An alternative to the Chroma Key.

[fr4nk]

Hello people, I'm new here, I just wanna ask you something.
As you guys can read the title, i wanted to ask you if there is a way to erase some parts of a videoclip (like the Erase tool found in Photoshop for example, and, obviously, without erasing the part frame per frame, but once) so to show the video that is below? So the erased part remains transparent and the rest of the clip continues to show.
I've tried with Flash but u can only "mask" the video, u can't make a part of it "transparent".
Thanks in advance.
Fr4nk

[racer-x]

You might want to try "Track Masks" if the area that you want to make transparent is pretty static.

I recently made a video tutorial on Track Masks editing with Vegas. look it up in the guides section, if your interested.

[fr4nk]

Cool, I will take a look today, plus i just got Vegas early
Any other answer by someother?

[fr4nk]

I watched this tutorial, but the mask that you made in photoshop is static, i want that this mas contains a video, do u understand?
Or is only possible to make masks with Paint programs?

[edDV]

I'm not sure if flash supports alpha. Alpha is the transparency component for each layer in a composite. Mask is a separate way to show or hide a portion of the frame.

[thecoalman]

It's not very clear what you are trying to accomplish. I'm assuming that A)you already have a video and B)it has a regular background of varying colors and images that you want to remove.

Is that what you're tryig to do?

You can do this but its a very long process and would require a tremendous amount of work.

[fr4nk]

Now i explain better:

1) I wanna cut a part of a video, an HEAD for example, and put it on another one.
Is that so hard? I remember that there were softwares that allows you to cut a region of a video, and save it somewhere

2) I wanna just cut a video region so it becames a "mask" for the other video that is below.

Have I been clear now?

[thecoalman]

Is that so hard? I remember that there were softwares that allows you to cut a region of a video, and save it somewhere

Yes it is, cutting a region and cutting a head are two different things, a head is going to have movement unless your subject is absolutely still hence the reason they you use choma keying. As I mentioned above you can do this but it will be a very long process, doing it in photoshop is simple because you only have one image to deal with. With video you have 30 frames a second.

I don't have Vegas so I couldn't even begin to tell you where to start.

[fr4nk]

oh i see, well i'm gonna try to do something with the chroma then

[Cornucopia]

"Masking" in compositing, is the process of using a controlled selection to set transparency levels in a layer.

For layers that already have alpha channels, the Alpha channel is usually the mask.

For layers without alpha, you have to define the selection...

A fairly quick/automatic way is to use Keying (Chroma or Luma), which bases transparency on Color value(s) or Light value(s) respectively.
Problem is, these are usually ALL or NOTHING threshold processes, and so you have to get that threshold just right.

You can also create Mattes (cutouts), based on Standalone greyscale still or video clip layers. These could be created through Bezier path drawing, or some other feature selection.

And sometimes you can do a combination of all the above.

Scott

[edDV]

"Masking" in compositing, is the process of using a controlled selection to set transparency levels in a layer.

For layers that already have alpha channels, the Alpha channel is usually the mask.

For layers without alpha, you have to define the selection...

A fairly quick/automatic way is to use Keying (Chroma or Luma), which bases transparency on Color value(s) or Light value(s) respectively.
Problem is, these are usually ALL or NOTHING threshold processes, and so you have to get that threshold just right.

You can also create Mattes (cutouts), based on Standalone greyscale still or video clip layers. These could be created through Bezier path drawing, or some other feature selection.

And sometimes you can do a combination of all the above.

Scott

In the pro world you have the luxury of alpha (usually used to define object edges) for each input and one or more masks assignable for each layer of the composite.

These guys should pay their employer to work there.

Just kidding.