www.filterforge.com - General Discussion

Good News! New FF 4.004 and ENABLES submission of filters to library!

SpaceRay — Fri, 24 May 2013 13:56:48 -0400

SpaceRay, Fri, 24 May 2013 13:56:48 -0400

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Filter Forge have put this news Today we released the minor upd ate 4.004 to the beta version of Filter Forge 4.0! The current update fixes several bugs, and enables submission of user-made filters to the online Filter Library. So 4.0 compatible filters will come out soon. To download and install the update 4.004, sel ect Tools > Updates from the Filter Forge main menu. The update preserves all downloaded and user-created filters, as well as user se ttings and the license key. Happy New Beta!

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Filter Forge have put this news

Today we released the minor upd ate 4.004 to the beta version of Filter Forge 4.0!

The current update fixes several bugs, and enables submission of user-made filters to the online Filter Library. So 4.0 compatible filters will come out soon.

To download and install the update 4.004, sel ect Tools > Updates from the Filter Forge main menu. The update preserves all downloaded and user-created filters, as well as user se ttings and the license key.

Happy New Beta!

WOW! This is a very good news as finally we will see some coming new filters for FF 4.0, although really the only new things available that is different fr om FF 3.0 is the Loops con groups components, at least until now, maybe there could be more later.

Will see when it finally will see these 4.0 filters will be available.

I could send a filter but I still have a lot to learn with the Loops to make something more useful, the only thing I have done is the Multiple Randomizer with modified shapes

FF should make an iPhone app! (warning: crazy idea)

CorvusCroax — Fri, 24 May 2013 06:00:19 -0400

CorvusCroax, Thu, 09 Sep 2010 12:55:41 -0400
Hey: I just had a crazy idea: :!:

FF inc should make a miniature iPhone version of Filter Forge, so that people could use some of the image filters on the camera. Sort of like Plastic Bullet or Hipstamatic

It would be simplified, only allowing the use of filters and no editing, of course.

Maybe it would only allow use of presets, or tweaking of settings in the 'create preset mode', not in the image itself (for simplicity and performance).

Think of it like the FF freepacks, but even smaller and on the iPhone. FF inc might even exert some editorial control over what filters are made available for the iPhone version (since the iphone camera roll won't have all of the inputs available).

Image filter apps are popular on the iPhone, but none of them I've seen have anything even close to the breadth of the FF filters.

There are a bunch of filters which would would be great on the iPhone, and which could almost be apps in themselves:
Aether http://www.filterforge.com/filters/9008.html
http://www.filterforge.com/filters/7651.html
Technical Drawing http://www.filterforge.com/filters/1979.html
Grunge http://www.filterforge.com/filters/5074.html
LOMO, Shark Tank!, Sketchy Painting, Watercolor Painting, and many others.

/end crazy idea mode/

Mongoose King, Thu, 09 Sep 2010 17:58:36 -0400
I'm picuring people's iphones melting in thier hands as the processor turns into a tiny sun... :P

GMM, Fri, 10 Sep 2010 08:17:23 -0400
<official mode off>

iPhones are not x86-compatible. I think it's more plausible to wait until Parallels port their virtual machine to iPhone :)

</official mode off>

joel collins, Fri, 24 May 2013 06:00:19 -0400
Sounds good if they made this possible.

Contest on DeviantArt

Burt — Wed, 22 May 2013 11:04:43 -0400

Burt, Wed, 22 May 2013 11:04:43 -0400
Well I got my 3rd reward point and decided to use it to create a contest on DeviantArt with the FF Pro as a prize. I'm not sure if anyone here is interested but figured I'd post the notice here http://fav.me/d665npl

FF ordering system is down. (UPD: Fixed)

GMM — Thu, 16 May 2013 14:01:51 -0400

GMM, Thu, 16 May 2013 14:01:51 -0400
Our apologies for those trying to order Filter Forge at the moment: Shareit.com, our e-sales partner, is experiencing technical issues. Please try later today.

We'll extend the duration of the 60% discount so that noone misses it.

What filter is used on FF home page

EAdams — Wed, 15 May 2013 02:35:32 -0400

EAdams, Tue, 23 Apr 2013 11:34:33 -0400
What filter is used on the picture of the flowers on the FF home page?

GMM, Wed, 24 Apr 2013 04:27:42 -0400
It is StevieJ's Chipped.

EAdams, Tue, 14 May 2013 18:38:12 -0400
Thanks for the reply! I find that some filter effects just don't stand out with the default image but on other images they are spectacular. This is one of them!

Thanks, Eve

SpaceRay, Wed, 15 May 2013 02:35:32 -0400
Good to know that this was the filter used and I like it too and gives a beautiful and good effect

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EAdams I find that some filter effects just don't stand out with the default image but on other images they are spectacular

This is very true on some filters I have seen, that with the default thumbnail or presets you do not see the effect right, and is much better when used with your own images selected.

Romancing the Gorilla

Amy Hutton — Tue, 14 May 2013 06:32:00 -0400

Amy Hutton, Sun, 29 Jul 2012 13:18:57 -0400
What happened to Carl's Romancing the Gorilla Filter? That's one of my all time favorite filters!

And why did some of my filters disappear when I upgraded the software?

Disappointed.

Amy Hutton

SpaceRay, Sun, 29 Jul 2012 14:10:28 -0400
I have just made a search for Carl's Romancing the Gorilla Filter in the FF library and is true that is NOT there and has been removed :?:

As far as I know this only happens when the author decides himself to ask FF Inc. to take it out from the library.

So I do not know why Carl has decided to remove it.

So when the filter is removed, it is also removed from all the lists of any Filter Forge software, because you can´t have a filter in the list that is not in the FF online Library.

BUT it is NOT deleted, it is just moved to the "my filter" folder of your filter list.

Another way of keeping it safe and secure is to have a backup of all your downloaded filters

Carl, Sun, 29 Jul 2012 20:11:07 -0400
It is getting redesigned, after I received numerous email complaints about it and including one on FF's FB page. After X-Ray's redesign where it excluded the original look or the drastic changes to Film Noir, I thought it would be better to resubmit a fresh version of Gorrilla where no one can complain that it's lost this or that. The good news the new version will be faster, more user friendly and believe it or not with more choices, and very close to the look of the old one. Hopefully every one will be happy then :)

SpaceRay, Sun, 29 Jul 2012 22:10:18 -0400
Great news and good thing.

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The good news the new version will be faster, more user friendly and believe it or not with more choices, and very close to the look of the old one.

Thanks for making a redesign of it and that it will be better than the previous one

This is for sure one of the many selected jewels available in the FF library and like it much and have such beautiful and awesome artistic results.

USING OLD VERSION UNTIL RELEASE OF THE NEW

Anyone that STILL wants to use the old version will be able to do it if you have already downloaded it before, as it has been transfered to the "my filters" folder.

Morgantao, Thu, 02 Aug 2012 00:58:06 -0400
You scraed me there for a bit, Carl :D
Don't delete such awesome filters and leave us in the dark like that again! :D

Christiane B., Thu, 02 Aug 2012 03:00:45 -0400
Hi Carl,

sorry for asking you twice : at FB and via mail, but the "Gorilla" is one of my favourite filters and i was so upset to see you removed it :D

Thank you for redesign it ! I´m looking forward for the new version of it !! :loveff:

And at least: sorry for my bad, bad english :D

greetings

Christiane :)

Ozmandias, Sun, 06 Jan 2013 17:55:52 -0500
Any word on this filter? I'd love to get it.

SpaceRay, Mon, 07 Jan 2013 16:55:11 -0500
Carl, as you have not been able to make the redesign of your awesome and excellent filter in the last six months:

Would you allow for the release of the old filter here in the forum, for others that want to use it and can´t wait until the next version comes out whenever you make it?

I have it, but I do not want to put it here without you allowing it.

ORIGINAL THREAD HAS NOT BEEN DELETED

When this filter appeared it has it´s own thread and happily after the removal, the original thread has remained in the forum so you can see it

Romancing The Gorilla - The original comments thread

Carl, Tue, 08 Jan 2013 00:54:17 -0500
been distracted by other creative work returning an income ;) Their is a fatal error that can occur under random renderings, that was why after several complaints it was removed from circulation. I would not want the defective gorrilla on the loose, please don't post it.

the good news, the sky isn't falling, a stripped back re-loved gorrilla is under surgery. :banana:

Ozmandias, Tue, 08 Jan 2013 07:54:05 -0500

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the good news, the sky isn't falling, a stripped back re-loved gorrilla is under surgery.

Thank You, Carl! I'm new to Filter Forge and have heard that Romancing The Gorilla is one of the very best filters. You can't imagine how disappointed I was to find that it was no longer available!

You've made my day! :D I eagerly anticipate its re-release.

Thank you once again!

SpaceRay, Sun, 27 Jan 2013 01:17:17 -0500
How is it going the romancing ? Has the Gorilla got already romanced or there is still work to do? ;) :D

I am not needing it urgent at all (I already have the original and like it as it is), and does not matter if it will take more time, I am just curious to know how it is going, and do not want to hurry you up in any way.

SpaceRay, Tue, 14 May 2013 06:32:00 -0400
What happens with the great and awesome Romancing the Gorilla filter?

I that if you do not have time to make it better, or any other reason, would be good for newer owners that has not been able to download this wonderful filter, that you could submit it again as it is, and then after make the upgrade when you have it ready.

I fortunately have downloaded it in time and can use it.

Can Basic Version save new presets?

Andrew B. — Sun, 12 May 2013 13:38:24 -0400

Andrew B., Sun, 08 Jan 2012 23:29:21 -0500
Can a person using Basic Version save slider adjustments to a new preset?

GMM, Mon, 09 Jan 2012 01:58:12 -0500
Yes this is possible.

Drookit, Sun, 12 May 2013 13:02:25 -0400
:?: would be nice to know how and where in the menu stack :)

CFandM, Sun, 12 May 2013 13:35:16 -0400
After you mess with the sliders and get a look that you like you can click the arrow above the presets. To the right above the presets is where the arrow is and there will be a menu that pops up..Then choose "Add Preset"

Andrew B., Sun, 12 May 2013 13:38:24 -0400
deleted my post because it's redundant.

