Hi,
I have a number of cutouts of images that I have done in Photoshop and saved as PNGs.
For the most part, I import these into Avid and select "invert existing alpha" in order to have them import as cutouts. They import as some kind of key and I can do moves with them.
However, I can't size them upward in order to go close for details without destroying the resolution.
The original PNGs are of high resolution. i decided to try using pan and zoom to go to the original PNG. However, when I use the pan and zoom tool, the PNGs have a white background around them. I assume this is the alpha I invert when importing.
How can I invert existing alpha when using pan and zoom, or more to the point, how can I work with my cutouts in pan and zoom?
Thanks,
Reg
P.S. System is Avid Xpress Pro 4.8 on a Mac G5 tower.
When you use the pan and zoom effect, you are not importing the image and making a standard Avid media file. You are instructing the effect to look at a high resolution image somewhere on your system, usually the desktop. Since no Avid media file is being created, you can do truly resolution independent moves on a hi-rez file. You need not create any alpha channel in photoshop.
Larry Rubin
Senior Editor
The Pentagon Channel
www.pentagonchannel.mil
Never tried it so dont know if the nesting will work but you could try....
Add a chroma key colour to the background of your cutout. Save as a tiff /psd.
Apply Pan and Zoom to the new picture.
Nest a chroma key effect on the P & Z
Thanks for the continued dongle support
I just tried a test and it seemed to work great. I started with a png image file with transparent space. I ended up with the still having P&Z movement and matte transparency.
After some trial and error here is the basic breakdown of what i did:
Make a matte in photoshop of your PNG (breakdown below if needed). Import the original PNG and new B&W matte PNG into avid. Lay a whatever-background plate on V1, original PNG on V2, and the matte PNG on V3. Drop a P&Z effect onto original PNG on V2. Link the P&Z to the same original PNG file, put some movement on it if you want. When that V2 effect looks good, grab the purple effect icon from the effect editor and apply the identical P&Z effect to the V3 matte PNG. Then update the V3 P&Z to point to the new matte PNG. After this, nest a "Matte Key" effect (mac: option+drag/drop) to your matte PNG on V3. That should do it.
NOTE: This is basically the same concept as AndrewAction wrote about above, but I have experienced better movement and cleaner edges with Matte Keying rather than chroma or color keying. Matting could also prove more effective if you have an image file with a variety of different opacities. But hats off to AndrewAction for a concept to play around with while sitting at my avid. Thanks man.
Photoshop Matte instructions if your layer/layers already have a transparent background: Copy your file, Make a new layer and send it to the back and fill it with White. Then double click on the foreground layer in the Layer Panel bringing up the "Layer style" window. Turn the color overlay on and change the color from the default to black. This should give you an accurate matte. Save this and then import it back into your avid.
Let me know how it works out!
-Joel
If you use Moving Pictures plug in- you can use tiff's with alpha channels.
Thanks, Joel.
This seems to work. The only issue is, I don't know how to change the color from default to black when I turn the color overlay on for the matte layer in Photoshop. It lets me choose Red only for my matte. I used the Red matte, but I think it is contributing to a ghosting effect when my cutout moves over top of another layer in Avid.
Any advice?
I'd probably just use After Effects for any moves on images with Alpha Channel
Kenton VanNatten | Avid Editor (for hire)
"I am not obsessed... I'm detail-oriented"
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