From: Jack Tunnicliffe<jack@javapost.ca>
Subject: My Daily Fix
Date: Sat, 23 Jun 2012 11:03:45 -0600
Message-Id:<A809E36D-70AF-4492-9E9E-FB169DBE29FA@javapost.ca>


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Here's a little fix I did yesterday on an episode of a series we post. =
We were doing the final approval when the producer noted that no ink =
went onto the paper when the woman signing the document. The DP was in =
the room and said he remembered the problem but assured the producer =
they had done a take with ink. We were to begin mastering in  a couple =
of hours but their editor was off and they didn't know who would source =
the footage.=20

I had remembered seeing another shot in the show where the same woman =
signed a document, but it was not from the side like this one but from =
above or in front, so upside down. I told them I could fix this in an =
hour rather than them going back and searching their archives and they =
agreed to have me repair it.=20

I grabbed a still of the signature at the moment her hand moved to =
reveal it, but there was still a shadow. I took the still into Photoshop =
and deleted the background so only the writing remained. I then used =
transform distort to turn the signature and angle it down to precisely =
match the footage of the woman writing with no ink. I motion tracked the =
surface of the paper using some nearby text, because the paper moves up =
and down as she presses with the pen. I color corrected the writing so =
it matched the new environment. I duplicated the source footage with the =
pen moving and put it on a layer above the signature and made a mask the =
shape of the bottom of the pen so the pen would move in front of the new =
signature layer. I motion tracked the pen with the AE tracker then used =
Mathias tracker to mask script to move the mask with the pen. Only took =
a couple of tweaks to perfect. Then I unveiled the signature with an =
animated AE mask as she wrote, so it was even her own signature.

This may not be so stunning to old AE users but maybe some of the new =
users will find this of interest. I find AE such a great tool for fixing =
almost anything on a daily basis.

http://web.me.com/java008/Crime_Stories/Handwriting_before.html

http://web.me.com/java008/Crime_Stories/Handwriting_fix.html

Jack Tunnicliffe
Java Post Production
www.javapost.ca