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Subject: Labor-Intensive Greenscreen
Content: I have been having some trouble with greenscreening. My first problem is that I don’t have a proper screen (anyone know were to buy the professional stuff?). Also, I am using Axogon Composer (free) for compositing. I don’t think it is very good, and my uneven background doesn’t help. It always ends up destroying my foreground when I remove the background. Well, I think I have found a solution for people with my problem. Even if your greenscreen isn’t good enough for your editing program, Photoshop Elements or GIMP can probably handle it. The idea is to use your photo editor to put a better screen in place. This takes awhile, but its worth it. Here’s my Photoshop tutorial: First start the Editor, then click File>Open. Go to your frames’ folder. Click the first frame, then Shift+click the last frame. All the frames in between should now be highlighted. Click Open. Importing the photos might take awhile. Now choose a good green or blue color on the palette. Select the bucket and then click the unwanted portion of your frame. Now the magic takes place. The bucket recolors pixels that are similar in color and connected to the point you click on, unlike Composer, which replaces pixels no matter where they are. Most of your screen should be removed, but you will have to click a few times. If it is removing only small areas or parts of your foreground you will need to adjust the Tolerance on the tool info bar. Once only small spots are left you can remove them with the Brush or repeatedly click on the area with the Bucket. Now double click on your next frame in the Project Bin. Recolor the background again and then open your next file. Repeat until done. Then click File>Close All. To speed things up, just quickly press Enter every time you see a dialog box. Each frame will overwrite the old version and be saved with a good compression level.             The GIMP works too, just make sure the Bucket’s color replacement option is “similar colors” and the threshold is turned up (50 seemed to be good for my photos). Although I tested it, I won’t write much about this because it is similar to the Photoshop method and I am not as familiar with GIMP. I have a tip, though. GIMP opens each frame in its own window, which I think can be annoying. To get rid of them, right click on the group’s taskbar button and choose Minimize Group. Then open the toolbox (“GIMP”) and Layers/Undo windows. On the GIMP window click File>Dialogues>Images. This isn’t a perfect solution, since an image window isn’t closed when you select another one, but it should reduce desktop clutter.             After you assemble your AVI you can import it into Composer, etc. The editing program will have a good greenscreen, and compositing will be a snap.   PS: Does anyone know how to get more than 99 frames in Composer?       Does anyone have a link to good Vista compatible video editing freeware?