video matching a look

[gdgross]

Hi all, I am working on a simple music video for my band. It's a bunch of old TVs stacked up, and clips of the individual band members playing on the various screens. One of the screens is an oscilloscope and the singer isn't present in the vid, but the oscilloscope trace of her voice is.

Here's the idea:

My question is simple, but I imagine it might have a complicated answer: how can I make the images on the TV screens look more like they belong there, as if they were actually played back for real, and recorded on the screens? Currently, to my eyes, they look more like they are pasted on, for lack of a better description. (Which the are, of course, haha!)

Frame rate? Lighting? some kind of screen curvature emulation? take the sharpness/resolution of the clips down somehow? (would have to think how to do that... in audio and electronics, we call it decimation... lol)

Any thoughts? Thanks!
Geoff

PS - i'm a musician pretending I know about video things, so speak to me like a newb!

 

[mlesemann]

We did something (somewhat) similar in my movie Detours (shameless plug: watch it on Tubi or Amazon Freevee ) and simply recorded it, then played it through the TV. Granted it was only one scene but it worked fine.

Attached is a screen grab of one scene, which may (or may not) be similar to what you're aiming for.

 

[indietalk]

Use the natural edges of the screen slightly so it blends with the TV casing better. Don't go all the way to the edge. Talking a very little amount here.

 

[gdgross]

We did something (somewhat) similar in my movie Detours (shameless plug: watch it on Tubi or Amazon Freevee ) and simply recorded it, then played it through the TV. Granted it was only one scene but it worked fine.

Attached is a screen grab of one scene, which may (or may not) be similar to what you're aiming for.

View attachment 4445

Thanks I'll see if I can check it out - that pic looks great

I actually tied to record the oscilloscope trace IRL, with the other TVs stacked up like that, but it's old display wasn't super bright, so it ended up being easier to record it separately in a dark room where I could bump up my ISO setting without blowing out the rest of the picture, and then apply it on top of the other clip, same as the TV clips.

It's too hard to get all the timing right though with the multiple screens, I think. I'd need some kind of multiple output video controller to syn them all up. (Not to mention that the big TV doesnt' work anyway, I found it for $20 on craigslist and thought it looked cool! lol

 

[gdgross]

Use the natural edges of the screen slightly so it blends with the TV casing better. Don't go all the way to the edge. Talking a very little amount here.

Thanks, I'll play with that. may also want to adjust the mask edges I guess. I'm in fcpx, and there are settings for feathering and falloff of all the masks I have applied to the screens.

 

[Nate North]

Use the natural edges of the screen slightly so it blends with the TV casing better. Don't go all the way to the edge. Talking a very little amount here.

I would add to this that you should feather or blend the edges with the edges of the actual screen a little bit. It goes by a few names but most software refers to it as feathering. Maybe just 10 or 20 pixels depending on your resolution.

In addition to this I would add that there are many commonly available effects for this exact purpose many of which are built into editing software programs free of charge. Typically they have a number of controls that you can use to refine the exact look that you want.

Common names for these effects which typically drag and drop onto a footage layer would be things like Old TV, VHS tape, scan lines, etcetera.

I know for example that da Vinci resolve has a canned vintage television effect included that you can dial to taste in the settings on the upper right inspector pane once you have applied it to a footage clip from the master effects panel which is opened with a tab on the left hand side of the screen.

That should get you what you want. If you have any further questions I'll try to help.

 

[indietalk]

You could also add some effects, like a VHS or similar effect to one, and maybe a super-8 effect to another, etc. But you'll still want them clear and sharp for the most part so maybe use effects but still with high res or only use a certain percentage of effect.