DV Filmmaking

Chapter 5. Shooting for Effects

In this chapter

Preparing a Chroma Key Shoot

Framing Images with Composites in Mind

Planning a Matte Effect

There’s a sequence in Wayne’s World where Wayne and Garth introduce the audience to a new feature of their show, chroma key, and use it to travel to New York, Hawaii, Texas, and Delaware without ever stepping foot outside the studio. Chroma key, the effect they were using, is the same technology that allows meteorologists to stand in front of moving weather maps on the 6 o’clock news.

In Wayne’s World, the characters stand in front of a chroma key screen and as they pretend to be in New York, they joke about carrying a gun and going to see a Broadway show (which is of course what all New Yorkers do, at least on the weekend).

The images in Figure 5-1 are screen captures from a chroma key sequence created in Final Cut Pro. In the first image, our young star, Luca, is running past a chroma key screen. The center image shows the exterior wide shot into which he will be composited. The final image shows the completed composite: the green background has been removed from the first clip, and the boy has been added to the exterior clip.

Figure 5-1. In the first image above left, a boy stands in front of a chroma key screen; the second photo depicts a street scene he will be composited into; the third image shows the boy composited into the background ...