Matte (filmmaking)
Encyclopedia
Mattes are used in photography
and special effects filmmaking
to combine two or more image elements into a single, final image. Usually, mattes are used to combine a foreground image (such as actors on a set, or a spaceship) with a background image (a scenic vista, a field of stars and planets). In this case, the matte is the background painting. In film and stage, mattes can be physically huge sections of painted canvas, portraying large scenic expanses of landscapes.
In film, the principle of a matte requires masking certain areas of the film emulsion to selectively control which areas are exposed. However, many complex special-effects scenes have included dozens of discrete image elements, requiring very complex use of mattes, and layering mattes on top of one another.
For an example of a simple matte, we may wish to depict a group of actors in front of a store, with a massive city and sky visible above the store's roof. We would have two images—the actors on the set, and the image of the city—to combine onto a third. This would require two masks/mattes. One would mask everything above the store's roof, and the other would mask everything below it. By using these masks/mattes when copying these images onto the third, we can combine the images without creating ghostly double-exposures. In film, this is an example of a static matte, where the shape of the mask does not change from frame to frame.
Other shots may require mattes that change, to mask the shapes of moving objects, such as human beings or spaceships. These are known as traveling mattes. Traveling mattes enable greater freedom of composition and movement, but they are also more difficult to accomplish. Bluescreen techniques, originally invented by Petro Vlahos
, are probably the best-known techniques for creating traveling mattes, although rotoscoping and multiple motion control
passes have also been used in the past.
Mattes are a very old technique, going back to the Lumière brothers. A good early American example is seen in The Great Train Robbery
(1903) where it is used to place a train outside a window in a ticket office, and later a moving background outside a baggage car on a train 'set'.
portion of a scene was filmed, the background portion of the film wasn’t exposed. Once the live action was filmed, a different cut-out would be placed over the live action. The film would be rewound, and the filmmakers would film their new background. This technique was known as the in-camera matte and was considered more a novelty than a serious special effect during the late 1880s.
Around this time, another technique known as the glass shot was also being used. The glass shot was made by painting details on a piece of glass which was then combined with live action footage to create the appearance of elaborate sets. The first glass shots are credited to Edgar Rogers.
The first major development of the matte shot was the early 1900s by Norman Dawn
ASC
. Dawn had seamlessly woven glass shots into many of his films: such as the crumbling California Missions in the movie Missions of California, and used the glass shot to revolutionize the in-camera matte. Now, instead of taking their live action footage to a real location, filmmakers would shoot the live action as before with the cut-out cards in place, then rewind the film and transfer it to a camera designed to minimize vibrations. Then the filmmakers would shoot a glass shot instead of a live action background. The resulting composite was of fairly high quality, since the matte line – the place of transition from the live action to the painted background – was much less jumpy. In addition, the new in-camera matte was much more cost effective, as the glass didn’t have to be ready the day the live action was shot. One downside to this method was that since the film was exposed twice, there was always the risk of accidentally overexposing the film and ruining the footage filmed earlier.
The in-camera matte shot remained in use until the film stock began to go up in quality in the 1920s. During this time a new technique known as the bi-pack
camera method was developed. This was similar to the in-camera matte shot, but relied on one master positive as a backup. This way if anything was lost, the master would still be intact.
Around 1925 another method of making a matte was developed. One of the drawbacks of the old mattes was that the matte line was stationary. There could be no direct contact between the live action and the matte background. The traveling matte changed that. The traveling matte was like an in-camera or bi-pack matte, except that the matte line changed every frame. Filmmakers could use a technique similar to the bi-pack method to make the live action portion a matte itself, allowing them to move the actors around the background and scene – integrating them completely.
