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Non Reversing Mirror Effect
I am working on a project which is a tracking shot with a woman talking as she goes. The idea is to split the woman in half (and therefore the frame) from top to bottom, leaving say only the left handside of the frame. The director then wants to mirror the remaining side so you have a whole walking talking woman made up of one side of the frame. The problem is mirror plug ins and even crop the frame, copying the layer and then flipping in just makes a naff hall of mirrors effect…I am after the concept of NON REVERSING MIRRORS……to illustrate the point
1234 should read in a no reversing mirror effect
1234 4321
If this is clear…any help would be greatly appreciated
Andrew
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9 Replies
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Try duping the layer, masking half the frame and scaling -100,100 or apply effect>transform to do a similar thing.
Unless I misunderstood you.
Steve
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I have masked off one side…so I have half a frame. I need to now use this same side of the frame to make a whole face…but really non reverse…..as if I reverse the image like a reflection, I get a nasty house of mirrors effect…its kind of difficult to explain verbally…..I’m not sure that scale 100 100 is doing the trick
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If I understand,
you want:
I think you need to slice the left side into some strips and then duplicate those strips and arrange them from right to left.
Otherwise there is no way.Here’s one I did in photoshop, but I’m not sure this is the effect you want:
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If I understand, you want:
I think you need to slice the left side into some strips using duplicate layers with masks and then arrange the copies from right to left on the other side, without flipping them.
Here’s one I did in photoshop, but I’m not sure this is the effect you want:
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If you want to flop (the correct term) an image, you can scale it -100,100 (note the minus) by changing the scale property or by using the distort>transform effect. If you only want part of the image, you mask it. The technique is simple, but it sounds as if you want something different.
When you look at a person and a reflection of that person obliquely, say from close to the wall holding the mirror, the person and reflection will look similar. However, If a person stands on a mirror and you view them from above, you see the top of their head, but in the mirror you see the bottom of their chin. Is that the problem? That the mirror should show an image that is actually different from the footage, not just a flop? If so, that cannot be done without shooting more footage.
Keep trying to figure out how to tell us what you want. Every VFX person needs to be able to express clearly what he/she wants in order to determine the proper technique to use.
Steve
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the strips you have are correct but the right side of the monkey needs to be an exact match for the left…so you are creating a whole new creature……the more I play with it the more I think that it is a major post job…..I could put an mpeg 1 up of the test to show you were I am at….is there a way to do this???
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i think what I need is a flop so two left sides of the face joined together in the middle to create 1 new….strange but almost human face…the problem is movement of the person….I have to shift the frae left and right to create the smooth looking face…but then the background is no good. I think if the face was against blue or green then you could key it out…and matte the new human onto a b/g……I’ll keep pluggin away…I could render out an mpeg 1 to show you the 3 secs I have done as a test..if that would help…can I do that attach a .mpg file to the thread??
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Hmmm. My take on this is that you want a perfect mirror reflection of half of the face – end result is an almost perfect face. You’re not getting what you want because of a combination of movement of the subject, camera shake, and changes in the background.
As you’re apparently beginning to realise, the correct way to do this shot is to plan BEFORE the shoot. If the background is to look un-mirrored, consider keying the subject. The subject needs to be carefully blocked and rehearsed to maintain a constant position. Or perhaps tracking a mask edge on a certain point of the face.
However you approach it, without shooting with some forethought, the product is going to look “cheesy hall of mirrors”, as you put it.
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Seeing as you’ve already shot the footage. Couldn’t you fake it?
Use the whole body without flipping it, so now you only have to worry about the face. Is the subject speaking? If not, if they’re holding their head still, could you use a still prepared in Photoshop of the perfect face which you then track onto the head of the subject??? If there’s an aspect change, then you could morph between a number of stills?????
From what you’re saying, it sounds like the effect you’re going for is to create a slightly disconcerting look:
“Something’s not right here but i can’t put my finger on it” – a bit like the PS2 launch ads where a girl was in a room with a slightly too big head.Graham
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