Adobe To End Applications, Subscription to "Creative Cloud" Coming

Thrash — Sat, 11 May 2013 04:02:04 -0400

Thrash, Mon, 06 May 2013 15:58:50 -0400
So we will no longer have an application on our desktop to run local, we'll be dependent on the cloud based application (and a decent internet connection and a good server by Adobe) to create in Photoshop/Illustrator/etc. Adobe there will be no more Creative Suites released and all users will be required to buy a $50/mo subscription to the cloud. While it gives you access to all Adobe apps, what if you only ever use or want to use say Photoshop and Illustrator? No a la carte?

What will this mean for the future of Filter Forge?

CFandM, Mon, 06 May 2013 16:37:39 -0400
Not only Filter Forge but there are also the other plug-ins that go along with these applications.... :)
I'll hold back on my "Against Cloud" arguments... ;) :D

SpaceRay, Mon, 06 May 2013 22:37:28 -0400
According to this news from Adobe on 6 May this is not true

John knack on Adobe - New FAQs about Photoshop, Lightroom, & Creative Cloud

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New FAQs about Photoshop, Lightroom, & Creative Cloud •Photoshop and Camera Raw: Photoshop CS6 (non-subscription) will remain available for sale alongside CC, and it will get free updates that add new camera support (though not new features). •Creative Cloud: You don’t need a constant internet connection (in fact, yearly subscribers can be offline for up to 3 months at a time), and you don’t need to store your data in the cloud. If you’re really going to Antarctica for 6 months or work in a disconnected environment, please call customer service & we’ll get you taken care of. You can keep running older versions alongside the CC versions. •Lightroom: LR5 will be included in Creative Cloud, but you won’t have to subscribe to Creative Cloud to get it (that is, you’ll be able to keep buying it via perpetual (non-subscription) license).

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New FAQs about Photoshop, Lightroom, & Creative Cloud

•Photoshop and Camera Raw: Photoshop CS6 (non-subscription) will remain available for sale alongside CC, and it will get free updates that add new camera support (though not new features).

•Creative Cloud: You don’t need a constant internet connection (in fact, yearly subscribers can be offline for up to 3 months at a time), and you don’t need to store your data in the cloud. If you’re really going to Antarctica for 6 months or work in a disconnected environment, please call customer service & we’ll get you taken care of. You can keep running older versions alongside the CC versions.

•Lightroom: LR5 will be included in Creative Cloud, but you won’t have to subscribe to Creative Cloud to get it (that is, you’ll be able to keep buying it via perpetual (non-subscription) license).

ONLY the new Photoshop CC will be ONLY available for Adobe Cloud subscribers, Photoshop Creative Cloud (CC)

SpaceRay, Mon, 06 May 2013 22:47:34 -0400
I am sorry that I was wrong reading ONLY the above news blog and giving my opinion based only on this one to tell that this was not true, as I have been reading now many more news and this, unbelievable, is really true.

Searching for a news that really shows it I have seen this

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Adobe kills Creative Suite – all future features online only Adobe had been expected to demo Creative Suite 7 at its MAX conference down in smoky Los Angeles on Monday, but instead announced there'll be no more versions of its boxed software and that the Creative Suite brand will cease to exist. All CS apps updates will only be added to its Creative Cloud suite

Please read the full news in the link above here to know more about this new future with Adobe

And to confirm the news here is another one I have found this other very interesting news that has a lot of information and is very interesting and recommend also to read

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Adobe kills Creative Suite, goes subscription-only In a major shift for its business and its customers, Adobe Systems on Monday announced it no longer will sell its Creative Suite software as it moves instead to the $50-per-month Creative Cloud and other subscription plans. "We have no current plans to release another perpetual release of the CS tools and suites. Creative Cloud is going to be our sole focus moving forward," said Scott Morris, senior director of product marketing for Creative Cloud.

Quote

Adobe kills Creative Suite, goes subscription-only

In a major shift for its business and its customers, Adobe Systems on Monday announced it no longer will sell its Creative Suite software as it moves instead to the $50-per-month Creative Cloud and other subscription plans.

"We have no current plans to release another perpetual release of the CS tools and suites. Creative Cloud is going to be our sole focus moving forward," said Scott Morris, senior director of product marketing for Creative Cloud.

So it seems that there will be no more Photoshop versions after CS6 that was version 13.0, now there will be just ONE continually upgraded version and there will be no more waiting until the release of any new features that is know as

And also very useful and interesting for more information, and why they have done it and know there is this other long news with many things

Mashable - Adobe Goes All-In on Subscription Pricing Model

SpaceRay, Tue, 07 May 2013 08:41:30 -0400
Considering the two posts above I can now answer to Thrash, and I recommned and suggest to read them and the included links before continue reading this post below, although of course that you are free to do what you want.

Also this other one from the famous DPReview website with more information

Adobe heralds subscription-only future for Photoshop and Creative Suite

And it seems that this bad news is not shared as there is about 1 million happy Adobe subscribers

Survey: Customers happy with Adobe Creative Cloud so far

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Thrash 1 - So we will no longer have an application on our desktop to run local,

This is not true because ALL the adobe cloud applications ARE local and run from your desktop computer, they are exactly the same as the ones you already have, and you do not need to have internet connection active always, they are not cloud based, you download and install them in the same way as before.

I can tell you this because I am already a Adobe cloud subscriber as I have put in this other thread

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Thrash 2 - Adobe there will be no more Creative Suites released and all users will be required to buy a $50/mo subscription to the cloud

This is not true that you will be forced to make a subscription to the Adobe cloud because from now on, you will have 2 subscription options, you can have Adobe Cloud subscription, BUT if you do not want it you can also make a separate monthly subscription to any application you may want and is not required to belong to the Adobe Cloud.

And if you already own your Photoshop (bought one), you will not be forced to subscribe to either of this 2 options, if do not want to, and they will continue to support you, and will be able to keep using your desktop applications, and you will still be able to buy Photoshop CS6, BUT the problem is that you will be forced to subscribe if you want to have any new possible updates that there may be available, as all of them will be only for Photoshop CC

And from 31 December 2013 you will NOT be able to upgrade to CS6 from CS3 or CS4 and only be possible from CS5, so if you do not want to make any subscription you must upgrade to CS6 before 31 December 2013 or buy Photoshop CS6 Box or download version before they take it out.

And also on 31 July 2013 will end the offer discount upgrade from CS3, CS4 and CS5 to Adobe Cloud offer and will be ONLY possible to upgrade from the CS6 version.

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Thrash 3 - we'll be dependent on the cloud based application (and a decent internet connection and a good server by Adobe) to create in Photoshop/Illustrator/etc.

If you subscribe to the Adobe Cloud you are NOT at all dependant on internet and even you can be offline without internet to be able to work with the Adobe Cloud applications as you can see already in my other post above here.

I am a Adobe Cloud Subscriber and I can tell you for sure that ALL the Adobe Cloud Application are really DESKTOP APPLICATIONS :) They are NOT CLOUD BASED at all, and they are NOT online based, they are exactly the same as the one you would buy from Adobe website or in a software shop.

What is true is that you need to have a minimal decent internet connection to download just ONCE any of ALL Adobe applications that are included and available for you to download them

BUT WHAT IS VERY IMPORTANT is that the download is NOT done in any way as any other download you could do from the internet, you have the Adobe Cloud Download manager that will do all the work for you and you will not be dependent on any browser or have fear that the connection would be lost and loose the download, I can tell you that it works smoothly and very well.

And Adobe have shown that they have very powerful and strong new servers to be able to supply all the needed to Adobe Cloud subscribers, and I have the proof from my own experience.

Skybase, Tue, 07 May 2013 09:34:17 -0400
TL;DR
1. You don't need the internet to use it.
2. Nobody's forced.
3. You still have options.

Burt, Wed, 08 May 2013 11:55:50 -0400
In general I'm not a fan of these subscription or licensing models but will have to see how it shakes out. I once took some 3DS Max classes and they were early proponents of 'licensing' the product rather than owning it. The plan was cheaper so I got it, took my classes and then the license expired and I couldn't afford the $3000 for the new product. If I had purchased the product the usual way I would have at least had an older version product I could continue using.

SpaceRay, Sat, 11 May 2013 04:02:04 -0400
I want to comment and tell my opinion about this surprising and shocking news that will change very much many things and it could be good and bad in many ways, but I do not have the time right now to do it

Just to put this news I have found that is interesting

After nearly 10 years, Adobe abandons its Creative Suite entirely to focus on Creative Cloud

It explains the news and WHY, and there are more than 300 comments below the news too

Sorry that I would like much to comment more but I can´t do it as I have to go.

What happens with the usage ranks AFTER a filter has got a HU?

SpaceRay — Sat, 11 May 2013 03:57:57 -0400

SpaceRay, Wed, 08 May 2013 17:35:29 -0400
The usage rank is to reward the author for the work on the filter made, and this helps to reach the wanted HU award that is given.

BUT what happens with all the usage ranks received AFTER the filter has got this HU award? ( as there is no more higher lever than "High")

Are all the usage ranks lost and does not count anymore?

Or it is used to keep the High level because if the filter is not used anymore could loose the "high" rank and go back to "average" or perhaps even "low"?

I wanted to suggest also if perhaps could be possible to have a even higher level than "high" for filters that are even more used after the HU award, although without giving any further award.

I mean if would be possible to have a "Very High" level for the filters that are used much after a HU award?

HU = High Usage

GMM, Thu, 09 May 2013 04:10:29 -0400
No ranks are lost: filters that lose their popularity will be eventually relegated to the 'Average' or 'Low' ranks.

SpaceRay, Sat, 11 May 2013 03:57:57 -0400
Thanks for the answer GMM, this is what I have thought that they were for keeping the level of usage rank, but was not sure about it.

Video Tutorial Test

CFandM — Mon, 06 May 2013 15:26:37 -0400

CFandM, Sat, 09 Jun 2007 11:14:32 -0400
I have been working on some video tutorials and finally got one to where it looks decent. But then as you know when you post it on those video sites it gets shrunk down and it loses it luster and quality...So heres a test video..Using the download library
option in FF...Don't make fun of my voice it was a long week.. :D

http://video.google.com/videoplay?doc...pr=goog-sl

Carl, Sat, 09 Jun 2007 11:57:05 -0400
Had look at your tutorial well done for me very informative I've actualy not downloaded that way and had wonder how you multi-selected. What are your other tutorial videos on? Keep them rolling I'm always interested in learning more as I'm sure alot of other people are. It is a shame you lose the gloss as you say, it would be nice to be able to read the writing.

