I love malty: Simple Camera Rig. However, After Effects will no longer render the malty: Rigged Camera, as it has been for the past month. Now it says it will only render the "Active Camera." I know I must've messed something up. Any ideas on how to fix? I am using After Effects CS6, with malty: Simple Camera Rig 2.0.5. Any help is appreciated.
Edit: I fixed my own problem. Had nothing to do with your wonderful script. I truly love Simple Camera Rig!
This is weird. If I start with a completel;y new AE project, add a new composition, add a solid, make that a 3D layer and then add a camera, I can run malty - works fine. I therefore assume that it is 'installed' properly...
But if I then close that project, open an existing project, and try to run Malty, I get the "Seems like some files are missing..." error
If I then inside that existing project simply start a new composition, add a solid/ 3D camera, then Malty works again...
It seems like Malty's functionality is partly composition dependent...
I would happily let you use Teamviewer to see for yourself...
Hey Nick. Totally forgot about this case. I'm so sorry. Can we setup a skype / teamviewer session tomorrow night? That would help me diagnose what's going on.
Hello, I bought this script today in hopes I could create better camera movements with my titler pro AE text that I create. It appears that once i enable the script I cannot use heading, pitch and bank with the text I created, only track works. The others do nothing as I adjust the values. I am on AE 2014 WIndows. Any help would be great! -Adam
Hey Adam. Name of the layers are dependent on the view in your timeline window. If you click on the column name "Source Name" it will change to "Layer Name" and will display "proper" names. As for the rest it seems really odd. I haven't used Titler Pro myself and based on all other expiriences with the Simple Camera Rig I would say it's something with that plugin rather than with mine, but I honestly don't know.
Also... if the titler works with regular AE camera (which I assume it does) it should work with my rig as well.
I'd like to look into this issue myself, so please skype me or send me a private message so we could setup a TeamViewer session to see what's going on.
You may be dreaming, or you may not. It depends on many different factors that are unfortunatelly out of my control. Different versions of AE behave differently under the hood then you're copying and pasting layers (for example the order in which the copy-paste operation takes place). This thigs are usually invisible to the user, but with complex setups (like the rig) it may cause problems. On top of that when copying many layers the order in which they were selected also matters, so that's the next factor that plays an important role. That's why the script is build in such a way that you don't really need to copy-paste it. Just create a brand new rig in your new composition. If you'd like to have the exact same keyframes you can use the Mimic Camera feature. If that's not what you want the last resort is simply creating a new rig in the new composition, going back to the original rig, selecting all the keyframes, and then copy pasting them to the new rig.
Just downloaded the demo. Running CC under win 7 SP1 ultimate 64 bits.
It does not work the way it's supposed to. The simple rig palette is and remains empty no matter what.
If i want to see the knobs that control the rig, i have to dig inside the effects section after adding a rig in the comp section where there is a control named "missing simple camera rig" which need to be clicked upon and only then, the knobs appear but in the corresponding "effects control" palette. Any suggestion?
I keep getting this error when I reopen projects that I have used the Simple Camera Rig. I have installed the latest version 2.0.5. Any suggestions?
Did you reinstall or updated AE so that it's a separate new application? For example from CS6 to CC, or from CC to CC 2014? This behavior is known and it's a consequence of how the rig is build. Even though it can be caused by many things, none of them is damaging. If you go in and find the comp with the rig in it, you will find the rig still works. AE just get's confused sometimes when the rig is not "properly installed". In the 2.0.5 I've decided to remove the installation process, because it was confusing too many users and gave no benefit other than the lack of "missing" message in few cases.
Just downloaded the demo. Running CC under win 7 SP1 ultimate 64 bits.
It does not work the way it's supposed to. The simple rig palette is and remains empty no matter what.If i want to see the knobs that control the rig, i have to dig inside the effects section after adding a rig in the comp section where there is a control named "missing simple camera rig" which need to be clicked upon and only then, the knobs appear but in the corresponding "effects control" palette. Any suggestion? Or is this a limitation of the demo?
To be able to see the knobs you need to click on the null layer called "camControls". It's usually the first layer in your composition. To make sure you're clicking on the right layer, click on the "Layer Name / Source Name" column in your timeline window and set it to "Layer Name". Then find the "camControls" layer, select it and look at your Effects Palette.
