Hi, I'm Steve Washer with BrainyVideo.com
The video you're about to see is a section of my new course on green screen.
It's been in high demand, because green screen is a skill that will take your
videos to new heights of attraction and conversion,
without a lot of fuss.
So, why is this a course and not just a quick video?
In the past, I've been able to create single videos that show you how to do
white or black screen
very effectively. But green screen requires more setup. It has more moving
parts that work together
and almost demands a systematic approach
so that you don't waste a lot of time putting it all together every time you
wanna make a really cool video.
The folks in our video brain trust
get this whole course included as part of their membership--
and they get almost any other program they can dream up,
just for asking--
but for now, you can get the next two parts of this course for free.
I'll show you how at the end of this brief introduction.
So, sit back and enjoy part one of Green Screen Success--a simple system
for more engaging videos.
One of the easiest ways to add interest to your videos
is to be able to change the background behind you.
It opens up
a world of possibility--you can transport yourself anywhere,
do almost anything, and without ever even having to move your feet.
You can show your audience a level of professionalism they've probably never
seen in your market.
Chromakeying can increase your conversions and enhance your reputation.
But, it can also be dangerous. Because unless you've shot it properly,
the background will make the foreground, i.e. you,
look absolutely terrible. That's not good for the image of your business.
At a minimum,
it'll take hours of fiddling with the settings in your editing software to
make it look right, and you may have to buy special software
to remove all the green rings around you,
and let enough of your hair show, so that it doesn't look like
you're wearing
helmet--a green, Martian helmet.
Or that enough of you even
shows up on the screen so that you can be seen in the first place.
So, what's the answer?
Well today, if you'd still like to do green screen
but you don't have the budget of a Rupert Murdoch, or even your local
TV station,
you're going to have to substitute
knowledge
for sheer
horsepower.
Knowing how the background has to be set up and lit
will get you 80% of the way.
I'm gonna show you
the easiest way to do chromakeying today.
And you can adapt what I show you
to whatever software you might be using,
although i'm gonna show you how to do this
in several software packages.
The technique of removing the background is called "Pulling A Key."
And it's generally accomplished by using a filter called "ChromaKey."
In this method, a green or blue screen is used as a backdrop
and special software recognizes the green or blue pixels
and removes them from the scene.
Today
the color green is used almost exclusively because
the kind of inexpensive video cameras that most of us use are most sensitive
to the green channel.
And since they see it better, they can more effectively remove it.
The complication
has always been that these same inexpensive digital cameras
can't sample enough of the color in any scene to give good separation from the
green
of the green screen.
So what ends up happening
is one of two things,
neither of them very helpful:
Either you get an ugly green
fringe around the subject,
or the subject practically disappears in an effort to remove the
green fringe.
But there's good news.
And that's why I
built this course:
all of this nastiness can be eliminated if you set up the shoot
properly--this is 80% percent of the game.
If you get this right, your software has a much easier job of getting rid of the
background. And this part of it is easy to do,
no matter how simple your camera may be.
In fact, if you get this right
you can use a standard editing program-- even a
free program like iMovie--
or a very inexpensive program like
Pinnacle
and get amazingly professional results.
So the calculation is this:
If you spend more time
setting up the scene properly,
you can spend much less time in the software.
And since setting up the scene doesn't really cost anything,
this seems to make sense to me.
So, let's look at what we need to do to set up the scene.
Now, there are four absolutely critical things
we need to take control of,
and they're all equally important because they all work together.
Get even one of them wrong, and your key will fall apart. Here they are.
Number one: the distance from the background to the subject.
Number two:
the quality of the background itself.
Number three: the evenness of the light on the background.
And number four: the exposure levels of the camera.
Let's look at the distances first and see what they need to be and why.
First off, you need to have as much distance from the background as you can.
I used to say you needed a minimum of 8 feet,
but no one has 8 feet, so now I say just get as far as you can from the
background.
But why?
Well, there are three reasons. Now, number one: remember how I said that the light
has to be completely even across the background?
Well, if you're too close to it,
like this,
you get shadows. And shadows show up as what?
That's right--
a darker color
than your otherwise spotless green background.
And the second reason,
and maybe even a more important one,
is that you don't want the light
hitting the background to reflect back on you
and create an ugly green fringe around your whole body--especially your hair.
Because hair
is the hardest thing of all to key around.
you end up seeing nothing but thick, green lines where strands of hair should be.
So, you know, if you're a guy who's bare up there, you have a slightly easier job of it.
Now the third reason
is that because you're aiming to get very even light across the backdrop,
you're going to be setting your lights at a bit of a distance
from the backdrop.
Obviously
you don't want to be lit by those lights
like this,
because then that light doesn't look very good on you. So you want to put yourself
in front of the lights. Stand in front of them.
So, to get as far away from the backdrop as you can,
you have to stand in front of the lights.
And of course, these lights have to be a good distance away from the green screen
in order to light the green screen effectively.
And that's why you need so much distance. And that's why I used to say
put yourself at least 8 feet
in front of your screen. But basically, what you're really trying to do is
create
a certain amount of distance
from the light to the screen,
and then a certain amount of distance
from yourself to the light.
And it doesn't have to be a lot. I mean,
look at the difference
between this shot
and this shot.
I only moved about 6 inches.
So, that's the calculation.
I hope you enjoyed Part One of Green Screen Success.
To get the next two parts for free,
just put your name and email below or at this address,
and we'll send them to you as soon as they're ready.
For more engaging videos, I'm Steve Washer with BrainyVideo.com