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Green Screen photography

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HardCandy13

Ive seen some really gorgeous photography of DD on Flickr, much more beautiful than the ones you see from the regular doll photographers/collectors. Some of the nature around the dolls look so stunning and as appealing as the dolls.

 

I came across one photographer and the outline on the doll wasn't as realistic as the other photographs on their flickr account, this made me wonder if any of the photographers use the green screen technique? Or do they take up their camera's, lighting and reflectors to location?

 

I personally do not like taking my doll outdoors, I keep fearing that they may rub off on the rubble/rocks and the weird stares from people lol! I keep them strictly in doors, but I do want to try to get those beautiful shots too.

 

Have any of you tried the green screen technique? How easy/difficult is it to get a realistic outdoor picture from?

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foo

It would be normal to take lighting equipment to location, and it would be much easier to do if you're not alone. Lighting equipment left at home isn't useful :~)

 

About how hard it is to get a realistic picture, unknowdata uses a computer monitor placed on its side for a lot of backdrops,

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/unknowdata/

 

I tried doing it, but haven't posted any of the more successful photos. The thing is that to do it, it works best if the monitor is vertical like his, and without doing that I haven't liked how my stuff has turned out. Well, mainly I haven't put enough effort into composing something proper, moving monitors around and stuff.

 

However, it does coach you into doing what's necessary to get consistent foreground lighting that works with an outdoor background image (it definitely takes effort!). You can try this with a TV too. If you can get something fairly natural looking, you could just place a green screen in the background and work from there.

 

Edit: unknowdata talks a bit about his technique on this blog, but unfortunately it's not in English.

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HardCandy13

Thank you so much for your great reply!

 

I love the dedication of some of these photographers. I can't imagine lugging around photography equipment and having to block out the awkwardness by some of the bystanders. I thought it was a more personal 1 on 1 photoshoot, but going in groups makes a lot more sense and more convenient now that I think of it.

 

Im familiar with Unknown Data~ They've got that gorgeous custom Takane! I hope Volks releases her next because Takane and Hibiki are the prettiest character from that series to me lol

 

Thank you for posting that tip! The fabric backdrops I got just felt a little too solid and one dimensional when I took photos of them, I didnt like them unless the camera blurred them out to make it a little more believable. That monitor tip seems amazing and I love the layering of items in the front to give it a more realistic look. Its definitely a tip I will be using. I guess this is even a better incentive to invest in a bigger monitor XD Im very new to photography but I am extremely willing to learn, I am aiming to get pretty shots and hopefully feel they reach my "standards".

 

Your photography looks great and I just followed. Your lighting technique is beautiful. Im still messing around with mine but I just got some new equipment and reflectors Ill be testing out soon.

 

Do you personally think a green screen would give better results? I got the idea from some person on a gossip website making fun of a floating head in the background because that person was wearing a green shirt. I thought "outdoor" photography would be more convenient and easier to photoshop the stand out if it was against something as simple as a green screen. Ive never tried it, but it does seem promising, especially with the plethora of gorgeous backdrops available online. It just seems easier (and more socially acceptable lol) to take nature photographs and then work her into the pictures using technology and proper lighting/filters.

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foo

Thank you For lighting, I'm mainly using two remote flashes on (very cheap) light stands, and one of them has a Rogue FlashBender mounted on it. Normally you use the white surface, but that kit comes with silver and black surfaces too. I use the black surface almost all the time, because it does a great job of producing very diffused light.

 

However, daylight + a single flash is just wonderful at the right time of day. For this one I just used a bounce flash somewhere behind me, pointing at a wall on the right side. This one was taken during sunset, and is actually a JPEG from the camera (I think I only cropped it).

 

I guess green screen would produce better results, but I haven't tried it myself :/ With a monitor I've had two main problems, positioning it correctly so it's a full background (you don't see the monitor's edges) and the flashes bouncing off the monitor's screen. However with a monitor you don't have to worry about composing your photo in a way so it's easy to replace the green (I think stuff like long hair strands can be tricker to deal with than you'd like, especially if the strands are a bit out of focus).

