Smoothing Out Dolly Tracking Shot in Resolve

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Garry Jenkins

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Smoothing Out Dolly Tracking Shot in Resolve

PostFri Feb 03, 2023 8:48 pm

Hey everyone,

I have this very slow tracking shot, manually done on a dolly:


...and was wondering what the best way was to smooth out the stop-starts and speed variations? I had good success with the stabilise option until the subject moves, which then sends things a bit haywire, regardless of whether I choose to just analyse the zoom, or pick 'Perspective', 'Similarity' etc.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks you,
Garry
www.deep-cut.co.uk
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Steve Alexander

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Re: Smoothing Out Dolly Tracking Shot in Resolve

PostFri Feb 03, 2023 9:29 pm

Rather than using a cloud tracker, you could use a point tracker in the legacy stabilizer (or in Fusion) and see if you can stabilize a portion of the non-moving background. Might work.
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Andy Mees

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Re: Smoothing Out Dolly Tracking Shot in Resolve

PostFri Feb 03, 2023 9:36 pm

Yep, try switching to the Color Page and using the Classic Stabilzer... use the Interactive Mode to only select tracking points that are not moving independently of the zoom ie not the person in bed. You can read up on using the Classic Stabilizer in Chapter 149 of the current manual.
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Joe Shapiro

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Re: Smoothing Out Dolly Tracking Shot in Resolve

PostSat Feb 04, 2023 3:07 am

Thanks for the tip Steve and Andy. As the UI curmudgeon I hope in the future they integrate this very common desire into the "regular" stabilizer UI so you don't have to "just know" to go back to the legacy one.
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Marc Wielage

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Re: Smoothing Out Dolly Tracking Shot in Resolve

PostSat Feb 04, 2023 4:13 am

Garry Jenkins wrote:I have this very slow tracking shot, manually done on a dolly... and was wondering what the best way was to smooth out the stop-starts and speed variations? I had good success with the stabilise option until the subject moves, which then sends things a bit haywire, regardless of whether I choose to just analyse the zoom, or pick 'Perspective', 'Similarity' etc.

My thought would be to stick with the new Stabilization engine and try Translation only (which is Pan/Tilt only). See what that does. If that doesn't work, then I'd go with Classic Stabilization, go to Interactive mode, and trash all the points around the subject.
marc wielage, csi • VP/color & workflow • chroma | hollywood
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Garry Jenkins

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Re: Smoothing Out Dolly Tracking Shot in Resolve

PostSat Feb 04, 2023 10:34 am

Thanks everyone, really appreciate the advice - Translation is very close, it's just the subject movement that confuses it, so I'll study the classic stabiliser and give that a go! I'm sure I'll get there with a bit more learning...
www.deep-cut.co.uk
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Sven H

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Re: Smoothing Out Dolly Tracking Shot in Resolve

PostSat Feb 04, 2023 11:16 am

If all of the above don't work and you don't want to go into fusion you could also try the match move OFX, but I'm pretty sure the stabilizer is the best option
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Garry Jenkins

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Re: Smoothing Out Dolly Tracking Shot in Resolve

PostSun Feb 05, 2023 9:27 am

I must admit figuring out the classic stabiliser even with the manual has been a challenge, so I may yet enlist someone who knows what they’re doing! Managed to get a lovely track in Fusion thanks to some YouTube vids but translating that into what I’m after is beyond my skill set :D
www.deep-cut.co.uk

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