6.24.7. Motion Lock

The Motion Lock effect allows you to apply other effects directly to a video layer, and track those effects to the movement of the layer’s contents.

Using Motion Lock

Since the effect is predominantly automatic, the most basic use case simply involves applying the effect to your video on the timeline, and waiting a moment for it to analyze the contents of the video. Once analysis is complete, the results can be applied and you are ready to add other effects.

1. Add the Motion Lock effect to any video clip on the editor or on a composite shot timeline. HitFilm will being analyzing the layer automatically, to track the motion data.
2. Once the analysis is complete, select and enable the components of the motion data you wish to use: Position, Rotation, and/or Scale.
3. On the Viewer, select the tracked points you want to use by dragging a lasso around them.
4. Click the “Apply Transform” button to apply the tracked data.
5. Add other effects to the layer, and they will track with the layer content’s movement.

Controls

The controls for the effect are relatively simple, and determine which aspects of the motion data derived from the layer’s contents are used.

• Position: Enables or disables the X (horizontal) and Y (vertical) movement of the motion data, caused by movement or panning of the camera.
• Rotation: Enables or disables the rotational movement of the motion data, which would be caused by the camera rolling around the lens axis.
• Scale: Enables or disables scale data, to reflect any changes in size, caused by the camera’s distance from the subject changing over time.
• Apply Transform: Click this button to apply the transform data you have enabled. This will not alter the appearance of the layer itself, but does alter any effects which follow Motion Lock in the effects list for the layer.

Viewer Controls

The Motion Lock behavior viewer controls will appear in the bottom left corner of the Viewer when the effect is applied. The specific information displayed will change based on the current state of the Motion Track process.

• Footage Analysis: While the footage is being analyzed, the progress will be displayed.
• Replace: Click this button to ignore the tracked points you previously drew around, and select a new area.
• Add: Click this button to retain the currently selected points, and add additional points by dragging again.
• Remove: Click this button to switch to subtractive mode. You can then drag around selected points to remove them from the selection.