Wishlist/General

From VFXPedia

All requests for major new features or minor, uncategorised improvements.

Contents 1 General 2 Workarounds 3 Completed Requests 3.1 since 5.2 3.2 since 5.3 3.3 since 6.0 3.4 since 7.0

General

• Fusion needs to be capable of working with multi-GPU machines such as the dual [or quad] Fermi cards or a Quadro and a Tesla card for optimum GPU capability.

• A better compatibility with After effects plug-ins, the 3D based are unsupported and 2D ones Buggy.

Does Fusion7 even come in 32 bit? If not, we've lost AE plugin support completely.

Yes there's still a 32 bit version.

• A possibility to define frame padding not only with numbers, but with ### or [###] as well. The problem is when you edit loader's path manually or with scripts, Fusion sometimes returns an error not being able to find <Input_File.>000.<ext> if the sequence begins from <Input_File.>001.<ext>. The same happens if a loader had referred to a real file name-number and then this particular frame has been removed from the sequence. Besides, maybe, some people want file names like <Output_Sequence.>1000000000000.<ext>. They can be defined as <Output_Sequence.>100##########.<ext>. Another example: <Output_Sequence><Static_Cam>##_v01.<ext> for static pictures compositing... --Gringo 05:30, 25 September 2009 (EDT)

• Possibility of using Path Templates such as [CompName], [NodeName], [Date] and others would eliminate the necessity of editing paths in Savers and Loaders every time while creating new versions of comps or using the comps as templates. --Gringo 15:36, 18 December 2009 (EST)

-- Or just allow in-tool-scripts to do these string replacements on the file name (see wish in eyeonscript section) --Tilt 16:41, 29 August 2011 (EDT)

• Jittered motionblur to replace the recent trailed one. Far less samples would be enough for more :-- natural look. (AKA stochastic or random motionblur) --Ata

--Daniel: Pixar's patent complicates things.

--Ata: I know I know.. but every other renderengine use this kind of motionblur. How did they do that? (mentalRay; Maya; Shake; Nuke; Max; etc.)

---Hevonen: Something should be done about that motion blur. It's pretty horrible in 3d with fast moving objects near camera.

---- Fusion 7 allows you to render motion vectors which can be used as a workaround for situations like this (although it has different problems that might force you to split the scene up into close and distant geometry).

• Ability to resume Previews (flipbooks) - useful for a preview of large amount of frames

• Cache to Disk for particle and 3D tools. I want to be able to use disk caches to speed up network rendering of particle and 3D scenes, and to allow "hacking" of a comp by replacing disk caches, like we do with RAW files now. --Chad

-- Available for particles since Fusion 6.2.

• Mac OS X support to make use of existing hardware.

• Possibility to modify any channel with any image tool (why is modifying limited to RGBA?) and more (or unlimited) channels. Possibility to rename/group channels (like when there are several rgb passes) at loader node would be useful for OpenEXR variants.

• A checkbox in fuses' controls "Embed to the Composition" to include script code for fuses to the composition body so that the composition could be open anywhere without need of the used fuses installation. --Gringo

• If an image is loaded to B view and only A view is displayed at the Display View, the branch creating the image for B view should not be rendered. --Gringo

• A COM/component interface to developer environments such as vb.net to allow for rapid tool development & user interfaces. This would make for a very robust development environment for Fusion tools, albeit a single-platform environment (Windows).--Sam

• A kind of driven keys or inbetweens could be useful for rotoscoping. You could set main keyframes during the first pass and use driven keys making secondary adjustments in the frames between the main keyframes. If any additional shape corrections or major makeovers are needed, you could adjust only main keyframes. Driven keys would be adjusted either automatically or deleted and recreated again. A non-linear spline interpolation doesn't always help in this situation. --Gringo 10:30, 29 August 2009 (EDT)

You can do that sort of thing with "inserted" modifiers. Problem is, none of the preview controls line up. Hmmm.... there might be a way to back-transform them... --Chad 18:19, 1 September 2009 (EDT)

I don't think there is such a possibility in case of shape animation. Anyway, it's a low priority wish :) --Gringo 09:04, 2 September 2009 (EDT)

• "Proxy Override" - A way of applying individual proxy settings for a single node or an entire node branch. --Fry 07:22, 14 April 2010 (EDT)

How would this differ from Scale with a reciprocal pixel scaling? --Chad

Yes, scale is a nice workaround - but a seperate button inside the node control (like pass trough, pin, lock) could speed up things and keep your comp clean. --Fry 05:35, 17 May 2010 (EDT)

• Can we get paint stokes to animate parameters like size etc over the stroke path like Shake used to?--Protean -- 26 August 2010

• Option to clear the cache of ONLY the active comp, or to clear the cache of all BUT the active comp. --Chad 10:59, 23 November 2010 (EST)

• Option to clear the cache of ONLY the render range, or to clear the cache of all BUT the render range. --Chad 10:59, 23 November 2010 (EST)

• A common parameter for all the tools which would be named "Overall Magnitude" or "Amount of the Effect" or "Effect", "Effect Multiplier" in addition to the "Blend" parameter of 2D tools.