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foo

Okay, I tried doing stuff properly with a monitor this time. It worked out great

 

15461740960_5191e12bac_c.jpg

DSC_2012 by bodolza, on Flickr

Finding a useful background picture's hard, but this one worked much better than expected. I guess it's worth doing photography just so you can get backgrounds, I just picked something out of my photo library that I thought would work.

 

The other thing is that I had to paint the shine out of her eye from the flash (kind of like the opposite of red-eye ). Looking at it again I should have spent a bit more time to make it look nice, but I had other things to do tonight >_>

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-Mei

That looks really nice! I have tried using monitor as background before, but finding a suitable picture is so hard. Not only i find my monitor so small (24'', unknowndata's is 23''? ) but also finding something that can "fit" DD into the composition make it harder. Scale matter >_>

How did you position the light though? In front of the monitor? Or is it the normal set up of trim, rear and above?

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foo
That looks really nice! I have tried using monitor as background before, but finding a suitable picture is so hard. Not only i find my monitor so small (24'', unknowndata's is 23''? )

Mine's 24" too. In this photo Sakuya's actually kneeling on a table, not standing, which makes things easier.

 

How did you position the light though? In front of the monitor? Or is it the normal set up of trim, rear and above?

With this I used the Rogue Flashbender with the black thing that I mentioned before, and it was to my right. Since the monitor's glossy, it will only show up as a bright white spot if the reflection shines directly into the camera, or barely at all. I think you actually can see the flash's reflection on the photo, but it's so subtle that you can't tell that it's there unless you know what to look for. I can't see it anymore, actually

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-Mei
That looks really nice! I have tried using monitor as background before, but finding a suitable picture is so hard. Not only i find my monitor so small (24'', unknowndata's is 23''? )

Mine's 24" too. In this photo Sakuya's actually kneeling on a table, not standing, which makes things easier.

 

How did you position the light though? In front of the monitor? Or is it the normal set up of trim, rear and above?

With this I used the Rogue Flashbender with the black thing that I mentioned before, and it was to my right. Since the monitor's glossy, it will only show up as a bright white spot if the reflection shines directly into the camera, or barely at all. I think you actually can see the flash's reflection on the photo, but it's so subtle that you can't tell that it's there unless you know what to look for. I can't see it anymore, actually

 

Yes, no reflection, just fancy creamy bokeh?

I have a matte IPS though xD I shall experiment sometimes soon and report back

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-Mei

So here is what i got:

 

15838391458_a2d496ea01_z_d.jpg

15848503349_1172e624a3_z_d.jpg

15838254947_f35b8ca58c_z_d.jpg

 

Backdrop was a monitor. Sadly the resolution is kinda low so the background isn't as sharp as i would like. Sorry for the poor lightning, i don't have enough flash pole

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Collie

Using a monitor as a background is a clever idea, your photos look great, foo and -Mei!

 

Especially photos with an outdoor background are nice, since I'm not a fan of taking my dolls outside.

I need to test this too, I finally got a 24" screen a few weeks ago after years of having only a dreaded 17" one...

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Skaf

This does indeed seem like a good idea and as evidenced by the images in this thread it can produce some pretty nice results. I figured I had to try this myself, this is my (fairly poor) attempt:

 

15867574947_49c3a28249.jpg

DSCF3363 by t.skaf, on Flickr

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foo

@Mei: I didn't realize you took those photos with a monitor backdrop, I was wondering where you took her to get that background

 

@Skaf, that's pretty good actually you just have to do something to make the lighting on Saber more uniform (the right side is in shadow).

 

FWIW this was the second photo I tried taking against a monitor, which I like a lot,

 

15606829567_674f1d4348_z.jpg

DSC_2138 by bodolza, on Flickr

 

I actually had to hold up a gold reflector on the left side of the photo to get the look I wanted The flash was to my right.

