Exercise: Keying & using garbage masks
Click on the icon for a quick preview of the exercise and the final result.

Download an archive that contains the footage as well as the setups used in this exercise.
Put these files in your Flame system: for example under the /usr/tmp directory.

To learn how to load material into the Flame Library, see the exercise:
“Loading an archive”

Footage courtesy of: Hybride, a Ubisoft division
Images are subject to copyright: please read the disclaimer at the end of this tutorial.

Start in Batch.
1. Click and drag the Library node to the Batch schematic.
2. In the Library, select the clip “Marie_Antoinette_walking”, hold CTRL and select the clip “Walking_background”.
3. Press Load.
4. Drag an Action node to the Batch schematic.
Note: Be sure that the option Auto Image is ON in the NodeSetup tab.
5. Connect the Back clip to the background tab.
6. Double-click the Action node to access its menu.
7. Select the new media layer in the Media list and click on Add Input.
8. Connect the green screen element to the front and the matte tabs of the layer node.
9. Toggle to Action Result view; press F4.

We will access the Keyer tool directly on the media layer and perform a key on the greenscreen clip using the Master Keyer.
1. Select the Media tab in Action.
2. Double-click the K cell on the Media layer 1 to access the Keyer tool.
3. Inside the keyer module, be sure that the Keyer tab and the MasterK are selected.
4. Click on the left color swatch next to the Mix value and drag across the green screen area to sample the range of green shade.
This automatically generates a key.
5. Press F3 to see the matte view
6. Drag the Mix slider left and right to find a setting for the best initial key.

Use the onscreen matte sliders to further adjust the luminance of the matte.
1. With Matte selected in the Sampling menu, hold ALT while moving across the image to display the matte sliders.
Find an area that shows a combination of multiple variables; for example the grey areas inside the dress.
2. Make adjustments to the different sliders to obtain a clean matte and smooth edges.
At this point don’t worry about the rigs and the borders of the image, concentrate on the talent.

You can toggle between matte and result view with F3 and F4 while adjusting the values.

You can also use patches to remove unwanted grey values and replace them by white or black.
1. From the Sampling menu choose Patch 1.
2. Drag the cursor on the grey areas that you want to force to pure white.
3. You can also hold CTRL and drag a rectangular selection.
4. From the Sampling menu choose Patch 2.
5. Drag the cursor on the areas that need to be pure black.
Be careful not to add patches that are too strong; monitor the edges of the matte.
6. You can turn these patches on and off to see how they affect the matte.
Adjust the patch Range and Soft values to your liking.

By default the patch should be set to white, but you can change it when needed to black or analysis (grey).

1. Click on the GMask tab.
2. Deactivate Autokey to prevent animation of the shape over time.
3. Click on Add (next to Geometry) to access the mask GMask creation mode.
4. Draw a shape around the talent; click and lift the pen for each point.
5. At the end, click on the first point to close the shape, or press M.
6. Change the shape Colour value to 0 (black).
7. Enable Outside (next to GMask).
8. Adjust the points on the shape if necessary.

1. Like in Action, you can press the ~ key to toggle between the Gmask schematic and result views. 2. To modify points on a mask: Press D to activate delete mode; A to add points, M to go back to move mode. 3. To Delete a garbage mask and its axis: select the axis in the viewer, select Branch in the Selector tab and press Delete.

1. Select the Keyer menu.
2. Enable Shrink and change the value for 0.50 to shrink the edges a little bit.
3. Enable Erode to smooth the edges a little bit.

We will color the shot within the Keyer to match the clip with the background.
1. Press the CCF tab to access the color corrector.
2. Toggle the CC menu to CW.
3. In the Color Warper, bring the Black down and the white up slightly to increase the contrast.
4. Bring the Midtones track ball towards orange.



Click Return to exit the Color Warper and, Return again to return to Action.