You'll notice I even reframed from from making a joke out of your h-hhmmm voice :) :D

Really good 8)

StevieJ, Sat, 09 Jun 2007 12:55:13 -0400
CF, excellent idea!!! :) I was actually hoping that something like this would be done. I especially look forward to your "advanced" tips and tricks instruction videos.....the "secrets of the FF pros" series ;) :)

jffe, Sat, 09 Jun 2007 14:39:43 -0400
Great idea and all, unfortunately, even at 3/4 screen size, flash videos suck, and ya can't really read enough to teach anyone how to really modify/make filters too well eh. The voice isn't too bad, cut the highs around 10Khz, and boost around 100Hz, or better yet, run it through a pitch shifter -1 octave, and add a goodly amount of reverb for that monsta truck announcer voice, that and sample a Harley or a chainsaw for the background. :D

jffe

CFandM, Sat, 09 Jun 2007 18:44:23 -0400

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Carl wrote: You'll notice I even reframed from from making a joke out of your h-hhmmm voice Smile Big grin

Yea thanks for not making the joke.. :D :D

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Carl wrote: What are your other tutorial videos on? Keep them rolling I'm always interested in learning more as I'm sure alot of other people are. It is a shame you lose the gloss as you say, it would be nice to be able to read the writing.

Yep hopefully I will keep them rolling. Trying to get the basics out of the way first.
There was the downloading one. Then most likely an overveiw type of thing for using the exsisting filters such as the presets and settings to using them with images and such..It seems like I would need to have those also for the people who purchase the basic version and can't edit the filters...But they can also come to the fourms for that info also.
Then the editing of exsisting filters then leads into the putting together filters.
Such as basic techniques to advanced techniques...
I do have an idea or two that I didn't try on that first one..So I will try it on the second one and if that works I most likly update the first one with it also... :) :) :loveff:

CFandM, Sat, 09 Jun 2007 18:53:23 -0400

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StevieJ wrote: CF, excellent idea!!! Smile I was actually hoping that something like this would be done. I especially look forward to your "advanced" tips and tricks instruction videos.....the "secrets of the FF pros" series Wink Smile

Guest apperances.. :?: :D :?: :D
Yep I was kinda hoping also that something like this would be done...Guess I can start it... :D :D

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jffe wrote: monsta truck announcer voice,

heeh Fitler--Fitler---Forge--FOrge--Sunday--Sunday--

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jffe wrote: Great idea and all, unfortunately, even at 3/4 screen size, flash videos suck, and ya can't really read enough to teach anyone how to really modify/make filters too well eh.

Yep flash videos do suck...I hope Adobe is listining..No offense by the way, just hoping the quality of flash video can get better...When its resized....
Yep what I'll have to do is some trickery when making the video..Is zooming and panning with the cursor so when the video is playing it will be close to the action..Then see the whole screen when needed...But we'll see how this goes...:)

Kraellin, Sat, 09 Jun 2007 18:53:45 -0400
what program did you use for the capture?

CFandM, Sat, 09 Jun 2007 19:05:08 -0400

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Kraellin wrote: what program did you use for the capture?

Its a cool little free app called "Camstudio" found here.
http://www.camstudio.org/

Kraellin, Sat, 09 Jun 2007 19:55:46 -0400
ah, thought maybe. have it, but havent installed or used it yet.

StevieJ, Sat, 09 Jun 2007 22:37:27 -0400

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CFandM wrote: Guest apperances..

LOL..... run it live every night like the Tonight Show....."Our next guest this evening, Craig "Kreallin" Waters, renowned Filter Forger, will demonstrate how to construct crystaline pattern filters.....but first, a word from our sponser" :D LOL....

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CFandM wrote: monsta truck announcer voice, heeh Fitler--Fitler---Forge--FOrge--Sunday--Sunday--

LMAO..... :)

CFandM, Wed, 13 Jun 2007 18:16:07 -0400
Weird just checked and the video is no longer up at google..Heres the you tube link.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ToH-xhp43Q

You can watch it full screen..Quality still is not great but theres no squinting..

Carl, Thu, 14 Jun 2007 07:15:35 -0400
It's just like being at the movies now except no ones rolling jaffas down the aisle :D
I just hope you have jaffas or that line is totally meaningless LOL

CFandM, Thu, 14 Jun 2007 20:28:02 -0400
Well I know of jffes but not jaffas..I actually have not gone to the movie theatre in quite a while...A personal boycott if you will...I wait for the DVDs usually..But I did look up jaffas..They sound tasty...

Carl, Fri, 15 Jun 2007 01:24:14 -0400

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CFandM wrote: They sound tasty

yummy ;)

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CFandM wrote: I actually have not gone to the movie theatre in quite a while..

It's probly been 20 years since I've been

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CFandM wrote: A personal boycott if you will

:?: interesting - philosophical ?

Torley, Sat, 23 Jun 2007 11:47:59 -0400
Oh rite on! I'm a general fan and advocate of video tutorials (vidtuts), since good ones give you an excellent sense of "over-your-shoulder" learning. *checks it out*

CFandM, Mon, 25 Jun 2007 16:36:55 -0400

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Torley wrote: Oh rite on! I'm a general fan and advocate of video tutorials (vidtuts), since good ones give you an excellent sense of "over-your-shoulder" learning. checks it out

Yep I do like the video tuts also. Got some more coming had to put them aside for the moment to focus on other things. But I'll be back at it..
Ya "Over the Shoulder" is right. But without the frustration of teaching someone who does not know how to turn on a computer... :)

Redcap, Fri, 13 Jul 2007 18:08:10 -0400
Wonder if we could do a tutorial podcast? :)

CFandM, Sat, 14 Jul 2007 06:51:20 -0400
I don't see why not... :)

CFandM, Mon, 06 May 2013 15:26:37 -0400
Well thought I would bump this thread instead of starting a new one since they are video tutorials of sorts.... ;) :)
There are a couple of images in the Beta Gallery of filters that I have created some tutorials for...These are the links to the videos...

Box Fractal

Geometric Abstract of sorts

Don't forget to click on the gear in the youtube player and select HD it helps as you can see what I am doing.....

GPU rendering?

meyendlesss — Mon, 06 May 2013 00:02:32 -0400

meyendlesss, Wed, 27 May 2009 16:43:55 -0400
Can FF use the GPU for rendering yet?
If so... how...?
If not... when...?
I'm in the market for a new card.
I'll likely go with a GTX275.
Would be really great if FF could utilize that power.

GMM, Thu, 28 May 2009 03:55:52 -0400
Please review this forum thread.

meyendlesss, Thu, 28 May 2009 04:31:13 -0400
Thanks
So it looks like the answer is no...
Well that's too bad.

StevieJ, Thu, 28 May 2009 11:59:22 -0400
Ah, so if you're using any GPU rendering, you want to check out the color differences.....do I have that right???

meyendlesss, Wed, 10 Jun 2009 13:04:03 -0400
Check out Nvidia's CUDA Zone for some interesting stuff...

http://www.nvidia.com/object/cuda_home.html#

xirja, Wed, 01 May 2013 18:44:59 -0400
From:

http://arstechnica.com/information-te...in-kaveri/

"...the inconvenience and inefficiency of mixing between CPU and GPU code, due to the memory copying and pinning that has to take place. HSA eliminates these steps. While this still doesn't make programming the GPU easy—many programmers will have to learn new techniques to take advantage of their massively parallel nature—it certainly makes it easier."

"We asked company representatives if Intel or NVIDIA were going to implement HSA. We're still awaiting an answer."

?

Skybase, Wed, 01 May 2013 23:44:54 -0400
... kinda bumped a 2009 thread here heh.... although I can still add on a bit.

One of the main issues that I've personally observed with running stuff on the GPU is simply that not everybody has the same, uniform specs for it. Meaning depending on your set up, you can either have a smooth running, amazing program or a clunky annoying, and almost unusable program and there's a great disparity of reported performances. I think it's safe to say that most people probably don't have the best specs for GPUs more also on the end that they can't afford one so easily.

So we typically get dazzled by buzzwords and demo videos but the reality is the technology is still in its infancy and not everybody would have full-on access like the demo videos show.

Betis, Thu, 02 May 2013 20:03:03 -0400
Yeah but... any program can run that way, CPU or not, depending on your setup.

In fact FF already runs a lot more slowly for some people with old processors than people with fast new processors and more cores

SpaceRay, Sun, 05 May 2013 18:59:54 -0400

Quote
Skybase One of the main issues that I've personally observed with running stuff on the GPU is simply that not everybody has the same, uniform specs for it.

Of course that this happens with the GPU, and it will obviusly depend on what graphic card you may have, BUT this happens exactly the same with the CPU and in the same way, not everybody have the same uniform render speed on their computer, and will depend on the CPU speed and perfomance they have.

I agree much with Betis too

Quote
Betis Yeah but... any program can run that way, CPU or not, depending on your setup.

Quote
Skybase Meaning depending on your set up, you can either have a smooth running, amazing program or a clunky annoying, and almost unusable program and there's a great disparity of reported performances

Well, I have to maybe disagree with this, because for GPU that is NOT going to be used for 3D Rendering or for really powerful hungry big and complex softwares, you will NOT need a very expensive and new graphic card, and even a very old graphic and mostly cheap (well at least from the last 5 years) will work well and right with a GPU optimized software.

I have a very old Nvidia 9600 GT graphic card that is very low on the Graphics cards benchmarks and really much slower than most of the modern and new graphics cards and all the GPU optimized software I have tried (not 3D rendering software) work very well, fluid and fast, and do not have any problem to run them in REALTIME and work very smooth and fast without any glitch.

For example I have Photoshop with GPU, a few of Photoshop Plugins GPU optimized and enabled hardware accelration, and also Adobe´s Pixel Bender that works very well with my slow GPU and makes everything in realtime, and there is also some other software that are also working with GPU acceleration and I do not have any problem.

Also have tried the DAZ 3D Studio software with GPU preview and works very well and smoothly, so from my experience and point of view you do not need to have a very high quality Graphics card for using GPU optimized software.

