Masking Digital Video

 

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I have a digital video sprite that I want to mask (cut out a section). Is there an easy way to do this?

There are 2 Xtras that can do this.  Video Sprite from Penworks, and Video Mask from Smoothware.  Bot will do this but at a cost.   If your budget does not allow for these these, or if your video is not very demanding, then there is another approach that you can take with Director. Note: This process requires that the AVI or MOV cast member be set to play NOT Direct to Stage. In earlier versions of Director, this property could only be changed on the Macintosh however, since Version 6, Windows users too could turn off this default property. 1. Import the Digital Video as usual. 2. Select the digital video cast member and turn off the Direct to Stage property. (Either by using the blue "i" button at the top of the Cast Window or by choosing Cast Member -> Properties from the Modify Menu. 3. Place the digital video cast member on stage. 4. Create your mask cast member. (Using the Paint Window or by importing a bitmapped cast member from a paint program.) Note: This technique requires the elements of the mask that you want to be transparent be white. If your mask also must have white areas which are NOT transparent, paint them in light gray NOT pure white. 5. Place the mask cast member on stage, on top of the DIGITAL VIDEO sprite. 6. Select the mask sprite in the Score Window and set the ink to Background Transparent. When you play your movie, the video will show only in the areas of the mask that are painted in white. Important note: There will be a severe performance hit on the playback of your movie, especially if there are animated elements on the stage ... including the mask. Be sure to test your movie on the slowest platform you expect the movie to be played on. For better performance, incorporate the mask in your video editing program so that Director can play it back Direct to Stage as a rectangle.