concept for a Studio Generator ....

meant as a suggestion for a future project …
Our friends Norbz and Luigi had shown us recently what's possible with the 3D-fonts in Motion5/FCPX.

I actually don't have the time, so the following are just idea-sketches:
• a 'studio' with a floor and 1-3 walls
• a counter
• some lights




as a layer between background and foreground a dropzone.
In FCPX, you drop a green-screen recording into the well




the generator has a checkbox to show only elements behind the subject (low track, subject keyed over it = 'before' bg), or showing elements 'before' subject (high track, covering subject = "in front")...

finally, you create in Motion some camera positions...



which are avail via drop-down selection in the Inspector of that generator...

=> a super-low-budget solution, asks only for some cheap green-screen (FCPX is very forgiven with bad lighting) .... schools, NPOs, one-man-companies, tutorial makers...
when you invest a few hours into the 'set', using your own textures (company logo?) etc, integrate 'screens', and esp. in lights (note: the keyed subject get lit!), you can create some surprising results.

This is really no rocket-science...



.... which commercial plug-in maker will grab that idea first ...

That's very clever Karsten. I'm enjoying the fruits of your imagination. Keep it up!

This is neat. I'll take a hack at a few 'studio' scenes next sure why not. Only thing would be the lighting, it would have to be the same as the green screen footage (and or just have moveable lights in the plugin I guess).

Later today or tomorrow I'll have something to give away .

Norbz wrote: …Only thing would be the lighting, it would have to be the same as the green screen footage ….

no ... ? have a look (ignore the worst key ever. LOL :sick: )



that's 'virtual lights'... the subject/me appears like any other object in the set... receiving light, or creating shadows ... ok, not like real light, my nose creates no shadow/'depth', even when light comes 90° straight from side..
so, for sure, you can not re-establish Rembrandt lighting in post :lol:

but a 'plain vanilla, all bright, 5 chinaballs talkshow'-lighting ... ? easy, I'd say!

Couple years ago we had a string of projects that required virtual sets. We purchased them online. But we found that you light the talent to either match the set, which saved lots of time in post. Or you lit the talent very neutrally, and then introduced virtual lights in post, which took more time to match. This experience inspired my tutorial at macProVideo, which shows how using the Bump Map filter can make virtual lights more realistic with textures and shapes in your video.

The only trick with virtual lights, is getting shadows to work properly. And there is a whole toolbox of tricks for that, depending on your situation in Motion.

Then, there is motion tracking, which Motion's built-in tracker can handle fairly well.
(Will post example as soon as my FTP server issues are resolved by my ISP later today)

BenB wrote: ... // full quote //
…

fully agree - on a pro-level.

What I have in mind is junior-league:
Keep it simple, keep it cheap - limited therefor easy to use.

That's why I mentioned talkshows and their <yawn> 'flat' lighting, we hobbyist like to re-enact with a couple of china-balls.


( very little magic here - lightwise. Han Solo meets Kimmel - great show!)

And, for a start:
no cam moves, simple 'fix' pov: wide establisher, from left, from right, cu, medium for an insert. Avail via menu ...
If the generator is made intentionally so, all you need is a green blanket from the penny-store, and mimicing head turns to cam1,2,3 ... or, by concept, make it more easy, for a sitting host (then a real prop/table should be mandatory)

Tracking (would be awesome, DriveX anybody??) is the luxury version. ...

in the mid-90ies (gosh! 22y ago!!) we did one of the first live-show with virtual-sets AND live character-animation (see the little troll?) For this simple stuff we needed three fridge-sized workstations... kids loved it, talking to a toon-character…




now we do this with a laptop .... crrrrazy.

.... hmm, maybe I can post an example next week, what I have in mind ...

Match Move in Motion isn't something you could Publish to an FCPX template, but works great for camera dollies and pans. You have to have marks on the green screen to match up to. There's an exercise that does this in the APTS book for Motion 5, one of the parts of that convoluted text that actually makes sense. Here's basically what you end up with. Talent was filmed on green screen with camera dolly movement. Match Move in Motion moves the background (virtual studio in this case, but can be a photo of video clip) to match that camera movement.
Here's a cheap example where dolly moves in closer and to the right.