Hi, helpful friends! Here is my dilemma:
I recently shot a band against a green screen. To track camera movement, I placed blue tracking markers on the screen. The original intention was to key out the blue markers but 2 of the members are wearing blue shirts! 😡
Is my only option to rotoscope (frame by frame) each tracking marker out with a mask, or is there a better solution I am not thinking of?
Thanks for any and all insight!
Could you post a screenshot of one of the frames with the tracking markers in the same shot with the blue shirts? Chances are, with any luck, you won't have to rotoscope every frame. It will depend somewhat on how many times the blue shirts cross over the markers. The Keyer can be restricted to a very small range of hues/values and you might be able to target the markers and keep them separate from the shirts even though both are "blue".
Ok - I could use another one with the green screen in place! You might have an easier time in Final Cut if you have it. I have a cheat you might be able to use (in FCPX), but I need the green screen + markers to test the theory.
Ok - you can't get away completely, but you can limit how much work you need to do with this technique.
Take a look at this:
Before applying the Keyer, what I did was apply a Color > Colorize filter to the image, then started adding shape masks. The first mask simply outlines the group. Go to the Effect Mask menu and select Invert Masks.
The next step is matching the color of the green screen.
Set Colorize > Intensity to 100%.
Click on a color swatch in the Colorize and use the Color Picker eyedropper to match a color. Drag that color swatch onto the other color swatch so that Remap Black To and Remap White To are both the same color.
For each tape marker that is not included in the mask, Add Shape Mask (you can add as many as you need) and if you notice in the image, most of them are smaller circles. Drag each mask below the last in the list and set it to Subtract (as in the image). The dragging into order is just for organization (it'll help).
Once you get all the shape masks in place, start going through the video to find where players move over a marker.
You can add the keyer at this point.
In the image above, I have ALL the shape masks selected so that they would show up in the image. However, *ONLY* the selected shape mask will be highlighted in the Viewer.
What you want to do is: one shape mask selected at a time, skim the clip. Where a player passes over a marker or edge of the mask, set a marker. Keep skimming until the player moves off the marker/mask. These are the frames you will need to keyframe.
Each shape, once you start keyframing, will follow the changes in position and shape (including the feather "ring") as you go frame to frame. If you need to create "hold keyframes"* you will need to manually set a keyframe on a frame (click the diamond). [* particularly if you are changing shape and feathering — when you get really good at it, you can figure a kind of min/max range and just keyframe the start end of these changes. Keyframing the position is the simplest — it starts to get complicated when position, size, shape, and feathering are all in the mix. You really have to pay attention!]
Once you've worked one mask, clear the markers, select the next shape and repeat.
You will still need to do some rotoscoping, but hopefully not nearly as much as you would in Motion. It's tedious work, but not nearly as bad as it sounds.
For marker tape in narrow/small gaps, try to keep the mask as tight as possible. Reduce the number of "crossover" frames to as small as possible (I used rather sizeable mask for most of them.) It looks like there are about 7 markers that will need attention. You might get lucky with 3 of those.
Keyframing these basic shapes is a lot easier than rotoscoping a bezier shape.
Here you go! The green has been keyed out. The colors are a bit close, I'm afraid :/
Sure thing! I do have Final Cut!
Outstanding! That helps me a lot, thank you!
Removing Trackers Markers
