[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

This may help:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qhDNC-CC48

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

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[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

What you are experiencing in more commonly known as banding. There are a few things you can do to try and eliminate that:
Work @ 32 bit color space- this will allow for smooth blurs and gradients. However that will change the way some plugins interact with the elements (some are not even built for 32bit) and change the final look.
Add noise/grain on the blur- this will minimize banding.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

Trying to re-create Tutorials would be the direction I would go. AEtuts+ , the COW, Videocopilot and a bunch of others should provide you with plenty. The issue is more with what you want to get better at? AE can do a lot of things. Different plugins can offer tools that can enhance the software ( Trapcode/RED Giant , Mettle, Zaxwerks, Duik, various AEscripts – Newton, Plexus and the like). These have their own tutorials. After you have mastered the basics is a matter of exploring and pushing the limits.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

No- in the Mocha planar tracking version I suggest tracking masks that match the reflective parts of the car (separate the windows from the body to allow for different opacity). Create a comp with the images you want reflected on the car (buildings, other cars…)and animate that to give the impression of movement (you’ll have to match the speed of the car as perceived relative to the objects in the shot) and then bring that in your main comp and position it in 3d space to match the orientation of the car. Precomp that again and use the tracked masks to comp it on top of the original footage.
There may be other ways of doing it- I can see how using FreeForm Pro to distort the reflection layer in 3D to match not only the orientation but the curvature of the body of the car could be beneficial, but without seeing the footage is hard to be more specific.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

I agree that the best way would be to re-create the shot in 3D. Element 3D allows for great results with the right models and textures.
However I would try some planar tracking with Mocha and then animating and applying a reflection texture to match the speed of the car – do a test for one door or window to see how that works.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

There’s no one button push type of plugin for this one. You have a few options of doing it already. It will involve some roto work ( drawing the shapes and possibly tracking to match the moves) and a combination of wiggle and roughen edges. I prefer the hand drawn direction though, for a more random, organic feel, even if it takes a longer time.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

Are you looking at a custom view instead at the Active Camera by chance?

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

You could also make a feathered garbage mask – pretty tight around the problem area, comp the same clip behind and move slightly to find a good area that blends in. This will give you the same grain and natural movement of the skin.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

It’s all about how you set your lights and the shape of your “walls”. In your case the back wall is rectangular, with the width longer than the height. The light cone is circular, so if you want the light to fade at the edges you will need to block some of that light to match the proportions of the wall. Barn doors can provide that control for you. If you decrease the angle of the cone of light you can get the same feathered light on the top and bottom, but then your light will not reach as close to the sides. You could use a series of lights to compensate, but that will add to your render times- barn doors is still your best solution. Of course you can build your own version, but for 10 bucks it may not be worth your time.

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist

[Tudor “ted” jelescu]

This can help:

https://aescripts.com/cm_barndoors/

Tudor “Ted” Jelescu
Senior VFX Artist