How to create a coloured screen divide?

[lukemilnes]

I am making a live music video. Its an event filmed on 3 cameras and i will edit it in FCP using the Multiclip option.

The trick i want to achieve is when the music breaks down at key points in the performance i want to bring in multiple shots on the same screen. Divided by a solid white crisp border. A really clean, urban feel to the border.

So in more depth.

1. The picture should shrink out of a full screen shot into a shrinking and moving smaller picture which will reveal a white background. and then place itself neatly on the left side of the now white screen.

2. The picture that has shrunk will place itself on the left of the screen and then separately 2 other pictures will appear, perhaps in time with a beat or rhythm in the track. These 2 pictures showing the same or possibly different footage will be evenly spread across the screen with the 1st.

3. the final effect is 3 pictures with a white surround. when the break down finishes the screens disappear.

Can anyone tell me what software i might need on top of FCP, or can i achieve all this with FCP?

Really appreciate any time spent by those with the know how, who reads this and might be able to help me.

Thanks.

 

[-DH]

In FCP, place a color matte (Video Generators->Matte->Color Matte) on track V1 of the Timeline. The default color is grey; double-click it to load it into the Viewer window. Click on the Viewer's control tab to change the color ... I'd recommend using a not full white color. Full white is 255-255-255 (RGB) which may be too bright for TV purposes. Instead, use something between 210-210-210 and 220-220-220. You can control the brightness level easily with the color selector's RGB sliders.

Next, place your other clips on V2, V3 and V4 respectively. Use the Basic Motion controls in the Viewer window to keyframe the scale and positioning of each clip over it's duration. With the color matte on V1 as a background, it will show anytime the clips on the other tracks are reduced in scale.

-DH

 

[lukemilnes]

Thanks -DH. We'll see how i get on. Since i learned the package for the 1st time a few months ago, ive had a break and im at sea all over again. Some of the basics elude me.

The problem im having now is using the 'Make Multiclip'.

Ive 3 video cameras. Each has a different starting point relative to one another within the event being recorded. So ive synced them up using an 'out point' which each have in common.

I put them into 'Make Multiclip' synced through this 'out point'. unfortunately one of the cameras was stopped for 12.01 seconds during the event at 16 mins.

Since its synced from the outpoint this leaves the first 16 mins of footage out of sync relative to the other 2 videos.

Ive decided i need to insert a 12.01 slug to effectively push back and fill the missing footage gap. But the only way i see this possible is by creating a sequence from the original footage.

Once this is done though i cannot use the sequence with the 2 other original bits of video footage. Its says 'General Error (34)'.

Help!

 

[-DH]

I haven't used the multi-clip feature much ... I'm still using FCP 4.5 for most of my projects. But here's what I'd do if multi-clip was giving me a problem.

Place the color matte on V1 as above. Place the other clips on V2, V3 and V4 respectively. Sync the video clips on the Timeline then load each clip (one at a time, of course) into the Viewer and adjust Scale and Center so you can see all 3 clips on-screen at the same time.

Back on the Timeline, cut away the parts of each clip you do not want to use. When you're done with that task, select all clips remaining (except the color matte), right-click on one and choose Remove Attributes / Basic Motion. That will bring all remaining clips back to center and full screen.

Now you can go back and make the Scale and Center keyframing adjustments you talked about before.

Now that I think about it, since you talked about having more than one clip visible at a time, I don't think the multi-clip feature would work well in this case at all.

-DH