Creating a floor reflection on the z-plane??

B

Bender

Member
Can anyone guide me in the right direction here?

This is literally my 1st time doing any kind of green screen shooting/editing. Everything went smooth, but now I'm stuck. I have a full body shot of the subject, cleanly keyed. How can I get a floor reflection with the correct perspective on the z-plane.

I've attached a screenshot of what I have. It looks like he's standing on his tippy toes. How do I make this look realistic?

Any help is appreciated, thanks.

AE_screenshot.jpg
 
since we can clearly see the light on his face and forearms, shouldn't the shadow be angled back toward the left? and the shadow needs to be softened, there are multiple sources of light behind him so if you need a shadow at the front it won't be well defined. not much help but it's all I got...
 
You could try rotating your subject's reflection on the x-axis and see what that gives you but I wouldn't call it a day after just doing that. In terms of making it look realistic, I think what Tired is trying to say is that adding a shadow will definitely help sell the effect much more effectively. In the case of the reflection, as Postmaster pointed out, you can find plenty of free ways to pull off a simple reflection.

I'm assuming since this is your first time keying, however, you probably don't want to get too technical but there's an important concept you should understand.

Compositing isn't only about adding the obvious touches to your subject/object. Trust me, I've learned from experience that it's all about the subtle details. For example, two additional effects that would help 'sit your subject in the scene' tremendously would be a bit of light wrap and edge blur. Just like reflection, there are free ways of going about achieving these effects.

On the other hand, there are also great third party plugins you can try out and use as references if you really don't have the budget for it.

Red Giant software offers some good options for both reflection and keying actually.

Try Red Giant Warp (for reflection)
and Key Correct (includes light wrap and edge blur)

These plugins are most likely more than you are looking to spend, nonetheless, a trial version of RG Warp (which comes with RG reflection) might help you get a proper feel for your reflection.

As I said, if you truly want something realistic your probably going to have to add more than just reflection. I don't mean to sound critical, it's just honest advise. Considering that it's your first time though, it looks pretty decent so far. Here's a video on how to achieve a nice light wrap and edge blur with the effects that come bundled with AE. You might want to skip ahead when he moves on to the other software. Good luck with the final comp and I hope this helps.

-B
 
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Thanks for your input so far guys - it's very helpful. I should have pointed out that I wasn't anywhere near done with the comp .. I knew there was more I had to do. But I wanted to figure out the reflection part before moving on.

Thanks!
 
To be honest, the guy kind of looks like he's standing on his toes even without the reflection. I think your background "floor" is at the wrong angle to make the shot work. The horizon needs to be lower to match the angle of his feet.
 
you could use vc reflect (or another reflect plugin, or simply flip and skew the footage with the transform effect etc) or you could use the real shadows from the greenscreen footage. There is a really good mathematical way to do it that i've forgotten, but you basically desaturate and grade it to what you need, then multiply it on top of your background.
 
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