"Some files are missing..." using v2.0.5 and followed install instructions. Was working fine for months before this latest AE CC 2014.1 update (I assume for Yosemite) Nov2014
I can confirm some serious performance slow down issues with Element 3D and this script. It happens when I add a light (cast shadows off). If I remove the lights), performance is restored. If I remove the malty rig and leave the light in, performance is restored.
Seems to be an issue with the expressions, not the fact that a camera is parented to a null(s)
"Some files are missing..." using v2.0.5 and followed install instructions. Was working fine for months before this latest AE CC 2014.1 update (I assume for Yosemite) Nov2014
Please help :-(
I've noticed that most who get that error have their upzipping software configured in a way that ignores folder structures. Make sure you extract everything exactly as is from the zip file and everything should be fine.
Also... I'm working on adding a user interface for mac users. Some of them (including you from what I can remember) are having problems with using advanced function os the rig that require running it with modification keys pressed. This issue will be solved in the upcoming release.
Great script. Very useful and well implemented and documented.
Question:
Element 3D 1.6 has 3d point nulls you can specify. Can you use these nulls with your rig? Do you understand what I mean.
-matt
Hey Matt. You can use the nulls generated by Element just like any other nulls. I mostly use them for auto-focus feature in the rig (Focus Layer parameter).
As for the performance issue with Element I'm glad you did your homework and tested it out. I did that too along with many other users ever since I got reports of laggs. Unfortunately there is nothing I can do about it, because the cause of the performance problems is not inherently the Rig's fault. As I've pointed out many time, the rig is simply a bunch of nulls and expressions connected in a clever way. How Element handles expressions is beyond my control and influence.
There were cases when even having just a simple text layer and the rig caused performance drops. Again... in that case it was just a faulty workstation.
I wish there was something I could do to fix it. I also suspect that even VC can't do anything about this issue, because from what I understand it's AE that handles expressions and passes them onto other plugins (in your case Element) so that they are totally unaware of anything going on. That puts the blame on AE processing the expressions. AE is a complex machine so the reasons why some people expirience this lag and sme don't may be many.
The only thing I can suggest is making sure you have the latest drivers for your GPU (I hope it's GeForce GTX) and since you've already tested what works and what doesn't, try designing your comps in this "draft" mode and only moe to final quality when doing rendering.
Thanks for the response. I have a geforce 980 with 4gb of RAM. My workstation has 32 GB of ram running on workstation class motherboard with 2 physical mulit-core CPU's. If it can't run on this, I'm not sure it can ) (maybe I need a tegra board!!)
The only reason I'm ask'n is because I've replicated a (manually) camera parented parent to three null (x,y, z) and then to another control null linked to angle effects. I have not experienced slow downs with this and similar comps with E3D. At this point is more point of academic curiosity. i accept the idea that this is inherent..
Thanks for the response. I have a geforce 980 with 4gb of RAM. My workstation has 32 GB of ram running on workstation class motherboard with 2 physical mulit-core CPU's. If it can't run on this, I'm not sure it can ) (maybe I need a tegra board!!)
The only reason I'm ask'n is because I've replicated a (manually) camera parented parent to three null (x,y, z) and then to another control null linked to angle effects. I have not experienced slow downs with this and similar comps with E3D. At this point is more point of academic curiosity. i accept the idea that this is inherent..
-Matt
I'm curious too. If I knew what exactly is causing this I could report it back to the right people. As for your workstation I can see that it's powerful, but the point is, that no matter how much RAM one has, or GPUs or whatever, there's still a million things that could cause just this one specific behavior. If you'll find a clue that I've apparently missed (but still look for) please let me know
One thing that spoils the fun with Malty Camera RIG is that it's out of the UNDO/REDO loop. Meaning that if you do changes to SCR and want to undo those changes, you just cant UNDO/REDO. If you think that AE camera is screwed and you need SCR to "fix it"... I think any camera is screwed if you cant UNDO/REDO changes. A moment ago I was bit tired and wanted to UNDO changes that I had done to SCR... CTRL+Z... hmmm... hmmm... why isnt anything changing. Oh I changed a lot of things, I actually reverted my project to a stage where it was around an hour ago... REDO.... WHAT? I CANT REDO THE CHANGES. Any ideas when your going to fix the camera that was supposed to fix the camera?