FF GPU SETTINGS AND PREVIEW

As it happens in DAZ 3D Studio, you can have the GPU optimized ONLY for the settings and preview and NOT have it for rendering that is done without any GPU rendering acceleration.

What I really would love and like would be that Filter Forge could use the GPU for the adjusting and modifing the settings of a filter in realtime with GPU acceleration, and so it would be much smooth, faster and better to really customize the result you may want, and then I do not care much if the final result render would not be GPU enabled.

Although thinking HOW FF works this would NOT be possible and only a full GPU acceleration would be possible as any preview is already done with the real render engine, so it is always like rendering the final result.

BUT a possible alternative could be to have only a GPU enabled acceleration only available for a 600x600 preview that could be done in realtime and that modifying each setting would be done much faster than is now that you have to wait until the result is shown until testing a new setting, and this again and again.

IF Filter Forge could have GPU acceleration, it would really be much more popular and would sell surely much much more.

xirja, Sun, 05 May 2013 22:55:34 -0400
Right, but the software having to be completely rewritten for GPU processing is the issue I was hoping to address here. Hopefully with AMDs HSA method or something similar, it will be a matter of a few tweaks in the code, rather than a complete exhaustive and painful overhaul. Not being too familiar with these matters I thought it might be a noteworthy update to the initial questions posed.

Skybase, Mon, 06 May 2013 00:02:32 -0400
Conclusion: Probably rewrite the program from scratch to incorporate it. That's the best.

Boy what are we going to do about it now? haha... guess more discussion? Please please threads? lol you name it we've extinguished it all. Your turn FilterForge lol! I don't mind waiting 3 years before you come up with something.

*yawn*

Soon will be 3000 Facebook likers of Filter Forge !!!

SpaceRay — Sun, 05 May 2013 18:28:59 -0400

SpaceRay, Thu, 28 Apr 2011 13:08:22 -0400
I have seen that now there is 2922 in Facebook and I hope that very soon will be more than 3000 !!! and wish that there could be much, much more in the future and than could enjoy, love and use this great Filter Forge !!! :)

SpaceRay, Fri, 29 Apr 2011 22:58:16 -0400
It keeps raising now today there is already 2942, 20 more in only 2 days. :)

I have to say that I do not use Facebook, but as I know that this is a good thing for promotion of companies, so it is good to have as many facebook likers (or friends) as you could have so it becomes more and more popular and known by more people.

TBH-1138, Fri, 06 May 2011 22:13:54 -0400
It doesn't matter until it's over 9000. ;)

jitspoe, Sat, 07 May 2011 02:07:07 -0400
WHAT, 9000?!

SpaceRay, Sat, 07 May 2011 15:04:13 -0400
9000 ??? :?: :D Why over 9000 ? Is this a mystic and special number ? :D

By the way, now is 2976, so only 24 more to reach 3000.

TBH-1138, Sat, 07 May 2011 17:30:12 -0400

Quote
jitspoe wrote: WHAT, 9000?!

THERE'S NO WAY THAT COULD BE RIGHT!!! CAN IT?!

GMM, Mon, 09 May 2011 02:45:38 -0400

Quote
SpaceRay wrote: Is this a mystic and special number ?

SpaceRay, I guess you haven't seen Dragon Ball :D

SpaceRay, Sun, 18 Sep 2011 16:02:00 -0400
Yes, you guess right GMM I have not seen Dragon ball, well I know what it is and have seen some short pieces of some episodes, but really know nothing about dragon ball.

By the way I put again this thread up because the Facebook likers have raisen until 3938 !!! so soon will be 4000 !!!

Ok, it does not matter until 9000 :D but there is now is at least 1000 nearer, only 5000 more to 9000 8)

SpaceRay, Sat, 01 Oct 2011 00:33:45 -0400
CONGRATULATIONS FF !!! There are now 4005 Persons in Facebook that like FF. Great!

I hope that there will be many thousands more in the coming future.

Now there is only 4995 left to reach 9000 :D

Crapadilla, Sun, 02 Oct 2011 04:48:02 -0400
At 9000 FF would be totally over-liked, and we don't want that! :D

SpaceRay, Tue, 13 Dec 2011 05:34:50 -0500

Quote
Crapadilla wrote: At 9000 FF would be totally over-liked, and we don't want that!

we don´t want that ? Why not ? Sorry, Is this a joke that I do not understand as before ?

When reached at 9000 it means that much more people likes FF and so is more popular and better known, and this must be a good thing for FF and I hope that it reaches 18000 and beyond much more.

By the way now is 4372 :D

SpaceRay, Sat, 21 Apr 2012 13:07:21 -0400
In April 2011 there was 3000 FaceBook Likers, now one year after it is reaching already 5000 !!

Congratulations for keep raising the persons that like FF and it is getting more popular, although Crapadilla do not want it to get MORE popular ;) :D

SpaceRay, Sun, 05 May 2013 18:28:59 -0400
As shown in the post above here, in 21st April 2012 was reaching 5000 Facebook Likers, and now one year after there is 11.912 F. Likers, WOW! more than double amount.

I am happy and glad that FF is getting much more popular and known and many more people likes it, altough I am not one of them as I do not have a facebook account.

I think that Crapadilla will not be happy to know this according to his comment above ;)

Now that it has reach to this high amount I wonder about the comment TBH-1138 has made above

Quote
TBH-1138 It doesn't matter until it's over 9000

Well, now it has finally reached and is way over 9000, so does it matter now? ;) :D :D

Advantages and Disadvantages of using the OL and OLIFF Filters Library

SpaceRay — Sun, 05 May 2013 18:14:59 -0400

SpaceRay, Sat, 15 Oct 2011 18:05:25 -0400
I know that there are two ways to download filters from the Filter Forge (FF) Filters Library:

1 - Using the OL (Online Library) which is in the FF website.

2 - Using the OLIFF (Obsolete Library Inside Filter Forge)

I just want to list the Advantages and Disadvantages I have found using the OL and OLIFF Filters Library and which one is better and gives the best experience.

ACTIVATING AND USING OLIFF

By default is NOT activated, and you have to go to inside FF to:

Tools --> Options ---> Online and choose "Library browser obsolete" and click OK

Then to be able to enter to this FF Browser you go to the main window of FF and look in the top right corner wh ere is put "Download more filters" and when cliking on this it will appear.

Then if what you need to download is very new filter, you have to configure it to see "new filters first" so it appears in the first positions.

Here you have to choose all the filters you want and then click on "download" button on the bottom right corner.

ADVANTAGES OF OLIFF vs DISADVANTAGES OF OL

1 - If you use the 'OLIFF' method of downloading , you can see all the filters you have downloaded already as they will have a small 'v' in bottom right corner of the thumbnail preview. In the OL there is no way to see which ones you have downloaded already and this is a bad thing.

2 - IN OLIFF you can have filters thumbnails preview shown in a big screen with rows of thumbnails of the filters, that contains much more previews than in the OL and fills all your available screen space, which is very good. The size of the thumbnails are the same in both.

3 - You have the option to HIDE all the filters that you have already downloaded so you are shown ONLY those filter that you still do not have downloaded to FF and be able to discover new filter gems. In OL you can´t do it.

4 - The preset thumbnails preview are much bigger in OLIFF than in OL.

5 - The best and probably most useful is the ability to Mass or Batch download a group of choosen filters instead of downloading one by one as in the OL, which saves a lot of time and is much easier to download and select the filters you want. In OL you must search and open the filter page for each one and download one by one going to each one of the filters pages.

ADVANTAGES OF OL vs DISADVANTAGES OF OLIFF

1 - In the OL you have preview image thumbnails for all the presets available of that filter and in OLIFF you have only one preview window wh ere is shown all, and the presets are only shown as numbers without any kind of preview image and have to click on each one to see them (or hit the space bar on keyboard)

2 - The preset thumbnails in the OL are already rendered and instantly available, in the OLIFF all the presets previews MUST be rendered in the moment you want to see them and takes some time to do it, so is much slower to preview that in OL.

3 - The preview image of the filter is MUCH BIGGER and MORE DETAILED in the OL and you can see much better what does the filter look like and the effect it makes, because in the OMIF the preview image of the filter is MUCH SMALLER.

4 - The large preview of filter in OL is instant and already rendered and in the OLIFF the much smaller preview must be rendered each time is choosen and is much slower compared to the instant website preview, even in FF 3.0.

5 - In the online FF Filters Library you can search by keywors, filter by theme and topics and select how to view the filters, and in the included "obsolete" library inside FF you can´t do it in the same way, and when going to search it does not work so well, and most of the times, at least for me it does not work search in OLIFF.

6 - In the OL you can see the Filters list of FEATURED, RECENT, POPULAR and so you chose how to see the filters, and in OMIF there is NONE of these choices. Well is supossed to be available a kind of "popular" or "recent" built in OLIFF but it does not work, at least for me. Both OL and OMIF have ALL FILTERS BY CATEGORY menu to choose.

7 - The OL Browser can use the Zoom feature to enlarge the previews and preset thumbnails and in OLIFF has fixed size always.

8 - In the website filter page OL you can see the filter controls list, in OLIFF you can´t because what is included is only the "about" information included inside the filter.

9 - OL is loaded instantly, just the time it takes to load the page of the file, the OLIFF takes much more time to load, and I agree that is because it has much more information to load.

Quote
ONE BIG AND IMPORTANT QUESTION

Wouldn´t be MUCH better that the OLIFF could have all the preset and filter previews already rendered and instant available as in OL?

Perhaps you could say that this would make Filter Forge software bigger, as they should be included inside FF, but this is not all true, because after installing FF in your computer the OLIFF could connect to the FF website and download all the preset and preview of all the filters and keep them inside the FF folder to use them and it would not take much as I think that they are very small files.

IF OLIFF could have instant previews and preset as it happens in OL, without having to render them, it woud be much better and much faster

Also if the preview window of OLIFF could be resizable or fixed bigger and could fit the big filter main preview of each filter as seen in OL

SpaceRay, Wed, 01 Feb 2012 23:51:56 -0500
Hello, I have updated and added some more data, especifically the:

ACTIVATING AND USING OLIFF

It has been good that nobody answered here so I have been able to fix and update the above post, because I forgot on HOW TO USE OLIFF

I do not like at all that you CAN´T modify any previous OF YOUR OWN if anybody have already posted after, in others forum you can always modify your own posts.

