AE MOTION TRACKER IS GARBAGE

[dukeeastwood]

I've noticed for sometime now, but today it really has come to head... in After Effects, i have noticed that you can track something perfectly (manually frame by frame of course, AE on it's own can't track anything)... so with the tracking done and the info added to either a null object or a effect (in this case, the distortion mesh offset in the Liquify effect) hit apply and what do you get? THE TRACK GOING ALL OVER THE PLACE NO WHERE NEAR WHERE THE TRACK EVER WAS!!! YOU CAN SEE IT IN THE EFFECT, CAN SEE IT IN THE MESH WHEN TICKING IT FOR VIEWING, EVEN THE [reference to profanity removed by moderator] TRACK WIRE FRAME CAN BE SEEN DIPPING BELOW WHERE A TRACK MARK EVER WAS.

WHAT IS THIS? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY?

IT FLAT OUT DOES NOT WORK!!!!!!!

The track looks accurate before applied to anything, once applied all the work is completely ruined...

pretty infuriating... not sure anyone has a solution as it IS 100% the software being a worthless dumper fire no where near worth what it is costing it's users.

[Rick Gerard]

There’s a real good chance it’s nothing but user error. I have use the motion tracker in After Effects probably thousands of times with very good results.

Without a detailed workflow and some screenshots it’s going to be impossible to tell you where you went wrong but I would guess that your feet your area is way too small and you don’t understand exactly how it works. Please check the user guide.

[Sterphy]

I know you love Adobe, but you can't pretend the built in tracker is at an acceptable level

[imeilfx]

I can understand that you can be mad but please - STOP YELLING!
After that let's think. If you make your tracking and everything is going as it supposed to and just after linking/parrenting your layer with tracker - everything goes wrong. So as Rick said - maby there is a problem somewhere in there? I'm using every tracking metod that AE offers for long time and if something went wrong - it was never software fault. You just need to know limits of that exact method and learn workflow of that method.
What coud go wrong? Maby you are doing somethin wrong with parenting, maby anchor point of your composition/layer is in wrong place. no one can tell you untill we get more details about your workflow.

[dukeeastwood]

THE....TRACKING...IS ... GARBAGE...

could not be more clear about that, and it IS indeed the software... anyone who thinks otherwise isn't doing as many tracks as they want people on the Adobe forum to think they are doing; which may also be the reason neither of you have any actual knowledge on the matter, you just LOVE to come on here and to run your mouth as if that is the same as being an expert in the software. It's a lose/lose for you... anyone who has done 10 tracking shots in any Adobe program sees how limited its tracking abilities are almost instantly, so why do you two insist on making fools of yourselves?

The smoking gun is this... on a clip where the subject holding the track mark hardly moves, and the track mark successfully seems to hold steady through the duration of the clip... a layer that is then attached to the track mark will move left, right, up, and down where no movement is present in the shot. It's simple, repeatable, and proves the claim that After Effects motion tracking is 100% garbage.

[Dave_LaRonde]

Wow, I'm glad you know so much about After Effects!

This must mean you know about matching your AE version to the right operating system, and matching the right graphics card driver, right?

You must know effects of media containers codecs and trackable points on a good 3D track backwards & forwards.

You certainly have to know the effects of the sizes of two boxes in the point tracker as they relate to motion in the video.

And I bet you're an ace with tracking in Mocha.

I'd have to look up some of this stuff, but I bet you don't!

[dukeeastwood]

don't you work for some news station in some hick town with like 150 people? or did you just used to?

Why do you even post here?

nothing worse than hillbilly """""tech-heads"""""

[Dave_LaRonde]

dukeeastwood  wrote

don't you work for some news station in some hick town with like 150 people? or did you just used to?

Why do you even post here?

nothing worse than hillbilly """""tech-heads"""""

FYI, sparky -- I grew up in New York.  I CHOOSE to live where I live.

Nothing worse than wisea** dumba**es.

[imeilfx]

Ok. So if you are sure that it is garbage and you are not interested in resolving issue that you gave - only thing I can do is to thank you for that information and for sharing your extensive knowledge on After Effects and I have to thank motion design gods that I got that one and only After Effects that had bug in witch motion tracking was an is working as it should.

[dukeeastwood]

If it only ever works for you...

A. haven't done very many tracks

B. Are lying about all the headaches you've endured attempting to use AE and/or Mocha, and are minimizing how much of the tracking you had to do yourself manually.

A or B?

[Rick Gerard]

If you can't get good tracks then there is more than a 90% probability that it is user error or unsuitable footage for tracking. As I said before use AE tracking at least weekly and have done thousands of shots with nearly perfect shots. Most AE users have no problems with the tracker. That is a fact. If you can't get it to work then the problem is almost certainly with your technique or your shots. Deriding the experience of the folks that are trying to help you understand and use the tools is not only unproductive for you, you are also not going to convince anyone that uses the tracker on a regular basis that it is junk.