Chroma/Luma Key for OS X Browsers

April 27, 2012 8:12 AM

Is it possible to make a browser window and the background of web pages transparent but to leave the text and images opaque? This would be applied to all web pages viewed in the browser, not just for specific pages I am creating. I've looked at several plug-ins and applications that offer transparent browser windows, but nothing so far gives options for selecting colors to leave opaque. I essentially want something to act as a luma or chroma key for browser windows. I'm using OS X.

This is for a project where text is overlayed on top of live video. The current version of the project relies on a video mixer. However I believe there should be a way to do this within OS X. Example

posted by davidriley to computers & internet (3 answers total)

What is your video source? Have you looked into options for getting your video to be displayed in-browser, so you can just superimpose your content using CSS/Z-index like any other content?
posted by misterbrandt at 1:32 PM on April 27, 2012

You absolutely can do this in Firefox. It's not trivial, but poke me over the weekend, and I will write you a little plug-in for it, if you don't solve it.

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5692636/transparent-xul-window-in-firefox-4
posted by gregglind at 2:25 PM on April 27, 2012

(search more for "transparent firefox" or "glass firefox"... seems they are all a bit out of date / windows only though!)
posted by gregglind at 2:34 PM on April 27, 2012