Author: Artofwot
Designed for: Photoshop 7, but will work on other versions
Level: Beginner
Last Updated: June 28th, 2004

An Introduction To Filmstrips
Filmstrips are strips of images (or frames) that can be imported into an image editing application such as Photoshop to be retouched, or visual effects added. They are extremely useful. The film strip we will be using can be found in the "Lesson Files" .zip folder which you can download right next to where you opened this file from. It has been compressed considerably to cut down on download time, and web space.

Creating A Filmstrip
First, we're going to go about capturing video, and then exporting as a filmstrip. I'm going to use Adobe Premiere Pro for the capturing. Other versions of premiere work pretty much the same, and will export in the film strip format.  I'm not sure what other digital video editing applications will export in the film strip format. As I said above, the film strip I will be using can be found in the "Lesson Files" .zip folder, which you can download on the tutorials page.
Open up Premiere (or your video editing application of choice. Premiere Pro will prompt me to either create a new project, open an existing project, or open the help file. I'm going to click on "New Project". You are now asked to select a video preset (or create your own) and select a directory in which the project will be saved, as well as a name for the project you are about to create. For the video preset, I am going to make sure that the DV-NTSC folder is opened, and I'm going to select the Widescreen 32 khz preset (See figure 1).

Figure 1: The preset I am going to select.

I've picked this preset because I'm going to be capturing from my NTSC digital camera. Click "OK". To capture your video, go to File>Capture (or press F5). This should bring up a new window with a black screen.  Make sure that your camera is plugged in via fire wire or other cable, and that it is on. Click on the settings tab as shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2: The capture settings tab.

Click on the "Options" button in the "Device Control" box. Select your camera settings. My personal ones will be: Video Standard: NTSC. Device Brand: Canon. Device Type: ZR25MC. Time code Format: Drop-Frame. Select the settings for your camera. Press "OK". Press the "Play" button (the arrow pointing to the right), and then the "Record" button (the red dot). These buttons are labeled in Figure 3.

Figure 3: The play, stop, and record buttons labeled.

When you have captured all you want, press stop. A dialogue box will come up prompting you to save the video. Enter a name for the clip, and hit "Save" or "OK". In the bin window, the file you just saved should appear (Figure 4)

Figure 4: The bin window.

Right-click (CTRL-Click on a Mac) on the clip that is in the bin, and select "Insert". Now it should appear in the timeline (Figure 5).

Figure 5: The clip in the time-line.

Go up to the file menu at the top of the screen, move your mouse over "Export", and click on "Movie". A box will appear prompting you to save the clip. Before you do, click on "Settings" (Figure 6).

Figure 6: The settings button selected.

In the "General" box, click on the pull down menu (Figure 7) and select "Filmstrip".

Figure 7: Select "Filmstrip".

Click "OK". Now, once you are back to the earlier box, select the folder you wish to save the file in and click "Save". WARNING: This is a LARGE style. It is compressed no more than the DV footage you captured. Photoshop may run slowly. The file I have included has been compressed so it is easier to work with. You may now exit Premiere (or you other editing application). If Premiere asks you to save, click "Yes".

Working With A Filmstrip
Open Adobe Photoshop. Once it is open, go to the "File" menu, and select "Open". Navigate to the folder where you exported your filmstrip to, and open the file by clicking on the "Open" button.
Photoshop may take a while to open the filmstrip. Once it is open, we can start playing around. First, I'm going to adjust the image, so it is easier to see. Go to the "Image" menu, then to "Adjustments", and then click on "Curves". Just click on the line, and make a curve until the image looks normal. My curve looked something like Figure 8. You can see how much the image was improved ON ALL FRAMES by looking at Figure 9.

Figure 8: How my curve looked.

Figure 9: Before the curve change (right) and after the curve change (left),

Something you need to understand is the way that frames are ordered in a filmstrip. It goes left to right, such as in Figure 10.

Figure 10: The way frames are ordered.

