Greenscreen treadmills

[Jack_Felis]

Hey guys, I was very curious as to how to either get or make a greenscreen treadmill a'la the one used for Sin City. So far all I can think of is to buy a cheap treadmill and spray paint the thing with greenscreen paint. We've found the perfect treadmill at a local K-mart (ie. it's cheap and has no fancy handle setup) but we took pause because we thought "Surely they must sell these from somewhere!" But do they?

Does anybody know what would be the best option here or have any idea where we can purchase one specifically for greenscreen jobs?

[Edgen]

well, you could always just ask a local gym. I'm sure they wouldn't like for you to paint their treadmills though.

or, just somehow rig a harness to the actor as he/she runs and have...

never mind. Weight and gravity would cause that shot to fail miserably.
Craigs list or the local saturday/sunday yard sales is your best bet.

/j

[Jack_Felis]

Well, it's not getting a treadmill, it's actually making one green. I'm thinking like the ones they used in Sin City. Looking at the "all-green" version of the film, they used a green treadmill. Whether that's a specific specialty product made somewhere or whether they painted a treadmill is my question.

A harness setup is out of the question, I'm small-time independent, not big-time studio head. Good idea though :). Unfortunately, I couldn't find anything on Craig's List (or I wasn't surfing that site correctly :)) and I don't really trust treadmills from yard sales, who knows what they've done to them!

[GageFX]

who knows what they've done to them!

I know. People are real sick puppies these days. Gross.

But back to the question.

I would bet they had a normal garden variety treadmill that was painted chromakey green. If there exists a "special film industry special effects green screen treadmill", I'm sure it would judt be a normal treadmill that someone painted green and is selling for 10x the amount of a normal treadmill.

I'd have to check my Sin City DVD to see what their setup looks like, but I wouldn't paint the whole treadmill, I'd paint/dye/or whatever can paint heavy vinyl well the walking surface and then cover the rest with keyed fabric or build a platform out of plywood or similar material painted green so you end up with a flat surface meeting up with a green track, but you dont see an actual treadmill.

Just my thoughts.

-GageFX

[Edgen]

oh ya, just create garbage masks around the rest. The only thing you'd need is just the treadmill itself that the talent is running on.

Unless you are going for some crazy matrix style spin around shot.

/j

[Jack_Felis]

Hmmm, good ideas. I guess I'll have to try some, if not all of them, depending on the shot. Thanks guys!

[Kholi]

Hey good question to ask, Jack.

I have been wrapping my mind about this very same concept for the past two weeks because I will need to use one on my short.

It's actually not as hard as you might think. You have to really sit and look at a treadmill to realize this, though.

Gage's post is really the summary of it all. And you can still use wires in conjunction with it to pull off other stunt/special FX or distinct looks to the actual "running" action. That's what I plan to do.

You'll also have to re-route the controls to work externally, because you'll want to remove the handlebars so that you don't have anything in your way when filming/shooting.

Another thing to think about is purchasing a treadmill that's not automated. There are some that allow you to simply walk on it and the belt/platform still moves. This will allow the actors to move at their own natural pace instead of being forced to step at a certain rate.

PM me and tell me how your hunting and researching goes! I'll do the same.