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# #002 - A Lesson in 4 Frames
- URL: https://www.cut-daily.com/002-a-lesson-in-4-frames/
- Published: 2021-04-06T08:30:00.000Z
- Updated: 2021-08-20T13:15:09.000Z
- Author: Jonny Elwyn
- Tags: Archive, Free, vfx, editing-craft, tutorials

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ad/f4/adf48ad0-72f6-4d80-aaad-af9dbb2c1c94/content/images/2021/02/Harmy-four-frames.jpg)

How much can you learn from working on just four frames?

Quite a bit, actually.

Petr Harmy, a self-taught professional VFX artist, is lovingly [restoring the original theatrical releases of *Star Wars* (IV, V and VI) films](https://www.facebook.com/despecialized/) to preserve them for future generations of fans, in the best quality possible.

In this short video he demonstrates how he replaces four missing frames, due to a difference in the edit between the original theatrical release and the later Special Edition of *The Empire Strikes Back,* using a variety of 'new tricks'.

My key takeaways from Harmy's video are:

1. Stay organised - I love how clearly he has labelled and structured his node tree.
2. Try analysing effects backwards and forwards for potentially improved results.
3. Combine techniques; keying, clean plates, smart vectors, rotoscoping.
4. Learn the new features of your software - in this case Nuke's smart vectors.
5. Rotoscoping is a bedrock ability for any post pro - there's almost no avoiding it!

**Take This Further**

If you own the *Star Wars* franchise in an HD source material then you can find out how to [download Harmy's DeSpecialized versions here.](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yLsvexWBVM8IYSGopKuSfsGk5YIgCwQWd23bqb5ryD4/pub?ref=cut-daily.com#h.pnlzplvzwg9v)

Learn even more from Harmy by [subscribing to his YouTube channel](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGRiG79avXVi6a-%5FxAker3A?ref=cut-daily.com) and check out this article I wrote for Premiumbeat.com on [further post-production lessons from](https://www.premiumbeat.com/blog/post-lessons-star-wars-restoration/?ref=cut-daily.com) the DeSpecilized[ *Star Wars* restoration journey.](https://www.premiumbeat.com/blog/post-lessons-star-wars-restoration/?ref=cut-daily.com)

Rotoscoping:

[Watch Sean Mullen's free wire-removal tutorial](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2eFX60MGPs&ref=cut-daily.com) which includes lots of great tips on the best methods for effective rotoscoping in a variety of different scenarios.

It's much easier to use several smaller overlapping masks to rotoscope an object than it is to move one 'perfect' multi-point mask around all those frames. 

[Learn how to rotoscope in DaVinci Resolve Fusion](https://lowepost.com/courses/visual-effects/compositing/rotoscoping-in-davinci-resolve-r28/?&%5Frid=4870&ref=cut-daily.com) with Lee Lanier's 16-part course on LowePost.com (subscription required)

So remember, Cut daily.