I've heard this called the PLeasantville effect because that movie made such use of it. Here are two tutorials om how to do it with Final Cut Pro. Unfortunately the examples are basic objects so I have no idea how well they'll work with a character.

http://www.geniusdv.com/weblog/archives/pleasantville_effect_for_final_cut_pro.php
http://www.lafcpug.org/tutorials/basic_pleasantville_look.html

Another option is to film the one character separately.

RJSchwarz
San Diego, CA

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Originally posted by rjschwarz

I've heard this called the PLeasantville effect because that movie made such use of it. Here are two tutorials om how to do it with Final Cut Pro. Unfortunately the examples are basic objects so I have no idea how well they'll work with a character.

http://www.geniusdv.com/weblog/archives/pleasantville_effect_for_final_cut_pro.php
http://www.lafcpug.org/tutorials/basic_pleasantville_look.html

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Looks like chromakeying, I do not think that method would work for a character--too may colors, tones, flesh, clothing, etc. Just works for objects. Like you can have an actress wear red lipstick, or even green lipstick, the make sure those colors are not in the scene anywhere else. Then render b&w but have that color lipstick with some tolerance around the color hue show through as color. But it would not work for an entire character, I think that would require a lot of computer monkeys in a room doing frame by frame matting. Bummer, I was hoping to do it in a film but I doubt it can be done on the cheap.

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The effect seen in Schindler's List and also in Pleasantville was done using Rotoscoping, where they will create a matte of the character to be in colour. This can be a very long and drawn out process. There are tools in Final Cut Pro and After Effects to create mattes in this manner.

Another way would be to to shoot using blue screen of the actor your want in colour, this will provide an easier way to matter (making sure you don't have them too locse to the screen). Then shoot the plate background, you now have two seperate images that can be composited together and you can apply whatever effects you want to either of the images. This isn't a good approach especially if you have a moving camera, since making sure that the camera uses the same motion in the plate and the blue screen action is important.

Make sure that there is a reason for you to do this in your story or in the story telling of your film. Because if not done well will detract more from the what you are trying to say. In the two films above they were done with purpose of the story telling. Schindler's List was to identify the little girl later in the film when they are wheeling a barrow of bodies to put into a hole. Without the red dress it wouldn't stand out. Pleasantville it was to signify that someone was living a happier life, one not controlled by the bounds of the "TV show" they were living in.

I hope this helps.

If you are going to use a Chroma key do not any colour on the actor that is the colour you are keying out. The purpose of this is to create a matte using the colour, it will extract that colour (or a tolerance of it based on the settings) and the thing you are left with is the object, actor or whatever was in the shot. If the actor wears green lipstick and the background is greem the lips will disappear like the background.

If you are want to do something with just the lips of the person, to make them illuminate, then you could shoot it normally use a bright green or blue lipstick (making sure their eyes don't match) and then doing a colour swap or to key out the lips and add what you want. But if you are using a background of that colour, it isn't advisable.

Michael Rogers
McRogson