static clip with piece of dirt in shot

[Mark Suszko]

Import a still into photoshop, fix it there, bring the still back to Final Cut, use your crop or masking tools to “patch” over the spots.

Or, duplicate the same video, lay it on a track above the original, but then move it over to the left or right by a few pixels. Use a soft-edged wipe or mask/crop to cover the bad pixels with nearby good pixels.

There’s also a plug-in for this by DigitalHeaven.

[Ken Tannenbaum]

Thanks! Appreciate the information. Ken

Ken Tannenbaum

[Ken Tannenbaum]

Hi….still have a question. I exported a frame from the clip, brought it into photoshop, removed the unnecessary spots and saved it as a PNG, keeping the background transparent. Importing into FCP again I placed it on top of the existing clip BUT the transparent area of the still appears WHITE. Is the a way to erase that section or was the transparency lost during the importing process?

Thanks again! Ken

Ken Tannenbaum

[Shane Ross]

Why are you layering on top of the still in FCP? No…the idea is to do all the retouching of that still in Photoshop, and replace completely what you have in FCP.

Shane
Little Frog Post
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def

[Ken Tannenbaum]

Shane, thanks. Not sure I’m being clear. I didn’t (as you appear to think) layer “on top of the still in FCP”. I imported a photoshop PNG file which (I thought) I was supposed to put on top of the clip…so that the clip would run “under” where I retouched out those nasty dirt flecks. I hasted to say I experimented with the Luma Key which seems to do the trick EXCEPT the whole clip looks washed out.

Needless to say, in photoshop, all I’d do is erase the part of the top layer to reveal the clip below but I see no means to do that here. Look, I know this is a cakewalk for those who use it all the time. For me, it’s an exercise and if I can get it I may reshoot the video to get it right. Too bad, it looks aged otherwise.

Any thoughts?

Ken Tannenbaum

[Shane Ross]

Export what you have in FCP as a still…since it is a static shot. Bring that into Photoshop and retouch it. bring the result into FCP and replace the clip with the new, retouched one.

Now, if this locked off clip has movement in it and you don’t want to compromise that…don’t want it to look like a still. Then layer the retouched still over that shot, and garbage, matte out everything BUT the areas you retouched.

Shane
Little Frog Post
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def

[Ken Tannenbaum]

I did just that, exported a frame, opened it in PS for the retouching. Going back importing to FCP, the area I needed the transparency for is too sloppy.
The shot is of a black sauce pan with boiling water. It’s just the water I need to show through the top track which has the retouched image. In creating the
retouched PNG, the edge (water next to black pan) is too hard. I think the “problem” is that I’m not familiar enough with the soft-touch tools in FCP to properly feather it. But I’ve got time so I’ll work on it. Thanks for the advice.

Ken Tannenbaum

[Mark Suszko]

Ken, when you make the patch or band-aid in photoshop, you need to export it with an alpha channel, so, under the export dialogue, try the animation codec and/or export as a .tga file, and set the bit depth to 32-bit. Your alpha channel info “lives” in those extra bits beyond the ones describing the colors. I don’t tend to use .png, maybe because I’m old and set in my ways, but my understanding of .png is that it’s inferior to targa or tif and .targa of tif files contain a bit more information, so will give smoother detail.

It would help me advise you, if you could post a still or a 2-second clip of the shot.

Since there is some action going on in the shot, perhaps you’d do better, using the second trick I laid out: that is, layering a duplicate of the video track right above the main track, adjusting it over to one side by a few pixels, just enough to get past the stain and into clean material that matches, and using the masking tools to cut away everything in that layer but the patch. Since you have two spots to cover, you’ll have to do this twice, or do it with three layers in one pass. In the motion tab, you’ll see crop tools, and also a “feathering” control. Adjust the feathering to help blend between the tracks.

If you need more than a 4 or 8-point masking tool, you can still find them in free versions of 16 and 32-point, maybe even 64-point, using a google search or a keyword search of the COW for “Paul Crisp” and “multipoint masking tool”. Every FCP7 owner should own Paul’s masking tools.

[Ken Tannenbaum]

This is just shy of embarrassing. See, I’m over it already. This is for a stock video clip, something I enjoy and added to my stills work a few years ago. But I’m obviously learning. I actually thought I might reshoot this thing or submit it as is but the fix is simple I’m sure, so why not learn it. After you look at the potentially award winning two second clip, let me know of a good shrink somewhere in NYC. Truly appreciate the advice. I’ve been handing out advice on Photoshop and photography for a very long time and enjoy it. Apparently you do too.

Here’s a link: https://youtu.be/bNDbyuQ9qmI

Ken Tannenbaum

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[Mark Suszko]

Did this in ten minutes:

video result link to follow