Clone objects behind each other

Hello everyone I am soon going to be creating a short video that involves cloning people behind themselves. I was wondering how this was done? I am an experienced film maker have been filming for about 10 years and edit lots with a green screen etc. I know how to clone someone next to themselves but I can't figure out how to clone someone behind themselves. I basically want to film in an auditorium and have the same six people behind themselves multiple times in each of the rows of seats. Is this possible? I tried a test with myself with chairs and every time I went to mask out an area it cut off the other layer so myself was hidden including the chair. One example I have is the lion king movie where they cloned all the animals running in different directions I know that is animation but figured there must be some way to do it with live action people. Maybe I'm wrong though. Any help would be appreciated.

what's the replicator?

Bryce

If you are using replicators, Make sure you click the checkbox for "Random start frame" in the Cell controls. This will select a different start frame from you source for each cell. When you shoot your live action elements, shoot at least 2-3 times more footage than you will need. You can also click the Random Seed to mix it up if needed.


"You can come push the buttons, or you can let me do my job."

Hi Bryce,

Some time ago I did camera and compositing for a music video.
You can see it here:
http://adeszo.nl/articles/428
Is this similar to what you want to achieve? If so I'll explain the workflow.
First we shot a clean plate of the classroom without the artist. This shot was used as the background.
Then we had him with different outfits sitting on different chairs in the classroom with a collapsible greenscreen behind him.
In post I started on the layers where the artist was sitting in the back row. Then I made a garbage matte around each shot and I keyed out the greenscreen. I worked my way up through the layers and the topmost layer was the solo of the artist as he was standing in front of the classroom.
The camera was locked off for all the shots ofcourse.
I hope this can be of any help.

Kind regards,

Robbert-Jan van der Does
lighting cameraman/steadicam operator/editor

WISIWYG (What I See Is What You Get)

Well, if you don't put people on the front row you can make shots in your greenscreen room/studio.
Let's say from the waist or the knees up. I think I would play a little bit with the angle of the chair towards the camera to match seats in the auditorium on the left and on the right side. Use a stool or any other seat without back support. This will save you a lot of rotoscoping. You will have to do some masking around the seats in each row in the shot of the auditorium. When you have all the shots you can scale them and move them into position.
But the easiest would be to use a 1.5x1.5 m (minimum) greenscreen. Put the actor on one of the seats in the auditorium with the greenscreen directly behind him, repeat for all the positions you want him to be and don't forget to shoot a clean plate. No masking required for the seats and always a matching perspective.

good luck,
robbert-jan

Standing is easier when you are shooting the actor in another location then where you shoot the background. Just a garbage matte and a key per shot. And then you stack all the shots on top of each other, move the shots around and scale them where needed, maybe duplicate some shots and move those more to the back, give the duplicates a different in point, flip some horizontally etc.

succes,
robbert-jan

Not when they are far in the back behind the other clones.
It will just give some more variety. But if it turns out to look weird you can leave them normal. It's just an option.

robbert-jan