Tracking and Implant Progress - After Effects

In this footage I'd used some tracking markers on my actor's arm to help me when it came to editing it in After Effects. I think I may have been slightly over ambitious in what I wanted to achieve as it I made a few mistakes which has had a knock on effect with the quality of my work.

Tracking was a little tricky due to the framing of the shot. On set we thought holding a pillow would give a reason for the arm to be naturally still and help minimills movement (and therefore importance of tracking data), however it didn't occur to me that the markers may go off frame, and by doing so would hurt the chances of a smooth track. This meant when it came to tracking I had to manually adjust the key frames to create a smoother movement, unfortunately this seemed to produce a 'floaty effect'

(No sound in the following pieces of footage)

The above video illustrates the initial troubles with the track, especially at the end where it sort of loses hope. I was briefly introduced to the programme Mocha, which allows a selected part of footage to be tracked without the use of markers and seems to offer a smoother more solid track. If I had more time I would probably have tried to use it, but since I'd already spent time adjusting the manual track (and the Mocha track itself had some flaws) I decided against it. However it's something I will definitely investigate in the future, as it eliminates the need to use tracking markers (which can be difficult to remove sometimes) .

At a small resolution the floating isn't too noticeable, however there are still slips, especially at the start. Texture wise I created a simple square texture in photoshop and added a 'vein' through it, by adding the effect CC Glass the texture looks like it is protruding from the skin. A little bit of animation in 3D rotation had to be added to the texture in order for it to work with the twist of the arm, hopefully this matches the movement enough to be passable to the eye.

I attempted to add some blur at the beginning to see whether this would smooth it, however I think there's a little too much and the implant is lacking in visibility. This may also be due to the dulling down of colours in order for it to match the lighting/colours of the scene. However I may add a little more red and brightness to it, especially since some dialogue is 'it's red and inflamed'. Aesthetically I think I prefer the pinkness of the second video rather than the duller tones of the one below, the latter is a little too faded and light to say that it hasn't been in her arm that long.