NEW 2024 Mask Prompter Update video is live here: th-cam.com/video/ie6HaBYZDrQ/w-d-xo.html Also, make sure to check out the brand-new www.learnmograph.com!
Here's what I don't get about this plugin and the many others that claim to have AI: 2:13 In the first example, when you select the water, which is easy enough to track in AE's own tracker, what you really want is to tell the plugin (the AI of the plugin): Knock out the 2 sailboats but leave the water in between the masts, because the AI knows what a sailboat looks like from its training on what boats look like and can identify their parts. 6:14 Similarly, with the fish in the aquarium: Real AI should know what a fish looks like (how it swims, changes shape, moves), so when you select that fish, the machine learning understands how to track the fish itself. 8:05 And also, with the surf board: If it has AI built in, then it really ought to recognize a surf board, or at least when you it "that's the thing I'm interested in," so it can track the partial image because it knows what a complete surf board looks like. So, where's the actual AI in this plugin? I get there's an image analysis algorithm in this plugin that can distinguish edges in the Luma or RBG channels that tracks across moving pixels when there's enough contrast, but that alone isn't AI. I think this is definitely a good tool that can save some work because AE's roto brush is also a lot of work, but roto is all about the details (such as keeping all the fine fur that sticks out from the cow's torso in the mask instead of the hard edge Mask Prompter created). RunwayML's Green Screen module has just as many issues and lots of gotchas that have to be worked around also, so you're not alone in that regard! As someone who's suffered greatly from having to roto unkeyed objects and characters, I'm really sensitive to the nuances of what it takes to do decent roto...it's hard.
100% Agreed there. This certainly isn't the tool for fine roto work, or where the details matter (at least not yet), and it's really only as good as the models that it's trained on. I think, in time it could get there, and not all projects have budget for the time needed to do proper roto work, so it's a "pick your battle" situation. A lot of times, for quick shots, this will get you 90% of the way there, in much less time.
This current crop of auto-masking tools, be it the internal roto-brush, Runway ML, SD segmentation or now this Mask Prompter all have one thing in common: They are just skimming the surface of "roto" and can't be controlled enough to do difficult high-end work. It's great for clicks on YT, great for fast and dirty stuff but not really production level. Using it like here as a power window color correction mask surely won't be the main use. Everybody and their mother use DaVinci now for about everything and the tracking/masking/secondary CC tools are on a whole different level. What we totally need in (P)roto are tools to quickly get to extremenly editable (!) masks of organic shapes - moving people, cloth, animals, foliage. Every shown here can be done way faster with common methods.
Yeah first example could have been a hue vs hue and wouldn't have had the mask issues. Agree with you there are a lot of so called ai tools out there at the moment which simply don't give good enough results for pro work.
Interesting uses of Blace Plugins’ Mask Prompter. This has the potential to become an essential tool for simplified rotoscope. What the presenter did not mention is that depending on the scale of your footage (and computer), caching frames and rendering can be very slow.
Yes, it definitely can be very slow to cache frames. I opted to use my rtx 3080 work station for this due to the increased performance, however the M1 Mac version of the plug-in I used is significantly slower than the Windows GPU version.
@@slickrick37 It seems that people are getting different mileage on it depending on the systems they run and footage they are working with. I've had it work relatively fast on my macbook depending on the footage, and since the creation of this video have had it run slow on my RTX 3080 system, even with GPU acceleration enabled because of the video codec I was using. Depending on what you're trying to do, it may be worth transcoding your footage into something more edit-friendly. Perhaps ProRes 422 or DNxHR. I've also had luck with GoPro Cineform codec running faster than h.264 or h.265 footage with this plugin. Native camera files seem to be the slowest for it to work with. Hope this helps!
Thanks! I find it does a decent job. The aquarium shot towards the middle of this video is relatively low light, and it does a pretty decent job using the mask box. It might struggle a bit using points, but the mask method allows you to really hone in on the areas you want to work on.
Unfortunately, this does require a decently powerful machine to work properly. But there are a lot of other factors that can hinder performance including file type, resolution, complexity of the shot, camera movements. Basically the more the plugin has to analyze and process, the more it's going to bog down your system.
All these tutorial done with perfect footage are a sort of a misleading because when we go out to shoot in real life, footage is out of focus, the camera is shaky, the edges are blurred (the infamous camera blur), the balance is most of the time wrong, and I can go on forever. So I wonder why you guys never try these plugins with what real filmmaker or editors, in my case, are facing every day…..that will be the only way to know if your plugin works. In my experience, so far, AI keeps failing with real footage. Because even shooting with a red in 8K and on a jib, steadycam or dolly, it will always have issues, that’s why we need to use masks. But please show us your mask script with handheld footage or something more realistic…..thanks!
