Raw footage and Green screen

[Kacper Larski]

Hey guys, so this is my first green screen and I may have been a bit too ambitious. I can't key any of the footage, it just looks really horrible, but I partially feel it's the way I am exporting the raw footage. (This is my first time shooting on a RED) It was shot on a Red one at 4k.

Is there any thing I can do to fix this?

I've taken some snap shot r3d files.

http://www.kacperlarski.com/files/nadine_wide.R3D
or
http://www.kacperlarski.com/files/Gary_cu.R3D

and I have a few more zipped

http://www.kacperlarski.com/files/R3DFiles.zip But they're all shot under the same light... Argh, panic attack.... in 3,2,1...

Thanks!!!

 

[Joseph Coleman]

what are you using to key the footage?

 

[Jake Bastian]

Your footage is great. This is keyed from the r3d directly. Made two adjustments. You may need a separate matte for the hair when it's moving, but this is fine for keying.

EDIT: Nadine is going to take some work due to a few things you have working against you:
1 - Shoot daylight whenever possible
2 - Try not to shoot above native 800 ISO as it increases noise in the footage
3 - REDCODE 42 for fewer compression artifacts
4 - Keep wrinkles off your greenscreen for more even color

Having said that she's totally doable. You're gonna need a few different mattes since the color shifts so much in your green.

 

[Kacper Larski]

Wow... I think I love you guys.

I tried using keylight 1.2 in after effects and the result is the attached photo. Any tighter mask and I lost basically all the hair.

I also downloaded the Red Giant Primatte Keyer with even worse results. If the hair was alright, the key completely removed color from the face.

How do you key directly from the R3D file? When I import it into the new after effects the colors are completely off from what I see in RedCine. And they're definitely wrong because the whole video is almost green. And where could I learn how to do a separate matte for keying the hair?

 

[Jake Bastian]

After Effects will import your r3d, you just need to tell it how it should look by right clicking the file and selecting 'interpret footage'.

Lots of layers. Bezier is your friend here.

 

[Kacper Larski]

So you mean one layer a harder matte that keeps all the detail in the face and then another layer that catches mostly the in between?

I thought ISO was just meta date on the Red and unfortunately only had the camera a few hours before the shoot so it was all a little rogue and crazy. But the manual said the x default value was 1200 and it looked good there so I figured to let it stay there. Hell, I sound like such a n00b. But I am, so that makes sense.

Do you use keylight or the red giant keyer?

 

[Matt Ryan]

Just some suggestions: Shoot green screen nearer to 500 ISO to maximize light to the sensor. Try to use daylight but I've used tungsten plenty of times with great results as long as you expose it correctly. I tend to shoot everything around 500ISO and rarely go above 800. Jake has good advice above but I'd add to the no wrinkles comment that you must make sure to light the green screen evenly. The green screen should be within a half stop spot reading evenly across the frame. This will save you tons of post work.

 

[Jake Bastian]

ISO is just metadata, but it does have an 'optimal' setting as well. MX sensor is optimal around 800 (though that does vary depending on who you ask, few will tell you 1200 is ideal unless you're trying to trick yourself into protecting your highlights

I used Keylight for my test. I wouldn't key against a black background - my guess is matt's attempt is full of holes - it's also a mistake to try and use only one instance of keylight in most situations. (although to matt's credit he did just drop the plugin on to illustrate the r3d's promise).

 

[Matt Ryan]

ISO is just metadata, but it does have an 'optimal' setting as well. MX sensor is optimal around 800 (though that does vary depending on who you ask, few will tell you 1200 is ideal unless you're trying to trick yourself into protecting your highlights

I used Keylight for my test. I wouldn't key against a black background - my guess is matt's attempt is full of holes - it's also a mistake to try and use only one instance of keylight in most situations. (although to matt's credit he did just drop the plugin on to illustrate the r3d's promise).

yeah this wasn't a real attempt, I just wanted to see if it was as bad as he made it sound...Im not a post guy, I'm on the production side but just wanted to see if it could be saved.

 

[Jake Bastian]

yeah this wasn't a real attempt, I just wanted to see if it was as bad as he made it sound...Im not a post guy, I'm on the production side but just wanted to see if it could be saved.

I kinda figured it was just a quick salvage test, sorry if it sounded like I was trying to rag on you for helping. And thanks for posting the key with alpha to help illustrate my point as well

 

[Matt Ryan]

I kinda figured it was just a quick salvage test, sorry if it sounded like I was trying to rag on you for helping. And thanks for posting the key with alpha to help illustrate my point as well

haha i didn't think you were ragging for a second. Just wanted to clarify im not a post guy and really have no idea what I'm doing with this lol.

 

[Jaakko Rinne]

Kacper: You might want to check out some keying tutorials online. This one has some good ideas on working with less-than-optimal source material.

 

[Kacper Larski]

I was following that tutorial and getting less than perfect results. Matt, thanks for the quick mock but those were the results I was getting and hence freaked out a bit. Losing tons of details in the hair and even color in the people. I'm still a little wary of the wide shots like the one of nadine.

In the end I want the photos on a background that sort of adapts to what the models are wearing, but it is for a fashion client so it needs to look somewhat glam and losing hair detail and blurred edges make it look super cheese.

Here is a mockup of what the final video should look like.

I'm still looking into doing the layers of matte's to keep hair detail but looking into a pro to do it for me. I may have bit off more than I could chew. I'm just a young director/DOP trying to do something cool for a friends company with a pretty limited budget.

I have about 15-18 of those wide shots that I need keyed with about 10-15 seconds of footage for the site.

Thanks for all the help guys!

k.