Digital News Production: After Effects Editing

Opening Titles

The first step with my Adobe After Effects work was to create a logo/opening title. Due to previous research of gaming channels, we wanted it to be very slick, modern, strong and give a retro gaming vibe.

Here were my steps for creating the opening title...

• Deciding on a block, retro font for 'Game-Over'
• Adding our branded tagline 'Now it Begins'
• Using our branded colours by making the title red and the tagline white
• Adding effects: The words entering with a zooming out effect, then slowly rotating on a slant
• Adding a graphical background to add extra detail and depth. Then blurring it, recolouring it and slowing it down so that it doesn't distract from the logo
• Adding an effect to the text called Pixels, which gives a scrambled block look - adding to the retro theme
• Using Final Cut to add an extra effect to the whole video that involves a flash/electric spark effect and the image darting around before zooming out

I think the end result is brilliant and fits in with our channel perfectly. Accompanied by upbeat news-style techno music in our edit, it will feel like a realistic gaming news channel opening.

Presenter Green Screen

The largest task in After Effects was editing the green screen footage. To create a professional look with a unique yet relevant backdrop I performed the steps below...

• Selecting the individual clips of our presenter that we will be using in our edit
• Using Final Cut to compile them so that they can be edited in After Effects in one go
• Using the Keylight tool transform the green colour on the footage into a transparent background
• Using Screen Matte and Despill tools to clean up the edges of our presenter so that she doesn't blend into the background or look too sharp
• Finding a background: We looked at several graphical/moving backgrounds on free websites. We then decided on one from Videvo but decided to freeze frame it to make it still. This was due to testing moving backgrounds and finding that they were too distracting
• Changing the brightness of the background and changing the colour from blue to red, to fit with out brand colours
• Correcting the look of our presenter by using the tools: Colour Correction to give a less yellow look, Photo Filter to to do so even more, Vibrance to make the colours pop and Curves to lower and higher the different shades (shadows, midtones & highlights)

Below are stills of the end result...

Before

After

I'm extremely pleased with this transformation. It looks very professional and the fine tuning of the footage has left it smooth and easy on the eyes. I think the colour scheme and chosen background look exactly how we planned.

Interview Monitor

The third and final part of editing in After Effects was to add our channel's logo to the monitor in the package interview. I wanted the image on screen to move, for it appear as if it's there on screen on the set and for it to be included in all shots. So with very similar steps to the presenter green screen footage, I did the following in all three shots (Wide shot, presenter CU, interviewee CU)...

• Selected the individual clips of our presenter's questions and the interviewee's answers in a variety of shots that we will be using in our edit
• Using Final Cut to compile them so that they can be edited in After Effects in one go for each shot
• Using the Keylight tool transform the green colour on the footage into a transparent background
• Using Screen Matte and Despill tools to clean up the edges of the monitor's screen so that it looks more realistic
• Also using Despill to separate the colours of the green monitor screen and the green colour in the surrounding Xbox game cases, as the Keylight was picking them up as one
• Adding a green layer behind the footage to fill in transformed game cases that were still being picked up by the Keylight
• Creating a new clip of the opening titles to one where the text stays still, and the background moves, allowing it to play in one continuous loop
• Layering the logo footage into the interview shots to make it appear as if it's on set
• Correcting the brightness of the logo and slightly blurring it so that it isn't too sharp for the interview footage
• Correcting the look of our set, presenter and interviewee by using the tools: Colour Correction to give a less yellow look, Vibrance to make the colours pop and liven up and Curves to lower and higher the different shades (shadows, midtones & highlights)

Below are stills of two results....

Before

After

Before

After

It took much longer than expected to transform the interview footage due to the issues of the Keylight tool picking up the Xbox game colours as well as the monitor. But after a lot of work, I think it's turned out looking brilliant. The logo looks realistically placed and the colours and shading have dramatically improved.

Overall I'm very happy with how each part of my After Effects edits turned out. They're now completely ready to be placed into Final Cut for editing.