Agreed there, if you have a certain clip you are thinking of trying this on, please feel free to email it to me, and I can test this plug-in on it. Otherwise, the point of the tutorial is to show the capabilities of the plug-in, nothing is going to be absolutely perfect, especially with AI as it is now, but it gives you a much nicer starting point to work with.
Yes, this is true of every AI-based Roto tool I've used so far: great for undemanding work, possibly usable for prosumer, and then when you get into the details, _which is what roto is all about_, it can fall apart.
Grass might be kind of tough depending on how fine the detail is you're looking to get. Try experimenting with the "Refine hard/soft matte" effect. You can also play with the feather effect within Mask Prompter. I've also had some luck precomposing the footage with the effect applied, and using a "simple" or "matte" choker. Hope that helps, and thanks for watching!
FX Console is nice because it's free, but I've been using Quick Menu more and more because it lets you add things like trim paths, and shape layers without having to twirl down any shape options. I do have them both installed, but now I mostly us FX Console for doing quick screen grabs, and less for searching and applying plugins and effects. Thanks for watching!
I don't believe there is a single AI tool currently available that doesn't require a bit of decent human input. Even more developed tools like Chat GPT and DallE often require rounds and rounds of back and forth before getting something usable. But yes, it would be nice to just use the point placement and have it automatically detect and track the object instead of having to adjust a mask manually frame by frame.
I'm not sure, I only have mac and Windows GPU version to try here. You can always reach out to the developer by using the comment section on aescripts. aescripts.com/mask-prompter/ There is also a documentation site available here that may help with troubleshooting: docs.blaceplugins.com
On windows it will download a zip folder. Extract that and there will be a .exe file that you can run. That will install mask prompter for you. On Mac OS, again it will download a zip file, extract it and run the .pkg file and that will install mask prompter. Once installed, restart after effects, and Mask Prompter will be added to your Effects and Presets library. Thanks for watching!
If you mean the Magic Mask in Davinci Resolve, I cannot say. Most of my workflow keeps me in the Adobe suite, so I haven't had a chance to really get to know Resolve as much. From what I've seem Magic Mask seems to do a really nice job, but I believe is only available in the studio version of Resolve
You can mask hair with it. It doesn't get quite as refined of a mask on curly or wavy hair as if you used rotobrush with the refine edge tool, but if your talent is shot on a greenscreen or simple background, it does a decent job. You could also apply the refine soft matte effect after Mask Prompter to feather out your mask a bit to include any wispy strands of hair.
Yes there is a mac version available. I use it on my M1 Pro MacBook, and it works well. A tad slow without the nvidia GPU acceleration, but still does the trick.
It’s not available for free, but it is on sale at aescripts.com right now. There is also a free trial if you want to test it out first. aescripts.com/mask-prompter/
Sorry but this plugins is not Rotobrush killer, but absolutely not ! This plugins is a toys for speed working, just for easy shape. The result don't be professional !
As with any tool, you get out of it what you put in to it. Agreed, it is not as comprehensive as what Rotobrush can do. But in the examples shown here, I found it to be as quick and efficient as Rotobrush, but with a more simplified process
It is pretty render intensive if your GPU can't handle it. Even with an RTX 3080, it was still slower than I'd like, but still much faster than manual masking, or fiddling with the rotobrush.
NEW 2024 Mask Prompter Update video is live here: th-cam.com/video/ie6HaBYZDrQ/w-d-xo.html
Also, make sure to check out the brand-new www.learnmograph.com!
It's good, not for every project but good for some quick things!
Agreed, good for quick and dirty work. No where near enough to replace professional roto work, but really nice for a quick mask or matte.
Here's what I don't get about this plugin and the many others that claim to have AI:
2:13 In the first example, when you select the water, which is easy enough to track in AE's own tracker, what you really want is to tell the plugin (the AI of the plugin): Knock out the 2 sailboats but leave the water in between the masts, because the AI knows what a sailboat looks like from its training on what boats look like and can identify their parts.
6:14 Similarly, with the fish in the aquarium: Real AI should know what a fish looks like (how it swims, changes shape, moves), so when you select that fish, the machine learning understands how to track the fish itself.
8:05 And also, with the surf board: If it has AI built in, then it really ought to recognize a surf board, or at least when you it "that's the thing I'm interested in," so it can track the partial image because it knows what a complete surf board looks like.
So, where's the actual AI in this plugin?
I get there's an image analysis algorithm in this plugin that can distinguish edges in the Luma or RBG channels that tracks across moving pixels when there's enough contrast, but that alone isn't AI.
I think this is definitely a good tool that can save some work because AE's roto brush is also a lot of work, but roto is all about the details (such as keeping all the fine fur that sticks out from the cow's torso in the mask instead of the hard edge Mask Prompter created).
