Green Screen - Keying out in After Effects?

[Jebs19]

I am doing some green screen editing and I am keying out the green in after effects. I am getting some static (looks like there are artifacts or something on the shirt and a little bit on the face. Can someone tell me why this is happening? I shot on HD 1080i at 30fps and I am using color key to key out the green. Also, where can I find good tutorials on keying out green screen in After Effects? Thanks!

[Gary Parkinson]

We use a Plug in for After Effects called "DV Matte Pro" for all our keying work. We find it works a hell of lot better than any of the standard plugins that come with AE. Not sure of the price, maybe around $200. they have a trial version you can download.
There are a lot of ways to fine tune your key as well in DV Matte pro.
We have a done quite a few broadcast jobs using this plugin.

[Gary Parkinson]

Saying that, I have never used the latest keyers that AE has now, maybe they have improved.

http://www.dvgarage.com/prod/prod.php?prod=dvmattep3

[Jebs19]

Thanks Gary!! I checked that DV Matte Pro plugin out and it looks awesome. They have it for both After Effects and Final Cut Pro. Do you think either plugin will work just as well? The reason I ask is because I'd rather get the plug in for Final Cut Pro, as long as the DV Matte Pro plug in for Final Cut Pro works as well as the plug in for After Effects. What do you think?

[Matt Grunau]

After Effects comes with a great keying program called Keylight. It's been bundled since version 6(x), usually with the Professional version only, though I think in 7 and CS3 it is available with the standard version. The pro version of After effects offers enough extras that it is worth the expense.

Hell, the entire professonal Video bundle from Adobe is a steal, with all the software included.

Keylight is a very capable, user friendly, and versitile keyer. I've never used Dp matte pro, but from the examples posted on their website, it seems comperable to Keylight. Before you invest in extra software you may not need, think about using that money to get a proper greenscreen and some decent lighting. Even the cheapest, worst keyer on the market when used with a properly lit and greenscreen setup is going to give you beter results than the most expensive keyer with lousy grenscreen footage.

For keying, it is all about lighting and your setup, and plugins and filters run a very distant second.

[Gary Parkinson]

I’ve seen Keylight there but have never used it, I'm sure it'll do a great job so definitely give it a go before you spend any money. Like you mentioned Matt we invested a bit of money in our professional green screen and have worked pretty hard in getting our lighting just right, so keying for us is made pretty simple from that alone.

[lhdor]

I have used both and love key light. Jebs, do you have keylight with your AE?

[ToddWayne_AZ]

Jebs, here's a quick tutorial from Andrew Kramer on using Keylight in AE.

http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorial.html?id=50

I'm editing an interview right now and am using Keylight...here's a still from it. The hair can be real problem as well as finding that balance between the edges being feathered well and being too soft. I was recommended "dv matte pro" by a guy who does a lot of greenscreen work, so I downloaded their trial version and tried it out in FCP (didn't see that they had a AE version for mac or I would've tried it), but the results I was getting with Keylight seemed easily as good, so didn't spend the $.

But I agree with everyone, an evenly lit screen and well lit subject are the most important thing to get right.

[tcindie]

It's also a good idea to get as much distance as you can between the screen and your subject, to reduce spill.

I've heard from my mac buddies that this (http://www.oakstreetsoftware.com/gkey/) is a fantastic plugin, but it only works with FCP. It uses the same vector keying theory that is used by Ultra (http://www.adobe.com/products/creativesuite/production/ultra/).

I don't know of a vector keying solution for AE (which is a little surprising if there isn't one) but you could probably achieve similar results with cc Vector Blur and Keylight


Update: Just looked at the Oak Street Software page and it appears there is a windows version (http://www.oakstreetsoftware.com/gkey/VKey2_Wax_demo.zip) of the vector keyer available as a demo, it works with Wax (http://www.debugmode.com/wax/).

[Jebs19]

Thanks guys! Yeah I do have Keylight in my After Effects, but I would rather use something in Final Cut because I already have a lot cut together, now I just need to key out the green. Is DV Matte Pro in Final Cut Pro just as good as Keylight in AE?? It would be awesome if I could use that plugin for Final Cut Pro. Gary, it sounds like it works really well for you, right?

[Arson]

you could use keylight in AE and render out a pre-matted quicktime in millions of colors+
then edit to your hearts content in FCP with the nice clean pre-matted footage

[lhdor]

DV Matte Pro works fine. In my opinion though, keylight is faster with fewer steps to get a great key. Also doing all the compositing in After Effect you has all the tools available to you to get the most accurate composit. Yes DV Matte Pro will give you a good key but it takes a lot of fudging around to get there. If you flat out don't want to use AE then go ahead and invest in DV Matte.

[Chenopup]

I'd suggest trying the demo of dvMattPro v.3 - based on their sample tutorials, I think you could pull a key as fast as Keylight now and in many cases, it's a much more powerful program.

Trial is watermarked but should give you a good idea.

cheno

[Jebs19]

Arson, so how do I render out a pre-matted quicktime? And once it is rendered, should I colortime it in After Effects or Final Cut Pro?

It sounds like DvMatte Pro v. 3 is really good, but if it takes really long time, I'll just use keylight in AE.

By the way I am only keying out a person sitting in a chair doing an interview, so it's not the most complicated.. so maybe DV Matte Pro version 3 will be good enough?

[Gary Parkinson]

We invested in DV Matte pro such a long time ago when AE version 4 really didn't have much to offer in the keying area.
So we've stuck with it and have saved our presets that work the best for our fixed green screen here in the studio. If I was getting into AE now then Keylight would be what I would use only because I wouldnt have to spend the money on a plugin.
As far as I know from a friend DV Matte pro works pretty good in Final cut. As its been mentioned try before you buy.

[Arson]

Arson, so how do I render out a pre-matted quicktime?
This is from videocopilot on a mac.
works on a pc too
http://www.videocopilot.net/blogstuff/renderalpha.jpg