The matte shot stayed relatively the same after the development of traveling matte. In about mid-1980s, advancements in computer graphics programs allowed matte painters to work in the digital realm. The first digital matte shot was created by painter Chris Evans in 1985 for Young Sherlock Holmes
for a scene featuring a computer-graphics (CG) animation of a knight leaping from a stained-glass window. Evans first painted the window in acrylics, then scanned the painting into LucasFilm’s Pixar system for further digital manipulation. The computer animation
blended perfectly with the digital matte, something a traditional matte painting could not have accomplished.
matte filming, the live action portion is shot. The film is loaded and projected onto a piece of glass that has been painted first black, then white. The matte artist decides where the matte line will be and traces it on the glass, then paints in the background or scenery to be added. Once the painting is finished the matte artist scrapes away the paint on the live action portions of the glass. The original footage and a clean reel are loaded into the bi-pack with the original threaded so it passes the shutter in front of the clean tape. The glass is lit from behind, so that when the reels are both run, only the live action is transferred to the clean tape. The reel of original footage is then removed and a piece of black cloth is placed behind the glass. The glass is lit from the front and the new reel is rewound and run again. The black cloth prevents the already exposed footage from being exposed a second time; the background scenery has been added to the live action.
effect. In this process, the top and bottom of a standard frame are matted out, or masked, with black bars, i.e. the film print has a thick frame line
. Then the frame within the full frame is enlarged to fill a screen when projected in a theater.
Thus, in "masked widescreen" an image with an aspect ratio
of 1.85:1 is created by using a standard, 1.37:1 frame and matting out the top and bottom. If the image is matted during the filming process it is called a hard matte due to its sharp edge. In contrast, if the full frame is filled during filming and the projectionist is relied upon to matte out the top and bottom in the theater, it is referred to as a soft matte, as the aperture plate is not on the focal plane and causes a soft edge.
In video, a similar effect is often used to present widescreen films on a conventional, 1.33:1 television screen. In this case, the process is called letterboxing
. However, in letterboxing, the top and bottom of the actual image are not matted out. The picture is "pushed" farther back on screen and thus made "smaller", so to speak, so that, in a widescreen film, the viewer can see, on the left and right of the picture, what would normally be omitted if the film were shown fullscreen on television, achieving a sort of "widescreen" effect on a square TV screen. In letterboxing, the top of the image is slightly lower than usual, the bottom is higher, and the unused portion of the screen is covered by black bars. For video transfers, transferring a "soft matte" film to a home video format with the full frame exposed, thus removing the mattes at the top and bottom, is referred to as an "open matte transfer." In contrast, transferring a "soft matte" film to a home video format with the theatrical mattes intact is referred to as a "closed matte transfer."
that another process, such as bluescreen, would not remove. The name stems from the fact that the matte removes "garbage
" from the procedurally produced image. This "garbage" might include a rig
that is holding a model
or the lighting grid above the top edge of the bluescreen. Garbage mattes can also be used to include parts of the image that might otherwise have been removed by the bluescreen, such as too much blue reflecting on a shiny model ("blue spill").
Photography
Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either electronically by means of an image sensor or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film...
and special effects filmmaking
Filmmaking
Filmmaking is the process of making a film, from an initial story, idea, or commission, through scriptwriting, casting, shooting, directing, editing, and screening the finished product before an audience that may result in a theatrical release or television program...
to combine two or more image elements into a single, final image. Usually, mattes are used to combine a foreground image (such as actors on a set, or a spaceship) with a background image (a scenic vista, a field of stars and planets). In this case, the matte is the background painting. In film and stage, mattes can be physically huge sections of painted canvas, portraying large scenic expanses of landscapes.
In film, the principle of a matte requires masking certain areas of the film emulsion to selectively control which areas are exposed. However, many complex special-effects scenes have included dozens of discrete image elements, requiring very complex use of mattes, and layering mattes on top of one another.
For an example of a simple matte, we may wish to depict a group of actors in front of a store, with a massive city and sky visible above the store's roof. We would have two images—the actors on the set, and the image of the city—to combine onto a third. This would require two masks/mattes. One would mask everything above the store's roof, and the other would mask everything below it. By using these masks/mattes when copying these images onto the third, we can combine the images without creating ghostly double-exposures. In film, this is an example of a static matte, where the shape of the mask does not change from frame to frame.
Other shots may require mattes that change, to mask the shapes of moving objects, such as human beings or spaceships. These are known as traveling mattes. Traveling mattes enable greater freedom of composition and movement, but they are also more difficult to accomplish. Bluescreen techniques, originally invented by Petro Vlahos
Petro Vlahos
Petro Vlahos is a Hollywood special effects pioneer who developed the color-difference bluescreen process for the Motion Picture Research Council and, with his son Paul Vlahos, founded the Ultimatte Corporation in Chatsworth, California, in 1976....