RunwayML's Green Screen module has just as many issues and lots of gotchas that have to be worked around also, so you're not alone in that regard!
As someone who's suffered greatly from having to roto unkeyed objects and characters, I'm really sensitive to the nuances of what it takes to do decent roto...it's hard.
100% Agreed there. This certainly isn't the tool for fine roto work, or where the details matter (at least not yet), and it's really only as good as the models that it's trained on. I think, in time it could get there, and not all projects have budget for the time needed to do proper roto work, so it's a "pick your battle" situation. A lot of times, for quick shots, this will get you 90% of the way there, in much less time.
Love mask prompter.... works very very well
that a game changer , thank you for those tuts
Thanks for watching!
This current crop of auto-masking tools, be it the internal roto-brush, Runway ML, SD segmentation or now this Mask Prompter all have one thing in common: They are just skimming the surface of "roto" and can't be controlled enough to do difficult high-end work. It's great for clicks on YT, great for fast and dirty stuff but not really production level.
Using it like here as a power window color correction mask surely won't be the main use. Everybody and their mother use DaVinci now for about everything and the tracking/masking/secondary CC tools are on a whole different level.
What we totally need in (P)roto are tools to quickly get to extremenly editable (!) masks of organic shapes - moving people, cloth, animals, foliage. Every shown here can be done way faster with common methods.
Yeah first example could have been a hue vs hue and wouldn't have had the mask issues. Agree with you there are a lot of so called ai tools out there at the moment which simply don't give good enough results for pro work.
🙌🏼
Thank you!
Interesting uses of Blace Plugins’ Mask Prompter. This has the potential to become an essential tool for simplified rotoscope. What the presenter did not mention is that depending on the scale of your footage (and computer), caching frames and rendering can be very slow.
Yes, it definitely can be very slow to cache frames. I opted to use my rtx 3080 work station for this due to the increased performance, however the M1 Mac version of the plug-in I used is significantly slower than the Windows GPU version.
@@learnmographI'm running it on a MacBook Pro M2 Max. Still slow. I wish I knew that before I bought it.
@@slickrick37 It seems that people are getting different mileage on it depending on the systems they run and footage they are working with. I've had it work relatively fast on my macbook depending on the footage, and since the creation of this video have had it run slow on my RTX 3080 system, even with GPU acceleration enabled because of the video codec I was using. Depending on what you're trying to do, it may be worth transcoding your footage into something more edit-friendly. Perhaps ProRes 422 or DNxHR. I've also had luck with GoPro Cineform codec running faster than h.264 or h.265 footage with this plugin. Native camera files seem to be the slowest for it to work with. Hope this helps!
good job nice tutorial, just a tip about background music don't increase the volume every time between speaking otherwise nice job
Yes, the music volume swings in this video do not represent professional savvy, but ill judged video tutorial making.
Noted, thank you!
Awesome feedback, perfectly delivered 👍
Thanks a lot for all your videos are videos!!!!! How do you find it working on low brightness and similar color edges? 🎉
Thanks! I find it does a decent job. The aquarium shot towards the middle of this video is relatively low light, and it does a pretty decent job using the mask box. It might struggle a bit using points, but the mask method allows you to really hone in on the areas you want to work on.
It freeze my laptop every time I try render project with mask prompter used with AE
Unfortunately, this does require a decently powerful machine to work properly. But there are a lot of other factors that can hinder performance including file type, resolution, complexity of the shot, camera movements. Basically the more the plugin has to analyze and process, the more it's going to bog down your system.
All these tutorial done with perfect footage are a sort of a misleading because when we go out to shoot in real life, footage is out of focus, the camera is shaky, the edges are blurred (the infamous camera blur), the balance is most of the time wrong, and I can go on forever. So I wonder why you guys never try these plugins with what real filmmaker or editors, in my case, are facing every day…..that will be the only way to know if your plugin works. In my experience, so far, AI keeps failing with real footage. Because even shooting with a red in 8K and on a jib, steadycam or dolly, it will always have issues, that’s why we need to use masks. But please show us your mask script with handheld footage or something more realistic…..thanks!
Agreed there, if you have a certain clip you are thinking of trying this on, please feel free to email it to me, and I can test this plug-in on it. Otherwise, the point of the tutorial is to show the capabilities of the plug-in, nothing is going to be absolutely perfect, especially with AI as it is now, but it gives you a much nicer starting point to work with.
Yes, this is true of every AI-based Roto tool I've used so far: great for undemanding work, possibly usable for prosumer, and then when you get into the details, _which is what roto is all about_, it can fall apart.
nice video thanks! 👍
Thanks for watching!
Nice video! May we share this on our product page?
Of course! Awesome plug-in!
@@learnmograph Thank you :) Is there a way to contact you via mail?
