First, If you haven't already, review the tutorials posted by
Fulmar. Once that's done you may begin to grasp the challenges. If your looking for one fluid shot that ascribes a circle, going from the cockpit of the chase plane, up to and around the cockpit of the target plane, and then back to the chase plane, it's going to be very challenging. This is because the Aces High film viewer only supports a two point camera movement and does not support scripted camera movements (Like what I used to do in Operation Flashpoint), and as we all learned in geometry, two points ascribe a line, not a circle. That's not to say the shot I just described - which may, or may not be the shot you are looking for - is impossible. It just means that to get it will be a lot of camera shots and editing work.
For our discussion let's break the camera movements into three segments, or lines. Lines A, B and C will ascribe a very elongated triangle, as Line A goes from the chase plane cockpit to the target planes right wing - or just in front of the wing. Line B will cut across the front of the target plane, and Line C will go from the target planes left wing back to the chase plane.
To accomplish this it will be three camera movements. For A, set the camera in World Pointing, advance your film to the start point of your shot. Move your camera into position just outside the cockpit of the chase plane - it's more realistic, in my opinion, if the camera doesn't break the planes skin during motion - and then capture that position with the "Grab All" for the start camera position. Advance the film 5 to 8 seconds - the duration of this leg of the shot - and then use the arrows to position the camera at the target plane. Set your camera angle so it's pointing at the target plane at the end of the shot. Once happy, click "Grab All" for the end camera position.
For Line B use "Plane Relative" instead of World Pointing". Start by clicking "End of Shot" while in Shot A, and then "New Shot". Set World Pointing and then position the camera at the same spot where the last camera ended; just in front of the right wing and pointing at the plane. When your happy click "Grab All" for the first camera position. Move the camera to in front of the left wing pointing at the plane, and again click "Grab All" for the end camera movement. Drop a 3 second time into the second camera position definition. This will cause the plane crossing shot, shot B, to last 3 seconds.
For Line C again use "World Pointing". Click "Go to End" for shot B, move the camera to the same position for the end of shot B and click Grab all. Then advance the film 5 to 8 seconds and reposition the camera back at the chase plane. This leg should be shorter than shot A, so as to imply the planes are catching up to the camera.
You will now need to record all three camera movements separately, then splice them together using your film editor. Now, a word here about the camera movements. If you start shot A pointing at the target plane, and, during the shot move past the target plane and turn the camera around to keep the target plane in frame, that 180 degree turn will actually occur during the duration of the shot. This means that half way across the span between the two planes you will have turned 90 degrees, and neither plane will be in frame. To avoid this you can break shot A into A1 and A2. Shot A1 would travel from chase plane to the tail of the target plane, and A2 would travel from the tail of the target plane to the front position, but would have the bulk of the pivot around the plane, and thus will be able to keep the plane in frame.
This, by the way, is how to start ascribing a circle. You continuously bisect the lines into smaller and smaller segments. Each time you do you will more closely approximate a circle, but will increase work load as you try and get all the camera positions in just the right spot. To facilitate camera positioning, for continuity of shot, you can copy the parameters from the end of one shot into the beginning of another shot. If you save the shots you can edit the shot file with notepad - to make copying camera positions easier. Now, I have not had any luck with the "Y" position - I suspect the game ignores it for some reason - and as you switch from World Pointing to Plane Relative the coordinate system will change, again complicating camera positioning.
But that's the only way I see getting your shot done, with the tools Aces High provides in the Film viewer.
InCrypt.
