WRITTEN BY NICEPHOTOG@GMAIL.COM WWW.NICEPHOTOG-JSP.NET ---------------------------Video Special Effect and software------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- (ALSO "Make an Infra Red Camera" http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/content/kitchenscience/exp/make-an-infra-red-camera/) An "animation special effect technique" you can use to jump over a road or be larger than life is to use a special system to animate by taking each picture out of the master copy movie file where you need to put in a live animation "overlay"(will actually be fused/joined into the picture). ==.YOU NEED.== A. Irafanview and plug-ins (Freeware download) http://www.irfanview.com B. Microsoft Paint .NET (TO USE THE BACKGROUND ERASER ON EACH EXTRACTED IMAGE OF THE MOVEMENT) C. Any Video Converter "avc-free.exe" (Freeware download) http://www.any-video-converter.com/download-freeware/ D. JPGvideo "JPGVideo.exe" (freeware) http://www.sharewareconnection.com/jpgvideo.htm D. [! "uses 24bit" .jpg or .bmp pics only "normal colour pics" "bit depth" converter is in either irfanview or Paint .NET] == == 1. convert a copy of the master video file-type to .AVI 2. Use "Irfanview" image viewer and its plug-ins (2 downloads) to extract the frames. http://www.Irfanview.com/ a. get "irfanview" and install it THEN b. install the "plugins/addOns" HOW TO PREPARE IMAGES OF YOURSELF JUMPING LIKE A VIDEO-GAME-CHARACTER "OVER A ROAD" 20 FOOT IN THE AIR. (Its -----principally the same as animation-----, just more image preaparation) First get a video of the road with no people in it for a few seconds and convert it to AVI and extract the frames using "irfanview". be sure the video section is .AVI format (open it twice) Open the video in Irfanview THEN "OPTIONS" menu >to "Start Multi media Player(PlugIn)" THEN Open it in the Multi media Player(PlugIn) window Then Press the "extract frames button" Alternately press "options" menu then "extract all frames" (the frames will be in .bmp) 1. Get "a digital camera" and set the picture dimensions to near the size by width and height of the normal video picture. 2. Get 2 clean white double bed sheets. Place one flat unruffled on the ground(floor) , sit the other up (unruffled) vertical as the vertical background for the photos. 3. Stand a the center of the (WHITE) sheets and make a slow motion jumping flying and landing movement to test your appearance on video for the figures size in the video picture related to where you are placed. Usually it requires to know how fast the real time action would take because film and video in a capture has a rating called "FPS" Frames Per Second (Number of Pictures to animate movie each second). So if you ran from one side of your road to the other at 30fps and it took 2 seconds that would require 60 pictures. Alternately you could use a video recorder in that background setup and "convert the captured motion to AVI" the "extract the frames" with irfanview. 4. Do the movement piece by piece and take a picture of each positional posture of the movement. (effectively your stand still in the center of the ground and backdrop sheets) 5. put each picture into Paint .NET one by one and click the "magic wand" selection tool on the white beside the figure in the picture. TWO CHOICES CAN BE USED HERE. On the "edit" menu you can choose "invert selection" to select the contents of the figure only the right click on the selected figure section, to "copy" then "paste" the figure onto(overlay onto) the extracted bare picture sequence for the jump movement. OR use the "eraser tool" to destroy all the colour information around the figure in the sequence picture and paste that pictures "edit > crop"(menu) figure selection onto the bare base video sequence picture of road. NOTE: Some preparation of the white using the paintbrush may need to occur to prevent the "magic wand tool" from "selecting" little chunks of background that are not completely white. Paint as much of the background as close as possible to the jumping figure in each picture(frame) with the same type of white. To get rid of white pixels if the are still on the edge of the postures figure, you keep base "transparent" picture for editing. -Create a picture with any one colour or background in "true colour"(e.g. jpg bmp). -Use the "eraser tool" to remove all the colour and save it as e.g. "transparentbase.jpg" -remove the figure by "magic wand tool" "selection" and paste onto the "transparentbase.jpg" -save it with "its sequence number" as "example only" frame23.jpg (remembering "FPS" frames per second) -reopen it and erase around the edges of the postured figure with the "eraser tool" set at 1 or 2 pixel width. -after it is cleaned, use the "magic wand tool" to select the figure and add it onto the "master copy video extracted picture" on that number in the sequence. (It could be required to (fuse)"merge layers" in some imaging programs such as paint shop pro before saving) Use the "JPGvideo" software to join the jpg(converted base pictures edited .bmp to .jpg) sequence the software above uses normal 24bit colour picture and all the same size pictures only. Then convert the output to .wmv and put it into a video somewhere using "windows movie maker"