I've been rendering my poser figures on a green background and then removing that background in photoshop using the select color range option. This is how I managed to get several figures in the same image like I did in "Vanity Fair." The problem with my latest project is that I still see a bit of the green outline around some of the figures so they look pasted when I create a layer for them. Or when I remove the background color, the edges of the figure are jagged and look like they weren't antialiased. Is there a better background color than green for this procedure. I think part of my problem is that the renders I used for VF had an initial height of about 2100 while this time I used 1700. Just wanted to check in see if anyone had any other techniques. Sorry there isn't any preview pictures...

The problem with that is if you render with antialiasing the antialiasing will affect the green background, changing the pixel colours, I would try a medium grey as the background, but the extra pixels will still be there, they just wont be so noticeable.

So use a medium gray background with antialiasing? Should I then use the magic wand tool rather than the select color range to subtract out the background or will it matter as long as the selection is lowered?

You are really making your life hard for nothing. When you save your image, save in tif format. You will automatically get an alpha channel. In photoshop, open the tif file, make a background layer, select the layer where the figure is, go to Select>Load Selection select the alpha, and check the invert box. Hit the delete button and all the background will be gone leaving your figure by itself. Be aware of the fact that any object that is in your scene will be included in the alpha generated by Poser, only the background will be masked. So if you want to separate your figure from the props, you may have to render several passes, making the props invisible in one of them.

If you save the render as a TIFF image, the alpha info is automatically saved with it, so as to save you from having to mask out the figure manually. So there would be no need to use the magic wand or color range to subtract the background.

Not sure if P4 can save as TIFF, but I know P5 can. EDIT: Coss-posted with DominiqueB apparantly. ;-)

Message edited on: 08/28/2004 11:40

Thanks I was saving BMP's and then editing them.

.png format also includes the alpha channel info. That's how I save all of my renders.

Prefer tiff myself, lossless compression, I stay away from compressed format unless for web. It's the format I use for catalog work.

I render bigger than I want it to be and actually use a layer mask to gently erase the very edges. It's bit fiddly, but I actually find it fairly relaxing, almost meditative. bonni

And yet another way... If you already know what background you are going to be using, grab a color that's close to the color of the background image. The resulting fringe wont be as noticable then. (but really, stay with the grey when you can) Also, try playing around with the "extract" filter tool. It does a pretty nice job. Backlighting the subject will also help reduce a bit of fringe too come to think of it. Good luck!

P5 lets you export an image as a ".PSD" This is the native PS format and it contains the alpha channel.

I also do what was said above re. tiff files and alpha channels, rendering over either black or medium grey . Then in Photoshop after that selection process look down at the very bottom of the Layers menu,should be something named 'Matting' . Using the commands in there you can remove either a black or white edge line left by the selection process or use the 'de-fringe' command to spread colour by one or more pixels to blend the edges in .

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