SpaceRay, Sun, 07 Oct 2012 17:29:55 -0400
In the first post I have told how to activate and be able to use the Filter Forge Browser BUT I want to show it now graphically with a screenshot

SpaceRay, Sun, 07 Oct 2012 17:34:04 -0400
And then after this, clicking OK will close the options windows and now you only have to go and click on the "Download more filters..." button

I am glad that this is still included in FF 4.0 and is available in the same way although it keeps being the same as before.

SpaceRay, Wed, 27 Feb 2013 15:53:42 -0500
I hope and wish that the OLIFF (Obsolete Library Inside Filter Forge) will still be available in FF 4.0 final version as it is already now in FF 4.0 Beta 1, as from my point of view is very useful and good to have and not "obsolete" and not needed.

And even if the FF 4.0 library will be made all new and much better I think that this will continue to be useful and not be replaced by the new filter manager, as they are different things.

Burt, Wed, 27 Feb 2013 17:45:43 -0500
Thanks for dissecting and explaining this SpaceRay.

SpaceRay, Sun, 05 May 2013 18:14:59 -0400

Quote
Burt Thanks for dissecting and explaining this SpaceRay.

Thanks to you for having found this useful and hope it could help you, good to know and glad for having done it.

And it seems that in FF 4.0 will not change and will be the same (at least in FF 4.0 beta 2), so this will continue being useful and the same in this new forthcoming version.

Thank for all the effort getting rid of Bad allocation error

ddaydreams — Sun, 05 May 2013 18:05:17 -0400

ddaydreams, Fri, 03 May 2013 15:57:41 -0400
I can't say enough how grateful I am that I'm not seeing the Bad allocation errors anymore. Keep up the great work.

SpaceRay, Sun, 05 May 2013 18:05:17 -0400
Yes, is true that now the bad allocation is much more often missing and almost does not appear, although sometimes it still happens, but as said really much, much more less often, and I also want to give thanks for this and having been able to solve it at least in this way, I mean it has not been totally eliminated but as it is now is much more usable and much better working than before.

Keep up the good work and hope and wish that it could be totally eliminated forever.

Is FF Slow ? Get a new Dual Socket 16 cores/32 Threads Intel CPU

SpaceRay — Sun, 05 May 2013 18:01:13 -0400

SpaceRay, Fri, 20 Apr 2012 22:55:19 -0400
Filter Forge is SLOW when you use it on higher resolutions of 2000 x 2000 and will take MANY minutes to get the result done, and much more slower from 5000x5000 and reach up to 40 or 50 minutes or more.

And not only the final result, the preview on many filters on reduced 600x600 view is ALSO SLOW

As from the news available until now, FF Inc. will not improve the render engine speed and will not add GPU support, so it seems that future version will have the same speed as FF 3.0.

So the only solution that is really possible is to upgrade the CPU and make it faster as FF is optimized to use the most of the CPU cores available and works well with this. RAM and GPU is not important.

Of course that this is not a cheap upgrade or solution, but really will be the ONLY way to speed up Filter Forge as FF Inc. will not do it for us.

ENTER THE NEW DUAL SOCKET MOTHERBOARDS WITH 16 CORES/32 THREADS INTEL CPUS -

I have seen some news that at the end of April 2012 Intel will release a whole new bunch of CPU chip processors that will change the market and lower the prices.

Also the trend until now has been to add multiple cores to the CPU to make it faster, BUT it seems that this is not enough for many users that want even faster computers, so it seems that since beginning of 2012 the Dual Socket Motherboard have begun to be more available to domestic customers and not only for high end business, and now in April/May 2012 will appear more.

I have a Intel i7 2600k Quad Core/8 threads and this is not enough at all for making Filtter Forge work fast or in a good usable way. And I have no hope from the news available for the future that FF Inc. will make something about it.

SO Imaging having QUADRUPLE Power of a i7 2600k CPU chip, it would make Filter Forge 4 times faster !!! (This is true to according some benchmarks I have seen)

SO 40 MINUTES WAITING FOR THE RESULT WILL BE REDUCED TO 10 MINUTES !!!

AND THE PREVIEWS AND CHANGE ON THE SETTINGS OF FILTERS COULD BE PROBABLY DONE IN REALTIME OR A VERY FEW SECONDS.

And this would be possible with FF 3.0 NOW

THE BAD NEWS

Now is time for reality check, as the bad news is that buying a new dual socket motherboard LGA 2011 with two Octocores CPU will cost about 2000$ / 2300$ :( :cry: :cry:
Probably this price could be lower in May/June 2012.

Of course that this is not at all affordable for most of us, BUT if you are using Filter Forge for work and are earning money with it and so you are getting profit from this it would be perhaps a good idea to invest in this new motherboard and CPU combo to make FF really much faster NOW and do not keep dreaming and waiting that FF Inc. will sometime in the future could probably make a faster and optimized version.

DREAMING IS FREE

From the news that are until now from FF Inc. there is no point or hope to keep dreaming and wishing that FF inc. will possibly make something to make FF faster

So now I will stop my dream and wish that FF improves and optimizes FF and will change and continue dreaming on upgrading my computer to this BEAST computer above said

AND do not keep complaining and requesting FF Inc. uselessly for something that FF Inc. can´t do according to the way FF is built and that needs a whole overhaul and rebuilding and as said by FF Inc. this is TOO MUCH WORK.

Dreaming is free :D

AMD 8 CORES = INTEL QUAD CORE

If anyone think that AMD has already some 8 Cores chips available much cheaper, PLEASE, look at what PERFOMANCE AND SPEED they really give and NOT on the number of cores, because on lots of benchmarks the AMD 8100 Series that have 8 Cores is nearly equal (and even sometimes lower) than a Intel i7 Quad Core 2600K.

SpaceRay, Sat, 21 Apr 2012 15:53:42 -0400
I will see if there would be good in value for money with near close perfomance to use the new 6 core Intel Sandy Bridge E chips that are much cheaper than this 8 core chips and both have the same LGA 2011 sockets and chipset and use the same new dual socket motherboards

will put some links to this above as news so you can see them.

SpaceRay, Sun, 22 Apr 2012 03:03:48 -0400
Meanwhile I find more information I leave this links here

Dual socket LGA 2011 motherboard (this is only one of the many available now or soon)

http://www.ocaholic.ch/xoops/html/mod...ng=english

Intel launches long-awaited 8-core Xeon processor E5-2600 product family

http://slideshow.techworld.com/334280...ct-family/

Preview of the Sandy Bridge E 6 core chip

Intel Core i7 3960X (Sandy Bridge E) Review

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5091/in...-end-alive

AND THE MOST IMPORTANT PART IS THE REAL PERFOMANCE AND BENCHMARKS

http://www.ocaholic.ch/xoops/html/mod...537&page=2

THE BENCHMARK IS FOR ONE CPU IN MULTICORE SUPPORT

Intel Xeon E5-2600 3.0 GHz_________________22 sec______8 cores + 8 virtual cores HT

Intel Core i7 3930K 3.20 GHz DDR3-1600_____25 sec______6 cores + 6 virtual cores HT

Intel Core i7 2600K 3.40 GHz DDR3-1333_____37 sec______4 cores + 4 virtual cores HT

AMD FX-8150 3.6 GHz DDR3-1600__________41 sec______8 Cores

Here you can see that the AMD 8 cores is even slower than the intel quad core and nearly half the speed of the Intel 8 core.

Also is interesting that the new 6 core is not much away and better than the 8 core (they have different technologies so really can´t be compared much) chip, and what is very important about this is that the i7 3930K 6 core is much cheaper.

I will put more information about this later.

SpaceRay, Mon, 23 Apr 2012 02:23:51 -0400
We will have to wait until the official announcement from Intel that is supossed to be done on the 29 of April 2012 to know really what will happen, and what will be the real prices of the new chips and if they will lower the prices of other previous chips like the ones above that are already available.

I have seen also that it would be much better option to but a dual socket motherboard LGA 2011 with two Intel Core i7 3930K 3.20 as this would be about 1200$/1400$ instead of the 2000$/2300$ of the octacore Xeon chips and from the benchmarks that I have seen there is no point to pay nearly 1000$ more for a LITTLE more speed.

SpaceRay, Thu, 26 Apr 2012 23:36:25 -0400
Intel have released already the new Ivy Bridge Chips BUT for now they are ONLY QUAD CORES :( and the announced 6,8 and 10 cores will come later in summer or auttum this year, and is possible that the 10 cores will arrives for next year.

And also the news of reducing prices is only applied by now to quad cores chips and not to the 6 or 8 cores :(

The speed increase from the Sandy Bridge 2700K chips is between 2 and 8% depending on the application so there is no point at all to upgrade to this new chips, is not worth in any way.

Here is the FULL review with some benchmarks to show the speed difference if you are interested

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/i...,3181.html

This is the specific page for Professional graphic applications benchmarks

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/c...133-7.html

SpaceRay, Mon, 30 Apr 2012 05:25:26 -0400
Here is a explanation of why the new Intel Ivy Bridge are STILL only quad cores.

Why Ivy Bridge Is Still Quad-Core

Mainly for marketing as for higher cores they want to sell the new Sandy Bridge E with 6 cores.

The Ivy Bridge E with 6 cores seems to be released in 6 or 8 months from now, although this is ONLY a rumour because there is no confirmation that this is true, could be earlier or later.

Here is another benchmark comparison of quad cores chips including the new 3770K

SpaceRay, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 03:57:45 -0400
I have been looking to see HOW MUCH one of this new dual CPU computers can cost and regretably they are MORE EXPENSIVE than I thought or wished

Dual Socket LGA 2011 CPU are about 525€ (about 640$) !!

Hexacore LGA 2011 CPU Intel Core i7-3930K 3.2 Ghz - LGA 2011 - another 530€ (about 650$) each one

So it would be a minimum of 1940$ for ONLY the motherboard and the CPU chips :( :( to get a 24 cores computer (6 + 6HT x 2 = 24)

And there is the option of choosing the much the half price Quad Core CPU Intel Core i7-3820 3.6Ghz - Socket 2011 that cost about 260€ (about 320$)

So it would be 1280$ instead to have a 16 cores computer (4 + 4HT x 2 = 16)

But this would probably ONLY make Filter Forge only double faster than a single i7 2700k cpu chip and would not be worth to spend this great amount of money to get only the double speed.