, are probably the best-known techniques for creating traveling mattes, although rotoscoping and multiple motion control
Motion control photography
Motion control photography is a technique used in still and motion photography that enables precise control of, and optionally also allows repetition of, camera movements. It can be used to facilitate special effects photography. The process can involve filming several elements using the same...
passes have also been used in the past.
Mattes are a very old technique, going back to the Lumière brothers. A good early American example is seen in The Great Train Robbery
The Great Train Robbery (1903 film)
The Great Train Robbery is a 1903 American action Western film by Edwin S. Porter. Twelve minutes long, it is considered a milestone in film making, expanding on Porter's previous work Life of an American Fireman. The film used a number of innovative techniques including cross cutting, double...
(1903) where it is used to place a train outside a window in a ticket office, and later a moving background outside a baggage car on a train 'set'.
History
Originally, the matte shot was created by filmmakers obscuring their backgrounds with cut-out cards. When the live actionLive action
In filmmaking, video production, and other media, the term live action refers to cinematography, videography not produced using animation...
portion of a scene was filmed, the background portion of the film wasn’t exposed. Once the live action was filmed, a different cut-out would be placed over the live action. The film would be rewound, and the filmmakers would film their new background. This technique was known as the in-camera matte and was considered more a novelty than a serious special effect during the late 1880s.
Around this time, another technique known as the glass shot was also being used. The glass shot was made by painting details on a piece of glass which was then combined with live action footage to create the appearance of elaborate sets. The first glass shots are credited to Edgar Rogers.
The first major development of the matte shot was the early 1900s by Norman Dawn
Norman Dawn
Norman O. Dawn was an early film director. He made several improvements on the matte shot to apply it to motion picture, and was the first director to use rear projection in cinema....
ASC
American Society of Cinematographers
The American Society of Cinematographers is an educational, cultural, and professional organization. It is not a labor union, and it is not a guild. Membership is by invitation and is extended only to directors of photography and special effects experts with distinguished credits in the film...
. Dawn had seamlessly woven glass shots into many of his films: such as the crumbling California Missions in the movie Missions of California, and used the glass shot to revolutionize the in-camera matte. Now, instead of taking their live action footage to a real location, filmmakers would shoot the live action as before with the cut-out cards in place, then rewind the film and transfer it to a camera designed to minimize vibrations. Then the filmmakers would shoot a glass shot instead of a live action background. The resulting composite was of fairly high quality, since the matte line – the place of transition from the live action to the painted background – was much less jumpy. In addition, the new in-camera matte was much more cost effective, as the glass didn’t have to be ready the day the live action was shot. One downside to this method was that since the film was exposed twice, there was always the risk of accidentally overexposing the film and ruining the footage filmed earlier.
The in-camera matte shot remained in use until the film stock began to go up in quality in the 1920s. During this time a new technique known as the bi-pack
Bipack
In cinematography, bipacking, or a bipack, is the process of loading two reels of film into a camera, so that they both pass through the camera gate together...
camera method was developed. This was similar to the in-camera matte shot, but relied on one master positive as a backup. This way if anything was lost, the master would still be intact.
Around 1925 another method of making a matte was developed. One of the drawbacks of the old mattes was that the matte line was stationary. There could be no direct contact between the live action and the matte background. The traveling matte changed that. The traveling matte was like an in-camera or bi-pack matte, except that the matte line changed every frame. Filmmakers could use a technique similar to the bi-pack method to make the live action portion a matte itself, allowing them to move the actors around the background and scene – integrating them completely.
The matte shot stayed relatively the same after the development of traveling matte. In about mid-1980s, advancements in computer graphics programs allowed matte painters to work in the digital realm. The first digital matte shot was created by painter Chris Evans in 1985 for Young Sherlock Holmes
Young Sherlock Holmes
Young Sherlock Holmes is a 1985 mystery/adventure film directed by Barry Levinson, produced by Steven Spielberg and written by Chris Columbus, based on characters by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle...
for a scene featuring a computer-graphics (CG) animation of a knight leaping from a stained-glass window. Evans first painted the window in acrylics, then scanned the painting into LucasFilm’s Pixar system for further digital manipulation. The computer animation
Computer animation
Computer animation is the process used for generating animated images by using computer graphics. The more general term computer generated imagery encompasses both static scenes and dynamic images, while computer animation only refers to moving images....
blended perfectly with the digital matte, something a traditional matte painting could not have accomplished.
