Recommendations for ‘Pro-sumer’ cameras

[Mark Suszko]

Tell us more about the show first, about the space you use to shoot in, and what you’re trying to accomplish.

[Wolf Wildwood]

Gday.
The filming space is about 12 feet by 20 feet, and the green screen is only about 2 feet behind the character’s heads (see attached image).

I use a halogen soft light to light up the screen (from above the puppet’s head) and three others to light the scene.

On the image you will see where I have garbage matted (the line across the level of the bottom end of the green screen. Because I have ‘maxed out’ the ultra-key I had to resort to using a green background for the elephant image to prevent green edging around the puppet’s hair and my hat and beard.

I need to be able to produce this at broadcast quality.

“The lesson of history is that no-one learns from history’s lesson”

[Mark Suszko]

Before you run off buying new cameras,…What is your technical workflow with the Sony camera so far? Tell me you’re not down-converting to DV before you start working with this footage. Because that WOULD give you poorer results for keying. You would want to convert that HDV into something like prores 4444 before attempting precise keying.

I also foresee problems with your tablet catching spilled green light from the background at certain angles. What if you changed your seating position to face 3/4 towards the camera, where we can see both of your eyes, but not the tablet surface? That would be a classic pose position for this kind of show.

[Wolf Wildwood]

Gday Mark,
Thanks for your reply.
I am importing directly from HDV tape as HD to Premiere Pro 5
Is ProRes 4444 an option in Pro? (sorry for my ignorance re techy stuff)

Re; tablet reflection… I have tried many different angles but this one is the only one I can effectively communicate with the puppet. Any reflection on the Cintiq screen is garbage matted out anyway.

At present the entire sequence is shot using the one camera… filming the entire script at the angle the screenshot shows, then re-positioning the camera for the closeups and running through the script again completely.

I use the wide shot as the backbone and cut in close-ups on the fly. (I rarely plan on which dialogue will be closeups during scripting)

Once again, thanks for your time.

Wolf

“The lesson of history is that no-one learns from history’s lesson”

[Mark Suszko]

What are the specific stats/settings of the footage in your Premiere timeline? I’m asking because I’m not convinced the problem is your camera, so much as the settings you’re using for the timeline and the keyer and maybe the evenness of the lighting on the green screen. HDV is not a great format for keying, I hear.

[Wolf Wildwood]

Yes, I had read someone mention that (about the hd-greenscreen)

My video is 25.00 fps, 1440 x 1080 (1.3333)
My Ulta Key Output is Composite and the Setting is Aggressive
Matt Gen is set at Transperancy 40, Highlight 10, Shadow 55, Tolerance 90 and Pedestal 50
(Being new to all this I came to this setting by trial and error… I’m not even sure how each of those settings effect the matte generation.)

The screen itself is material and with the lighting so close and high the texture of the material throws tiny shadows all over the screen.

I intend to experiment by spray paining a large board green instead.

Thanks.
Wolf

“The lesson of history is that no-one learns from history’s lesson”