Iris wipe for ending, with pause?

Want to end a show with the standard Charlie Chaplin iris wipe. I can do it with Oval Iris, except -- I want to put a pause in it. So it starts irising down, pauses for a few seconds, then irses down the rest. But no way to put keyframes into transitions.

So any suggestions?

Thanks,
Jeff

I would delete my original post if I knew how.

Best to tell us how and what you did to solve problem so others wil benefit

Michael Horton
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I used 3 Oval Iris transitions in a row.

So you want the picture to iris down to maybe 80% of the picture is black (and the remaining oval is 20% showing), have it hold there at 80% for 5 seconds, then go the rest of the way from 80% to 100% (i.e, black). Here's what I did:

1) Select the first part that you want to go from 0% to 80% (for example). Put the Oval Iris transition on the end of the shot, stretch it out for the duration you want (to go from 0% at "start" in the transition detail to 80%), also click Reverse in the transition so that it will make everything black except the circle showing the image.

2) take the continuation of the shot from there that's say 5 seconds long. Put another Oval Iris on the right side of that and drag to fill that clip, and in the Oval Iris control, make the "start" be 80% (or whatever you ended the other with) and make the "end" also be 80%. This will keep the circle the same throughout that 5 seconds. Fill the full shot with that transition. (again you have to reverse the transition to make it black everywhere except the oval).

3) Take the final shot you want to go from 80% to 100% (full black). Put that Oval Iris on the end of that shot, drag all the way to the start of that clip, make the "start" 80% and the end 100%, and make sure to reverse the transition. THere you have it. Works like a charm, you can adjust lenghts to get it right.

> I used 3 Oval Iris transitions in a row.

Could have just keyframed a black matte with a Mask Shape filter on it, which would also have allowed you to feather the edges of the iris if desired, as well as adjust the proportions of the iris.


www.derekmok.com

Thanks, Derek. Yeah, I will do that instead since I might be fiddling with this and that's going to be a heck of a lot easier than tweaking my workaround.

in some ways the simplest aproach to an animated iris wipe is to use the vignette filter.
i have used the free one from Marcus Herick, i'm sure you could still find that on-ine somewhere.

it's simple to use, you can position the centre, animate holds, etc, etc.
plus you can control the softness, which you cant do with a mask shape alone, i think.

when i say "in some ways" it is the simplest, i mean that it's great for working on your own in FCP,
but like mot "in-clip" solutions, it needs a bit more thinking if you need to hand your project over to someone else for on-lining or grading.
my slution was (after lock-off) to copy the filter to a matte/color generator, and create a black & white version of the iris.
i exported that as a hard copy, then used it as a layer above the clip, with a composite mode.
THIS could be given to any on-line place and they could do the same thing.

the film was a short "siltent" film with quite a few iris in/outs


one more tip about irises, and this will make me sound lke a complete hippy (which i'm not... complete, that is!):
i found that they always worked best when centered on the chakras (i told you !)

on closer shots, center the iris betwen, and just above the eyes: on the "third eye"
on big wides, center on the sternum (heart chakra), or throat.


cheers,
nick