In-camera matte shot
The in-camera matte shot, also known as the Dawn Process is created by first mounting a piece of glass in front of the camera. Black paint is applied to the glass where the background will be replaced. The actors are then filmed with minimal sets. The director shoots several minutes of extra footage to be used as test strips. The matte painter then develops a test strip (with the blacked out areas in the shot) and projects a frame of the 'Matted' shot onto the easel mounted glass. This test footage clip is used as the reference to paint the background or scenery to be matted in on a new piece of glass. The live action part of the glass is painted black, more of the test footage is then exposed to adjust and confirm color matching and edge line up. Then the critical parts of the matted live action scene (with the desired actions and actors in place) are threaded up for burning the painted elements into the black areas. The flat black paint put on the glass blocks light from the part of the film it covers, preventing double exposure over the latent live action scenes from occurring.Bi-pack process
To begin a bipackBipack
In cinematography, bipacking, or a bipack, is the process of loading two reels of film into a camera, so that they both pass through the camera gate together...
matte filming, the live action portion is shot. The film is loaded and projected onto a piece of glass that has been painted first black, then white. The matte artist decides where the matte line will be and traces it on the glass, then paints in the background or scenery to be added. Once the painting is finished the matte artist scrapes away the paint on the live action portions of the glass. The original footage and a clean reel are loaded into the bi-pack with the original threaded so it passes the shutter in front of the clean tape. The glass is lit from behind, so that when the reels are both run, only the live action is transferred to the clean tape. The reel of original footage is then removed and a piece of black cloth is placed behind the glass. The glass is lit from the front and the new reel is rewound and run again. The black cloth prevents the already exposed footage from being exposed a second time; the background scenery has been added to the live action.
Mattes and widescreen filming
Another use of mattes in filmmaking is to create a widescreenWidescreen
Widescreen images are a variety of aspect ratios used in film, television and computer screens. In film, a widescreen film is any film image with a width-to-height aspect ratio greater than the standard 1.37:1 Academy aspect ratio provided by 35mm film....
effect. In this process, the top and bottom of a standard frame are matted out, or masked, with black bars, i.e. the film print has a thick frame line
Frame line
A frame line is the unused space that separates two adjacent images, or film frames, on the release print of a motion picture. They can vary in width; a 35 mm film with a 1.85:1 hard matte has a frame line approximately 8 millimeters high, whereas both a full frame negative and the anamorphic...
. Then the frame within the full frame is enlarged to fill a screen when projected in a theater.
Thus, in "masked widescreen" an image with an aspect ratio
Aspect ratio (image)
The aspect ratio of an image is the ratio of the width of the image to its height, expressed as two numbers separated by a colon. That is, for an x:y aspect ratio, no matter how big or small the image is, if the width is divided into x units of equal length and the height is measured using this...
of 1.85:1 is created by using a standard, 1.37:1 frame and matting out the top and bottom. If the image is matted during the filming process it is called a hard matte due to its sharp edge. In contrast, if the full frame is filled during filming and the projectionist is relied upon to matte out the top and bottom in the theater, it is referred to as a soft matte, as the aperture plate is not on the focal plane and causes a soft edge.
In video, a similar effect is often used to present widescreen films on a conventional, 1.33:1 television screen. In this case, the process is called letterboxing
Letterbox
Letterboxing is the practice of transferring film shot in a widescreen aspect ratio to standard-width video formats while preserving the film's original aspect ratio. The resulting videographic image has mattes above and below it; these mattes are part of the image...
. However, in letterboxing, the top and bottom of the actual image are not matted out. The picture is "pushed" farther back on screen and thus made "smaller", so to speak, so that, in a widescreen film, the viewer can see, on the left and right of the picture, what would normally be omitted if the film were shown fullscreen on television, achieving a sort of "widescreen" effect on a square TV screen. In letterboxing, the top of the image is slightly lower than usual, the bottom is higher, and the unused portion of the screen is covered by black bars. For video transfers, transferring a "soft matte" film to a home video format with the full frame exposed, thus removing the mattes at the top and bottom, is referred to as an "open matte transfer." In contrast, transferring a "soft matte" film to a home video format with the theatrical mattes intact is referred to as a "closed matte transfer."
