For my film with a quarter, there is a scene where a little boy comes across the street to pick up the quarter. He stands there looking at it, and someone who is driving isn't watching the road. And he turns around and gets hit by the car. What I did was recorded the boy first, and had mats on the ground from out of frame. I made him pretend he was getting hit. He just went back hard, landing on the mats. Then I left the camera still and recorded the car zooming past the camera. Now, in adobe premiere, I want to composite both of them together. I used the track matte key(not sure which key i should do) and both shots are up, but it is transparent. When ever I mess witht the opaciy, and it justs darkens the whole picture, or it makes one of the two clips dissapear. Any advice on what to do? Thanks

layer 1 is the footage of the vehicle, layer two of the boy. Simplest way is to use the crop effect to cut the video at the edge of the boy, then keyframe it sliding off the screen as the car enters the frame. If the edge being straight is a problem then use the track matte, but only track matte the boy, not the car. Get it as close to him as possible. Do you have to use premiere for this? And why are you trying to change opacity?

well, I don't have to use premiere.. I can use photoshop if there is a way. I'm not used to photoshop, but if you could tell me step by step, i'm sure I can do it. If I did crop it, it woulf still be transparent. If you know how to do it in photoshop, then please tell.

photoshop and premiere arent good for this sort of shot... photoshop is for graphic creation/picture editing, premiere for video editing...

the keyword here is COMPOSITE...
you need a program like after effects, combustion, or commotion...

those are the programs where you are supposed to do these kind of cutting in...

get familiar with one...

im great with AE, so if you have questions, let me know...

j-

yea i wasnt referring to photoshop, rather AE.

well, how do you do it in AE?

basically what jeff said...

you go into ae...
import both files
1) car footage (we will call this ACTION)
2) boy getting hit...(yes, the REACTION)

so now with both files on top of each other, you can adjust the opacity of one of the clips to about 50% and then, when you scrub, you can see where u need to mask...

keyframe the Mask Shape properties, and add JUST A LITTLE feathering to the edges, to make it seamless...

then play back...
tweak....
play it back again...
tweak it again...
play it again...
---and keep on until you are happy with your final product.

then, turn up the opacity of the previous clip back up to 100%...and then do a RAM Preview, to make sure you like what you see...
and then, render the bad boy out as an avi or mov file, and then bring it back into something like premiere, or final cut, or avid...

yeah, no offense, but its going to take a while if you dont know how to use a compositor...

good luck, and if u need any other help...
one of us can help you out...

cheers...
j-

Or, just do it again real slow.

I stuck the camera on the car dashboard looking out, the driver crept up really slow, then as the car hit my legs, I fell foreward really slow, and then proceeded to roll off the car super slow. Once I sped that up in post, it looked fine. Sure no one saw it from the outside of the car, but it was still effective.

That could work.. But I don't think the parents of the actor will be to thrilled with it. He's only 9, but I might try it by myself just to see if anything could go wrong. But that is a good idea. Thanks