After Effects 6 Mac OS

[Gareth Munden]

Hi everyone, I'm new to After Effects 6 (on Mac OS 10.2.8). I have some Super-8 stuff that has been Telecined and I've edited in FCP, what I'd like to do next is remove any dust and stuff that came on my Telecine. I understand that AE 6 and the clone tool are the things to use . But after hour of playing about I just can't work it out . Please someone help.

 

Thanks Gareth Munden

[Theo Lipfert]

Hi everyone, I'm new to After Effects 6 (on Mac OS 10.2.8). I have some Super-8 stuff that has been Telecined and I've edited in FCP, what I'd like to do next is remove any dust and stuff that came on my Telecine. I understand that AE 6 and the clone tool are the things to use . But after hour of playing about I just can't work it out . Please someone help.

 

Thanks Gareth Munden

 

After you select the clone tool from the paint palette, you need to select the area on your footage you want to clone FROM by clicking while holding down the "alt/option" key. The cursor will change to a crosshair (I don't have the program running in front of me, so it is possible you need to hold down the ctrl key instead -- just try both to see which makes the cursor change!) While holding the key down, drag the crosshair on a similar looking part of your footage. Release the alt (or ctrl) key then drag the mouse over the scratch to paint it out.

 

Here is the tricky part. If you twirl down the effects line of your timeline, you will see your paint has a duration of some length that most likely is not exactly what you want. You can just drag the effect shorter or longer on the timeline to fix. Or, you can set the length (in time) on the paint palette. This will change the time on the next paint stroke you make.

 

Post again if this doesnt answer your question. There are other ways to fix scratches and muck (like by using layers and masks) so if this doesn't help, be really specific about what is going wrong.

 

Good luck.

 

Theo

Bozeman, MT

[Gareth Munden]

I think that only works on 6.5, but I've only 6 on my machine.

[Keith Mottram]

maybe dont bother with ae, it could be easier to export the frames you need to alter as stills then do the work in photoshop reimport into fcp and that would be it.

 

keith

[timHealy]

I didn't know that Adobe introduced a clone tool for after effects, but it would make sense to have similiar tools for their products.

 

Pinnicle use to make Commotion that did have a clone tool that worked just like photoshop. In fact it was like photoshop for film. You could import a clip and go through your clip frame by frame.

 

I have a OS 9 version but it seems Pinnicle doesn't make it any longer. It is not on their website.

 

Anyone why it is no longer produced?

 

best

 

Tim

[Victor Mejia]

maybe dont bother with ae, it could be easier to export the frames you need to alter as stills then do the work in photoshop reimport into fcp and that would be it.

 

keith

 

So let me get this straight: Photoshop can be used to clean up footage (remove scratches, dust, etc.) then brought back to FCP?! How do I learn this process?? Is there a book, manual, website? I need to remove a massive scratch on some digitized super 8 film. Thanks.

Victor

[Mark Allen]

victor - you might look into searching "filmstrip" in the help files - but I would highly not recommend photoshop for this task because the whole need for AE is that the clone stays consistent. If there are single frame only scratches you could simply save the frame out under file menue an the reimport it (hint name the file with the time code).

 

Always remember that these tools are well explained in the help documentation under the help menue.

 

For the original quetsion, the most common error with clone stamp is that people don't realize (even in v. 7) you have to paint onto the layer you want to paint onto. I forget anything but 7, but in 7 you can clone for a different source if you want.

 

 

in FCP you could in theory just duplicate your clip ontop of another one, then mask OUT an area you want to remove and then shift the bottom layer to a fill point. I do this in AE instead of using the clone tool. Much better.

[David Cox]

Just a small point - this is a cinematography forum, not a post production one. This thread is probably best debated elsewhere?

 

But since it's here, the traditional way to remove film dirt in post production is to get the area of the image that is covered by the film dirt from the previous or next frame. If the camera is locked off, that?s all you'll need to do. If it's moving or there are major lighting changes between frames, you'll need to manipulate the "patch" you got from another frame accordingly.

 

If you introduce any item only on one frame - i.e. a big splodge of painting or cloning, you will most likely just turn a bit of film dirt into a big splodge. Anything that exists just for one frame will flash up to the viewer. By taking something from surrounding frames, you get the right image information for restoration.

 

You need to be able to see your fixes playing real-time to see if you have made things worse or not, so exporting a single frame to a paint program is not really the way to go.

 

David Cox

Baraka Post Production

www.baraka.co.uk