[Jeff Kay]

Can be done with a mask, but most likely the dancer is rotoscoped out of the background dance layer into a layer on top of the Usher layer.

[Jeff Kay]

We are having trouble with the language barrier.

You rotate the camera by rotating the camera layer. I have no other way to explain this part.

Have the videos rotate to face the camera by Layer > Transform > Auto Orient then orient towards the camera. This can also be done with javascript expressions, but I often start using expressions when there is a simpler method.

[Jeff Kay]

The deal is that AE isn’t an audio software. The default settings for a render don’t export sound. You can bring sound into AE, but don’t roundtrip the sound through AE.

[Jeff Kay]

The speed that the playhead moves is based on frames not based on the zoom level of the timeline. That’s just the way it is and it really makes little sense for the playhead to move across the screen at the same rate as that will mean the playback of the cut will vary depending on the zoom.

Some quick google-fu has returned several results of people that are irritated with the response of apple’s magic mouse in the MC environment.

https://community.avid.com/forums/p/126872/726126.aspx
https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/8/1158989
https://community.avid.com/forums/t/104990.aspx

There are also other options for controllers than a mouse. I’ve seen keyboard primary, trackballs, shuttles, I even have a friend that is using a G13 as silly as that sounds (https://gaming.logitech.com/en-us/product/g13-advanced-gameboard).

[Jeff Kay]

The effects, particularly the final polish, in that video are significantly beyond the beginner level of AE. Rather than trying to learn AE by trying to mimick something of that caliber, it would likely be better to get a broader understanding of what the software is capable of. There are many sites with AE tutorials of varying skill levels. One of my favorites is video copilot (https://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/). There is a whole lot there and going through many of those should give you a broader basis.

[Jeff Kay]

In the effects panel there is a whole selection of effects listed under “distort”. Though the final result will still be a flat 2D layer as AE can’t actually bend in 3D, so the 3D look will have to be faked.

[Jeff Kay]

You could certainly place the stickers on in that fashion and have their movement match the movement of the car. Though I’d also look at some of the warping options such that the stickers match the contours of the car rather than being completely flat. Its a similar idea to a thread a bit lower about putting in a fake scar. Though in this case I’m not sure my first attempt would be puppet pinning as that tends to have a bit more organic feet rather than the flat unchanging surface of a vehicle.

There are multiple things you can do with blending modes, opacities, lights, shadows, and reflections that can improve photo-realism (well as photo-realistic as animated stickers can be). Honestly don’t know where to begin.

If you are feeling fancy you could create a projection such that the stickers are projected onto the car (https://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/3d_camera_projection/ https://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/3d_camera_projection_2/). I think the process is really slick, but it can also be extremely time consuming depending on the footage. Though those videos should give you a few ideas of the things you can do with lights/shadows/reflections.

To animate the stickers, just subcomp the sticker and animate within the subcomp.

EDIT: Oh wait I had an idea that should be simple to attempt. Create puppet pins at vertices on the door/hood, track the motion of each point, and apply the path to the puppet pin (from a starting point where the sticker is correctly placed).

[Jeff Kay]

The first one can be done with a moving camera or a stationary camera. My first thought was stationary camera, but it might be easier to have a rotating camera where the rotation of the various ‘footage’ squares is controlled by an expression that always has them face the camera. The particles look like a pretty straightforward particle generator. But its ultimately 3D compositing and there will be multiple different ways to do this.

In the second I am 99% positive that it was created in an actual 3D modeling software, not in AE.

[Jeff Kay]

I’m not exactly sure what you mean. Is the playhead moving faster than the playback such that the position on the timeline and the playback in the monitor are desynced, or is a single J/L input having it act as if J/L was pushed twice?

I have no clue what could produce the former, but for the latter it could be a malfunctioning keyboard or mouse shuttle getting turned on.

[Jeff Kay]

That isn’t exactly how the toggle works. With the toggle on, all clips are linked, with the toggle off, none of them are (or at least that is how it behaves with default settings).

Are the video and audio for that clip coming from different sources, such as synced audio or multicam? Without actually seeing the timeline all I can offer at this point is speculation. Though if its just one clip, it ultimately shouldn’t cause much complication with the cut since you know how it is acting.