Note: Please update your After Effects CS4 installation to make sure you have the latest version available via the Adobe Updater. There is an issue with the preinstalled After Effects script that requires you to work with the latest point release (separate downloads available for Mac OS and Windows).
Ever wondered how you can create personalized video on the web? Want to create your own ElfYourself.com? This tutorial shows you how it’s done using After Effects CS4 and Flash Professional CS4. Ooh.. before I forget… One of my evangelist colleagues has a cameo appearance at the end of the tutorial ;-)
Awesome! Thanks for sharing this Serge.
Do you think there is a way to get face motion tracking in Flash, and create the experience at runtime, thus allowing people to upload video and replace with their face?
Thanks,
iBrent
In theory, yes… But the result will not be as tight as doing the motion tracking in After Effects. In theory, the user could select a color to track. You could then track that color with some ActionScript but the result greatly varies based on various factors like CPU and how unique that color is in that video… I would not recommend it…
Hi Serge,
I’m a Flex engineer here at JibJab and actually the person who built our ‘Starring You’ head tracking technology.
I definitely appreciate your kind words and your interest in how we built ElfYourself.
Best,
Jamie
looks so easy the way you explain it, good job :)
I already did some motion tracking work with AE in the past … very powerfull stuff.
Great tutorial, how they make a moving path to use in choose a face?
Thanks for the tutorial. Really great stuff! Elf Yourself is really fun and I do get requests for this kind of work – so this is a great help.
My next problem is my clients usually want to be able to share this thru YouTube, etc…
Any suggestions how to output this as shareable video instead of flash? Are there tools for this? I have been hitting a lot of dead ends searching.
Great tutorial:
I have problem creating markers in After effect.
Im selecting in track point a attach point but when i create a markers and click to see a information of marker not create a name and when I export work flash never read a track point.
Only need know,
Why the function convert selected properties to marker.jsx not create a markers name?
Not sure what is going wrong there. Will check with a colleague in the morning.
Hi and thx for the tutorial.
do you know if it’s possible to get an updated version of the script “convert properties to markers” since the one provided with cs4 doesn’t name markers so it doesn’t work on flash ? or maybe you know where to find it, the original link on the adobe blog posted by Coleman doesn’t work. Or maybe you’ve find another solution to bypass the issue.
Not sure what is going on with that script. My machine has a fresh install of CS4 so should be exactly the same as yours…
I work on a pc, maybe this is the difference. I’ve managed the problem modifiyng the jsx file myself by replacing line 48 with :
existingMarker.cuePointName = existingMarker.cuePointName;
instead of :
existingMarker.cuePointName = time; which was naming each marker with the current time. so now you have to create the first market, name it as you wish then apply the script to it and all the markers will be named as the first one, so it will go fine on flash.
Serge, regarding your tutorial, do you know a way to convert the tracker point 2 rotation informations to rotation ?
It’s not working… I tried everything… Every flv has some cuePoint error (and I tried more then 40 video files until now).
I believe the problem is the “Convert Selected Properties to Markers.jsx” file.
For those having problems with the script, please make sure that you have updated your version of After Effects to the latest available version. Use the Adobe Updater to make sure you have the latest version.
After updating my script in AE, and converting the markers for my motion tracking (Multiple motion tracks on the video) and exporting to FLV it all seems good to go. But when I import the video into flash and then go into debug, it throws an Illegal Cue Point error. I’ve spent hours and hours and can’t get this to work. Can someone please tell me what I’m doing wrong?
Hi Serge,
I like your tutorial and it did work for me, now I was wondering how I could make a 3d plane follow and make is turn from side to side like this website http://www.theecodance.com. I hope you can point me somewhere that I can learn how to use 3d object with minimal knowledge of AS3. Thanks.
Hello!
With this tutorial, I’ve been able to also add rotation and scale in a similar manner, but I can’t stop there. How can I add data for more than one character? I tried using multiple movie clips to contain the data, but this causing problems with the sync once it is uploaded to web. Is there any way to add multiple character data to the cue points? Many Thanks, Robert
Hi Robert,
I think in this case you may want to export the cuepoints as an XML file instead of embedding it in the FLV.
Fisrt, sorry for my english…
This code no worked for me. The problem was that my AFX is not in english and, the consequence is that the code is different :
is not : var values:Array=paramObj["Track Point 1_attach Point"].split(/,/);
is (in french for me): var values:Array=paramObj["Point de suivi 1_Point d'attache"].split(/,/);
So, if your AFX is not in english, your obliged to modify your code. The name parameter is not the same…
Thank for this. Your save my life !
;-))