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Keying in After Effects CS3

  • Article is provided courtesy of Adobe Press.
  • Date: Nov 12, 2008.

Contents

  1. About Keying
  2. Getting Started
  3. Changing the Background Color
  4. Adding the Foreground Subject
  5. Creating a Garbage Mask
  6. Applying the Color Difference Key Effect
  7. Choking the Matte
  8. Removing Spill
  9. Keying Out a Background with the Keylight Effect
  10. Adjusting Contrast
  11. Adding the Background Animation
  12. Adding the Title
  13. Adding the Animated Logo
  14. Copying Effects Across Two Layers

Article Description

Does the idea of keying conjure up images of a meteorologist on the evening news, or a shooting technique used in motion pictures? With After Effects, even the simplest, least-expensive project can take advantage of keying. The Adobe Creative Team takes us through a step-by-step example of this technique.

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Changing the Background Color

The default background in After Effects is black, which makes it hard to see holes or other errors when pulling a key. So you'll start by changing the background to something other than black or white. In this exercise, you'll use orange.

  1. Choose Composition > Background Color or press Ctrl-Shift-B (Mac OS: Command-Shift-B).
  2. Click the color swatch and select a bright orange hue, such as RGB 255, 200, 0 (see Figure 3). Then click OK to close the Color Picker, and OK again to close the Background Color dialog box.
Figure 3

Figure 3

TIP

Instead of changing the background color, you can click the Toggle Transparency Grid button at the bottom of the Composition panel. This action turns on a checkerboard background that reveals transparency, which is another good way to spot errors in a key.

4. Adding the Foreground Subject | Next Section Previous Section

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