One thing that spoils the fun with Malty Camera RIG is that it's out of the UNDO/REDO loop. Meaning that if you do changes to SCR and want to undo those changes, you just cant UNDO/REDO. If you think that AE camera is screwed and you need SCR to "fix it"... I think any camera is screwed if you cant UNDO/REDO changes. A moment ago I was bit tired and wanted to UNDO changes that I had done to SCR... CTRL+Z... hmmm... hmmm... why isnt anything changing. Oh I changed a lot of things, I actually reverted my project to a stage where it was around an hour ago... REDO.... WHAT? I CANT REDO THE CHANGES. Any ideas when your going to fix the camera that was supposed to fix the camera?
That is simply not true, which gives me a clue that maybe your Element problems are also related to the same thing causing the UNDO not to work, which is totally out of my control. Seems to me something is wrong on your machine. It's either the system or AE (most likely something small, corrupt config after crash or someting), These things can be tricky to spot, since usually everything seems to be working fine, until one plugin starts to slow down or not accept the UNDO commands
Hopefully I get my UNDO/REDO problem fixed. In the meanwhile I have few development ideas. It would be great if SCR would have somesort of shake/wiggle movement randomizer built in with some presets such as (handycam, walking etc.).
Other thing is about rotating the camera around the cameras axis. It's really cool that you can make perfect circles around the camera control null etc. But if you want to make the camera to turn around its own axis, you can do that by adjusting cameras orientation, but while doing that the control null does not follow the camera... and this might end up in a weird situations. Is there a way to go around this or could this issue be "solved" within SCR in future?
Hopefully I get my UNDO/REDO problem fixed. In the meanwhile I have few development ideas. It would be great if SCR would have somesort of shake/wiggle movement randomizer built in with some presets such as (handycam, walking etc.).
Other thing is about rotating the camera around the cameras axis. It's really cool that you can make perfect circles around the camera control null etc. But if you want to make the camera to turn around its own axis, you can do that by adjusting cameras orientation, but while doing that the control null does not follow the camera... and this might end up in a weird situations. Is there a way to go around this or could this issue be "solved" within SCR in future?
If I understand correctly you want to have additional controls to spin the camera on all of it's own axis? You have an option like that, but only on the Z axis, and that's called "Bank".
I'm currently working on a new release and it's too late at this stage to add this feature, but I'll think about it. I don't really see the need of doing that. I never had to do it, no one I ever worked with needed that feature and you're the only one to ask for such a thing. Besides it would change the structure of the Rig quite extensively which could cause confusion for long time users, which I'd rather avoid.
However... the reason for the Rig being build as it is is that you can make changes to it's structure on your own if you so desire. I haven't tested it, but you might try this steps. In theory they should work.
1. Create a regular rig.
2. Create one more null layer and make it 3D. Call it camAxis.
3. Unhide Shy Layers
4. Shift-Parent camAxis null to malty: Rigged Camera.
5. Parent (normally) the camAxis null to camBank null.
6. Parent (normally) the malty: Rigged Camera to camAxis
7. Turn on Shy Layers and lock all the layers you had to unlock (if any).
This should allow you to control the cameras rotation on it's own axis using that null's rotation parameters. I advise using Rotation instead of Orientation. Also, after doing so you might see your camera move back a bit due to some math involved. You can easily fix that using the Track slider on the camControls layer.
Quite frustrated. An arc in a 180 degree circle like your promo video seems fairly easy and im sure for highlighting individual products its great but im trying to tell a moving story and the camera just doest go from point A to point B (arc or straight line)
I have a vine growing along a flat plane. I have to follow this vine growing, spreading outward and at various points on route (as it grows) I have to focus on a 3D block that appears.
So....
I want to start TILTed DOWN at the ground as well as TRACKING FORWARD (as I follow the tree trunk growing) then I want to TILT UP to reveal a 3D block and at that point I want to TRACK 'AROUND' the 3D object whilst still going forward.
This is the main reason I bought this plugin.
Andy
After looking at your videos Im guessing I have to do this using the CoPilot plugin Target Camera 2 although this is another layer of complexity which I wasnt expecting. Can you suggest a work flow/approach to get the camera move im after?