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-Mei
@Mei: I didn't realize you took those photos with a monitor backdrop, I was wondering where you took her to get that background

 

Once i went to a Yoga place and they had all these terrarium hanging down from the ceiling. It looked really cool! Now if only i have the space and money to spend on actual studio room decoration

One thing i realize only after i finish with the shoot is that i shoot...too far? Maybe because it was my first attempt with the 70-200mm and i was overwhelming by the focal length (not to mention the weight - no tripod - crawling all over the bed because my room is small :c). However it looks like giving the "breathing space" seems to take away the artificial "monitor" feeling?:p

@Skaf, that's pretty good actually you just have to do something to make the lighting on Saber more uniform (the right side is in shadow).

 

I actually had to hold up a gold reflector on the left side of the photo to get the look I wanted The flash was to my right.

I think part of that is to make the light uniform and even. For example in that saber photos, you can kinda see her face and her white dress having some sort of "white" lightning, as compare to the background, which is much warmer? Perhaps try to shine some yellow light on the side/in front of her; or post process somehow

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Skaf
@Skaf, that's pretty good actually you just have to do something to make the lighting on Saber more uniform (the right side is in shadow).

 

I actually had to hold up a gold reflector on the left side of the photo to get the look I wanted The flash was to my right.

I think part of that is to make the light uniform and even. For example in that saber photos, you can kinda see her face and her white dress having some sort of "white" lightning, as compare to the background, which is much warmer? Perhaps try to shine some yellow light on the side/in front of her; or post process somehow

 

I'm still learning so these are all good tips. The problem I suppose was that I had light from the outside shining in on her left which isn't optimal since the background doesn't reflect that. I'll look into investing in a golden reflective surface.

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sklurk

clean greenscreen color keying is all about 2 things:

 

the uniform lighting of the color to be keyed out (can be any color as long as it doesn't exist in your image to keep) that's why it's ridiculous blue or green. The less color variation or lighting variation in your backdrop means you can pull it out that much easier, photoshop it's a magic wand, in aftereffects there's automated plugins.

 

Second to get a good match you need to match lighting to the bg you're going to put your photo on... that's tricky sometimes.

 

You also need enough lighting so the detail can come through, you can always adjust that later though. Also better hope there's nothing reflective in the character that will pick up those green tones, you have to paint those back in or if they don't get keyed out, you need to paint them so they're not green.

 

There's also lots of silly tricks and happy accidents to get what you want.

 

neweyes.jpg

 

This one was taken with the camera flash, but I basically filtered it through my hand... the flash actually turned reddish as some of the light was tinted by going through my fingers. This show I think was taken in front of a monitor with a decent bridge camera on macro. I haven't decided if I want an slr yet... as felicia is quite financially demanding at the moment.

 

I'm not so much into photography as I work in animation with film tools, but what I do is essentially photo finishing and effects for full motion video, so I'm just fooling around with quick tricks and filters.

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sklurk

if you're going to be keying it out, the farther away you can get the screen from your subject matter the easier it will be to light the 2 things independently. The higher res and cleaner you can get the image without any noise in the screen the easier it is to pull the color and keep fine detail and edges. It should also help from getting any reflected color or contamination from the screen onto your model.

 

For the model backed by a computer screen you can't really do that since the farther you move the screen back the more zoomed in to your figure you have to be in order to keep the backgroun in full frame, unless you're using a giant TV.

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foo
For the model backed by a computer screen you can't really do that since the farther you move the screen back the more zoomed in to your figure you have to be in order to keep the backgroun in full frame, unless you're using a giant TV.

You can compensate for that with a small monitor if you use a telephoto lens, but if you make the monitor really far you'll need to zoom in a lot. That means you'll also need a lot of space between the camera and the model, and will have to deal with depth of field issues (the monitor image will be out of focus).

 

I'll look into investing in a golden reflective surface.

I just have one of those 5-in-1 collapsable reflector discs, it's pretty handy.

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GreenDragon

Using a monitor for a background is a fantastic idea, can't wait to experiment with that. One other thing that I use for a back drop is record album covers. My husband has an extensive collection dating back to the 1960's with some pretty amazing art work.

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