NEW Flame 2015 Ext 2 Video - Planar Track: Using Gmasks with Perspective Grids

[Grant.Kay]

Hi All,

I hope that you have had a great start to your week!

There are so many options when it comes to planar tracking so I have posted a new video to the Flame Premium Learning Channel.

This video focuses on how to use multiple Gmasks when tracking a perspective surface.

This is really handy when you are trying to work with a difficult track as well as isolate regions on an image for a perspective planar track.

More Videos and new features are in the works!!!!

You can check this all out on the Flame Premium Learning Channel.

Or you can download the videos via iTunes.

Please follow me on Twitter @Anonymous for the latest Official Flame Premium Training Updates

All feedback, requests and comments are always welcome!

Have a great week!

Regards

Grant

[Anonymous]

Great video. Thanks for making these.

One question though. We recently upgraded to extension 2 and the shape tracker in action is gone. I have been told that the planar tracker is its replacement. Is this correct? 

Thanks

[Grant.Kay]

Your welcome for the videos…

The shape tracker in Action has not gone anywhere 🙂

With the redesign of the tracking UI, it has been put in its "proper place".

Just a small bit of back history to help explain the change. The shape tracker was a form of planar tracking except it tracked points on a surface rather than a defined region.

So if you want to use the "shape tracker", select the Planar option in the tracking menus.

Change the Tracking Algorithm from "REGION WARPING" (most commonly used planar tracking technology) to "MULTI-FEATURE DETECTION" (was originally called the 2D shape tracker.)

Hope this helps.

Regards
Grant

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the helpful reply.

I tried out the mutli-feature detection today and I am not getting nearly the same great results I was getting with the "shape tracker" from extension 1. Is it possible the algorithim has changed? Also the nice blue boxes have gone away as well. 

Thanks.

[Grant.Kay]

Nothing should have changed there as far as I was aware.

As for the nice blue tracker boxes, you need to select node that you are applying tracker data to and switch to the Object view with F8.

When you analyze you will see the blue boxes..

They are no longer displayed in the result view so get in the habit of going into the object view.

I show this in the rest of the tracking video series on the Flame Premium Learning Channel.

Regards
Grant

[vkshah]

Very helpful videos, thanks Grant!

[kyleabsten]

Hi Grant,

This is not strictly on subject, however this was the closest thread I could find to my problem.  We just upgraded to extension 2, and I was very excited to have Mocha style planar tracking built right into the box.  The tracker seems to track quite well, however, I use planar tracking alot for clean up work and I am running into one problem I can't figure out.

When I use the planar tracker with a gmask attached to isolate the region I want to track, the axis I am applying the tracking data to no longer allows me to "adjust offsets".  This is troublesome because let's say I painted a clean frame on frame 12 of the shot.  I need all my axis settings at default (scale= 100, Position x=0, Position y=0 etc) on frame 12 so that my clean frame lines up perfectly.  I can not figure out how to make this happen.  Am I missing something?

Kyle

[Grant.Kay]

Hi,

I believe this happens because the workflow has changed a bit with the way data works within the node.

This is how its now done.   (I will make a video on this at some point  )

• Let's say that you paint a clean frame on Frame 12 with a matching matte.
• I used a mux node to freeze frame 12 for the whole shot.
• Create an action node and connect the original image as the background and the painted frame as input 1.
• Delete the image 1 object as we'll add it later.
• Select the background input in the media list and double-click on the Gmask node.
• In the F8 Object view, draw your mask to the planar surface you will track.
• Perform the planar track as explained in my videos.
• Once you are done, press F4 for the result view and ensure that the Gmask sticks.
• Remember to hide or disable the Gmask as it was just used for tracking purposes.
• Now it does not really matter if you started the planar track from frame 1 or frame 12.  The point is that it tracked all the frames.
• Select the tracked Axis and duplicate it with CONTROL+D
• Connect the original axis to the duplicated axis.
• Select your painted frame (with its matte) and add it to the composite.
• Parent the duplicated axis to the axis of the image.
• So at the moment, if you look at frame 12, your painted frame will be offset from its correct position.
• Double click on the duplicate axis for its controls.
• This axis acts as the inversion for the tracking data.  
• In the Axis menu, you should now find an INVERT button.  When you click this, your image should snap into place.
• In order to ensure that it locks to all the other frames, keep the duplicated axis selected and go to the animation menus.
• On Frame 12, click the KEEP button.   This will delete all the keyframes except for keyframe 12.
• If you scrub the result view, things should align up on every frame.

I have laid it out in point form but its actually very fast to achieve this .

Hope this helps.

Regards

Grant

[Grant.Kay]

Here is a screenshot of my nodes when I performed the method above.

I used a matte input with my clean frame but you could have also used an action gmask attached to the image input if you want to do the roto-work in Action at the same time.

Regards

Grant