Review: GreenScreen Made Easy by Hanke & Yamazaki

During the few years I spent teaching animation and visual effects at an art college, inevitably the question would come up about half-way through the semester: “I shot something on a green screen.  How do I remove the green background?” I would take a deep breath and choose my words carefully, not wanting to get into an hourlong discussion on the complex art and science of chromakeying. The easy way out would be the response of “Use the Keylight plug-in.” However, I very well understand that the production and post-production processes of chromakey are much more complex, involving not just one plug-in used correctly, but a whole series of processes that must be carefully considered, from the camera, to the lighting all the way through to the keying process.  Until now, there have been few resources to which a we can point students, hobbyists and budget-conscious filmmakers as a definitive guide for acquiring and keying greenscreen video, and at that, doing it well and on a budget.
    This brings us to the new book from Jeremy Hanke & Michele Yamazaki (coincidentally, the latter a former Junior High peer of mine.)  This book fills the educational void in this part of the production and post production process.  Following a logical workflow, the book starts with the physical greenscreen itself (whether to buy or build, and how), progressing to the camera, lighting and shooting considerations, to the nitty gritty technical workflow of the post production process, such as footage preparation, how to battle noise and artifacting, and how to effectively use a number of keying plug-ins for After Effects and Final Cut Studio.

Nucleo Pro 2 from Gridiron Software and the BG Renderer CS3 script that is freely distributed by scripting guru Lloyd Alvarez often get direct comparisons in their functionality. I come across discussions in forums, email lists, post house / design shop discussions everywhere that directly compare the two pieces of software. I'd like to provide a definitive answer on what the pros and cons are between the two, including some render tests to compare render speed.

Does the After Effects community need another glow plug-in? The short answer is yes.  Don't get me wrong, I am a huge fan of the smooth look that the After Effects Glow effect can deliver, especially at 32-bpc. But, I can't help but feel at times that it's a bit limited. The A/B color mapping could use a lot more color control.  Plus, the added CPU expense of rendering in a higher color depth can get costly. Plus, there's no control over the area of the glow short of using an Adjustment Layer.

I wanted to do a quick review of this, because I absolutely love my SmartDisk FireLite 250 GB USB Portable Hard Drive.  This is one of the very few hard drives that has been faithful, glitch free and crash free in the entire time I've owned it, which is over 3 years now. Also, it's the hard drive that has taken more abuse than any piece of computer equipment I own. It's bounced around in my bag (mingling with change, snacks and receipts), flown to every major US city with me, it's even been dropped several times.  This thing never misses a beat and keeps on ticking.