Removing tiles in underwater footage

[Mike Sevigny]

hey Niklas,

I’m not sure this will look perfect when your done with it no matter what technique you use. the motion blur will be a real pain. Here’s what I would try if I was faced with it.

1. Track the shot in mocha and attach the movement to a null object
2. Create a solid and parent it to your track, then roto the character on the solid to use it as a matte.
3. Create an adjustment layer, parent it to the null, apply wire/rig remover effect and adjust it to get rid of your grid

Some additional work to bring it all together will likely be necessary. Hopefully this is a good starting point.

Good luck!
Mike Sevigny

[Niklas Brandin]

Big thank you for your input! I´ve got a decent track from mocha, and your suggestion seems to be a great idea.
But I have a couple of problems.. :/ I´ve got my adjustment layer parented to the null object, and it follows the tracking. But when I add the CC wire remove-effect to the adjustment layer, the point a and point stays in the same place, even tough the layer is animated. How do i get the wire points to follow the layer itself? :/
Once again, thank you for the support!

[Mike Sevigny]

you’re right, that was my mistake. I’m sitting in front of after effects now and it’s not working with an adjustment layer or solid. What I was describing was a workflow I used a while ago but now that I think about it, we had BCC’s wire removal tool which I don’t have here.

If you have your clone working on your image, you could try an expression for the position of your clone (within the plugin). Add the position of your null to the position of you clone to result in an animated clone moving with your scene.

a = effect("CC Simple Wire Removal")(1); // your current clone position
b = thisComp.layer("null_layer_name").transform.position; // the position of the null
a+b // your output

You’ll likely have to apply this to your clone source too. That wont account for the rotation but maybe that won’t be so bad to animate when the position is locked in. Or maybe someone has a math.equation they can share for rotation.

I’m sorry I might have lead you down the wrong path. I hope you’re finding solutions.

Best,
Mike Sevigny