When you do something to a filmstrip, it will affect all of the frames. If you want to just affect one frame, select by using the marquee tool. Just press "M" on your keyboard, and click and drag from one corner of the frame to the other (diagonally) and the frame is selected. Anyways, that's the power of a filmstrip. If you combine Photoshop's power with the power of animation, you can get some really cool results.
Next up, we're going to do a little rotoscoping. When the kid walks in the door, looks around and sees something, a laser is going to come towards him and blast a hole in the wall This. is not going to be a tutorial on creating a realistic laser, I'm just going to give you instructions on how to make a very basic laser. Go to the frame where the boy starts to duck. You can really select any frame that feels right to you. Draw a white line like the one in Figure 11. You can use any tool you'd like. In this example, I used the line tool. To access it, press "u", and then at the top of the screen just below the menus, click on the icon that looks like a line. Click and drag to draw a line.

Figure 11: A white line.

I know it doesn't look pretty right now, but it will change. Make sure the line is selected, and go to the "Edit" menu, put your mouse over "Transform", and down near the bottom select "Perspective". Use the mouse to move the edges until you get a result that looks like Figure 12.

Figure 12: The desired result.

Make around 3 copies of this shape by dragging the original to the new layer button (Figure 13). Add a gausian blur to each of them. To apply a gausian blur, go to the "Filter" menu, put your mouse over "Blur", and select gausian blur. Press okay when the dialogue box asking you if you want to rasterize the shape. Use the "Spacebar" (hold it down and move around with your mouse) to move the view around. Select a good blur value. After all three copies are blurred, make a new black layer. To do this, click on the new layer button in the bottom of the layer palette (Figure 13).

Figure 13: The new layer button highlighted in red.

Use the fill of "pain bucket" tool to make the layer black. Select the color by double clicking on the square that's on top of the other (Figure 14), and selecting a color in color picker (make sure it is completely black). To use the pain bucket tool, select it by pressing "G". If the gradient tool is selected instead, press "SHIFT"-"G". Now, make sure that the new layer is selected and click. Move the black layer behind the white ones by clicking on it and dragging it under the others in the layer palette. Turn off the background layer (by clicking on the eye that's next to it), and pressing "SHIFT"-"CTRL"-"E". ("Shift"-"Command" - "E" on a Mac). Now you should have two layers: the background layer, and the black layer with the laser outline on it. Select the black layer and click on the thing that now says "Normal" and change it to "Screen" (Figure 14).

Figure 14: Setting the transfer mode to "Screen".

Now you may turn on the background layer by pressing where its eye used to be. Make sure that the layer with the laser outline is selected in the layer palette and go to the "Image Menu", then move your mouse over "Adjustments", and then choose "Color Balance". Take the "Red" slider, and put it to its highest value. Click the checkbox next to the words "Preserve Luminosity" to make sure that it is unchecked. Click "OK". There, our laser is now red.
Now you can start the job of copying the laser layer (drag it to the new layer button), and putting one on each frame it should be visible. For each frame you may have to adjust its perspective or scale.  I will leave this up to you. To scale, go to the "Edit" menu, move your mouse over "Transform", and select "Scale".
For the hole in the wall, we'll just make a circle by pressing the "U" button, and at the top of the screen clicking on the icon that looks like an oval. To constrain the shape to be a circle, hold down the "SHIFT" key as you drag to make the circle. To change the color to a black, double click on the square that is next to the layer in the layer palette (Figure 15).

Figure 15: The (in this case white) square next to the layer.

And select a color in the color chooser. Go to the "layer" menu, move your mouse over "Rasterize", and select "Layer". Press the "R" key. A box in the tool box should be selected. Press "SHIFT"-"R" until you get the tool shown in Figure 16.

Figure 16: The smudge tool.

Make sure that the layer that has the circle on it is selected, and click in the circle and drag the mouse out.  The edge should be smudged. Keep doing it until you are satisfied with the result.
Your can now save the filmstrip, but pressing "CTRL"-"S" or "Command"-"S" on a Mac. This will save the filmstrip. You can then open Premiere, double click anywhere within the "Bin" (Figure 4) and locate your file on the hard drive. To move the file to the time-line, right-click on the file (CTRL-Click on a Mac), and click on "Insert". Unfortunately, the audio will be lost, so take the audio from the existing clip.

Closing Words

I hope that you have enjoyed this quick tutorial. I realize that we did not go over making a laser or a burn in great detail. They were both extremely rough, because what I was trying to get to was that fact that it was possible to do a little bit of animation in Photoshop. If you've had any trouble with the tutorial, please e-mail me at tutorials@fanfilmengine.com.
I will be happy to assist you in any way possible.
That's all for now, but there will be plenty more tutorials coming.

Ronald Hill
"artofwot"

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