Lightsaber roto helper thingy for AE

Here's a little script I've made to make the roto process for Pink Five more user friendly and to replace Teague's beam method*. It was written with a specific purpose in mind so I don't now how useful it'll be for everyone else but hopefully it'll work for you in one way or another. I might develop/tweak it more if there's any interest.

http://lamer.3design.net.pl/P5_RotoHelper_v2.jsx

Drop the file into your scripts/Script UI Panels/ folder and you should be good to go.

There's a short overview included in the file itself but here's a quick tutorial anyway:

Basically the script extends the lightsaber core by 50%. This is useful whenever you need to have a shot of someone slicing something with a lightsaber. You simply shoot the scene with a shorter stunt blade and extend the core in post. The main issue with that is when doing it by hand you have to guess how far to move the mask. This becomes even more difficult when the blade gets obstructed or there's some tricky perspective involved. It's hard to keep the lightsaber at a constant, correct lenght throughout the shot.

That's where the script comes in. All you have to do is:

1. import your footage and make a new comp
2. hit Setup scene which will create a Roto layer with a 4 vert mask
3. align the mask with your blade (make sure the bottom left corner of the mask goes on the bottom left corner of the blade)
4. roto ALL the frames
5. hit Generate extended core

this will extend your core (duh) to a correct lenght and automatically round the top using a 'roundness factor' (default: 4). All this is happening on a new layer named Core. Your Roto layer will be preserved in case you need to go back to it for any reason. When extending the core the script will also create a matte layer where you'll put all the other masks. (don't add additional masks to the Core layer itself, use the matte, trust me)

Round Top and Round Bottom allow you to tweak the roundness of the blade for individual frames. The tangents are always kept in in line with the mask so the curve remains even. Round Bottom also gives you an option to curve inwards whenever the hilt gets in the way.

'Generate lightsaber glow' is where the cool stuff happens. Once you're done with rounding and masking hit the button. It'll make a precomp with the glow layers and link the Core shape and all the masks of the Core Matte layer with their counterparts within the Test Glow precomp.

Core controlls the shape of the blade while Core Matte has all mask properties linked so you can go crazy with feathering, expanding etc and it'll autoupdate.

Of course it does all the linking magic when the precomp is being created so if you add another mask to the matte after you've added the glow it won't be linked with the precomp. Although if you're adding the glow before having all your masks set up you're working backwards and therefore don't deserve the live update anyway

Play with it and let me know what you think

Also Teague deserves a credit for putting up with all the dev versions and pointing me in the right direction.

--------
*If you don't know what that is ask Teage, I've signed an NDA

Last edited by Lamer (2013-02-20 15:42:31)