Primatte Chromakey 3.0 Software : Adobe Photoshop Tools

Spill Removal & Fine Detail tools in Primatte Chromakey 3.0.

When Primatte Chromakey 3.0 doesn't pull a perfect mask initially, you'll get 'color spill'. This is a reflection of background color onto your subject. Primatte Chromakey 3.0 gives you many Photoshop tools and methods to get rid of color spill.

You'll find that the Spill Sponge or Spill Minus tools fix most major problems. Other Photoshop tools solve more specific issues, like using Make Transp to get rid of that final, stubborn green halo. Typically you will combine a few Photoshop tools to get the best color spill removal results.

Remove a lot (or a little) spill.

The four Spill Removal buttons within Primatte Chromakey 3.0 are great for simple, fast correction on your mask. Some work as a single click correction. With others, you click repeatedly to interactively determine how they diminish or enhance the bluespill.

  • Spill Sponge removes heavy spill. You will use this tool a lot as the first result for major spill areas.
  • Spill Minus removes medium spill. You'll use this tool a lot as an incremental way of treating smaller areas of spill.
  • Spill Plus returns or adds spill to help with over-correction from the Spill Minus tool.
  • Matte Sponge removes smaller transparent areas in the final comp.

Wrap up the spill.

The new Light Wrap button in Primatte Chromakey 3.0 is also for spill removal. It works a little differently from the Sponge and Spill tools. Light Wrap wraps the edges of a foreground layer with soft light from the background layer.

This gives the illusion that light from the background layer is reflecting along the edges of the foreground. Light Wrap helps to eliminate spill around the edges of your subject, and make the edges of the foreground blend better with the background. This gives a better integration between the subject and background in your composite.

Fix details after the spill.

There are six Fix Detail tools. They are best used for small incremental
changes or working on small areas of an image. Click repeatedly on a spill area to gradually remove or recover the spill intensity.

  • Make Transparent makes a selected color region more transparent.
  • Restore Detail can restore small lost details such as wisps of hair.
  • Matte Plus increases the density of the mask.
  • Matte Minus decreases the density of the mask.
  • Detail Plus makes Foreground (or subject) detail more visible.
  • Detail Minus makes Foreground (or subject) detail less visible.

Attention to the finer points.

Often, spill color will not be completely removed using the Spill Removal procedures. There will be a little bit of color overage left (kind of like that stubborn five pounds we keep trying to lose). If this is the case, you can try a fine-tuning operation.

The Fine Tune button opens up a Tune Controls dialog box with three tuning sliders. The Remove Spill slider removes spill from the registered color region. The Restore Detail slider will bring back detail to semi-transparent objects, like smoke and hair. The Transparency slider makes a color region less opaque. There is also a Color Chip to sample with.

Wash that spill right outta your hair.

There are a few more Photoshop tools in Primatte 3.0 for making your mask perfect. They fall into the Fix Matte category because mostly they adjust the mask as it hits the edges of your subject.

The two sliders called Soften Matte and Shrink Matte give the Primatte mask a softer edge. They generally get rid of artifacts and aliaseing on an otherwise good mask. This could be pixels that become discolored or too bright, which may happen if you overcorrect the spill in your mask.

The Remove Noise button also adjusts the pixelated-ness of the mask edges. Its Degrain Controls affect the size of the smoothness that is applied to the mask.