Hey Andy. Have no fear, I'm here to take your frustrations away
What you're attempting is one of the core mechanics of the rig. Maybe I should have done a better job at explaining it, however it is covered in the introduction video you can find here: http://vimeo.com/album/2410990/video/67048219 Start watching from 19:30. In that example I have a car driving along a road, which is essentially the same thing you're trying to do. The car is moving along a path, and your vine is moving along a path.
If I understood you correctly you were using the Track feature to move the camera while you should be using regular keyframes on the camControls layer instead (or simply parent it to another null). Just a reminder - you can still use regular keyframes on the camControls layer even though many of it's parameters have expression enabled. Just don't turn them off and you'll be good to go.
You should think of the cam Controls layer as a platform on which the camera rig is mounted, and the Track parameter is the length of the "arm" on which the camera is mounted. Thats why if you want to move the camera along a path you should be using regular keyframes instead of the Track. Track will change the "anchor point" of the cameras rotation and I think this is what's causing the problem in your case.
Since the Position parameters on the camControls layer are separated for X, Y and Z I think you might me more comfortable simply parenting the camControls layer to yet another null. I usually call in Leader. Make sue it's a 3D null before you parent the camControls to it. This technique opens up many interesting possibilities as well. Also I'd recommend watching a complete free training for the rig. There are many cool tips in there. Here's the link: http://vimeo.com/album/2410990/sort:preset/format:detail
And that's it. Hope it answers your question and that the frustration is now all gone. Make sure to let me know.
Having a recurring problem with After Effects giving me the error: This project contains one reference to missing effect "simple camera rig". This happens when I open the project. The rig seems to work fine if I dismiss the error box. Any advice?
I sure hope the update will fix my sureTaget problem.
It is hard to guess what is causing the problem. Are you using ft-Toolbar? If so, which version? Are you on a Mac or a PC? Some people have reported that on some Mac's the CTRL key doesn't get passed to the script. I've done some research and it's a core bug in ESTK (the tool used to create the rig) meaning there's not much I can do about the key itself. However, I'm working on an update for the rig. Among other features version 2.1 will have the optional GUI (it's own panel) for those of you experiencing problems. Please be patient.
Having a recurring problem with After Effects giving me the error: This project contains one reference to missing effect "simple camera rig". This happens when I open the project. The rig seems to work fine if I dismiss the error box. Any advice?
This error (warning actually) may occure when opening a project with a rig in AE which did not have the rig previously installed, or after some updates to AE, or things of that sort. Still... the rig will work as intended. This is just a mechanics of AE. It was changed in version 12.1 so the error no longer occurs if you use the latest version of the rig (currently 2.0.5). If you open up a project that used an earlier version of the rig this warning message may still occur, but as mentioned earlier by me (and noticed by yourself) the rig will still work. I'm afraid there's nothing I can do about that other than asking you to use the most up-to-date version of the rig.
Guess it depends on what kind of animations/videos you are working on. If you do videos where the camera spins around object, maybe Malty is good for that. But lets say you have an animation where camera looks left and the to the right, with Malty you cant do that. If you want to to do that movement you need to go "outside" the camera rig to get that simple movement done. And as its not in the camera rig, it may and can start to cause issues.
If I understand correctly you want to have additional controls to spin the camera on all of it's own axis? You have an option like that, but only on the Z axis, and that's called "Bank".
I'm currently working on a new release and it's too late at this stage to add this feature, but I'll think about it. I don't really see the need of doing that. I never had to do it, no one I ever worked with needed that feature and you're the only one to ask for such a thing. Besides it would change the structure of the Rig quite extensively which could cause confusion for long time users, which I'd rather avoid.
However... the reason for the Rig being build as it is is that you can make changes to it's structure on your own if you so desire. I haven't tested it, but you might try this steps. In theory they should work.
1. Create a regular rig.
2. Create one more null layer and make it 3D. Call it camAxis.
3. Unhide Shy Layers
4. Shift-Parent camAxis null to malty: Rigged Camera.
5. Parent (normally) the camAxis null to camBank null.
6. Parent (normally) the malty: Rigged Camera to camAxis
7. Turn on Shy Layers and lock all the layers you had to unlock (if any).
This should allow you to control the cameras rotation on it's own axis using that null's rotation parameters. I advise using Rotation instead of Orientation. Also, after doing so you might see your camera move back a bit due to some math involved. You can easily fix that using the Track slider on the camControls layer.
