Writing this issue’s column, I felt a bit like Bill Murray’s neurotic character from What about Bob? Baby steps: Set impossible goals. Baby steps: Order custom computer. Baby steps: Upgrade software. Baby steps: Add money to computer. Baby steps: Rent a camera. Baby steps: Spend more money. Baby steps: Start over.

In the last couple of months I decided it was time to grow up, put away childish things (such as my MiniDV camera) and start shooting and editing consistently in higher definition video formats. My biggest motivation: My heavy reliance on “chroma keying,” or the process of using a blue or green screen to remove the background in video and replace it with something else.

Eric Jurgenson at Maine Video Systems tests the latest HD equipment.

I produce a monthly TV show called Liberty News TV (www.libertynewstv.com), where I do a lot of real-time keying with the Matrox RT.X100 Xtreme Pro system. It’s a great package for the price ( just under $1,100), but I’ve been unhappy with the keying quality of MiniDV NTSC footage. In my experience, trying to remove a blue or green background using DV footage is close to impossible. You end up with a lot of “flitter” around the edges of the person or object you’re trying to isolate. Only one tool gets rid of almost all of the flitter—the Reflecmedia system (www.reflecmedia.com). This product consists of a LiteRing and some special Chromatte fabric. I tried one of these packages a few months ago and it blew me away. Unfortunately, I can’t use it for the type of work I do, because I often work with a teleprompter mounted right in front of the camera lens, so the glowing ring makes it impossible for the talent to read their lines.

That problem left me with no option but to upgrade to a higher resolution shooting format—HDV or HD—to allow me to achieve the flitter-free key I wanted. But I learned the hard way that you can’t avoid spending some serious money to reach pixel nirvana. Moving from MiniDV to HD or real-time HDV editing is going to cost you close to $12,000. Period.

Before I understood that simple truth, however, I wasted a lot of time and money trying to beat the system. For example, I thought I could save money by having my local computer shop build me a custom computer by salvaging parts from my two-yearold machine. Big mistake. After paying $500 for a new motherboard, the technician informed me that my RAM was not compatible (add $1,200 to original estimate), my CPU fans would need to be replaced (another $140) and that I wouldn’t even be able to use my old Matrox cards in the new machine. So much for downward compatability with my old projects and files.

Despite the setbacks, I ultimately took several baby steps toward my goal of higher quality keying. Trial and error sucks, so let me save you some hassles. Here are a few hard-won recommendations to consider if you’re serious about upgrading to uncompressed HD, HDV or Beta-quality standard definition shooting and editing.

WORKSTATION

No Cutting Corners
Just Buy It
Power Tower Pro Silent; $3,449.00
www.guygraphics.com
Had I to do it over again, I would take a look at a readybuilt video editing machine from a place such as Guy Graphics. I looked into their offerings and they have packages that are guaranteed to work—and their attention to machine noise is a major plus. Their top-of-theline model has specs similar to a nice system I test drove below. One note of caution: Don’t buy this model expecting to edit high definition in real time unless you also upgrade to a more powerful NLE, such as the Matrox Axio LE.

CAMERA

Just Do One Thing
HDV-Yes! DV-No!
Sony HVR-Z1U; $5,946.00
www.sony.com/professional
This Sony HDV-capable camera, one of their latest, seemed a logical upgrade for chroma keying. But I also wanted the option to continue shooting in standard definition for TV broadcast. What I found, however, was that when used in the standard definition 720x480 DV (4:3 aspect ratio) mode, the Sony camera lacked the light level sensitivity of my old, obsolete Sony TRV-900s. Also, the DV footage I captured had a slight flicker that I found distracting. In fairness, I did not try down-converting HDV footage to DV, so that end result might look better. On the other hand, I shot some HDV footage with a bluescreen and used it to test several keying methods. The bottom line, which I’ll spell out in more detail later: HDV can key beautifully, but only if you have the right system.

