9
Replies
I tried lowering the percent of stabilization and the crop didn't change. Thank you for any help!
If you are having problems with Warp Stabilizer then it's either the Interpolation, the shot, the codec, user error or you are running a version of AE that has a bug. I have not seen any verified reports of a bug with the current releases of the last 4 versions of AE so I would guess that the problem lies with the codec or the footage interpolation if it only happens in one version of AE. If it always happens then it's probably ths shot.
Most people don't use Warp Stabilizer efficiently. Warp Stabilizer should be the only effect you add to a layer. If you must do some other processing do it after you have rendered a production format DI from your footage. If you are doing anything other than basic color correction the best option that does not involve rendering is to Pre-compose the Warp Stabilized layer moving all attributes then apply your effects to the nested (pre) comp. If for some reason you need to color correct before you Warp Stabilize so that the contrast is increased in the scene to help so the stabilizing then you should apply your color correction, Pre-compose, then run Warp Stabilizer on the nested (pre) comp. Color correction is usually the last step in the process, not the first as it is in the Screenshot.
If you need to do any motion tracking or plainer tracking or camera tracking and your effects involves inserting things into a scene that are supposed to look like they are there then all of that tracking and compositing should be done before the shot is Warp Stabilized because WS will and always does add some distortion to the scene. The only way to make the composite really look like it is part of the shot is to run Warp Stabilize on the entire composite. The easiest way to do this is to drag your main comp in a new comp and run WS on the entire main comp. If there are a lot of effects and the composite is rendering very slowly you will probably be better off rendering a DI (digital intermediate) from the comp and then running WS on the rendered clip.
It is also important to understand that Warp Stabilizer will not work on all shots. For example, a handheld closeup shot with shallow depth and details in the background and foreground like this one from a film I recently produced will not respond well to Warp Stabilizer.
Can you guess why?
As the camera moves in and out and left to right there is a huge shift in parallax between the back wall of the saloon, the in the middle and the actor closest to the camera. Warp Stabilizer does not know what is most important in the shot and it will try and reduce the movement of the part of the scene with the most detail by warping the other parts of the scene into different positions. This makes the foreground, the background and even the top of her hat and her shoulder look like they are made of jello.
The camera movement almost completely destroyed a great performance so the shot had to be fixed. In all honesty, I admit that I tried Warp Stabilizer first and ended up with a complete mess. The solution was to motion stabilize the shot using the corner of the picture frame on the wall so that it stopped moving. Except for the edges of the frame that kept appearing it now looked like the camera was locked off. This gave us a place to start. The shot was scaled up enough to hide the edges of the frame and just 3 keyframes were needed to smoothly hide the left and right edge of the frame as they crept into the shot. A jerky nearly unwatchable handheld closeup was transformed into what looked like a skillfully executed camera move that slowly moved from profile to 3/4 and made shot work well. Warp Stabilizer, the tool that most inexperienced VFX artists would choose, was actually the worst tool to choose to try and repair this shot.
I hope this helps. The best technique always depends on the shot. There is no one tool fixes all solution.
AdChoices