Moving Picture Plug in for Avid or something better?

[Mike_Raddport]

We're having an issue getting backplates onto our photo comps in the avid. We're somewhat committed to using the Moving Picture plug-in, and we are unable to comp in a backplate without manually cropping out the black background that the plug-in uses automatically.

It seems to me that we must not be the first to have this problem. Does anyone know of a solution using Moving Pucture on a photo whilst choosing a background other than black?
Thank you.

 

[joekun]

There are 2 ways of doing this that I am aware. If you just want a solid color background behind your pic then you can use the "prep picture" options within Moving Picture itself to select one. This basically creates a border around your image. Be aware there is no color picker so you will have to match colors manually if that is what you are looking to do. Also, if the image is large enough and you create a border that goes outside the limits of what MP can handle it will simply crash without warning, and in my experience the resolution limit is much lower than the 8000x8000 MP tells you it can handle.

The other way to do it is to create an alpha channel for your image and then have a background underneath the moving picture effect in your avid timeline. When I do this I load up my image in photoshop, select all, create a new channel from selection and then save it and proceed to open it in MP. Make sure that the "ignore alpha channel" setting (also in the "prep picture" options under the edit menu) in MP is not checked.

Many editors like to cut the still media into the timeline within avid for reference and then put the MP effect on top of it, but be aware if you do this your background will be another copy of the same image.

I'm always on the lookout for a better option that MP, but despite its flaws it is still by far the easiest option IMO.