Chroma key differences between Premiere CS3 and After Effects CS3

This comparison shows the differences between Premiere and After Effects when chroma keying. As you can see the Premiere tool is virtually unusable.

Set-up

- Footage shot on JVC GYHD111 in HDV mode (720P)
- ChromaKey Green screen lit by 500w Lowell Tota
- Single key light (Photon Beard 200w Microbeam with diffusion gel)
- Premiere CS3 on PC
- After Effects CS3 with Keylight plugin (included in distrubution)
- All footage scaled down from HD to SD timeline (80% reduction)
-Frame grabs taken from Premiere (AE footage rendered and imported into Premiere)

Original image Apart from a slight lack of focus this image should be a ideal source for chromakey. I have used a shallow depth of field to throw the background out of focus therefore reducing the detail in the green.

Premiere ChromaKey to black The green still remains… Increasing the ‘similarity’ control results in loss of the main image.

Premiere ChromaKey with background With the background added the final result is poor.

After Effects ChromaKey to Black In After Effects it is a different story! The edges are crisp , this is with default settings applied.

After Effects ChromaKey with background The final result is pretty good.

Video format for XDA Graphite

After many attempts I have discovered a suitable format to use on my XDA Graphite mobile phone.

Using Premiere CS3 I exported as a WMV (Windows Media Video) format with the following settings:

- Select ‘Windows Media’ in the presets selector of Adobe Media Encoder
- Select the ‘Video’ tab and set 2 pass, 320×240, 25fps, square pixels, 200Kbs (under advanced settings)
- Select the ‘Audio’ tab and select 44kbps, 44khz

It works really well especially if you set the XDA to play video full screen. I have not manged to get a single preset to work with H.264 despite many attempts.