Ultra Tutorial 3: Pan and Zoom, Input Positioning, and more By Karl Soule

In this tutorial, well walk through the use of the pan and zoom controls within ULTRA. These tools make it easy to do a "match move" of the background and your keyed talent, and help "sell" the virtual environment to your audience. We are also going to show how to reposition your input clip to match the scene. In the Sessions tab, inside the Sample folder, youll find a session entitled Pan and Zoom Sample. This is our finished session from this tutorial, so if youd like to compare your results to ours, save your session, and load this one. 1. 2. 3. 4. Start a New Session. In the virtual Set tab, Open the folder for the Library Set. Find the shot entitled Library Cam 2 (Tight). Drag and drop that shot into the Virtual Set icon.

In this tutorial, we are starting a little differently than past tutorials. ULTRA is very flexible, and you can start with either the virtual set shot or your input clip. When you start with the virtual set first, ULTRA uses placeholders in the image for other clips. In this shot, we have a placeholder for the input clip, and a placeholder for the B Source in the monitor. 5. In the Browse tab, find the clip called "Interview - Tight." 6. Drag and drop the clip into the Input Clip icon. In this particular source clip, we dont have a clean plate, but we do have a nice, even backdrop. We can use the single-click method to key our subject. 7. In the Source Preview Monitor click once on the green background.

8. Change to the Keyer tab. 9. In the Keyer tab, click the Apply Points button.

Fig 3: Starting Orientation Backward See how our talent is on the wrong side of the screen? Well quickly fix this using the Input positioning tools. TIP: Its always better to shoot your talent shot centered on the subject. If we wanted to center our talent in the scene now, we couldnt because his shoulder is cut off by the edge of the frame. Now, well fix his positioning in the scene. 10. Go to the scene tab. 11. Under "Input orientation in Scene," set the "y" coordinate to 180. This repositions and flips the talent around in the scene so that he isnt obscuring the monitor. You may notice that the "y" value jumps back to zero, and the X and Z values both change to -180. This is because both sets of coordinates represent the same value, and ULTRA will sometimes substitute a different set of numbers.

Fig 4: Needs Crop and Adjustment Youll probably notice that he isnt positioned quite right for the scene. Thats because the set shot is designed for a centered talent shot. Since our talent is not centered, we need to reposition him in the scene. 12. On the scene tab, locate the Input Position in Scene window. 13. Set the x, y, and z values back to zero. You will have to type zero in each box. The Reset button for this scene will reset the position values back to what loaded up with the Virtual Set.

Now that we have positioning set up, lets tweak a few values on the key. We arent going to spend too much time on this See tutorial 1 for more detailed instructions on keyer setup. 14. Lower the Transparency to .320 15. Raise the Start Threshold to .146 16. Turn Highlights Off. In this key, the Highlights value is causing some issues with the edging. Turning Highlights off helps clean up some of this. 17. Set Shadows and Sensitivity to 1.00 (all of the way to the right.) 18. Set the Alpha Curve at .496. See Tutorial 1 for step-by-step instructions how we arrived at the Color Suppression values. 19. Set Desaturation to .518 20. Set Spill Suppression to .416. 21. Set the Color Curve to .504. At this point, we are still dealing with some edge problems. For this shot, its necessary to use the matte post-processing tools to correct the problem. 22. Set Shrink Matte up until you see the edge disappear. You should have a value around .475. The danger of using the Shrink Matte setting is that we lose a little of the image around the edges. This can cause problems in areas where the keyer is having a difficult time, such as semi-transparent areas, or thin objects with lots of spill.The other matte controls help compensate by redefining the edges in the key, softening them, and then sharpening them back up. 23. Set the Soften Matte slider for about .182. This softens and blurs the edge of the matte. This is necessary for the final step resharpening the edge of the matte. Basically, we are blurring out the white unwanted edge, and then resharpening the edge after the unwanted parts are gone. This gives us nice sharp edges for the shot, which we want, without any of the unwanted parts. 24. Set Sharpen Matte for roughly .400 25. Set Sharpen Range for about .350.

Fig 6: Final Key 26. Go to the Backgrounds tab. 27. Find the picture called Capitol. 28. Drag and drop it into the Source B picon.

Fig 7: Placing the Source B Image Now its time to set up the Pan and Zoom, and we are ready to output. Basically, we define a pan/zoom move with 2 keyframes a start point and an end point. This is done using the windows in the Pan & Zoom tab. 29. Go to the Pan & Zoom tab. 30. Check the Enable box. What we want to accomplish is a clip that starts full screen, then at 5 seconds in, the clip begins a slow 5 second zoom-in. 31. Locate Pan and Zoom point 1 32. Scrub the output preview monitor to roughly 5 seconds into the clip. 33. Click the Set button next to the Time indicator for point 1.

Fig 6: Setting Zoom In Point This will set the starting point for our zoom. 34. 35. 36. 37. Locate Pan and Zoom point 2. Scrub the output preview monitor to roughly 10 seconds into the clip. Click the Set button next to the Time indicator for point 2. Hold down the Shift key, and drag down in the point 2 grid window to about -.120

Fig 8: Setting Zoom Out Point Now, weve established our zoom point, but the camera needs a little reframing. Well need to add a slight pan down to remove some headroom in the shot. 38. Without holding down shift, drag up the point 2 grid so that Y is roughly 0.060. 39. Scrub the output preview monitor again to confirm your pan and zoom. The clip should be ready for saving! FAQ for Tutorial 3 I noticed a bit of a black line on the left side of the input clip. Can I get rid of this? There is a thin black line on the edge of the clip. This is caused by the camera the clip was recorded from, and is not a problem with ULTRA. Certain camera manufacturers use a matte on the edge of the active picture area to cover possible noise in the image. For this tutorial, it wasnt necessary to

remove it, but that could be easily done using the Input Cropping tool on the Input tab. See Tutorial 2 for a description of this function. How do I set the duration of my zoom? The duration of the zoom is determined by the time difference between point 1 and point 2. For example, if I set Zoom Point One at 5 seconds into the clip, and then I set Zoom Point Two at 6 seconds into the clip, Ive created a 1 second zoom. If you ever need to determine the length of your pan/zoom, just subtract one points time from the other. In what situations would I use the "Start Zoomed" check box under Pan and Zoom Point 1? This is used for the opposite of the shot we just did a zoom out shot. Start zoomed in, and hold the starting point for a certain length of time before zooming out. Zoom point 1, click the Start Zoomed box and then scrub and set the point in time you wish to remain on the zoomed-in shot. Then set the point in time for Zoom point 2 when you want to reach full screen again.