Chroma Green Backdrop test shot

I got to play around with my new backdrop other night just to see how easy/difficult it would be to use when wanting to drop in a custom digital backdrop. I learned that while I have good photoshop skills, I really need to work on the extract command! It's a painstaking process if one doesn't do it correctly.

Setup consisted of 2 Britek lights, Amvona backdrop stand and chroma green backdrop, and my alter ego. :-) The backdrop I created in photoshop fairly quickly and easily.

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They look good to me, If you hadn't mentioned it was originally a chroma key background, I never would have known :)

Did you light the background separately, or just yourself?

Just lit myself against the chroma green backdrop. The digital backdrop utilized a soft omni light from the render command. I've got to get better at the extract command, though, because digital backdrops offer a whole lot more flexibility IMO.

I've toyed with the idea of getting a chroma key, but haven't really seen very many samples of the person/subject dropped out against a different background.

How did you get the blurred background? I can see where the omni light is, but I cant quite figure out the rest of the background.

it looks good, but a little soft around the edges...it's definitely good for a replaceable bg, but i would still go with the actual bg if you know what you're going to be shooting. I hope you don't mind, but I pulled up your image in photoshop and played around with the b&w and if you boost the magenta slider to about 140% you can sharpen the right arm from the background better. Just something to think about. May be caused by something like in 300, how they used a bluescreen instead of green because of the fringing between the red and the green....

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Originally Posted by jorgemonkey

How did you get the blurred background? I can see where the omni light is, but I cant quite figure out the rest of the background.

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In ps create a new file, 300dpi, say 4x6 or 5x7. Choose a color for your foreground, say dark red. Then choose a lighter shade of the same red for your background color. Then use render command, clouds. Then the render command again for the soft omni light.

The blurred background can either be done with the blur tool or if you have hodgy's softar filter like I do, then you use that after you've imported your human subject to your background. The history brush on this effect will unsoften the background to your liking.

Brent, I forgot to use the history brush on my other arm. That's why it still looks soft. I also should have used the history brush around the outline of my sweater as well to keep it from looking too soft.

AH, thats why my PSed backgrounds never came out that great. I would usually render the clouds on a white background, then change hue/sat to get the color I wanted.