Clean a Dirty Floor in Premiere

[jessicaw23751302]

This may sound like a strange question but I am looking for a way to make a dirty floor look cleaner. I shot a video in a photo studio (white floor and walls). It was my first time shooting at this location and I couldn't figure out how to turn on the main lights but we got the backlights on and I cranked my iso. I say this because now I can't just key out the background. And because it is a white background, it also affects what is in the shot as there is white in it too.

So the problem is, the ground is dirty. We tried to clean it when we shot but it was scuffed and old. I tried to use a title (white box) to cover the worst parts but that only works to an extent.

Does anyone have any ideas as to how I can fix this? 

I need to reshoot eventually anyway as what we filmed changed slightly. But I would like to use this video now since we have it, and it won't be approved unless the floor is cleaner.

[SAFEHARBOR11]

Please post a still image of the scene in question, that will help with creative ideas for a fix

Thanks

Jeff

[jessicaw23751302]

[SAFEHARBOR11]

In context if possible, meaning the whole frame please, unless you are not allowed to post the content?

[jessicaw23751302]

I can not post the entire thing as it isn't public yet.

[SAFEHARBOR11]

Will anyone be walking in that area, or will image remain the same all the time? It the latter, perhaps make an off-white box to match and feather the upper edge to blend in?

Honestly, going to be difficult for me or anyone else to come up with a fix without really knowing what exactly we are dealing with. If we can't see the image...

Normally, I would take a full image into Premiere and play with it to see what can be done. Otherwise we are just guessing.

Can you maybe blur talent face or logos before posting full frame image??

EDIT: Photoshop has a filter that removes specks and scratches from photos that works automatically...that might work and Photoshop can to a degree work with video clips, if you could apply that filter selectively to the floor area using an Action perhaps?

Thanks

Jeff

[Adareimages2]

What about masking the top half of the shot and over exposing the floor?

[brian@atomicpix.com]

Add a layer with white and use a mask to conceal or reveal as needed.  It's easier in AE but you can do it in premiere.  Hopefully the clip isn't too long or there isn't too much movement in the area.  If so, it will take a while but it's very easy to fix.

[shooternz]

Why did you plan a key shot on a white BG...especially considering you have white image content!

You could try masking and rotoscoping in After Effects and that will be succesfull... assuming the actual image is decently shot. Which I have my doubts!

[jessicaw23751302]

someone and something will be on the floor (walking and then something lying)

I don't want to mask the top and over expose the floor because then the white walls look too dark so I would have to mask all the movement in the shot.

Its about a 2:30 min clip and there is movement throughout.

I wasn't expecting to have to key it and that is the only studio we had access to. I had started a new position and two days into it they said "OK today we are filming this!" there was no planning.

I do have access to After Effects but I have never used it before.

Here is the entire screen on just one shot. The entire video is shot in this location and this is after I have done my best to clean it up. There is movement through the shot and at one point it takes up almost all of the shot. I don't expect there to be a fix for this, I just thought there might be an idea or trick that I haven't learned yet. 

[Adareimages2]

I'm guessing that there are few "ideas and tricks" you haven't learned yet, or at least tried. My view is that all the best ones have been offered to you, and you've rejected them.

That floor is not just "dirty", it's very marked and scuffed, and it would be impossible to "fix" in post in my view, for a video. It may be possible for a still, but even the most experienced stills photographer (and I won a major Photoshop award a few years ago), would find it too time consuming.

Some things need to be considered before you shoot. This floor is one of them. I would have gone for keeping it out of the frame and shooting the people from above the knees. That is perhaps another option; crop the frame to take the floor out. But, to be honest, I would not have shot that floor.

[jessicaw23751302]

I am shooting a product that gets laid on the floor so the floor has to be in the shot unless I cut half the product out. I chose a screen shot that included the most floor I could but I can't really get around showing it.

When I reshoot I told them to repaint and to use a Chroma Key paint so it wont be a problem in the future.

[SAFEHARBOR11]

"I told them to repaint and to use a Chroma Key paint so it wont be a problem in the future."

That is no guarantee that the next result would be any better than what you have now. Lighting is hyper-critical when shooting green screen footage, and also most cameras use high compression and 4:2:0 color which does not lend itself to clean keying. Best to record to an external recording device like Atomos or Black Magic HyperDeck that records ProRes 4:2:2 footage that will key much better (assuming proper lighting) due to having more color information in the video file, along with far less compression which creates jaggy edges.

