Green or blue?
Green is the default: camera sensors have twice as many green photosites, so green keys are cleaner and need less light. Choose blue if the presenter wears green, for night or underwater scenes, or for blonde hair, which spills less with blue.
Fabric, paint or pop-up?
| Type | Pros | Cons |
|---|---|---|
| Chroma paint on a wall or cyc | Seamless, durable, best for permanent studios | Needs a room |
| Chroma fabric | Cheap, portable | Wrinkles cause uneven tones; steam it |
| Collapsible panels | Fast setup for streamers | Small; you can't show legs or walk |
Light the screen first
- Aim for an even screen: no more than about ⅓ stop variation corner to corner. Use your camera's waveform or zebras.
- Expose the screen around 1 stop below the presenter's face. Too bright increases spill; too dark adds noise.
- Soft, broad sources (LED panels with diffusion) beat hard spots.
Fight spill
- Distance: 2–3 m between presenter and screen.
- A back light, slightly warm (magenta-ish gel) to neutralise green on shoulders.
- Cover a green floor with grey under the presenter if you don't need full-body shots.
Camera settings
- Shutter at 1/50 (PAL) or 1/60 (NTSC), or faster for motion.
- Record 4:2:2 or better if you can; 4:2:0 compressed footage makes edges blocky.
- Turn off in-camera sharpening, which creates halos.
Keyer workflow
- Garbage-matte everything outside the screen.
- Pull the key for the core matte, then refine edges separately.
- Suppress spill, then colour-match the foreground to the background.
- Add light wrap and a touch of grain so the presenter sits in the scene.
Step-by-step for streamers: chroma key in OBS.