Recently I was tasked with building a small green screen that was attached to a small base with some hinges so that it could be lifted up and down as needed throughout filming. I had always known about the standard muslin chroma key backdrops but hadn’t really thought much about chroma key paint. When planning for this project I decided that it would be best to build it out of wood with a metal base. In concluding this I had to look for an alternative solution to the standard muslin chroma key backdrop.
The first solution that we had was a piece of poster board. This worked fine but was easily damaged and hard to keep in place. I probably could have attached this to the board/hinge assembly and been fine but I started thinking about paint. It didn’t occur to me that I needed a specialty paint, I figured I would just need some shade of green.
In doing research I came across this, which is the most expensive paint that I have ever seen in my life. I needed to paint a board that was less than 3 square feet, spending $75 wasn’t really an option. I took to the internet to find another solution. At first I was trying to figure out if there was something special about this paint but all that I could find is that it is just super thick latex paint that covers in one coat. I eventually stumbled across a blog which is where I found the information that I am going to pass along to you.
As it turns out there is a far less expensive option. It is known as a Home Depot Disney color called Gama Sector Green. Some kind human on the internet went through the process of going to Home Depot, getting all of the paint swatches that were close to a muslin chroma key green backdrop, and finding the one that matched. The pictures on the blog were pretty convincing so I decided to go for it. Unfortunately when I arrived at the Home Depot I couldn’t find it. I looked high and low and was unable to find this mythical Gama Sector Green. In fact, I wasn’t able to find any Disney colors at all. I eventually decided to ask the kind lady behind the counter if they still had it. She told me that if I had the name, they could probably mix it. Luckily they had it.
Here is the code if you are also interested in picking this paint up. I had this made in the most inexpensive court of paint that
they had but I am assuming that if you needed something more robust they would be able to mix it for you. It’s important to get it flat. Too much gloss will likely cause your lights to reflect too much off the paint and interfere with the green screen effect. I can see a lot of uses for this paint. You could paint a wall, make a small screen like I did, paint other objects to blend in with a wall, ultimately the only thing limiting what you can do with this is your creativity.
Below you can see a video of me painting the board, talking a bit about the paint itself as well as touching a little bit on the green screen process. Thanks for stopping by! Have a great day!