Hello! My daughter is autistic and much clever than me. She asked me: can you make parts of a video clip transparent? And I don't know. Can anyone advise? I own Video Pro X but haven't used it in ages and can't recall the version... fairly recent, though.
@MCK Hi, yes is the short answer.
Have a look at Chroma Key where you can select colours on the preview window, you can also add a black & white mask (black & white picture) to the timeline then add Chroma key - Activate black/white mask. that will make the black or the white transparent. there's a little arrow at the start of the clip that inverts it from black being transparent to white being transparent, There's a list of these masks in Templates that when added to the timeline it auto adds Chroma key, If you want to you can create a B/W image yourself in a separate photo editor & drag it into the timeline, you'll have to add Chroma key - Activate black/white mask yourself from the Effects tab.
This is Movie Studio but Video Pro X is the same.
Thank you so much for this.
Our daughter has done the above, but says that rather than make colours transparent, she wants to make a section of footage transparent. I'm not sure what she is working on, but I guess it could be a building, or a head and shoulders... anything.
Is this feasible?
I use the term MMS (Magix Movie Studio) & VPX (Video Pro X), the way the two work is identical I believe.
@MCK Hi, yes any B/W image can be used, If the camera isn't moving ie. it's on a tripod that is a bit easier, the building just needs drawing around in a photo editor & a B/W image created from that. but if the subject (head and shoulders) are moving I don't think that is possible or should I say it would need a lot of work, a lot of individual masks one for every frame or every other frame, it would basically need a mask that also moves & MMS doesn't do that.
For a moving mask the subject would need to be tracked & even the best tracking software needs a bit of work to get it correct, @browj2 can point you to tutorials for moving a mask using keyframes or using Xara where you can manually create a mask, That is a paid for extra plugin that I think is now subscription only but he knows more about it as I haven't looked at it yrs.
Hi,
Try to find out if your daughter needs the transparency to be animated or static. Static is easy, animated is not.
For animated, there is proDAD Hide that can do this. I have never used it.
For static, you can export a frame to jpg from the video, open it in a drawing program like MS Paint, Xara, PaintShop Pro, Affinity, PhotoShop and create a white object over the part to be transparent. Export only the white object to a transparent png file and use it as the mask. It can be inverted so that you see only the part in the mask.
I have some tutorials showing using mask on my YT channel.
John CB
Hi
. . . . I'm not sure what she is working on, but I guess it could be a building, or a head and shoulders... anything. . . .
Taking a longshot guess, I suspect your daughter may be wanting to mask out an area eg peoples faces/heads or window, advertising signs/billboards etc and replace them with something else.
If so see the 2 tutorials here and here for 2 different methods
John EB
Hi.
ProDad Hide will only remove foreground objects and add the background from pre and post frames either side of the object as it passes. It has limited use and needs quite a powerful machine as renders as short as a few seconds can take hours. The more pre and post frames it needs to make a clean stitch, the longer the render time.
For instance it can't mask anything coming directly toward or away from the camera as it never gets the background behind it to replace or 'hide' the offending object / person. Also the speed and size of the section to be removed can be problematic.
It can also remove dust bunnies from footage which is an easier task if one can find another spot to use for a mask in a static shot or if the camera has constant movement so the program can see an unaffected area in the pre and post frames.
Perhaps there is a YouTube video that you could point us to to show us the desired effect.
Ray.