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Paths and light trails.
Hello. I’m making a short movie and I learned already a lot from all the tutorials here. But I do have one question! I’ll try to explain it as clear as possible:
I’m making a light trail that follows some people that are walking trough the city. So I first shoot some footage of people walking. But now comes the problem. I’m moving myself also!! So the path of the Emitter (for the particles from the particular plugin to make a light trail). Needs to move in it’s whole too! The first point of the path follows the people to make the trail but the whole path itself needs to move backwards so it looks like it DOESN’T move along with the camera but the camera passes it by.
Please tell me if I didn’t explain it clear enough! And please help me out cause this project needs to be finished rather soon!
Great thanks in advance!!!!
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6 Replies
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The best way to accomplish this would be to ‘matchmove’ your shot. That is to run the footage through a program that will analyze the footage and try to create virtual camera data that matches the actual camera moves. This data could then be imported into AE and your virtual camera should line up with the real camera… Ideally. It’s not always that simple and it requires purchasing and learning an additional piece of software (I like SynthEyes, https://www.ssontech.com/).
The other option is trying to match the camera move the old fashioned way. If you have information about your real camera’s focal length and distance to subjects then that may help you get a better match. This is entirely trial and error and may take you a while, but it can produce decent results. If you have the time, the passion and the patience it might be a good exercise, otherwise I’d recommend thinking about another way to do this.
Darby Edelen
Lead Designer
Left Coast Digital
Santa Cruz, CA -
great thanks for your fast reply!
Is it also possible to use the built in tracking feature of AE? And after tracking, can I link the Emitter (from the Particular plugin) to the tracking?
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You COULD use the built in trackers that come with After Effects… but how much do you like your hair?
AE’s trackers are very good at what they do well, but they are very limited. To pull off what you’re trying to do will be a lot easier with a tracker than can understand and create a 3d camera move.
There are great tutorials here on CC all about the “2d point trackers” that come with After Effects. Andrew Kramer has a great tutorial here about making a “demon face” look. He tracks a video to remove the motion through a “reverse tracking” method.
Watch this tutorial, and then watch the tutorials on the website for SynthEyes… All the videos are very good, and will explain better than I ever could the features/abilities, and the limitations of different tracking methods.
There are other tracking software around, some of it VERY expensive, but I agree with Dave: SynthEyes is your most likely source for a solution!
Brian
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Great thanks for your reply!
I make this vid for a school assignment and it has to be finished real soon so I came up with another solution that’ll be easier. This what I did:
I made a comp, put my vid in there and the put that comp on the main time line. In the vid comp I also put a green square that I line up with a constant element in the video. In my case a window of a building far away. Then I go back to the main timeline and position the video comp so that the square stays at the window. After that I copy the position keyframes, make a new comp and apply them. Then I add this code as an expression besides the keyframes:
x=thisComp.width-thisComp.layer(“fiets rit sequence.mov”).transform.position[0];
y=thisComp.layer(“fiets rit sequence.mov”).transform.position[1]-thisComp.height;
[x,y]So if the keyframe position places the comp to the right for 10 px. This expression place the comp to the left for 10 px. In that way it compensates the camera movement to the left and right. For the z camera movement I move all elements by had with a 3d layer.
I hope I explained everything clear enough and great thanks for your help!!
Vincent
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What you did makes perfect sense, and I’m sure it worked well, although I think there was easier ways to do that. Would love to see your final project/results if you’ve got a youtube post or anything =) Love watching other’s videos. Youtube is a big problem for me (addiction lol).
But it just goes to show you how flexible After Effects can be… there is typically a lot more ways than one to do any task!
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Hi! I watched the demon face tutorial and now it’s more clear to me how it also can be done. I think i’m gonna try that also. When it’s finished the vid will also be on my website. I’ll post it here when it’s finished!
Great thanks for you help!
Vincent
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