I’m planning on shooting some backgrounds for some primitive green screen work and I was wondering whether I should shoot them slightly OUT of focus (since that’s how I want them to look), or shoot them IN focus and then blur them in Vegas.

Are there any tutorials out there for learning how to do simple green screen work?

RJ

Why not shoot them both ways and have the best of both worlds.
The biggest problem shooting them out of focus is that, when you look at the shot on a TV, you may discover that you went too far/not far enough out of focus so shoot several seconds of each backdrop at a number of different focus settings.

For tutorials, check out the one on Keith Kolbo's site (http://amediaprof.com/content/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogsection&id=4&Itemid=27). He's got a low budget chroma key lighting tutorial on this same page.

Thanks Mike . . . that’s the advice and the “How To” I was looking for.

RJ

Well at the same time Rick, if the shot is simple enough, I would just shoot it both ways and see which one you think looks the best. If its simple compositing, like a man walking infront of a tree or something, its not like its a one time shot if you can understand what I mean..

Without setting up an " on set " keying display, I don't see how you would nail the out of focus amount and if the subject moves relative to the background how would adjust that amount of "out of focus"?
Lastly, what would the disadvantage be to simply shooting it in focus, then adjusting it in post? Unless you want varying degrees of out of focus in the same frame aka depth of field.