Sure thing: learnmograph@gmail.com
Hi there, is there a decent way to finish off the rough edges after a selection has been made? I'm having trouble with grass
Grass might be kind of tough depending on how fine the detail is you're looking to get. Try experimenting with the "Refine hard/soft matte" effect. You can also play with the feather effect within Mask Prompter. I've also had some luck precomposing the footage with the effect applied, and using a "simple" or "matte" choker.
Hope that helps, and thanks for watching!
Did not know about that quick menu plugin, is it better than fx console from video copilot?
FX Console is nice because it's free, but I've been using Quick Menu more and more because it lets you add things like trim paths, and shape layers without having to twirl down any shape options. I do have them both installed, but now I mostly us FX Console for doing quick screen grabs, and less for searching and applying plugins and effects. Thanks for watching!
@@learnmograph thanks for the reply, I will look into Quick Menu
People are able to make ai rotobrush masking tool but still has to adjust mask by hand. The future is now
I don't believe there is a single AI tool currently available that doesn't require a bit of decent human input. Even more developed tools like Chat GPT and DallE often require rounds and rounds of back and forth before getting something usable. But yes, it would be nice to just use the point placement and have it automatically detect and track the object instead of having to adjust a mask manually frame by frame.
I wanted to see how it handled the hair...
I have a video with that coming up soon. Been away for a while with family/health problems. Getting back to it soon.
I have a windows laptop without an Nvidia card, how do I get that version? I installed what I downloaded it but it doesn't work, thanks
I'm not sure, I only have mac and Windows GPU version to try here. You can always reach out to the developer by using the comment section on aescripts. aescripts.com/mask-prompter/
There is also a documentation site available here that may help with troubleshooting: docs.blaceplugins.com
i'll be honest, you didnt do well selling it to me on the first shot
Appreciate the feedback. Thanks for watching!
I use Rtx 4080 i9 processor still when i use this plugin it freezes my after effects , and gpu works on full capacity 100%
If you’re experiencing instability, you can turn off hardware acceleration. I’ve found that helps working with 4K footage.
It gives the .exe file, do I have to install it or directly paste into my plugin folder?
This is a plug-in you actually install, the exe file will take care of everything for you.
@@learnmograph I did the same but it still shows error. I'm using Ae 2021 version
@@360_store Ah, according to the website, it is not compatible with AE 2021. aescripts.com/mask-prompter/
as what they said, an AI base, does it need internet connection to properly working ?
You do not need internet connection for it to work properly, I was able to use this plugin on my laptop disconnected from Wifi.
@@learnmograph that’s cool thank you, its good to know that.
After download it what next i don’t know how install it
On windows it will download a zip folder. Extract that and there will be a .exe file that you can run. That will install mask prompter for you. On Mac OS, again it will download a zip file, extract it and run the .pkg file and that will install mask prompter. Once installed, restart after effects, and Mask Prompter will be added to your Effects and Presets library. Thanks for watching!
Do you think it gives better results than magic mask?
If you mean the Magic Mask in Davinci Resolve, I cannot say. Most of my workflow keeps me in the Adobe suite, so I haven't had a chance to really get to know Resolve as much. From what I've seem Magic Mask seems to do a really nice job, but I believe is only available in the studio version of Resolve
in after effect 2020 not working
Unfortunately this plugin is only optimized for After Effects 2022 and above.
@@learnmograph thanks for the fast reply :))
Could it masking hair?
You can mask hair with it. It doesn't get quite as refined of a mask on curly or wavy hair as if you used rotobrush with the refine edge tool, but if your talent is shot on a greenscreen or simple background, it does a decent job. You could also apply the refine soft matte effect after Mask Prompter to feather out your mask a bit to include any wispy strands of hair.
for mac?
Yes there is a mac version available. I use it on my M1 Pro MacBook, and it works well. A tad slow without the nvidia GPU acceleration, but still does the trick.
This plugin is free or not?
This is a paid plug-in.
gpu o cpu version?
I used the GPU version in this example. I used the CPU version on my MacBook and it works well, just not quite as fast as the GPU version.
How do we get it for free?
It’s not available for free, but it is on sale at aescripts.com right now. There is also a free trial if you want to test it out first. aescripts.com/mask-prompter/
Sorry but this plugins is not Rotobrush killer, but absolutely not ! This plugins is a toys for speed working, just for easy shape. The result don't be professional !
As with any tool, you get out of it what you put in to it. Agreed, it is not as comprehensive as what Rotobrush can do. But in the examples shown here, I found it to be as quick and efficient as Rotobrush, but with a more simplified process
My computer is literally crying. It's a very boring plugin.
It is pretty render intensive if your GPU can't handle it. Even with an RTX 3080, it was still slower than I'd like, but still much faster than manual masking, or fiddling with the rotobrush.