usually they use an invisible material on the ground, and that material has the ability to accept shadows or even reflections, but that’s it.
in maya the material is called “Use Background”
You can either composite it there or in AE.
You could also use the video of the 3D model over an empty BG, and then in AE duplicate the 3d footage layer and make it black (using Tint, brightness and contrast) and then add a blur to it to make it look more like a shadow. Then just lower the layer down on the Y-Axis so that it looks like it’s on the ground. You may need to play with one of the distort effects to make the shape look right.
Regardless, there’s no reson to render on a green screen – always render over an empty BG and then use an alpha channel when you output. That way it already comes in to AE with transparency, and you don;t have to deal with green halos or anything.
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
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