Unnecessary Overlap

by Dyske Suematsu  •  October 5, 2006

If your green screen set involves props that are painted green, there are a few things you want to keep in mind.

Exhibit A
Even though they are painted green, the props in the picture above will never key out perfectly because of the dark shadows they cast. This means that it would involve some manual clean up. In this particular scene, the actors at the table do not move much, so I should be able to draw a single static mask to remove all the props for the whole scene. However, unfortunately, there is one problem. Her right hand is overlapping the edge of the table. Her left hand is not a problem because it is behind the props.

Exhibit B

Exhibit B above shows how I drew the mask (the red area). As you can see, I had to draw around her right hand. This would not be a problem if she did not move her hand, but she did. So, I had to animate the mask as she moved her hand.

Exhibit C

Once I finished masking the props manually, I applied Ultimatte to remove the rest of the green areas. The result is Exhibit C.

Below, Exhibit D and E show how this scene should have been shot, without her hand overlapping the edge of the table. This would have allowed me to draw one static mask to remove all the props.

Exhibit D

Exhibit E

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