Artists at UK-based Time-Slice Films have perfected the technique of rotoscoping some of the most challenging archival footage using Imagineer’s motor on two recent high profile television broadcasts. On the BBC TV show “Duet Impossible”, today’s pop stars digitally perform duets with some of the biggest names in music history. The results have created unique new musical collaborations such as: Roy Orbison & Westlife, Dusty Springfield & Sugababes and Lulu & McFly.

Following the success of “Duet Impossible”, Time-Slice was asked to participate in the challenge of rotoscoping classic Elvis footage for a Celion Dion duet on Fox’s “American Idol”.

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The VFX team faced a range of challenges on the Elvis project, not the least of which was the 12 day deadline to complete the rotoscoping of nearly three and a half thousand frames for two minutes worth of footage. Visual Effects Supervisor for Time-Slice Films, Callum Macmillan, notes, “Having beta tested motor on Duet Impossible the previous year, we knew its potential and were keen to integrate this software as we were facing such a tight deadline.”

"One of the main areas where I felt motor did well was to hold a consistent shape around the back of Elvis’s head. While keying of different sorts enabled us to get some edges, Elvis’s black hair on a black background provided no edge whatsoever to roto with - we were literally guessing in the dark. However, we found that the planar tracker in motor was able to pick up enough of the small, twitchy movement of such an organic object that once we had defined your shape, we could leave motor’s transform, scale and shear functions to keep the line of the head, thus pretty much eliminating any edge boil normally associated with such guess work.”

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“I’m pleased with our creative team and the innovative tools from Imagineer Systems that enabled us to play a key role in raising the bar for this type of effect to be used in television.” Thanks to an incredibly talented pool of VFX artists at Time-Slice Films and a innovative new rotoscoping tool from Imagineer Systems, the “impossible” was not only quite possible, but an opportunity that raised the bar for dazzling, realistic rotoscoping projects.