Enhance tracking by scaling corner pin

Preset exchange

Moderators: Disciple, zlovatt

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malex
Posts: 20
Joined: May 21st, 2004, 3:03 pm

Problem : when you tracked a layer and created a corner pin effect that is applied to the layer you are applying to track to, it is usually hard to scale or change the corner pin's size without manually moving all the points (pain in the *!#). Here is the solution (Offered by Donat van Bellinghen)

When applied to a corner pinned layer, it creates a new corner pin effect (you'll have to disable your own corner pin effect) and adds a slider control. Tweak this slider control and you'll see you can 'scale' the corner pin effect while maintaining the same shape (the four new segments remain parallel to the old ones). I'd like to see this kind of control built in the corner pin effect.

http://aczet.free.fr/AE/corner_pin_enlarge.ffx.zip
Fuseman
Posts: 1
Joined: January 16th, 2008, 6:02 pm

Hi, i find the preset very useful! thanks for this! however, I'd like to know how to tweak this preset to be able to control the horizontal and vertical scale separately, im currently working on a project right now that involves a panning camera with a bit of perspective movement and a moving subject. for this i have made the corner pin really smaller than usual to be able to match the motion without hitting the subject. any tips on how to tweak this would be very much appreciated!

Cheers!!

Darwin
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Disciple
Posts: 137
Joined: June 5th, 2004, 8:05 am
Location: Los Angeles, CA
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Well, you can offset each point separately, or tie groups of points to different sliders...
If you attach a sample project I can give it a go.

Alex
slawes
Posts: 25
Joined: December 9th, 2006, 12:38 pm
Location: LA, California

Does anyone know (maybe Donat) where that handy preset for scaling the corner pin has gone - the link seems to be broken.

Thanks,
Stephen
hype
Posts: 94
Joined: November 27th, 2006, 11:08 pm
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Contact:

If you use the CC Corner Pin, which ships and installs with AE, you can do this same thing. It has it built in.
if it's not fun, what's the point?
http://www.mackdadd.com
slawes
Posts: 25
Joined: December 9th, 2006, 12:38 pm
Location: LA, California

Thanks Sean. I have actually been using the CC corner pin instead for that very reason. Unfortunately I want to go beyond the +200 that it gives you to expand the pin.
I'm sure that the preset must have an expression in there somewhere, if some kind soul could just post the maths behind it, I would be super greatful.

Thanks,
Stephen
hype
Posts: 94
Joined: November 27th, 2006, 11:08 pm
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Contact:

Are you just using the slider or actually typing a number in? I know sometimes in AE the sliders stop at a certain number, but if you click the number and type it in yourself, it will do much more. Just a thought. You've probably tried it already.
if it's not fun, what's the point?
http://www.mackdadd.com
jeichb
Posts: 1
Joined: June 7th, 2020, 11:40 am

Hi everyone,

I had to scale up a corner-pinned layer and stumbled upon this old preset. It still works in After Effects CC, but it performs a parallel scale. Unlike a perspective scale, it moves all corners by the same distance from their original location. For small adjustments, this might work, but if your camera angle changes significantly, the scaled objects will start floating. Therefore I looked up the math behind it (actually the geometry, not the math) and created this animation preset that scales a Corner Pin effect not in parallel, but in perspective:

-

Corner Pin – Scale in Perspective

corner pin enlarge persp.ffx.zip
(2.79 KiB) Downloaded 4228 times

-

Where to put the .ffx file

  • Mac: ‎⁨Macintosh HD⁩ ▸ ⁨Users ▸ Your user folder ▸ ⁨Documents ▸ ⁨Adobe⁩ ▸ ⁨After Effects 2020⁩ ▸ ⁨User Presets⁩

  • Windows: My Documents\Adobe\After Effects CC 2020\User Presets

How to use

  • Have a scene with a layer using the Corner Pin effect, working correctly, but too small

  • Disable your Corner Pin effect (but leave it where it is)

  • Find the preset in the Effects & Presets panel

  • Drag the animation preset onto your layer (it creates a second Corner Pin effect that references the first one via expressions)

  • Voilà, your layer should have 3x the width and 3x the height than before

  • Unlike the original preset, this one doesn't have a slider to adjust the scale. I recommend using a precomp to scale your objects.

-

If you use it, I would be glad if you drop a note here to let me know if it works for you. Feel free to enhance the preset.

rowandg
Posts: 1
Joined: October 25th, 2021, 2:13 am

jeichb wrote: June 7th, 2020, 12:10 pm

Hi everyone,

I had to scale up a corner-pinned layer and stumbled upon this old preset. It still works in After Effects CC, but it performs a parallel scale. Unlike a perspective scale, it moves all corners by the same distance from their original location. For small adjustments, this might work, but if your camera angle changes significantly, the scaled objects will start floating. Therefore I looked up the math behind it (actually the geometry, not the math) and created this animation preset that scales a Corner Pin effect not in parallel, but in perspective:

-

Corner Pin – Scale in Perspective

corner pin enlarge persp.ffx.zip

-

Where to put the .ffx file

  • Mac: ‎⁨Macintosh HD⁩ ▸ ⁨Users ▸ Your user folder ▸ ⁨Documents ▸ ⁨Adobe⁩ ▸ ⁨After Effects 2020⁩ ▸ ⁨User Presets⁩

  • Windows: My Documents\Adobe\After Effects CC 2020\User Presets

How to use

  • Have a scene with a layer using the Corner Pin effect, working correctly, but too small

  • Disable your Corner Pin effect (but leave it where it is)

  • Find the preset in the Effects & Presets panel

  • Drag the animation preset onto your layer (it creates a second Corner Pin effect that references the first one via expressions)

  • Voilà, your layer should have 3x the width and 3x the height than before

  • Unlike the original preset, this one doesn't have a slider to adjust the scale. I recommend using a precomp to scale your objects.

-

If you use it, I would be glad if you drop a note here to let me know if it works for you. Feel free to enhance the preset.

Thanks! Really useful for my project. Is there anyway to add a scale slider?

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