COW Tutorials: After Effects Blemish Removal

[Andra]

First of all: thanks for a great tutorial. I never thought I could get such results in a few relatively simple steps. I’ve never had to do stuff like that yet, but I’m just really excited to know that I can if I need to. Thanks!

After finishing the tutorial I realised that I was affecting everything with even just a hint of red in it, including for instance the slightly voilet veil. I wondered if there was a way to isolate the skintones. Then I looked into the keying section and found the Color Range effect. After adding a few colors to the range (a few points on her face) it was quite easy to adjust the sliders so I’d key as much as possible from the face without keying away anything else.
I hid the matte layer, added the adjustment layer and set the Track Matte to Alpha Inversed from the Matte layer. From there I did everything according to the tutorial.
I found that the veil had more detail left using this method, and you can see some seperate hairs wave in the wind to the right of her face that were blurred out in the original composition.
I know it’s just details, but isn’t that what it’s always about with those ladies? ;P

Is there any reason why I shouldn’t be doing it this way? Rendering didn’t seem to take any longer (11 seconds on my VERY mediocre PC), and getting the right matte didn’t take very long after figuring out how Color Range worked (I hadn’t used it before).
I’d really like to hear some thought’s on this.

Yours,
Andra

P.S.
Congratulations on the upcoming marriage!

[Andrew Kramer]

Thanks,
Your way is really good. Maybe better.

That’s very good that people or at least you are taking these techniques and improving them and tailoring them to your own needs.

Following a tutorial is good but learning from one is better.

Excellent take.

Andrew

BTW Thanks