So regretably this is a very expensive way to make FF 3.0 faster and I can´t afford to pay for this so I have to keep having spider webs around my arms waiting until FF renders the results of many of the filters at high resolution

uberzev, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 04:02:47 -0400
See, here I'm now sitting by myself, uh, er, talking to myself. That's, that's chaos theory.

Carl, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 04:29:21 -0400
LOL you have a cruel streak, I bet you pulled wings of flies as a kid ;)

uberzev, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 05:07:06 -0400
That's a Jurassic Park quote. I'm not cruel. :evil:

SpaceRay, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 05:14:27 -0400
I do not think this is a cruel comment. I do not understand why you are saying this in this thread, but I do not think that it could be a bad thing, anyway I do not care about it.

I have wrote this thread as a POSSIBLE AND REAL alternative to making FF 3.0 faster NOW and without waiting for FF 4.0, although I done it without knowing how much really could cost buying this new computer, so now I know that this is only affordable and possible for someone that uses FF for business AND has enough money to spend on this and finds it really worthy to upgrade the computer to make FF faster and so be able to make works faster and could earn more money to justify upgrading the computer.

ALSO I think that this will be the ONLY real way to make FF 4.0 faster, because unless Vladimir confirms that FF 4.0 will have any kind of speed optimization I think it will have the same render engine and speed of FF 3.0

uberzev, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 05:20:53 -0400
If I had some money I might have paid attention to what you posted. SpaceRay. :)

I'm just bored and messing around. The Forums are way too quiet these days.

And Vlad has been ignoring my annoying emails.... :(

Carl, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 05:32:46 -0400
Sr you never realize when Ubervez is taking the piss out of you, so be it, I really have better ways to spend my time

SpaceRay, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 05:34:03 -0400

Quote
Uberzev wrote: If I had some money I might have paid attention to what you posted.

Wel I am in the same situation like you, I also do not have money and do not have a work from the one I could earn money, so this was just a possible dream I could have and find a way to get some money to change the computer, but would never be able to spend this amount on a new computer :(

Quote
Uberzev wrote: And Vlad has been ignoring my annoying emails....

Does really Vlad or any other from FF Inc. answer emails that are not related to FF support or bug fixes ???? :?:

I have sent already some emails about some suggestions and features requests and never got any answer

Skybase, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 07:13:56 -0400
lol this is why I like working with what I have.

Sometimes... can't expect people to return you stuff. You just have to hope the people on the other side to be thankful about the little suggestions and a comfortable sign that there are users out there who love the software they make. :p You just have to be like "Oh they must be busy working on the new version of FilterForge." and just sit and wait.

I mena :p I'm PRETTY BORED TOO YOU KNOW. I'm just messing around on this forum more often lately.

SpaceRay, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 09:54:37 -0400
Sorry for boring you Skybase, but you are not forced to read all the I write if you know already what is about and you do not like it ;) :D

Anyway, Finally Vladimir has confirmed that FF 4.0 will NOT have any kind of speed optimization so I will not continue asking them about this in the same way as I have been doing.

And really this Thread suggestion and idea seems that is the ONLY way that will be possible to make FF 3.0 or FF 4.0 faster, BUT a really very expensive way. :(

SpaceRay, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 10:13:42 -0400
I forgot to say before that in the title I have put to buy the new 8 cores Intel chips that are put in the title to be able to get a 32 cores computer (8 + 8 x 2 = 32)

This costs about 1200$ EACH one !!!

and so this 32 cores computer costs 3040$!!!! :( :cry: :cry:

1200 + 1200 + 640 = 3040

And this is ONLY the motherboard and 2 CPU chips

Morgantao, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 14:40:14 -0400
SpaceRay, if you dream, why not dream BIG?
In my dreams, I have a cray supercomputer that laughs at the puny little programs like FF, and prefers to unfold proteins, crack all the encripted data on the internet, make super accurate models of the weather for the next 100 years, and unlock the secrets of the universe before the big bang. All at once. ;)

Skybase, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 19:14:13 -0400
Probably have some Higgs Bosons dancing on that computer right now. Probably makes it go faster. You know, just for FilterForge.

And in all honesty, you'd rather build a computer towards a situation and not towards a software unless you're convinced this would help you which is OK. This computer would be WAY too good for 3D and most things 3D (and a portion of 2D) go obsolete really quickly. There's almost no point in getting all of that since you'd be dealing with new hardware in 2 years to come. You wanna make a computer that's more adaptive to the situation rather than just buying everything fast you can at the time.

uberzev, Mon, 16 Jul 2012 19:43:29 -0400

Quote
Sr you never realize when Ubervez is taking the piss out of you, so be it, I really have better ways to spend my time

Tis true, I make fun of SR a lot.

But at the same time I seem to be the one helping him out the most.

So there's a balance. :D

Carl, Tue, 17 Jul 2012 03:11:48 -0400

Quote
SpaceRay wrote: I do not understand

That was the point SR, but if your happy to be ridiculed, igorance is bliss as the saying goes

Quote
uberzev wrote: But at the same time I seem to be the one helping him out the most. So there's a balance.

Fair enough, he doesn't mind so go for it :D

SpaceRay, Thu, 22 Nov 2012 21:39:47 -0500
There is news about this topic and there are some new prices for the low level of the new Xeon Processors

Intel Xeon E-2620 2 Ghz 6 cores for 415-450$ each one

And the Dual motherboard (ASUS) needed would cost 450-500$

So a 12 core (24 threads) 2 Ghz computer would cost less than 1500$ (well only the cpu and motherboard)

Obviously this is not the greatest and fastest computer because this is the most lowest version of the Xeon processors and with a low 2Ghz, BUT 2 Xeon of this is much faster than a single Quad Core and even Six core even when overclocked at 4Ghz

THE MAIN PROBLEM WITH THIS IS THE SOFTWARE

To be able to get real benefit from this Dual CPU the software must have been programmed and been optimized to be able to use this 12 cores in the best possible way as this is very important because normal and usual standard software are not prepared for multi core computers.

FILTER FORGE IS SLOWER WITH 12 CORES THAN WITH 4 CORES?

I have just seen a very curious thing that happened when making a render test speed to compare some speed results

And is a great surprise to see that a 12 core computer is SLOWER than a Quad Core computer, although there is not enough information and not enough test done to confirm it and should be investigated more, but

Could this be true and the title of this thread be wrong?

Please, see this other thread for more information

Please, anyone have Mac Pro 12 cores to make a filter forge benchmark?

SpaceRay, Fri, 23 Nov 2012 14:51:11 -0500
I have been searching comparisons, benchmarks and tests to see if a simple one 6 core chip Intel i7 3930K 3.2Ghz overclocked to 4 GHz could be also good to be near the perfomance of the two Xeon E-2620 at 2GHz.

Although the i7 3930K cost around 500$ you have only to buy ONE, and also the motherboard cost is much cheaper at nearly half price of the one needed for the dual Xeon, and the case can be also anyone compared to the expensive EEB needed for the Dual CHIP motherboard for desktop use as a workstation.

As I have seen is NOT so much important HOW many cores it has, is important the final perfomance and efficiency result, and having more cores does not been it is much better.

Tysus, Thu, 04 Apr 2013 15:07:06 -0400
Hey SpaceRay

I don't mean to be a downer, but I currently own a 12-core (hyper threaded) machine and can tell you that FF is defiantly not optimized for dual processors. In fact, I'd go so far to say that it doesn't support hyper-threading all that well either.

For example, my kids have a Core i5 2500 (overlocked to 4.5GHz), which does not support hyper-threading, but renders FF filters 2-3 times faster than my 12-core 3.2GHz machine. This leads me to believe that FF takes advantage of multiple cores, but not multiple processors or even hyper-threading.

I've run the same tests on FF version 3.0, and the beta for 4.

If you really want to improve performance, I'd recommend something like the Intel Core i7-3930K. When over-clocked it will deliver raw horsepower, and FF will defiantly recognize the additional 2 cores.

SpaceRay, Thu, 04 Apr 2013 15:24:18 -0400

Quote
Tysus I don't mean to be a downer, but I currently own a 12-core (hyper threaded) machine and can tell you that FF is defiantly not optimized for dual processors. In fact, I'd go so far to say that it doesn't support hyper-threading all that well either.

Please, What 12 cores do you have ?

If you say that you have a dual processor with 12 cores, does it mean that each processor has 6 cores and then two would have 12, and with hypertreading would have 24 cores?

Which processors are they?

Also it could be true that Filter Forge as you say is not optimized for dual processors, as I have seen in other information I have found that the software must be made specifically for dual and multicore processors and there are many that are only optimized for just one cpu and not two.

Quote
Tysus For example, my kids have a Core i5 2500 (overlocked to 4.5GHz), which does not support hyper-threading, but renders FF filters 2-3 times faster than my 12-core 3.2GHz machine. This leads me to believe that FF takes advantage of multiple cores, but not multiple processors or even hyper-threading.

:eek:
:eek:
:eek: So do you mean that a Core i5 2500 (overclocked to 4.5Ghz) is 2-3 times faster than a Core i7 2700 (overclocked at 4.5Ghz) ???? :eek: :eek:

This could be true and solve the mistery of Totte that gets no benefit from his dual processor computer.

very good information, and thanks to this I think that now would be good to make some tests with just 1 cpu and no multicore and without any hyperthreading, and then with multicore, and then another test with full multicore and hyperthreading, and finally the same with dual processors with also these 3 options.

I can make the test of the first 3 but can´t make the dual processor test.

found this --> Does disabling Hyper-Threading increase performance?

And here is a video to show how to disable the Hyper-Threading, it is done inside the BIOS in the CPU properties.

Also have just quickly tested how FF uses the CPU and it uses all the 8 cores of a quad core + HT as shown here below AND when using FF there is nothing else at the same time.

Tysus, Sat, 06 Apr 2013 12:05:18 -0400
My mistake, my computer multiprocessor machine runs at 3.3GHz - not 3.2GHz.