SOFTWARE

Software—A Solid Editing Base
Power Package
Adobe Creative Suite Production Studio Premium;$1,699.00
www.adobe.com
As part of my upgrade odyssey, I also installed the new Adobe Production Studio package and put it through several weeks of hard labor. This package, which includes Premiere 2.0, After Effects 7.0 Pro, Encore DVD 2.0 and several other upgrades, served as the base platform for all of the software and hardware I tested. Aside from one unexplained glitch in Premiere, which required a reinstall after a few days of use, this package came through with major advances. Most notably, Premiere and After Effects have finally achieved true synergy. Thanks to dynamic linking, I found it possible to take a segment from AE with several effects applied and import it into Premiere—without rendering. That’s a huge time-saver, opening up a world of new options for special effects on the fly. Premiere also has a new multi-camera feature. I didn’t realize how useful this could be until I actually tried it with some dance video footage. Just cue up your footage and you can cut multiple camera angles instantly. Other programs have also been improved. Encore DVD 2.0, for example, creates far fewer bad discs than its predecessor. My one complaint? Adobe Audition is not my favorite audio program. It takes forever to load and my audio files keep defaulting to it. Considering the immensity of this audio program, it should include more powerful de-noising and sound-scrubbing tools.

Improved Chroma Key Plug-In
HDV-Ready Keying Software
Primatte Keyer 3.0; $695.00
www.redgiantsoftware.com
If you’re not ready to invest in a complete NLE package yet, Primatte Keyer may be your best software solution for chroma keying. I’ve been using it for years. The latest version of this After Effects plug-in has been written with HDV compression in mind. The most powerful addition over previous versions is something called “deartifacting.” This filter applies some mathematical magic that smoothes the edges around your subject to decrease the flitter problem I mentioned before. I tested it on some HDV clips and it greatly decreased the amount of distracting, wiggling noise around my talent. One caveat: Rendering took about three times as long when the deartifacting option was turned on. The new version also incorporates many of the features previously found in Composite Wizard, another staple of any chroma key veteran. Nonetheless, I found myself still using my old copy of Composite Wizard to compensate for controls left out of Primatte 3.0, most notably matte feathering. The keys I pulled were way better than anything you can get from any of After Effects’ standard keyers, but not as clean as the Matrox hardware system by a long shot. Primatte’s lousy user’s guide may be partly to blame. (A company spokesperson says they’re working on better docs.) With detailed instructions, you could greatly tweak key quality.

Another Handy Plug-In
Faux HD for Mixing Media
Instant HD 1.0; $99.00
www.redgiantsoftware.com
For about $100, this After Effects plug-in quickly pays for itself by allowing you to sneak in some standard definition footage with your HDV project. The plug-in works instantly, blowing up your SD footage to various HD sizes. I compared the look of footage enlarged using Instant HD with the same footage simply scaled up in After Effects: The enhanced footage has a cleaner, sharper look with fewer artifacts and less pixellation. Also, the plug-in does some magic on still photos as well, instantly enlarging them so that you can pan and scan, creating the illusion of moving the camera over the image, à la Ken Burns.

NON-LINEAR EDITING

Get Real (Time)
Real-Time HDV Editing—for Real
Matrox Axio LE; $4,495.00
www.matrox.com
My friend Eric Jurgenson at Maine Video Systems in Portland, Maine was kind enough to conduct a series of tests using different types of footage in the new Matrox Axio LE system. This system boasts the ability to edit HDV and HD in real time from the timeline. I wanted to see that process in action, but also wanted to test the system’s built-in keyer, which is specifically designed to make the most of HDV footage. First we had to capture some footage, so we gathered various issues/63/images and captured them using the Axio LE breakout panel. These included:

• HDV
• HD uncompressed 8-bit video, captured from the Sony HDR-FX1’s built in RGB export cable.
• SD uncompressed 8-bit video, captured with a Sony Betacam SP
• Standard definition compressed DV footage

When working with SD compressed video, the Matrox system kept chugging even when stacked 10 layers high. When working in HDV and HD, applying any serious effect would cut our real-time prospects down to two video layers. As far as keying, we noticed very little difference in keying quality between the HDV footage and the uncompressed HD clips. If anything, the HDV keyed more cleanly. In fact, the Axio LE real time keyer really lives up to its hype. It pulled a crystalclear key from the HDV clips. One surprise was that our uncompressed Beta footage did not key especially well. I wondered if having the ability to capture 10-bit instead of eight-bit standard definition footage might have improved the results.

The Axio system is pricey compared to other prosumer NLEs, but it’s still half the price of most professional systems and has a number of powerful features such as allowing different formats to play on the same timeline, a cool multi-camera function for event shooting and full support for 24 fps mode. MM

 

Portland, Maine-based Matthew Power is an indie moviemaker, actor and award-winning journalist who studied acting and directing at UMaine and Amherst College. He attended the National Shakespeare Conservatory in New York and worked as an assistant director at Hartford Stage Company.