One thing you will have to know no matter what area of the industry you go into will be how to properly key footage. Luckily for us there are a ton of tutorials online that display how to do this and how to do it right. Of course, there are multiple plug-ins and applications you can use to complete this task, but I’m going to limit it to my favorite program, After Effects, and try cover some of the more widely used plug-ins.
First of all, Andrew Kramer has two great tutorials online which can be found on CreativeCow.net and VideoCopilot.net which will give you an idea of how to key using the Keylight plug-in (floating license, node-locked) created by The Foundry. You may remember Andrew from our very first Free Education Friday where he taught us about using camera projection. A very educated individual and a great man to follow.
Next we have Adobe.tv which gives us a tutorial on keying with Keylight divided up into many different segments. These tutorials go over all areas of creating a great key including masking, painting, rotoscoping, and more.
Last but not least we have Jerry Drozda Jr. over at Maltaannon.com showing us how to key some bad footage using Key Correct Pro from Red Giant Software.
All of the ideas mentioned in these tutorials are great skills to learn no matter what plug-in you use or even what application you are running. The knowledge will go with you where ever you go, and that’s the most important skill you will ever learn.
What if you don’t have any green screen footage to practice on? Well, luckily there are a few websites that have given us free downloads for just that.
HollywoodCameraWork was nice enough to release a lot of their green screen footage for anyone to download and use for keying. This is high definition footage and is perfect for learning to key or even using in a reel.
Timeline GFX has a small selection of footage for you to key, and some that is pre-keyed. Obviously, the pre-keyed footage will save you time if you want to use it in a project, but you won’t learn anything about keying using it.
Finally, If you go to All Bets Are Off Productions, Aharon Rabinowitz’s site, you’ll find a portion of good footage selected from the Crowd Control package he mentions often. This footage is entirely pre-keyed so be aware of that.
These were only a few tutorials and available footage that can be found on the web. Topher Welsh has a great list of green screen footage in his article 14 Free Stock Footage and Green Screen Plate Resources on AeTuts.com. If you do your own search you will be able to find a plethora more, but what Is provided above should give you a great start on learning how to key.
Author: Andrew Kramer, Adobe.tv, Jerry Drozda Jr.
Website: Creativecow.net, Videocopilot.net, Adobe.tv, Maltaannon.com
Tutorial: http://library.creativecow.net/articles/kramer_andrew/colorkey.php, http://www.videocopilot.net/basic/tutorials/04.Keying/, http://tv.adobe.com/search/?q=keying+after+effects, http://maltaannon.com/articles/after-effects/hs-bad-chroma-key/
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