Pulling Keys

I have used IB Keyer for this. It provides a lot more for the hair. I used the luminance match from the background as well as the chroma.......

The shirt area is roto'd and has and EdgeBlur which is brightened to give a soft and light outline....

Overall, pretty happy with this key.

The image will be properly colour corrected using other shots in the film as reference.

I am rendering most of the shots through the farm at the moment, and compositing some other final shots.

Cleanup in progress

Using Nuke's rotoPaint node, one can remove elements such as unwanted rope from their shots by using fairly simple digital painting techniques. For example, the clone tool, smear, blur and painting colour.

It is what is called 'invisible work' as it is not meant to be known to ever exist in the first place. After all, filmmaking is trickery and often staged and faked. Such techniques are to make things either more appealing or more realistic. Another good example is the light I removed in Sh041 (visible in this post.)

Here is an example of a 'Conjure' shot in progress:

I have also toyed with some colour correction, which needs some work, but for me it looks more like what I want from the shot rather than the warm image above it.

Of course it isn't as simple as painting one frame if the camera and other elements are moving. One has to track the painting into the footage, and any other painting done for areas which are out of frame in the beginning, as well as roto anything which is in front of the painted-out element. The character in this case moves on top of the rope. So he needs to be rotoscoped:

If I had left this shot without roto'ing the character and compositing this back on top of the repainting:

The area of painted wall would be on top of the arm as if a part of his arm was invisible or missing:

This is then the rotoscoped arm over the repainting:

So, this is what I have by this stage:

Hopefully this stands to demonstrate some of my compositing and cleanup processes I am using shot to shot.

Twinning

During the shoot we did use the composition in a lot of cases to create the idea of conjunction and twinning.

Seen as the content is of a man who has been conjoined to his twin brother for his entire life who imagines himself alone and independent, this is compositionally and in terms of storytelling rather significant.

However, some things we could not conjoin or twin up on set/location.

Therefore... COMPOSITING will be at hand to help..

Here is a quick example:

Sh040

In order to integrate these more I would however add a shadow on the original fan, add scratches and such to distinguish a difference between the two and add smoke from the additional composited fan - different to the original, for example.

Shot Consistency

Colour correction is a very good tool in the latter stages of film production to give the scene a consistent feel from shot to shot - especially when shots are taken from several different locations and made to look one of the same.

Of course, well before this, lighting is very important to be executed in exact ways location to location.

What the character wears is important as well as the location obviously appearing to be similar. If you design the set, then you can put similar or exactly the same props into the scenes.

If you design the shots for cutting in the storyboard, this subtracts any odd jump cuts that may occur in the edit.

Also, if the movements of the characters or elements join shot to shot.

Many things allow the cuts and story to flow better within a scene, and many more than these examples.

But, there is one other situation I'd like to point out: You shoot on several locations which are pretty similar, for example an alleyway, but they aren't totally similar.

Now, we did this, and we did frame steps in both alleyways to aid the cut. And, to be honest it isn't a big problem, but there is a very good way to synchronise them up using compositing.

Example of Alleyway #1

I have chosen to test cutting out one particular element from one close up shot, or mid shot, and compositing that into the wide from the other alleyway location.

Example of Alleyway #2

More on this later...

Tracking and Smoke Comping Tests

That's it just beginning, but I had 2D tracked this shot as it is a simply a tilting shot.

I have cleaned up the rope from the original image as well as obviously composite smoke elements.

I will be doing these 2D tracking shots well before I attempt the main 3D tracking shot.

Factory/Station Comp Testing

I have tweaked the roto of the beams of light, keyed the final character and composited them in place of the other, applying light wrap etc.

To Be Done:

• Modelling tweaked with Lina (more details and scaling issues fixed)
• Texturing (photos taken)
• Lighting (collaborations)
• Alternative camera angles tested
• More passes rendered
• More dust and live action elements composited

...

More up to date (lifting lighting values at the back wall and adding particles into beams:

Node Tree:

'Conjure' | Keying/Comp Test

Roman Composites

...No, The Romans weren't that ahead of their time...

This example demonstrates the realism I aim to go into in my composites.

Kahn's Exeter Short Film from Alex Roman on Vimeo.

It will consist of, for me, simple modelling, but realistic texturing, lighting and camera movement (building on my experience in these areas and hopefully collaborating in most areas also). Then the compositing in Nuke will be the main area of focus - polishing it to the highest degree.

This may be the reference, more closely in time, to some small tests this semester.

My focus also, more likely in the next semester, is the narrative of how these shots are put together with other styles of storytelling combined (but less prevalent). However, my main focus is well executed composites.