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Green Screen

February 26, 2010, 2:08 pm

This is a pretty cool video showing green screen use in TV and movies.

I will say I don't really draw any philosophical conclusions about the meaning of life and reality from it, other than to say, "how cool is it that we can do this?"

Via Maggies Farm

Tags: , ,
Category: Movies & Entertainment
  • Maddog

    Thus closing the second circle in filmmaking.

    The first was of course silent movies, which often used but did not really need movie studio settings. With the advent of sound, location shooting disappeared. This is notable in Hitchcock's Blackmail (1929), which contains early scenes shot without sound, but on location and later scenes with sound, but shot on the lot.

    Shooting on the lot would rule until The Naked City (1948), which revolutionized film making by shooting street scenes on location without the publics knowledge. They used hidden cameras and distractions to hide the fact that they were making a movie.

    Today we are back to shooting in the studio and using the green screen to insert the necessary background.

    The real question is what is next?

    Thanks Warren!

    Mark

  • Mike

    I'm also impressed by the lighting changes.

  • http://http//www.tinyvital.com/blog John Moore

    Mind boggling! Decades ago I did some work for MagiCam at Paramount, which took the basic green screen "Chroma-Key" technique and added a couple of tricks. They did the Carl Sagan Cosmos series there.

    But this just blows me away. Far more impressive.

    Scary thing is... I've seen a lot of those scenes. Too much adventure TV watching? :-)

  • Doug

    I finally understand how the Saints won the Super Bowl.

  • IgotBupkis

    > “how cool is it that we can do this?”

    "Beaucool".

    > Doug: I finally understand how the Saints won the Super Bowl.

    Sorry, Doug, they beat the Colts the way anyone does it -- Pressuring Manning and taking advantage of his "happy feet" -- that's been his problem ever since college, as Spurrier showed time and again. If your 'D' can get to Manning, your chances of winning go up precipitously, because he WILL start screwing up. The Colts generally win when their protection for Manning is impenetrable. When it isn't is their likely losses.

  • Tim

    Yet despite all the technology movies - even animations - depend on the voices of real human actors to give them life.

  • eCurmudgeon

    "Yet despite all the technology movies – even animations – depend on the voices of real human actors to give them life."

    For now, at any rate.

    I've long wondered why the studios haven't plowed major dollars into coming up with better-quality speech synthesis so as to get rid of human actors altogether.

  • epobirs

    Voice talent is relatively cheap. The folks who work nearly full time in the voice over and animation vocals biz don't make anything like the money serious TV and film stars pick up. Outside of the Simpsons cast and Seth McFarlane, who voices a major portion of the main characters on shows he already owns a major portion as creator or co-creator, not a lot of people in the vocal talent field are getting seriously rich.

    Frequently, when a big name actor does a animation voice, it's for a much smaller salary than an onscreen role. The actual workload is much less, there is no costuming or makeup hassles, and often it is an indulgence for their children, especially for performers whose careers are mainly in venue unsuitable for kids.

    So there just isn't much incentive to make a voice synthesis system that could compete with human talent. The game industry is more likely to make the investment, as there is more value in a distinctive character who can utter lines not written in advance. Interactivity demands more sophisticated AI to do this but the demand is there because game script can already be massive compared to a feature film. On a 'Star Trek' game, one of the TV actors reprising his role mentioned his dismay at having more lines to perform than any two feature films.

  • Kresh

    The people who make Sanctuary (with it's super-obvious non-real sets) should watch this video. It'll very much improve the quality of their visuals. I mean, a "laboratory" in the middle of a giant room? A laboratory consisting of three tables and a few microscopes set waaaaaay out in the middle of a giant room? Even a block and tackle cannot suspend disbelief enough for that.

    Then they need to hire real writers. That's a whole 'nother story. So to speak.