[Gareth Randall]

Do it on a Mac with a faster processor and/or graphics card (or preferably both). That’s the only way to speed it up. It takes as long as it takes, and that’s dictated by how quickly the computer can process the image data.

Having said that, more RAM might help a bit, if you’re not already maxed out. But at the end of the day, a faster CPU/GPU is what really counts.

[Gareth Randall]

And now it’s working fine all the time. I think the problem may have been that I was using Soundflower in conjunction with AU Lab to apply EQ to the system audio output to compensate for the rather bassy headphones I have to use. With Soundflower off, AV sync is solid every time. I’ll just have to get used to bassier audio 🙂

[Gareth Randall]

[Bruce Breidbart] “As it turned out you gave me the key to success at least 3 posts a go.
” For the actual rotation, I moved the anchor point of the plate back in Z space just a little”.”

Aha 🙂

Yes, you have to think in terms of how the plate-rotating mechanism would work if it was real. That gives you the clue as to where you need to position the anchor point around which the plate will rotate. If it was real, then obviously the plates would be attached to a rotating bar further back inside the car’s bumper, so then it’s just a matter of experimenting with pushing the anchor point back in Z space until you find the distance that works to mimic the rotation of the original plates.

[Gareth Randall]

As long as you’ve got the camera adjusted correctly and the anchor point of the plate moved back in Z space, then adjusting the X rotation will make the replacement plate follow the rotation of the original.

I’ve just tried deleting the keyframes of the missiles plate in the project I uploaded and re-animating it. This is what I did:

Go to the Anchor Point parameter of the new plate, and set Z to -151.65. X and Y stay at 0.

Line up the new plate over the original, then go to frame 4 (where the movement begins), and set an X rotation keyframe. Make the value -7.0

Switch off the new plate, or lower its opacity, so that you can see the movement of the original. Move forward to frame 18. This is where the original plate is edge-on to the camera. I trimmed the new plate graphic to end there.

I moved one frame back to frame 17 and set another X rotation keyframe for the new plate. Then I adjusted the X rotation until the position of the new plate matched the original – the actual value was -77.0.

Then I just turned the opacity of the new plate back to 100% and played. And… that’s it 🙂 The movement matched pretty much exactly. Literally just two X-rotation keyframes going from -7 to -77, nothing more.

[Gareth Randall]

[Bruce Breidbart] “I guess purchasing Mocha Pro might solve this problem quickly, but I’m not sure that’s what Gareth did.”

I didn’t use any motion tracking at all. Just keyframed the X rotation.

I’m no Motion guru, but if you want to post up your project file (as long as it’s Motion 4, I don’t have 5) I’m happy to have a look at it and see if I can get it to match mine.

[Gareth Randall]

Hi Bruce,

This might help you – the project for the “missiles to flamethrower” rotation, including the media. You should be able to see how everything works now, including how shoddily I positioned the replacement plates over the originals… 😉

7331_rotatewithmedia.zip

As far as I can tell, the only difference between my version and yours is that I moved the anchor point of the plates back in Z space. That’s how you achieve the effect of one plate rotating away into the depths of the car while a new plate moves up to take its place.

Rotating the plate on its X axis *without* moving the anchor point back gives you the effect you’ve got, which is of the plate flipping over from its front to its back.

[Gareth Randall]

[Bruce Breidbart] “Would you say that Gareth used a Photoshop file to fill in the license plate ?”

I did, mainly because PS has much better tools for doing that sort of thing than Motion does.

For the actual rotation, I moved the anchor point of the plate back in Z space just a little, and then keyframed the X rotation. After that it was just a matter of animating a mask to prevent parts of the licence plate being visible where they shouldn’t have been.

Here’s the project file for you to dissect. Unfortunately I couldn’t include the media, because the source clip I used is 1.3GB (1’25” of 1080p ProRes 422) and the Cow only allows 100MB maximum per upload. Motion doesn’t seem to offer a way to consolidate project files to only include the specific frames of the source media that actually get used in the project.

7320_licenceplaterotatenomedia.motn.zip

[Gareth Randall]

Thanks again to Simon. Just FWIW, here’s what it eventually ended up as (these shots were intercut with other clips):

rotating licence plate final

[Gareth Randall]

Brilliant – thanks!

[Gareth Randall]

Thankyou!