Tutorial 10 : Manipulating and Customize Virtual Sets

Do you like the Digital Studio, but wish it was green instead of blue? How about defocusing a set to add some depth-of-field? With this tutorial, we’ll show you some techniques to do exactly that.

Each of the layers in an ULTRA virtual set can be changed and manipulated by bringing up a different set of icons. By now, you are probably familar with the standard Virtual Set, Background, Input Clip, Source B, and Overlay icons, but there’s a way to view a different set of icons.

Set up a key as normal, and use a virtual set as the background.

Fig 1: typical key with Virtual Set as background

In the top menu bar, go to View > Displayed Inputs > Pre-Defined.

Fig 2: changing the viewed icons

Now, instead of seeing the usual icons, you will see the pre-defined icons for the layers of the virtual set. Each layer can be manipulated by selecting the layer, selecting the tab for the control you wish to use, and adjusting sliders. For example, let’s defocus the background layer in our example. This is handy for increasing the depth-of-field between our talent and the set behind her.

Make sure that the green light is on for the background layer. This indicates that the layer is selected for manipulation.

Fig 3: Selecting the VSet Input 1 (the background)

Go to the Input tab. Drag the Focus slider over to defocus the background.

NOTE : The Defocus slider function is dependent on the video card and may not work on certain older cards.

Fig 4: defocusing the background

Most of the tools in the tabs are available to manipulate the layers. For example, the color correction can be applied to each layer in the set. In this example, I used the Colors tab, and changed the color on the Tube to a light brown color, and then I selected the background, and changed the color on the background layer.

Fig 5: different layers of the Tube “Trak” shot

Fig 6: Digital Studio in Green and Brown