Tracking clone stamp help

The Clone tool has the following components that will take tracking data. 

Paint/Clone/Stroke Options/Clone Source/Clone Position = The source of the replacement pixels

Paint/Clone/Transform Clone/Position = Where the pixels go.

If you track the hole, add a null, apply the transform data to the null, then pickwhip the Paint/Clone/Transform Clone/Position values to the null, and the replacement pixels will follow the tracking.

This will work fairly well if the hat does not rotate, change perspective, or move closer to the camera in the shot.

The source of the replacement pixels, the "Paint/Clone/Stroke Options/Clone Source/Clone Position," takes the pixels from the frame you choose in Clone Time. It is not dynamic. Adding an offset to that value does nothing over time and will not respond to tracking data. I guess you could add a time expression to the Clone Time, then add an offset to a Clone Tracker.

If the lighting, the perspective, or the distance from the camera changes, tracking a hole on the hat and trying to apply that to the Clone tool is a very poor workflow.

Content-Aware fill would do a better job on your shot if it is anything like I think it is.

Another option would be to duplicate the footage of the hat, create a subtraction mask on the top copy that pokes a hole in the layer, feather the mask, then shift the position of the bottom layer so that the hole is filled with a part of the hat that has no hole. 

The other option would be to Motion Track and Stabilize the shot so that the hat does not move, then make the repair using Photoshop or even AE's clone tool on the stabilized shot, then put the motion back in the hat and add it to the repair. Mocha AE can do this fairly easily. It's not a hat, but here's a tutorial on the Motion Stabilize, add something, then put the motion back in using Mocha AE I prepared a while ago. It's a bench, not a hat, but it should give you the idea:

My Quick Tips Playlist

I instructed you to pickwhip the correct reference as per your scene, so please do just that.

Mylenium

You could apply a simple offset expression like

fCent=featureCenter;

xOff=-30;

yOff=-30;

X=fCent[0]+xOff;

Y=fCent[1]+yOff;

[X,Y]

Just pickwhip the correct reference to the feature center and play with the values. This can of course be expanded and modified infinitely, but that would require at least a screenshot and som more info.

Mylenium