Happy to report that I have finally finished a green screen scene! It is the second scene in the sequence; a mid shot with Steve, Rob and Alex in it. Lasts all of 56 frames.

In the end I used a combination of Primatte, KeyLight, KeyChew, Travelling mattes, Saphire Edge Blur and Mocha Pro tracked mattes to key out the green.

I have done some despill work using a track matte and a hue node to clear up green on the back of the iPad.

To grade it I have desaturated the actors slightly and used a Saphire Glow node to help match the background exposure - works well and will be using the same 'recipe' on the rest....which there is loads more of!

But at least I am on my way which is such a relief.

Before the rain came I managed to film the establishing shot of the house the Dad and Daughter are in.

Took my time setting up my jib - making sure everything was as tight as possible! Slight wind and quite frankly the jib is at its maximum weight with my camera at one end and 20kg weights at the other!

Worked well though. The new wireless monitor worked okay except when playing back I reckon I need to turn off the camera as got a dual screen thing going on!

Footage okay - after a small amount of sharpening in FCP it's perfect.

I need to do a camera check list and hang it off the tripod... Should include:

1. Black balance

2. White balance

3. Rough focus by eye

4. Exposure - using waveform, ND, T stops, ISO, shutter speed

5. Critical focus - using peaking on camera/monitor, expand on monitor, focus chart on iPhone/back of clapperboard.

Only managed 3 out of the 5 on the shoot hence the footage being slightly soft !! Only 5 things to do but with all the building of the jib etc got over excited !! Need to practice more...

Further tests done - a mixture of Primatte, Keylight and rotoscoping and so far the first mid shot is looking acceptable.

There is still some sizzling edges going on around actor Rob's hair but not enough to be distracting.

Started on actress Alex's body key - again used Keylight with a KeyChew node and Saphire Edge blur along with a rotoscoped travelling hold out matte. Looks okay so far.

Will need to rotoscope her hands and the iPad - may try Mocha to speed that up. Then it's her head. Going to try Primatte like I did with Rob's along with KeyChew and a lot of edge blur - Keylight providing the hold out matte.

Feels like I am moving in the right direction.

So it has been a week of many tests on the green screen footage, including;

downloading a trial of Nuke, rotoscoping in Shake, tracking and exporting in Mocha Pro to name a few, plus different tests with Primatte and Keylight in Shake.

However, nothing produced acceptable results (surprised with Nuke).

But, on Sunday night I stumbled across a website explaining the virtues of a "KeyChew" Shake macro plus edge blurring using Saphire's Edge blur.

Found the macro (and a load of others) hidden inside Shake's content properties.

Gave it a quick go using a key from Keylight and a hold out matte produced from Mocha Pro and imported the shape data into a Shake rotoscope node...

This could be the way forward ... more tests to do!!

This weekend saw my attempts at keying the main actors for the scientists scene. Despite an even lit green screen, after reading several blogs it appears my green was not bright enough. When trying to key I am being plagued with what's known as sizzling edges.

I have tried Keylight in FCP and this produces slightly better results but as its all HD it is still quite noticeable. Trying different methods in Shake as it is quicker to see the results; plus it looks like it is going to take several keys on different parts to get acceptable results.

This means a key for the head and a key for the body. It may also mean using Primatte for the edges and Keylight for the hold out matte and use if trackers.

More research needed and extra tests - maybe worth buying the latest Keylight for Shake £450+vat... Lets see how we get on first!! Will try an hour a night this week.