Such a parameter would be useful for all categories, including 2D-tools (Blur, Transform, GridWarp etc.), 3D-tools, Particles. It would simplify animation of the effects as well as fine tuning preserving proportion between the active parameters. --Gringo 10:24, 14 March 2012 (EDT)

What would it do though? The reason the Blend works as a Common Control is that the understanding of what it does is straightforward (it's a lerp to the input). I don't know of a similar generalization that would work for the above. --Chad 11:36, 10 May 2012 (EDT)

Indeed. Fusion doesn't need to know anything about what the tool does, or how it processes, to be able to apply blend. All Fusion needs is the source image, the result image, and as you say, it applies a lerp between. For anything else, Fusion doesn't know what parameters need extra scaling applied to them, or how they should be scaled/altered to increase or decrease the overall effect. To increase the effect, some options might need scaling up, some scaling down. In the case of a tool like Merge, not only does it do transformations, but it affects colour. So if you had a Merge doing transformations and set to subtractive (additive/subtractive = 0.0), which is not the default, if you double the amount of this effect, should the transformations be doubled and (somehow) the 'subtractive-ness' be doubled?? What should or shouldn't be done to change the overall "Amount of the Effect" is so subjective, it would have to be something explicitly supported by each individual tool, and even then not everyone would necessarily agree on how any effect should be increased. Stuart 14:48, 13 May 2012 (EDT)

Yes, I agree, it should be individual for every tool and not all the tools need it, but the general concept would be blending of the key parameters' between their values when they don't alter the image and the currently set values. It happens from time to time that one wants to increase or decrease an effect generally and it would be especially useful for animation. In a way, it would be similar to Krokodove's power masks, but would act uniformly for the entire image.

Here are some examples: Improved Blur, AdvancedCameraShake, Refraction

In some cases, it could be a parameter not for the entire tool, but for a group of parameters, like here: BlurredEdgesRestoration --Gringo 06:34, 15 May 2012 (EDT)

But as you know, in all of those examples the implementation of what the slider does is vastly different. So it wouldn't really be a common control, but just another control for the tool. What would you think about extending the current common control blend idea to other other things though? Like for a modifier that input and output a Number, would a blend be useful? Or a Point? Polyline? What about a transform? Or another idea, what about blending between two or more settings? So you do a weighted blend between say, S1, S3, and S4? --Chad 08:54, 16 May 2012 (EDT)

Well, the blending between the settings looks like a further step... Makes me think again about a possibility to use a general animation track for CC and keying tools (when you create a single keyframe for all the parameters instead of animating each of them). But at least, would be nice to have this "Amount of the Effect" parameter for the warp tools, resolution-independent transform tools, 3D-transforms and warps, matte tools, blurs. Generally, for all the tools which modify the source spatially and yes, as you've suggested, for number, point and shape modifiers. So, it's not a blending between the source and the result image, but rather a transfer between no effect and maximum effect, increased effect and even negative effect (a substitution for the Invert Transform checkbox). --Gringo 09:32, 16 May 2012 (EDT)

• The Save Image option in the viewer should burn in the LUT if the LUT button is enabled. Or, at least burn it in when saving to an int8 image format so you can still save jpegs when working in linear gamma for quick client previews / thumbnails --Tilt 14:16, 14 April 2013 (EDT)

• When canceling a render, the confirmation dialog presents an option to finish the frames that are currently in progress. So when all the currently "in-flight" frames are done, then the comp is unlocked and returned to the user. --Chad 11:22, 29 April 2013 (EDT)

Workarounds

• Convolve node as in Shake for using SobelH and SobelV. and version for Mac.

--Filter covers the first two wishes there. --Chad

• You can convert any point in the polyline to keyframe such right click and convert to keyframe and enter the frame number you want.

--Izyk I don't understand. Are you asking for a way to convert the animation applied to a mask point into a path? You can already do this using "Publish to path". I have no idea what you mean by entering a frame number - either the motion of the path is derived from the global polychange spline, or it is not.

--Gringo Perhaps, it's a request of possibility to convert an unlocked point on a motion path to locked to a specific frame. Can be partially achieved by moving keyframes in the Timeline.

Completed Requests

since 5.2

• 3D luts rendered on a GPU shader please (for lookup film emulation) - with an easy UI way of switching LUTs from a central networked location. --miafx

--Izyk Available in Fusion 5.2 and later.

since 5.3

• Bitmap mask node should create the size of the mask the same as the input image, not as the same as the comp pref. size. Annoying to keep switching the comp size back and forth just to create a few bitmap masks. --theotheo

Implemented in 5.3

• Ability to extrapolate spline curves in addition of looping them. Curve would continue on matching trajectory before first after last keyframe. Sometimes useful for animation.

-- there is Set loop -> Relative

--Chib: "Relative" post behaviour is a kind of "loop" relative to the start and end point of the piece repeated, so to make a linear post behaviour you have to create 2 keys at the end, and repeat only these 2 keys, which can be quite constraining... so +1 to a sort of "continue" or "linear" mode.