The exact machine is 2010 MacPro
The machine has 2 x Intel Xeon X5680 Westmere 3.33GHz (6-cores each) processors for a total of 12 cores (24 hyper threaded).

Theoretically this system should run circles around my Core i5, but this isn't the case. The over-clocked Core i5 outperforms in every FF filter I tested - by a long shot.

This isn't the case when I do renders with Cinema4D and/or After Effects; the Mac Pro destroys the Core i5 in terms of rendering speed.

I hope that helped...

SpaceRay, Mon, 08 Apr 2013 04:08:45 -0400
Thanks very much for the additional information, good to know and was very helpful to have another opinion of a user of dual processor like the one Totte also own.

So you are having one of the very good MacPro dual processors, although is expensive to have, and if you want a similat thing in Windows PC is even more expensive. :(

Quote
Tysus Theoretically this system should run circles around my Core i5, but this isn't the case. The over-clocked Core i5 outperforms in every FF filter I tested - by a long shot. This isn't the case when I do renders with Cinema4D and/or After Effects; the Mac Pro destroys the Core i5 in terms of rendering speed.

YES, theoretically your great double processor computer should be surely much better than an overclocked Core i5 and should outperform it in everything as it happens with the other software you have tried it, but seems that there is some problem with Filter Forge with Dual processors and perhaps also multicore, as I have tested myself and you also the renders are NOT faster.

So the title of this thread is wrong

Thanks again

Vladimir Golovin, Wed, 10 Apr 2013 05:02:33 -0400

Quote
For example, my kids have a Core i5 2500 (overlocked to 4.5GHz), which does not support hyper-threading, but renders FF filters 2-3 times faster than my 12-core 3.2GHz machine. This leads me to believe that FF takes advantage of multiple cores, but not multiple processors or even hyper-threading.

FF treats separate processors, physical cores and hyperthreading cores the same way -- it does not distinguish between them.

Burt, Mon, 15 Apr 2013 20:21:37 -0400
Well the next speed upgrade I would like to try (after a new computer as my desktop is 12 years old) would be a solid state drive or something like this http://ocz.com/consumer/synapse-sata-3-ssd

SpaceRay, Sun, 05 May 2013 18:01:13 -0400

Quote
Burt Well the next speed upgrade I would like to try (after a new computer as my desktop is 12 years old) would be a solid state drive

WOW, you have a 12 years old computer? then I think that a new SSD (solid state drive) Drive would be not be possible to be used in your computer, at least in the right and most useful way as your chipset will not have USB 3.0 that is needed for these to work, although you could buy an external USB 3.0 card to use it with the SSD drive, although I think that most of the USB 3.0 PCI internal cards are for PCI Express and not the old PCI that you may have, altough there could be perhaps a USB 3.0 for the old PCI, but do not think it would work as it would be slow PCI bus for the high amount of data.

FF will NOT get any speed increase when using a SSD drive at least when using filters and renderings, what gets faster in FF using a SSD drive is when loading the software or plugin and when loading the filter list that this is done much quicker than in a normal and old hard drive, more specially when you may have many thousands of filters.

FF Question re filters and downloads...

EA6B — Sun, 05 May 2013 17:20:13 -0400

EA6B, Sun, 05 May 2013 12:23:40 -0400
I just downloaded the program yesterday, in anticipation of purchasing. If I want to use a filter, I know to click on it and use it in PS.

What I want to know is whether the filter is downloaded and stored w/the program or whether I have to go online every time I want to use the same filter again?

Thanks. :?:
E

CFandM, Sun, 05 May 2013 13:43:41 -0400
Yep when you download a filter it is stored locally on your hard drive so no need to download it again...

EA6B, Sun, 05 May 2013 14:21:28 -0400
Thank You!

SpaceRay, Sun, 05 May 2013 17:20:13 -0400
As said by CFandM, when you install Filter Forge for the first time is created a new folder to store on your computer all the filters that you want to download fr om the library and as said you only need to download it just once and it will appear always after in your filter list, unless you uninstall Filter Forge.

Also when you install a new version of Filter Forge you have the option to import and copy your own existing filter library to the new version so you do not have to download them again.

To know WHERE does all these filters you download are located in your computer, please see this other thread

Where are the downloaded Filter Forge filters located physically?

Also have to say that would be a good idea to make a backup of the filters that you have already downloaded, because if something bad (wish it does not happen) would happens to your computer and you loose the data, you would have to reinstall your Filter Forge and download again all the filters unless you have a backup copy saved in another place outside of your computer.

Guide to how to backup your FF filters library from your hard drive

It would be very good if there could be a direct and easy option already available in FF 4.0 but there is no news about this, it would be good that you did not have to go to the filters folder to make a copy, and be directly made by the Filter Forge software.

TWO WAYS TO DOWNLOAD FILTERS FROM THE LIBRARY

Also as you are new, I want to say that there are TWO different ways to download filters into Filter Forge

Please see this other thread

Advantages and Disadvantages of using the OL and OLIFF Filters Library

Quote
I know that there are two ways to download filters from the Filter Forge (FF) Filters Library: 1 - Using the OL (Online Library) which is in the FF website. 2 - Using the OLIFF (Obsolete Library Inside Filter Forge)

Concerning forum spam

GMM — Sun, 05 May 2013 17:06:56 -0400

GMM, Wed, 06 Jan 2010 04:44:53 -0500
As more spammers start to post on the forums I would appreciate if you:

- do not alert the support team using the Contact tab — this will just make the chain to me longer;
- do alert me here, in this thread.

Thanks for helping us keep the forums clean :)

CFandM, Wed, 06 Jan 2010 17:19:16 -0500
Thanks for the thread GMM...To bad there needs to be one...Oh Well! :)
At least the clean-up will be tidy.. :)

Kraellin, Wed, 06 Jan 2010 21:35:32 -0500
if i spam gmm's thread on forum spam, do you think he'll remove the thread? ;) :D

KGtheway2B, Sat, 09 Jan 2010 15:00:29 -0500
I noticed this:

http://www.filterforge.com/wiki/index...nstruction

It seems the bots are editing the wiki now too.

Indigo Ray, Sat, 09 Jan 2010 15:48:54 -0500

Quote
KGtheway2B wrote: I noticed this:

Don't worry, Crapa's original article is still there.

Crapadilla, Mon, 11 Jan 2010 02:15:27 -0500
Still, its pretty annoying, don't you think?

Maybe some tighter security measures should be put in place, like disallowing new accounts with less than N posts to edit the wiki.

CFandM, Fri, 05 Feb 2010 10:17:12 -0500

Quote
GMM wrote: As more spammers start to post on the forums I would appreciate if you: - do not alert the support team using the Contact tab — this will just make the chain to me longer; - do alert me here, in this thread. Thanks for helping us keep the forums clean Smile

Another spammer hiding as a poster.. ;) :)
http://www.filterforge.com/forum/read...5&TID=7037

Same Spammer
http://www.filterforge.com/forum/read...6#postform

StevieJ, Mon, 08 Feb 2010 02:08:38 -0500
***cough*** :D

http://www.filterforge.com/forum/read...5&TID=6994

Quote
Crapadilla wrote: Maybe some tighter security measures should be put in place, like disallowing new accounts with less than N posts to edit the wiki.

Very good idea.... :!:

GMM, Mon, 08 Feb 2010 02:56:42 -0500

Quote
StevieJ wrote: *cough* Big grin

The link has been removed. Personally I don't think it's a good idea to reply to a spam post, like people do in that thread.

StevieJ, Mon, 08 Feb 2010 02:58:23 -0500
Sorry.....knee-jerk reaction.... ;) :D

Vladimir Golovin, Mon, 08 Feb 2010 04:38:46 -0500

Quote
Crapadilla wrote: Maybe some tighter security measures should be put in place, like disallowing new accounts with less than N posts to edit the wiki.

That would require a full-blown karma system, which is definitely a good idea but too much work at the moment.

Totte, Thu, 18 Feb 2010 00:26:30 -0500
http://www.filterforge.com/forum/read...0&TID=7070

Spampost

GMM, Thu, 18 Feb 2010 03:30:10 -0500
Thank you, post removed.

CFandM, Sun, 21 Oct 2012 09:56:19 -0400
Even more spam....They will never learn and are not very good at spamming...
http://www.filterforge.com/forum/read...sage114916
http://www.filterforge.com/forum/read...sage114917

SpaceRay, Mon, 29 Oct 2012 04:27:39 -0400
EVEN MORE SPAM appeared now

demanded to locate a terrific great deal.

very likely as a result of amending an ongoing Expense.

I found this easily as the title is NOT really very understandable and is weird and not much related to this forum :D

Sharandra, Sat, 08 Dec 2012 07:37:12 -0500
More spam

Totte, Sat, 08 Dec 2012 12:53:51 -0500
Spam:http://www.filterforge.com/forum/read...sage115628

lipebianc, Thu, 13 Dec 2012 02:46:55 -0500
SPAM:

1)http://www.filterforge.com/forum/read...sage115788

2)http://www.filterforge.com/forum/read...sage115786

Sharandra, Sun, 23 Dec 2012 08:25:25 -0500
Spammer spamming filter comments now: iusdfuysdf

Ammonite by Sjeiti

AlienMetal1 by John Michaud

Sunburst by Vladimir Golovin

Embroidered Knits by ahimsa

SpaceRay, Mon, 24 Dec 2012 03:57:06 -0500
There is 10 TEN more spam threads or posts from the user phoebe posted just now on the 24 of december

Sharandra, Wed, 13 Feb 2013 18:07:08 -0500
Not directly spam, but that user flooding the forum with empty comment posts gets a bit annoying... o.O

CFandM, Sun, 05 May 2013 08:28:38 -0400
What is this the legal fourm :?: ;)
More Spam....SPAMMER

SpaceRay, Sun, 05 May 2013 17:06:56 -0400
I agree with you CFandM, this post and thread does not seem to have any connection and does not make any sense in this forum.

Pausing a render ?

ddaydreams — Fri, 03 May 2013 10:41:48 -0400

ddaydreams, Fri, 03 May 2013 10:38:35 -0400
Can ff pause and resume a render ?

