Key.

Go to the Primatte tutorial to see how it works.

Inside the small polyhedron are all the background pixels. They are 100% transparent and have no background spill suppression. Pixels in the small polyhedron will appear black if you view the matte output.

Between the small and medium polyhedrons are the edge transition pixels which would appear gray when viewing the matte output. These are a blend of foreground and background pixels transparently blended with spill suppression applied.

Between the medium and the large polyhedron are the pixels in the center of your foreground objects. These have to stay 100% foreground, but do need spill suppression applied.

As you scrub on an image, Primatte pushes and pulls on the shells based on which function you use, creating dents and bumps on the shells. The position of the dents is determined by the pixel values as located on the RGB axis.

Pixels are distributed according to their color values and are manipulated based on their positioning within that 3D space.

Click the Auto Analyze button so that Primatte can automatically compute the best starting point for the key. Once the initial target for the key is set, you are free to modify and refine the result. Auto Analyze uses advanced image analysis tools to identify blue/green background colors, estimate foreground color properties, and then generate an initial key which is ready for fine tuning as necessary. Think of it as a short cut to jump start the sampling process that would otherwise need to be done from scratch.

In the event that Auto Analyze does not provide a good starting point, such as when keying colors other than blue or green, use Sample Background and then click and drag over the background. Sampling the background is a process that only needs to be done once, because multiple samples will not produce an additive result. Each time you Auto Analyze or use the Sample Background mode, it resets the sample.

Select Clean Background and click and drag over any gray pixels in the background to make them fully transparent. For manual control or difficult to key backgrounds, connect a Roto node to the Garbage Matte input where an animated shape can remove unwanted background elements.

Select Clean Foreground and click and drag over any gray pixels in the foreground to make them fully opaque. For manual control or difficult to key foregrounds, connect a Roto node to the Holdout Matte input where an animated shape can fill in the foreground.

Images that contain blue or green hues that are very close to the key color can result in matte holes or less than desirable edges. The solution is to enable a second, Hybrid Matte to fill in any gray areas of the Primary Matte while still retaining gray values in the edge. You can do this by turning on the Hybrid > Enable option in the Advanced parameter group and then adjusting the blending of the two mattes with Hybrid Blur and Hybrid Erode.

Using the Spill Sponge, click and drag in the foreground image where you clearly see that the background key color is spilling over onto the foreground. Usually a few clicks is all that is necessary to remove the spill. To make spill adjustments in fine increments, Shift sample to increase spill colors and Alt sample to decrease spill.

Once the spill regions are isolated, the Spill parameter group offers additional controls. Depending on the individual shot, changing the Spill Replace mode to either Solid Color or Softened Background may produce a better result.

Using the Matte Sponge, click and drag in the foreground area to increase the matte opacity. To make matte adjustments in fine increments, Shift sample to increase the matte opacity and Alt sample to decrease opacity. Several controls are also available in the Matte Refinement group.

With the work to generate a key complete, the final step is to composite the keyed foreground over a replacement background. Oftentimes, the foreground and background elements have differences in color and lighting that need to be addressed. Primatte’s color correction can adjust the keyed foreground to match the background and light wrapping tools wrap the background image over the edges of the foreground to achieve a photorealistic composite.

A number of operations rely on a sample which is accomplished using either a line or rectangular sample.

As the cursor is dragged over the image, a line is generated. The pixels under this line are sampled when making adjustments.

As you Ctrl-drag over the image, a rectangle appears. The pixels within the shape are sampled when making adjustments.

Precisely modifies the sampled area. These controls are only available when the Fine Tuning icon is selected and an area is sampled.

Increases or decreases the amount of spill in the current sample.

Increases or decreases the amount of transparency in the current sample.

Increases or decreases the amount of detail in the current sample.

Compensates for unevenly lit blue and green screens by evening out the colors.

Enables/disables Adjust Light.

Controls the strength of the Adjust Light effect. View > Adjusted Light while changing the Strength.

Control the type and strength of the spill correction.

Each color identified as spill is nudged toward its natural complement.

Each color identified as spill is nudged toward a uniform solid color.

Each color identified as spill is nudged toward a color taken from a softened version of the background image at the same location.

Defines the solid color towards which spill regions are pushed when the Spill Replace Mode is Solid Color.

The amount of spill replacement.

Enable/disable secondary spill removal.

Sets the spill color.

The spill color is automatically detected based on the screen color.

Green is used as the spill color.

Blue is used as the spill color.

Red is used as the spill color.

Adjusts the replacement color tones.

Enables/disable the Bias Fixed Channel.

The amount of spill removal.

Various controls to manipulate the matte.

Enables/disables the Matte Refinement parameters.

