• Adobe After Effects

  Is there a way to add an effect to only part of a mask?

  Posted by Davidfilmdirector on October 28, 2007 at 6:49 pm

  I have masked part of some footage of a person. Now, this masked portion needs to be lit, but only on the left side. How can I manage to light up part of a mask? When I tried to add the Level to the mask, it lightened up the entire piece, but I only want the left side. Then I tried to add a second mask, but it didn’t seem to work that well.

  Thanks in advance.

  Aharon Rabinowitz replied 18 years, 6 months ago 5 Members · 6 Replies
• 6 Replies

• 

  Stanley Gucwa-bucasas

  October 28, 2007 at 8:01 pm

  you could try duplicating the layer, then working in the top layer, just mask the part of the footage you want to adjust.
• 

  Mike Clasby

  October 28, 2007 at 9:48 pm

  Do the masking on a duplicated layer, and set the first mask to Add (default) and the second mask to “Intersect”. Then apply levels to that top layer with the masks. It should work.

  Here is a great tut on matching lighting that has a few neat tricks that might be of help.

  https://library.creativecow.net/articles/coots_brendan/greenscreen.php

  Andrew does a similar thing here:

  https://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials.html?id=38
• 

  Mike Derk

  October 29, 2007 at 3:43 am

  Hmmm… I’m guessing here, so bear with me.

  Could you put light on the entire mask, and then “shape” it with an adjustment layer that has a gradient in it?
• 

  Mike Clasby

  October 29, 2007 at 4:57 am

  Well you make a Luma Matte. Add a Black Solid, put Ramp on it, adjust the start and end of ramp so it goes from black to white where you want the area to be brightened, white for the brightest, then with the footage on the bottom, select Luma for a track matte. But if you use a Linear Ramp, the line of brightness won’t have any curves to conform to the contour of the body that’s masked off. And I’m assuming levels is applied to the masked layer below the Black Solid.

  And you’d need another copy of the layer below.

  1)Black Solid with Ramp (eyeball will be off when the layer below set to luma matte)

  2)Footage with mask, Levels… and TrkMat set to Luma Matte

  3)Footage
• 

  Mike Derk

  October 29, 2007 at 2:57 pm

  Thanks!

  I had a feeling there was a way to do that (it’s so standard in Photoshop); now I know how.
• 

  Aharon Rabinowitz

  October 29, 2007 at 3:21 pm

  If you have AE CS3, you can pre-comp the masked layer and then apply the bevel and emboss layer style to the nested comp. Just make sure that the shadow opacity is set to 0, and then play around with the size, soften and depth options. It might work.

  Aharon Rabinowitz
  Email: arabinowitz (AT) yahoo (DOT) com
  All Bets Are Off Productions, Inc.
  Creative Cow After Effect Podcast
  Internet Killed the Video Star: A Guide to Creating Video for the Web

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