I finally got my hands on the new Adobe Creative Studio 3 and spent a couple evenings with their green screen product, which for some reason is called Ultra CS3. (Isn't that a detergent?) After producing a number of green screen clips I can confirm that Ultra CS3 delivers horrific audio sync problems with an outstanding user interface.
The keyer controls (shown above) are quite impressive. There are sliders that control the alpha curve and sensitivity of your matte, so you can easily wrangle your matte into shape. There are highlight and shadow sliders that allow you to control whether or not the shadows falling on the green screen will appear in the final composite. All told there are 14 controls that allow you to tweak the way your content blends in with the background. Which makes it really simple to produce great looking composites that (for some reason) end up being totally out of sync with the audio track.
It appears that Adobe has made a green screen product for people that can read lips. It's really inexcusable and makes the end result totally useless (unless you want to re-composite your audio outside of Ultra). I should also note that there appears to be some degree of shrinkage in your top layer element after the composite, but Adobe allows you to compensate for this with a scale control (so you can blow that layer back up, but you end up with a pixelated top layer as a result).
There is one advanced feature that involves tracking shots. In Ultra CS3 tracking shots are possible with static video elements. Ultra can manipulate your top layer element (i.e. the subject) so that it properly travels with your background. Here is an example of this feature (called the Trak feature) with a Virtual Set that ships with the Ultra product.
Adobe Ultra CS3 sample output
It's easy to fall in love with this product while going through the compositing process and then fall completely out of love when you see the results (Adobe, I want my CDs back). If Adobe ever resolves the audio sync issues Ultra could mature into a great product, but for now I think the relationship is over.
