Tutorial: Page (1) of 1 - 04/27/05

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Combustion 4 Everyone ? Part Two Capsules By Stephen Schleicher

In our first installment covering the features of combustion 4, you learned to pull a key with the Diamond keyer.  Instead of having to repeat the lengthy procedure for each shot, wouldn?t it be great if you could save all of these operators as a single preset?  With combustion 4?s new capsules, you can bundle operators together to create your own custom effects.

In the case of the key we pulled in the last exercise, you can create a capsule and apply it to other green screen footage shot at the same green screen stage.

Step 1:  Switch to the Schematic view (F12) so you can see all of the nodes in the workspace.

Step 2:  Select the operator nodes by dragging a marquee around them.  When you have them selected, Right+Click and from the pop up menu choose Encapsulate.

Even though all of the operators are contained in a single node, you still have access to the individual operators by twirling down the capsule in the Workspace panel.  The nice thing about capsules is you can define what controls other users have access to if you need to share this preset.

Step 3:  Highlight the capsule in the Workspace panel and in the Capsule Controls panel select Controllers.  In this example, let?s imagine we want users to only be able to adjust the Blur Width of our keying capsule. 

Highlight the Blur Width in the Channel Picker panel and click the Clone and Link button.  This will create a control that is linked to the Blur Width of the Matte Controls operator.

Click for larger image

This panel also allows you to change the Channel Parameters.  Instead of having a blur range between 0 and 30, you can adjust it to a value that will work for this project.  There is a good chance the blur amount will never exceed 10 pixels, so change the Max amount value to 10.  You can Clone and Link whatever operator controls you want to create a simple interface to control the capsule.

When you switch back to the Basic controls you will only have access to the controls you created. 

Step 4:  Save this modified capsule by clicking on the capsule in the Schematic view and selecting Save Capsule from the menu.  Make sure you save this capsule in an appropriate folder for quick access by you and others in the future.  If you are working in a multi-combustion 4 environment, or just want to be nice, you can share these capsules with other combustion 4 users. 

While combustion 4 has interoperability with Discreet?s high-end applications (IFF/FS), capsules are a combustion 4 feature only.  They will not work in other discreet applications.

Step 5:  To apply a capsule to a layer, Right+Click the layer in the Workspace panel and select Operators>Capsule>Browse Capsule and navigate to the capsule location.

With combustion?s new capsules you can repurpose operators for footage you receive from a specific post house and use them as a starting point for the next project. 

For more combustion tutorials, be sure to check out my website at www.mindspring.com/~schleicher.

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