front/rear projection composites
 

DV has a number of problems that limit its effectiveness for composite shots. It can be done, but fringing and stairsteps often mar the results.

In the old days of Hollywood, before bluescreen, composites were frequently created on set or in camera. Two typical methods involved either a rear projection, or a front projection using a special beamsplitter in front of the camera lens. (There were many little tricks for fine-tuning the results, like shaking the screen to remove screen grain and so forth...)

My question is: Could something similar be done in DV using a video projector? How would you synchronize the projector and the camera to avoid scanlines?

The main reason that DV has such a hard time in compositing is due to the color sampling that the DV encoding process uses.

There is an excellent article at: http://www.videomaker.com/scripts/article.cfm?id=8282
that explains the precise reasons why.

Ashley

a better report
 

The Videomaker report is, as always, very superficial. Check out http://www.neopics.com/bluescreen/ . They provide an interesting solution not addressed in the Videomaker article.

You can do excellent composites in DV
 

I know because I am doing them right now for my movie "The Hunter's Prey"

Anybody who says it can't be done...they need to try a bit more. Once you get going it becomes easy.

Is it as good as comping D-5, D-5 HD or 35mm ? No, of course not.

Check this Adam Wilt page...about halfway down.

http://www.adamwilt.com/DV-FAQ-tech.html