Blacks in the matte are made blacker by increasing this value. As the value increases, more values are clipped to black. This is helpful for getting rid of unwanted gray areas in what should be the black part of the matte.

Whites in the matte are made whiter by increasing this value. As the value increases, more values are clipped to white. This is helpful for getting rid of unwanted gray areas in what should be the white part of the matte.

Shrinks or grows the matte. Negative values shrink and positive values grow the matte.

The matte is blurred.

Helps blend the foreground into the background by making the background wrap into the foreground edges without completely losing the edge. The edge of the foreground starts to become transparent.

Inverts the matte.

Provides spatial and temporal control over matte edges.

Enables/disables the Edge Cleaner parameters.

Sets the area to be adjusted.

Smooths the result over time.

Adjusts the contrast of the matte.

The amount of edge cleaning.

The sensitivity of the edge pixel selection.

A Holdout Matte defines foreground areas that should not be keyed out. The input can come from an existing source channel or a node like Roto, and the result is combined with the output matte.

Determines which channel to use as the Holdout Matte source.

Uses the red channel.

Uses the green channel.

Uses the blue channel.

Uses the alpha channel.

Uses the average luminance of the RGB channels.

Sets the blend mode for combining the Holdout Matte with the Primary Matte.

Sets the opacity of the Holdout Matte.

A Garbage Matte defines background areas that should be keyed out. The input can come from an existing source channel or a node like Roto, and the result is combined with the output matte.

Determines which channel to use as the Garbage Matte source.

Uses the red channel.

Uses the green channel.

Uses the blue channel.

Uses the alpha channel.

Uses the average luminance of the RGB channels.

Sets the blend mode for combining the Garbage Matte with the Primary Matte. See the Blend options for more information.

Sets the opacity of the Garbage Matte.

Enables/disables the Color Correct parameters.

Rotates the hue.

Adjusts the saturation. Positive values saturate, negative values desaturate.

Adjusts the luminance. Positive values brighten, negative values darken.

Adjusts the contrast. Positive values increase contrast, negative values decrease contrast.

Adjusts the gamma. The gamma adjustment leaves the white and black points the same and only modifies the values in-between. Positive values darken the image, negative values lighten the image.

Adds or subtracts red.

Adds or subtracts green.

Adds or subtracts blue.

Helps blend the foreground into the background by making the color of the background wrap into the foreground edges without completely losing the edge.

Enables/disables the Light Wrap parameters.

Selects the Light Wrap source.

Uses the background input.

Uses a solid color.

Softens the edges of the border image used for light wrapping. Available when Source is set to Background Input.

Sets the color of the light wrap. Available when Input is set to Solid Color.

The brightness of the light wrap.

The width of the light wrap.

Sets the blend mode for compositing the light wrap. See the Blend options for more information.

Blends the original and affected result.

Composites the light wrap only within spill areas.

Enables/disables the Light Wrap Spill parameters.

Selects the Light Wrap Spill source.

Uses the background input.

Uses a solid color.

Softens the edges of the border image used for light wrapping. Available when Source is set to Background Input.

Sets the color of the light wrap. Available when Input is set to Solid Color.

The brightness of the light wrap.

Sets the blend mode for compositing the light wrap. See the Blend options for more information.

Blends the original and affected result.

The Edge Color Correct parameters allow you to color correct only the edge of the foreground. It is a good idea to take a look at your Edge Matte in the View Menu so that you can see what your edge actually looks like.

Enables/disables the Edge Color Correct parameters.

Determines the width of the edge matte.

Rotates the hue.

Adjusts the saturation. Positive values saturate, negative values desaturate.

Adjusts the luminance. Positive values brighten, negative values darken.

Adjusts the contrast. Positive values increase contrast, negative values decrease contrast.

Adjusts the gamma. The gamma adjustment leaves the white and black points the same and only modifies the values in-between. Positive values darken the image, negative values lighten the image.

Adds or subtracts red.

Adds or subtracts green.

Adds or subtracts blue.

Some images contain blue or green hues that are very close to the key color which can result in matte holes or less than desirable edges. The solution is to enable a second, Hybrid Matte to fill in any gray areas of the Primary Matte while still retaining gray values in the edge. The blending of the two mattes is achieved with the Hybrid > Blur and Erode parameters.

Enables/disable hybrid keying mode.

Blurs the hybrid matte.

Shrinks the hybrid matte.

In cases where key color or lighting changes significantly over time, this parameter can be keyframed. The overall shape of the 3D key sampling is preserved, but the shape is repositioned in color space to account for the color change.

Enables/disables the small polyhedron.

Enables/disables the medium polyhedron.

Changes the polyhedrons from translucent to opaque so it is easier to see the clusters of color dots against the polyhedron surface.