Flame in hand

[Mike Clasby]

I’m not sure of the details of Andrew’s tut, but if you Edit the Target in the Motion Tracker Panel, choose your Flame layer, and hit Apply, then it should paste those Attach Point keyframes into the Flames Position.

Or you can just copy the Attach Points keyframes (make sure your at the beginning of the clip) then paste them into the Flames Position.

Or you can create a quick expression by Alt-Clicking the Flames Position Stopwatch and pickwhipping to the Attach Point Stopwatch. giving you an expression like:

temp = thisComp.layer(“Comp 1”).motionTracker(“Tracker 1”)(“Track Point 1”).attachPoint;
[temp[0], temp[1]]

If you want the Flame to be offset a little from the Attach Point, out this expression in place of the one you just created with the pickwhip.

a = thisComp.layer(“Comp 2”).motionTracker(“Tracker 2”)(“Track Point 1”).attachPoint;
xOffset = -50;
yOffset = 10;
a + [xOffset, yOffset]

Basically we’ve just created a variable “a” equal to that original first line, yours might be slightly different, so change that “temp” in the first line of you original expression to “a”, then add lines 2 thru 4 below.

Put in number how much you want the Flame offset from the Attach Point, it’s -50 in the and +10 in the Y above.

Children Playing with Fire, I dunno… but if he is a real super hero, better not get on his wrong side.

[Darby Edelen]

I generally like to apply my track to a Null object and then parent the object I want to follow the track to that Null object, this gives you the ability to offset the position and rotation of the layer in a very intuitive way.

This doesn’t work with perspective tracks, but if you’re trying to track in a ball of fire you’re probably only concerned with position.

Darby Edelen
DVD Menu Artist
Left Coast Digital
Aptos, CA

[Mike Clasby]

A Null is much better. I must start using them for that more. Thanks for the reminder, me forgets.