--Gringo In the Spline Editor: RMB>Gradient Extrapolation

• Ability to correctly extrapolate shape animation of masks too. In 5.21 Relative extrapolation for shapes still doesn't work, though the Loop and the Ping-Pong modes are OK --Gringo

--Gringo Works fine in 5.31

• Environment variable to allow us to specify locations of scriptlib directories. Right now I think it's hardcoded to \scripts. This will allow users to make their own custom scriptlibs without having admin rights. --Chad

-- Fusion uses Scripts: plus Scripts:Comp, Scripts:Utility, Scripts:Bins, Scripts:Manager, Scripts:Slave or Scripts:Job (whichever is appropriate for the context). eyeonScript.exe doesn't use Fusion's prefs, nor can it do pathmaps, so it uses a Scripts dir within the dir specified by the EYEONSCRIPT_PATH env var, or off its own executable dir otherwise. --Stuart

-- Ah, ok. Let's go ahead and add that to the Environment_Variables page. Thank you for the tip. --Chad

since 6.0

• Region of Interest... I know that in a software based on scanline renderer is easier to implement this feature like in Shake or in Nuke. But somehow it should be implemented because Fusion users need it badly especially when working with 2K or bigger resolution. Its like if Fusion doesn't have proxy. --Ata

--Ata 22:07, 15 May 2009 (UTC) New feature in Fusion 6.

• Scanline, tile-based or some other renderer architecture for faster rendering, less memory usage and uncropped/unlimited canvas area. This kind of renderer is standard in competition and it would be big thing for freelancers, animators and motion graphicians. It's clever for plugins to request only necessary parts instead of recalculating the whole image area, especially when this image is very big one. I haven't checked your current API in detail and I don't know if your architecture has flexibility for this, but this change could be made gradually by introducing new function calls in addition to old ones (eg. "get_region(x,y,w,h)" or some such). This way old plugins and nodes would still work and they could be rewritten to use new architecture one by one. Your current subscription model would fit such gradual releases perfectly.

Implemented as ROIDs in Fusion 6.

• An active render segment in the flow to isolate nodes and ignore all other nodes for performance improvements. (like an underlay) --jomox

-- But Fusion already ignores any tools not needed to immediately render what is requested by the user. You can't get it to go any faster unless you ask it to do less. Are you seeing something different happening? If so, that's a bug. --Chad

-- You can also create an Underlay and then easily select it and Ctrl+P all the tools inside at once.--Gringo 05:30, 25 September 2009 (EDT)

• Possibility to exclude from rendering the branches connected only to merges with Blend=0 and to other nodes that doesn't require their data at a particular frame --Gringo

-- branches connected to merges with blend=0 shouldn't be renderer, but this is a bug we reported to eyeon on last years world tour --Michael_v

-- There is no such a bug in latest versions. --Gringo 09:59, 25 October 2009 (EDT)

since 7.0

• The ability for the Saver tool to create the folder when the folder doesn't exist in the specified path. For example: X:\project\Folder1\Folder2\Renders.001.tga - If Folder2 doesn't exist, Fusion won't render the comp. Since people will still want Fusion to throw an error, maybe this could be an option in the preferences or the saver itself?--Leif3d
• If plugins are missing, create a placeholder node which passes through the main input or the input named "Background" or the first image input that can be found. Even if that could result in a wrong output, it would at least allow the user to view the output of a saver without the need to reroute parts of the comp. Especially if you take over a comp from another artist this can be hard, depending on his comp's "messiness". Moreover, if a comp with a Dummy tool has been saved, it will still be broken when it's being reopened once the missing plugins have been installed. The Dummy tool needs an output so connections to downstream tools can be restored.

Or make it fail, but please keep all connections so the script can be understood, saved and reopened without anything breaking. --Tilt 16:41, 29 August 2011 (EDT)

-- Fusion 7 tries to preserve connections to missing tools.

• "Open As" option for loading comps. The issue is that if I open a comp someone else has open, we generate conflicting .autocomp files. --Chad 11:49, 28 September 2009 (EDT)

I was going to add this to the wishlist, but I see I beat myself to it. Same issue, I can't review someone's comp without messing up the .autocomps. --Chad 12:07, 15 March 2012 (EDT)

Nuke provides event handlers to rewrite the path to an autosave file (when saving/loading/deleting it). Recently, this enabled me to quickly divert autosaves to another drive when our raid server started failing. Such event handlers could also be used to append a user's login name (although diverting autosaves to the local machine prevents clashes and bogus autosaves created by reviews as well) and it could even be used to create a versioning system that keeps the last X autosaves with a time stamp. Since Nuke allowed me to set this up in the facility-wide initialization scripts, I didn't even have to access a single workstation for my hot fix. --Tilt 00:58, 8 March 2014 (EST)

-- Fusion 7 has an autosave pathmap that can point to a different location for each user.

• A tracker should name its path modifiers automatically based on its name (e.g. "Tracker1_Path1") so you can find them again more easily in the "Connect To" list without having to do the extra step of renaming them manually. --Tilt