Chroma Keying with AE 6.5 standard???

[seodevhead]

Hey guys... I am fairly new to After Effects and have the "Standard" Edition of version 6.5 . I want to get started doing some DV work with chroma-key screens behind my subjects... but was told by a friend it would be near impossible to do without AE Professional version. Is he right? I wanted to ask if anyone knew if I could do the proper chroma keying in AE Standard edition 6.5. Thanks a ton for your help and advice! Take care.

[dipstick]

That's something that can easily be found by reading the manual.

Though I don't know for sure, I'd have to say yes. Something as easy as chroma-key can be found even in FREE apps like Wax2. Premiere has had it since version 6.5 that I know of, so I'm sure AE standard should support it.

Isn't it time you read the manual?

[seodevhead]

Well... note I didn't say it couldn't be done... I was just asking if it would be MUCH EASIER and worth the upgrade to the Professional Edition. I am fresh out of college with little funds. But I do want the right tool for the right job.

[guns1inger]

The pro bundle includes the Keylight keyer, which is a high quality keyer for DV work. Consumer DV is a bitch to pull clean keys from because of the way the colour information is stored. To do it using standard keying tools often required multiple layers and a lot of tweaking of edges and blurs. Dedicated DV keyers do a lot of this automatically for you. That said, it might be cheaper to buy a plugin keyer such as the well regarded DV Matte from DVGarage, than upgrade to the pro bundle.

[seodevhead]

As a student... I can score some good discounts on software. I have been looking at Serious Magic's ULTRA 2 software. Is it any good... if so, is it better option than DV Matte from DVGarage? THANKS!

[guns1inger]

Depends what you need to do with it. Ultra 2 appears to be aimed primarily at the real-time market - weather, news, virtual sets etc. I haven't played with it, so I don't know just how clean you can get things. There is often a little more forgiveness with real-time that there would be for off-line work, where you want the results to be absolutely clean.

If you can, try to get a demo of each to play with.

Primatte is another quite good plugin option to consider.