Garbage matte
A "garbage matte" is often hand-drawn, sometimes very quickly made, and can be used to exclude parts of an imageImage
An image is an artifact, for example a two-dimensional picture, that has a similar appearance to some subject—usually a physical object or a person.-Characteristics:...
that another process, such as bluescreen, would not remove. The name stems from the fact that the matte removes "garbage
Waste
Waste is unwanted or useless materials. In biology, waste is any of the many unwanted substances or toxins that are expelled from living organisms, metabolic waste; such as urea, sweat or feces. Litter is waste which has been disposed of improperly...
" from the procedurally produced image. This "garbage" might include a rig
Rig
Rig may refer to:* Rig, Something that a dog pulls when Mushing* Rig, a slang term referring to a tractor unit* Drilling rig, a structure housing equipment used to drill or extract oil from underground* Gaming rig, a PC built for high-performance gaming...
that is holding a model
Scale model
A scale model is a physical model, a representation or copy of an object that is larger or smaller than the actual size of the object, which seeks to maintain the relative proportions of the physical size of the original object. Very often the scale model is used as a guide to making the object in...
or the lighting grid above the top edge of the bluescreen. Garbage mattes can also be used to include parts of the image that might otherwise have been removed by the bluescreen, such as too much blue reflecting on a shiny model ("blue spill").
See also
- Alpha compositingAlpha compositingIn computer graphics, alpha compositing is the process of combining an image with a background to create the appearance of partial or full transparency. It is often useful to render image elements in separate passes, and then combine the resulting multiple 2D images into a single, final image in a...
- Anamorphic formatAnamorphic formatAnamorphic format is a term that can be used either for: the cinematography technique of capturing a widescreen picture on standard 35 mm film, or other visual recording media, with a non-widescreen native aspect ratio; or a photographic projection format in which the original image requires an...
- BipackBipackIn cinematography, bipacking, or a bipack, is the process of loading two reels of film into a camera, so that they both pass through the camera gate together...
- Chromakey (video)
- CompositingCompositingCompositing is the combining of visual elements from separate sources into single images, often to create the illusion that all those elements are parts of the same scene. Live-action shooting for compositing is variously called "chroma key", "blue screen", "green screen" and other names. Today,...
- Hanging miniatureHanging miniatureHanging miniature is an in-camera special effect similar to a matte shot where a model, rather than a painting, is placed in foreground and the action takes place in the background. It is thus a specific form of forced perspective.-Description:...
- In-camera effectIn-camera effectAn in-camera effect is any special effect in a video or movie that is created solely by using techniques in and on the camera and/or its parts. The in-camera effect is defined by the fact that the effect exists on the original camera negative or video recording before it is sent to a lab or modified...
- Live actionLive actionIn filmmaking, video production, and other media, the term live action refers to cinematography, videography not produced using animation...
- Optical printerOptical printerAn optical printer is a device consisting of one or more film projectors mechanically linked to a movie camera. It allows filmmakers to re-photograph one or more strips of film...
- Rear projection
- Schüfftan processSchüfftan processThe Schüfftan process is a movie special effect named after its inventor, Eugen Schüfftan . It was widely used in the first half of the 20th century before being almost completely replaced by the travelling matte and bluescreen effects....
- Special effectSpecial effectThe illusions used in the film, television, theatre, or entertainment industries to simulate the imagined events in a story are traditionally called special effects ....
- WidescreenWidescreenWidescreen images are a variety of aspect ratios used in film, television and computer screens. In film, a widescreen film is any film image with a width-to-height aspect ratio greater than the standard 1.37:1 Academy aspect ratio provided by 35mm film....
Books
- Mark Cotta Vaz; Craig BarronCraig BarronCraig Barron is an American visual-effects supervisor who specializes in seamless matte painting effects. He is also a filmmaker, entrepreneur, and film historian who is co-founder and head of the visual effects company, Matte World Digital...
: The Invisible Art: The Legends of Movie Matte Painting, Chronicle Books, 2002; ISBN 081184515X - Peter Ellenshaw; Ellenshaw Under Glass - Going to the Matte for Disney
- Richard Rickitt: Special Effects: The History and Technique. Billboard Books; 2nd edition, 2007; ISBN 0823084086. (Chapter 5 covers the history and techniques of movie matte painting.)