That's precisely what I do as part of my business. I get hired to go to a set as a VFX Supervisor and make suggestions and discuss camera moves, lighting, costumes, and everything else related to creating a shot that can be quickly and efficiently transformed into a believable composite.
I don't say you must do it my way because I want to use AE's Tracker. That's not my job. I make suggestions based on the story's needs and the shot, and I consider how AE's Track Camera, Mocha AE, Mocha Pro, and Syntheyes will behave with the shot. All major productions that require visual effects have somebody on set helping make sure the shots work for visual effects. Even the small production or the solo social media video producer should spend some time gaining a good understanding of how to shoot so you don't spend hours or days trying to insert a graphic behind a person walking through a shot.
Mocha is not clumsy. It just requires a little time to learn. Mask tracking works for some things. AI is part of Mocha, part of Photoshop, part of Lightroom, part of Rotobrush, and even part of the basic AE tracker because it looks at data and makes a decision. Some of the improvements are pretty good, like the improved Rotobrush, but AI still cannot do a great job of removing the background from a blond with long in a yellow shirt walking through a wheat field on a windy day. It still has to be photographed, so there is some chance of figuring out what part of the image is what. Even shutter speed is critical. You cannot pull a good green screen-keying shot of somebody dancing around if the footage is shot at 1/50 of a second on a 90 MM lens at T 1.2 because motion blur and shallow depth of field would foul up the shot and ruin the key.
Plan, shoot, and use the right tools. That's how the big studios do it and how amateurs can achieve amazing results.
I am not saying that AE's Motion tracker (point/detail tracking) could not or should not be improved, but it is entirely the wrong tool for most tracking jobs. Right out of the box, with a little planning and the proper exposure, focus, background, and camera movement, you can duplicate most visual effects compositing shots you see in any feature film using the standard set of After Effects tracking tools.
If you want to walk down a crowded sidewalk with nothing but hundreds of people and moving cars in the shot, and you have not planned for and included some fixed geometry in the shot, you are going to have a very difficult time having any tracking tools figure out what is going on in the shot. It's going to take a lot of keyframes.
... View more