Also, keying can work great when subject has color behind them. If your object is sitting right on the floor, that can create a shadow where the two meet, and it looks like your item might have some kind of transparency to it. Could be a keying nightmare. Also, the seam where floor and wall meet may not key perfectly, better to have a curved cyclorama with no seams/edges to deal with.

If you don't have a lot of experience shooting green or blue screen footage - and working with keying software - don't expect that shooting chromakey is going to solve your issues. Maybe you have done that before, I don't know, but I see no way of saving what you have now.

Thanks

Jeff

[jessicaw23751302]

Never thought of the transparency! (It's just plastic wrapping so it isn't in all the shots, but it still needs to be considered if more products have it)

This was just a mess from the start, the person who normally shoots in the studio was on holiday (Hence not being able to properly set up lighting because I couldn't find everything I needed) and I had 2 hours to plan a shoot without ever seeing the venue.

I'm working on a couple of suggestions to see if it can be improved so thank you for all of the help. I will see if it can be saved but only experimentation will tell.

[brian@atomicpix.com]

The existing shot is absolutely fixable.  Much of my work is fixing that type of OOPS shots for national campaigns.  Virtually anything can be salvaged with time and patience.  Depending on the amount of movement, you might be looking at a couple of days to fix your 2:30 clip but rotoscoping is the only way to fix what you showed us.  It's not hard, just time consuming.

Sooooo, for the next shoot, what to do differently?  From what I could see, your subject is a furry white thing, right?  DO NOT shoot it on green unless you have a death wish.  If it's just the fur ball and nothing else, shoot it on black and then play with the different blending modes to layer it on your background.  You might have to duplicate the fur ball layer a few times to get it to look right, mess with opacity, etc but it should work like a charm.  The big thing is to shoot a test and run into your suite and do a rough comp before shooting the whole enchilada.  Furry things are a pain but with a little planning, you can make it work.

[jessicaw23751302]

I would be shooting furniture, so sometimes it might have a fur texture, other times wood, other times soft (fabric or leather), or metal like appliances.

And I'm shooting in a photo studio that is just painted white. They will be repainting soon so I thought Green would be best, but reading some of these I'm not sure anymore.

Almost all of the shooting I've done has been Doc or news styled, so I've never really needed to key (other than in a class).

[SAFEHARBOR11]

Any time you are shooting green screen footage, plan on having the editing computer ON SITE with you. That way, you can do a test shoot, load the footage into Premiere and see how it keys, and if the lighting/setup need adjustment, you will know right away. Never do all your shooting with the assumption it will work, otherwise you may get back to the studio and be sorely disappointed, when perhaps just a simple lighting or camera adjustment would've resolved the issue and now it will be a royal pain to try fixing in post.

Read everything you can online regarding "lighting for green screen" as that will be really helpful. Lots of YouTube videos as well.

I worry that the glossy plastic wrap will reflect the green.

Good luck with your project

Thanks

Jeff

[brian@atomicpix.com]

Okay, furniture spots... that helps.  Making the product look perfect is the goal so great lighting is the key.  (yeah, pun intended)  I'd establish a base lighting scheme and keep a couple of extra fixtures, mirrors, flags, etc around to tweak on a piece by piece basis.  Details are the key to making glass and chrome look sexy, wood and leather look expensive, etc.

Do you have talent interacting with the furniture or are you doing camera moves on it?  If you are, shooting it on white is really the easiest way to go since it will simplify post.  Always paint the floor with a fresh coat of white before the shoot.  Don't let crew walk on it unless they remove their shoes and keep that bucket of paint on hand just in case you need to do quick touchups.  If you don't have a nice cyc wall, seamless paper will work for the background, you'll just have to clean up seams, etc in post.

If you don't have talent interacting with talent or you're not doing camera moves, shoot stills and clean them up in photoshop prior to post.

Okay, enough rambling.  Feel free to reach out if you want to talk through particulars.

[jessicaw23751302]

What we ended up doing was buying some "fake" floors to lay down when we shoot again. Just some rolled up linoleum that we can sandbag the corners and keep it from rolling up. This works for us too as we can change out the floor and the shoots will not look all the same.

As for editing, we agreed it wasn't worth the time it would take to fix (we would have to reshoot anyway since the product changed branding).

Thank you, everyone, for your suggestions and help.