learn to edit the test video clips before you begin shooting the final shots.

If you are going to do basic talking heads type interviews with a green screen background... I have found that using natural backgrounds to be as good and easier to edit than using green screen backgrounds. A lot depends upon how you plan the shots determines the appropriate background. I would not assume that a green or blue screen is needed in the first place.

Joe Moya

[orchidsofwrath]

If you are going to do basic talking heads type interviews with a green screen background... I have found that using natural backgrounds to be as good and easier to edit than using green screen backgrounds. A lot depends upon how you plan the shots determines the appropriate background. I would not assume that a green or blue screen is needed in the first place.

Yeah seriously. Its a static background! I'll bet the clip you showed did not use a greenscreen.

[Tumtumtung]

it you have never attempted the green screen effect, don't experiment with it on a project like this. Practice with the green screen later when you have time to mess around, trust me you will need lots of time for this.

Also, you MUST change you editing program to something more higher level. iMovie is alright for cheesy stuff, but you will need to upgrade. I suggest, Vegas Pro 8, i use this at my work and it is the easiest adaptable and professional all in one. Easy to use and with some practice and a hours away on tutorials in youtube you'll definately understand how and to perform the green screen effect more efficiently. i never said it would be easy.

here's a small example of some green screen stuff i shot. I did the green screen out in broad day light. HINT - cheap soft boxes = the SUN. Although mine didn't turn out as great due to Sun's contast change, it worked well.

Here is the link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHcrp7HAccE&fmt=18

[coach24]

Not sure what you're going to use to pull your key, but if you can, be sure to garbage matte first. If you're not familiar with that term, it basically means drawing a rudimentary mask around the actor(s) so that when the software does the keying, it has less green pixels that it has to work with. DVGarage sells a keying plugin for After Effects and they have a great set of compositing (keying/greenscreening) tutorials on the samples page. I'm not suggesting you buy it or After Effects - just watch the videos. Part 2 talks about garbage matting and making a good key using multiple passes.

http://www.dvgarage.com/prod/prod.ph...tk&sub=samples

Hope that helps.

[dminor]

I've spent probably a total of 2 hours playing around with FCP and was able to get this with a simple blue bedsheet, 2 soft boxes, and a key spot pointed at the ceiling in my apartment.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUw_pVv9d04&fmt=18"]YouTube - Livin Out Loud Promo 2[/ame]

There was some weird chromakeying problems with the design on the subjects shirt, but it was a freebee and I didn't feel like going out of the way to resolve it.

[steve]

You Don't need the green sreen and you don'y need to X dissolve static shots. If your using FCP just take the static shot you want to use drag it to the video track you want to use. Then "grab" an edge of the photo and stretch that out as long as you need it to be in the vid track.

Place your interviews in subsequent tracks and x fade those as you need to.

Here is a very good website to help with some of the issues you are dealing with.
http://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage...age_index.html

[scon]

After watching a few of the above links, I remembered seeing this lighting infinite white tutorial. Some great info and look...

[ame="http://www.vimeo.com/789519"]Lighting Infinite White on Vimeo[/ame]

[EssentialParadox]

Yep! I was just about to link to that infinite white video that scon linked to. Watch that all the way through to give you a good run-through of what you can do.


I'd suggest not doing any blue or green screen work. The HV30 is not a 4:4:4 camera and realistically you will get green tinges in people's hair and their outlines. If you have a white background it'll be a lot more difficult to see any outlines.

[black_fx_35]

Thanks so much for all of the information. One thing is certain, I have a lot to learn. Spending some time on the tutorials/sites that were suggested, and am going to do a number of test shoots to figure out what makes the most sense. Thanks again.