I'm encountering slow performance with the latest element 3d v2 when using the rig controls, the preview performance (when modifying keyframes) is way slower than with a regular camera or even a parented to nulls camera. Is there any way around that? I thought it could be Element but since the performance is much faster without the rig I thought there could be something that I need to tweak on the rig.
This is a known issue of unknown origin that occures randomly. As you noticed yourself a camera parented to a null works fine. The Rig is nothing more than that, however it seems to slow down performance, although I've only noticed this behaviour with Element, but no other plugins. I've investigated this issue before and sadly found nothing constructive. It's obvious that expressions used in The Rig might slow things down a tiny bit, but never to the extend noticed by me, you, and others on random occurences. Might have something to do with the workstation / graphics card since not all projects expirience a slowdown, but that is only my best guess. Wish I could offer more advice on this issue. I hope you will still enjoy The Rig.
Hey Paul. Something is wrong with the forum. I got a notification via email, but your message is not visible here on this page, so I'll just paste it in so others can read it. Here goes:
Hi, I've got my Element 3D object set up in After Effects, and the anchor point is set to the centre of the model. However, when I adjest the 'Heading' parameter in SCR, it doesn't look at the object when you spin around it. The model just moves out of shot. What's the deal with this? In your tutorial, you can easily move around the car model, and the camera looks at it the whole time. How do you achieve this?
Looks like it's back to After Effects cameras until I can get this simple thing sorted. Help!....very frustrated
So here is my response. I wish I knew what the problem is. Everything should work as intended. I would have to look into your project to figure it out. I've never had this problem before. It's probably something with the connecting of the nulls, however I've put a lot of effort to prevent this kind of thing ever happening, and if it did you should get a clear error or warning message. If nothing like that occured it's hard for me to pinpoint what the problem is just from your description. Please try again (as I'm sure you already did) and if that doesn't help we can set up a remote desktop session. Would that be ok?
It's June 2015! Do you plan on releasing a new version?
Just to make it clear - the current version is compatible with After Effects CC 2015, but I am in fact working on a new release, so expect an update soon. Few new features, improved controls, and easier access to hidden functions is coming. I'm sure you'll love it.
Launch Rig and make changes. So far so good, then > changed length of the comp, longer it > strange behavior in Timeline after the last keyframe concerning the time of the old length. The Object (Element 3D) jumps to initial position, no changes to the rig possible - any idea?
Sweet script, but I'm having trouble installing the script successfully because there are two .ace files that I cannot unzip..I'm on mac and the unarchiver doesn't work either..any thoughts?
A quick option to bake out your rig, would be awesome! ;-)
Already working on it Should be added to the release I'm working on, though there are more important things to add at this moment, so no promises.
Hi, my problem now:
Launch Rig and make changes. So far so good, then > changed length of the comp, longer it > strange behavior in Timeline after the last keyframe concerning the time of the old length. The Object (Element 3D) jumps to initial position, no changes to the rig possible - any idea?
(CS6)
It's probably the malty: Rigged Camera layer being to short. After expanding the composition, the length of the layer doesn't change, so in effect it behaves as if there's no camera. Simply extend the length of the camera layer and you should be fine.
Hey there,
Sweet script, but I'm having trouble installing the script successfully because there are two .ace files that I cannot unzip..I'm on mac and the unarchiver doesn't work either..any thoughts?
Chris
You do not need to extract them. Simply copy the content of the ZIP file into the Scripts folder and you'll be fine. There's a video on the script product page that explains it. It's the one with my face in it. The last video on the list. It's about the updates in version 2.0.5 which at the time of posting this message is the current version.
If you are planning to develop 2.0 version, here's few ideas-
-Crane movement. It would be great if there would be seperate value/control for moving the camera in Y-axis independent of the "Null Script Cam"-null.
-Dolly movement. As a addition to crane movement it would be also superb if the camera rig would have on value/control for movement in X-axis independent of the null.
