Improving Skies: Many Means to an End with in:sync Speed Razor 4.0

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Solution 2: Use the Gradient effect in combination with the Matte effect.

The problem in solution 2 is that the bottom of the original image's luminance values are altered from the RGB 0. We'll now solve that. There are two solutions to this problem, the following is the more elaborate one, but it will add power and facilitate the next stages. You may have already figured out the easy solution, if not read on.

Restore the video opacity of the gradient effect to 100%

Holding the shift key, drag out a duplicate of the gradient effect directly below the original.

The duplicate you created in step 2 will become your matte. So, since mattes have just luminance values, we need to dump our chroma . So set the RGB 0 to black (or 0 for all values) and set the RGB 1 to white (or 100 for all values).

Next drop the matte effect below the duplicate gradient on video layer V4. The sourcing defaults should be correct. V1 should be the original colored gradient and V2 should source to the grayscale gradient duplicate.

If you render a preview of this composite you will notice that the lower half of the image is unaffected by the gradient.

(The quick way to solve this immediate problem is to make the opacity of the bottom half of the gradient to be zero -- this is accomplished by changing the "Opacity 0" value to 0.)