Obviously you can achieve the crane & dolly movment by moving the NullScriptCam-null, but having these controls available withint the rig would allow more control in certain situations. Let's say you have a 3D model of a car and you would make SCR to go around it 360. As the camera would go around the car you could tweak the crane movement to make the camera slide up or down at the same time. Being able to do this kind of movement without keyframing the position of the null would be super useful.
-Wiggle movement. It would also be really useful if SCR would include a feature that would allow simulation of handheld camera movement or any other type of scenario where the camera movement would have some wiggle to it.
Hey Miika. Thanks for your suggestion. Other people asked about the crane movement as well. I'm still not convinced, but will most definitely reconsider it. In fact, version 2.1 has been ready for some time now. I just lack the time to update the tutorials. Sad... I know. Good thing is there are few new features that will most certainly make you and other users happy. As for the crane and wiggle - I will think about it again. If I don't include it in the upcoming release I will most certainly create few tutorials explaining how to do it on your own.
Edit: I fixed my own problem. Had nothing to do with your wonderful script. I truly love Simple Camera Rig!
Jerry - I posted this three weeks ago but not had any reply - I see that you are back now and posting - any insights?
************************ COPY *********************************
Hi Jerzy
OK - I am using AE CC2014. (Windoze 7 64 bit)
This is weird. If I start with a completel;y new AE project, add a new composition, add a solid, make that a 3D layer and then add a camera, I can run malty - works fine. I therefore assume that it is 'installed' properly...
But if I then close that project, open an existing project, and try to run Malty, I get the "Seems like some files are missing..." error
If I then inside that existing project simply start a new composition, add a solid/ 3D camera, then Malty works again...
It seems like Malty's functionality is partly composition dependent...
I would happily let you use Teamviewer to see for yourself...
??
Nick
I bought this script today in hopes I could create better camera movements with my titler pro AE text that I create. It appears that once i enable the script I cannot use heading, pitch and bank with the text I created, only track works. The others do nothing as I adjust the values.
I am on AE 2014 WIndows.
Any help would be great!
-Adam
Any update on the SureTarget integration issue?
Just downloaded the demo. Running CC under win 7 SP1 ultimate 64 bits.
It does not work the way it's supposed to. The simple rig palette is and remains empty no matter what.
If i want to see the knobs that control the rig, i have to dig inside the effects section after adding a rig in the comp section where there is a control named "missing simple camera rig" which need to be clicked upon and only then, the knobs appear but in the corresponding "effects control" palette. Any suggestion?
Or is this a limitation of the demo?After looking at your videos Im guessing I have to do this using the CoPilot plugin Target Camera 2 although this is another layer of complexity which I wasnt expecting. Can you suggest a work flow/approach to get the camera move im after?
Cheers
ANdy
I am not able to replicate your problem with Sure Target. Are you sure everything is installed properly?
Hi again. yes i did. In fact, everything works well except connecting with SureTarget
anchor point is set to the centre of the model. However, when I adjest
the 'Heading' parameter in SCR, it doesn't look at the object when you
spin around it. The model just moves out of shot. What's the deal with
this? In your tutorial, you can easily move around the car model, and
the camera looks at it the whole time. How do you achieve this?
Looks like it's back to After Effects cameras until I can get this simple thing sorted. Help!....very frustrated
So here is my response. I wish I knew what the problem is. Everything should work as intended. I would have to look into your project to figure it out. I've never had this problem before. It's probably something with the connecting of the nulls, however I've put a lot of effort to prevent this kind of thing ever happening, and if it did you should get a clear error or warning message. If nothing like that occured it's hard for me to pinpoint what the problem is just from your description. Please try again (as I'm sure you already did) and if that doesn't help we can set up a remote desktop session. Would that be ok?
It's June 2015! Do you plan on releasing a new version?
Sweet script, but I'm having trouble installing the script successfully because there are two .ace files that I cannot unzip..I'm on mac and the unarchiver doesn't work either..any thoughts?
Chris
It's probably the malty: Rigged Camera layer being to short. After expanding the composition, the length of the layer doesn't change, so in effect it behaves as if there's no camera. Simply extend the length of the camera layer and you should be fine. You do not need to extract them. Simply copy the content of the ZIP file into the Scripts folder and you'll be fine. There's a video on the script product page that explains it. It's the one with my face in it. The last video on the list. It's about the updates in version 2.0.5 which at the time of posting this message is the current version.