Skybase, Fri, 03 May 2013 10:41:48 -0400
Can't really pause renders in FilterForge unfortunately... but +1 for a feature request :)

filter for ores, gems etc on a transparent background

trond — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 16:01:16 -0400

trond, Sat, 27 Apr 2013 14:14:10 -0400
Hello, i am making a game where you will find ores to mine. There are alot of awesome filters here to create awesome ores with, but there is one problem. I need to render only the ore itself with a transparent background. I plan on putting the ores on a flat plane and apply DX11 tesselation on it so make it into a 3D shape, but for this to work its important that only the gem itself is rendered, no dirt/rock/other details.

Do any1 know a good filter for this, or is there a way to change an existing filter to do this? I have been looking around for ages, and think its time to ask for help :)

CFandM, Sun, 28 Apr 2013 11:57:55 -0400
There is this thread that I responded to some time ago....You can also post the link to the filter in question or ask/email the original filter author..

Question re Transparency in Png/Filter Forge

CorvusCroax, Tue, 30 Apr 2013 16:01:16 -0400
Hi Trond,

It's usually fairly trivial to create a filter with transparency. It's really not hard to create a filter which separates out one type of part.

Just open up the filter, start poking around, and there is probably something which could function as an alpha for that part; put it all on a switch and you're good to go. Sometimes you might have to subtract thing A against thing B, or put it on a threshold, but it's all pretty minor.

Best, -CCX

Just getting started

Spiritman — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 20:12:19 -0400

Spiritman, Thu, 11 Apr 2013 23:45:34 -0400
Is there a way to return to the settings that came with a filter?

I'm using Sketchy Paint and after moving some sliders in settings I'd like to return to the default but if you go to the presets Tab and then back to the sliders, they remain unchanged...even if the Default preset gave the original results, one cannot see what they are.....

Spiritman, Fri, 12 Apr 2013 00:12:23 -0400
I figured it out...the double click changes the sliders....sorry for the bother

Burt, Mon, 15 Apr 2013 20:12:19 -0400
No bother. Looking forward to seeing what you come up with. You have some beautiful photography on your web site.

Half a month with no new filters

ddaydreams — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 01:56:12 -0400

ddaydreams, Wed, 03 Apr 2013 10:20:04 -0400
I noticed the last filter submitted was last month on the 19th. Is the filter submission Que broken?

GMM, Wed, 03 Apr 2013 10:24:56 -0400
We're performing some maintenance works on the library filters. Expect the new/updated filters to be listed by the end of this week.

ddaydreams, Wed, 03 Apr 2013 10:28:35 -0400
Thanks for the new filters ETA :)

voldemort, Thu, 04 Apr 2013 13:17:25 -0400
Does this mean we will need to resubmit our filters?

SpaceRay, Thu, 04 Apr 2013 16:01:48 -0400
I was going to ask the smae thing as I could not believe than no one have not submitted at least one filter in 15 days.

Thanks GMM for let us know that for next week it will be solved and back again

Skybase, Fri, 05 Apr 2013 01:56:12 -0400
One of these days.... Haha there will be a giant flood.

Lol spaceray cheer us up with new filters if you're having trouble believing nobody's submitted stuff in 15 days.

v3 update

Ghislaine — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 12:44:07 -0400

Ghislaine, Mon, 01 Apr 2013 16:47:18 -0400
Hello everyone !

Where can I update the v3 ? Thanks in advance ;) for the reply.

ddaydreams, Mon, 01 Apr 2013 20:05:07 -0400
open your ff, then main menu>tools>update

GMM, Tue, 02 Apr 2013 07:56:01 -0400
You can also update it manually from the download page.

Ghislaine, Tue, 02 Apr 2013 12:44:07 -0400
Thanks GMM ! :)

And thanks to ddaydreams ! :)

30 day trial expired after 6 days...

namrettek — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 19:40:35 -0400

namrettek, Fri, 22 Mar 2013 17:23:48 -0400
I launched filter forge 3 today and it said my 30 day trial has expired.

I installed it (and downloaded it) on the 16th of March.

I'm a bit disapointed that I could not try it out more than a couple of times.

SpaceRay, Sat, 23 Mar 2013 07:20:55 -0400
this has happened before also, and then you should contact the FF customer support or wait until the forum moderator GMM can see what could be happening

Here are other threads about this

30-day trial period has already expired ! (I had 27 days remaining)

Trial period doesn't last 30 days — FIXED

30 day trial - expired on first run

or perhaps more here in this FF forum search

namrettek, Mon, 25 Mar 2013 15:14:21 -0400
Thanks for your reply. I sent in an email to customer support.

namrettek, Fri, 29 Mar 2013 19:40:35 -0400
Forgot to add - Support contacted me on the Weekday after this problem and gave me a temp liscence. So I am trying it out.

Computer died, now trying to find a filter

Jac — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 09:47:36 -0400

Jac, Wed, 27 Mar 2013 05:37:10 -0400
Hi all,

My computer died a bit ago and I had a ton of filters installed, but now having a problem finding one that I used sometimes. Would anyone here happen to know which filter might have made the below two images?

Thank you!

ThreeDee, Wed, 27 Mar 2013 09:35:36 -0400
Looks like this one.

Jac, Wed, 27 Mar 2013 09:47:36 -0400
Thank you so much ThreeDee!

I was searching for hours and couldn't find it.

Freepack Installation

RobWize — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 04:59:30 -0400

RobWize, Fri, 22 Mar 2013 12:46:02 -0400
Hello FilterForge, I'm trying out the freepacks (found here: http://www.filterforge.com/download/) and I'm wondering how to install them for use in CS6E. I've recently upgraded CS5E and I know that in that version after installation a FilterForge section appeared under the "Filters" drop down menu. That doesn't seem to be the case in CS6E. I've installed Freepack 1 - Metals, opened the image I'd like to play with in CS6E and opened the Filters menu, but I don't see any "Metals" or "FilterForge" selections.

Is this something that can be used in CS6E? If so, where is it located after installation? If not, is this a stand alone only?

GMM, Mon, 25 Mar 2013 04:59:30 -0400
Hello RobWize. What OS version do you use?

Freepacks do support CS6, I'm not sure why your copy failed to install as a plugin. Please uninstall it and reinstall; if it fails again try placing the plugin files manually.

FF3: Slow

tetonimages — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 08:57:25 -0400

tetonimages, Tue, 21 Feb 2012 10:57:27 -0500
I let FF 3 update itself last night hoping something would be updated to make it useable. Still very slow! I like the concept and I like the effects, but I really struggle forcing myself to click on the filer in my list, knowing it will take so long.

I have a fast Dell computer, maybe a year old, but it was the fastest system they sold at the time. It has a quad core Intel processor, 12 gigs of ram, a fast nVidia card with 4 gigs of ram, and plenty of scratch disk space. This is on a Windows 7 Ultimate operating system. I have most of the filter packages from OneOne, NIK, Topaz, Zycod, Alien Skin, and several other filter packages on my system, and none of them are even remotely as slow as Filter Forge.

Most images are 2754 x 4129, 8 bit (I use 16 bit on all the other filters when possible), and in the AdobeRGB color space. Most of my images are photos and the filters I use most often are the daubs, painterly strokes, and artistic effects.

I wrote FF's tech support prior to upgrading to 3, asking if they fixed the "slowness" problem and the response was they didn't know anyone thought it was slow. They wanted more details which I supplied, but I never heard back.

When I end up clicking cancel after ten minutes after seeing only about 10% of the status bar filled, I'd call that slow. I'd love to use FF daily, so maybe they can do something to make it much, much, much faster.

I read some of the other posts on this topic, and many pointed to problems with an under powered system, but that is not the case here. The program is simply slow in rendering both the preview image and worse on the final image.

M. Jackson

Morgantao, Tue, 21 Feb 2012 13:58:41 -0500
If you dig around on the forums you'll see that other than the quad core processor, none of what you have in your computer makes much difference. :(

1) FF can't use more than 1.5GB RAM. doesn't matter if you have 4GB or 40GB of ram, FF won't use it. FF has it's own custom built memory manager, that is 6 years old, therefore OBSOLETE. 6 years in RAM time is like 95 years human time. In other words, FF is senile. ;)

2) You can have the best graphics card on the planet, heck THE UNIVERSE, it won't matter because FF doesn't (And never will, according to FF inc.) use any hardware acceleration solutions such as OpenGL, CUDA etc. :evil:

3) FF isn't 64bit. It can run on 64bit machines, but it won't utilize 64bit functions that would make it faster and more efficient.

Also I can tell you that you shouldn't feel bad that you never got any reply from the support team (His name is Bob, I think :D ). It's nothing personal, Bob... I mean the support team generaly doesn't reply much.
Oh, and there's nothing slow about FF. It's just chronometrically challenged.

SpaceRay, Wed, 22 Feb 2012 00:34:00 -0500

Quote
tetonimages wrote: I let FF 3 update itself last night hoping something would be updated to make it useable. Still very slow! I like the concept and I like the effects, but I really struggle forcing myself to click on the filer in my list, knowing it will take so long.

Do you mean updating to 3.007 from 3.006 ? As you can see in this thread very little has been changed.

Upgrading from FF 2.0 to FF 3.0 as far as i know and from a few test I have done, the render speed is nearly exactly the same. NOTHING has been done to make this software faster with the new version. I do not know if something has been changed form 1.0 to 2.0.

I agree totally with you, I too like the concept, the engine and the wonderful, beautiful, lovely and awesome results and effects that you can get from the FF filters, BUT the price to pay for this is that you must have a lot of patience and wait much time for FF to render those beautiful results, because in many filters FF is SLOW.

I also feel like forcing myself to use FF and when I click on a preset I know that it will be slow to render, and even many times to preview it.

Quote
tetonimages wrote: I have a fast Dell computer, maybe a year old, but it was the fastest system they sold at the time. It has a quad core Intel processor, 12 gigs of ram, a fast nVidia card with 4 gigs of ram, and plenty of scratch disk space. This is on a Windows 7 Ultimate operating system.

I had during 5 years a AMD X2 4600 that was a dual core and when I wanted to work with Filter Forge was desperately slow and I was in pain working with it.

In August last year I could afford and have the opportunity to upgrade the main part of my computer and bought one the latest and fastest processors available in the balanced price/perfomance market, that is a Intel Quad Core Sandybridge i7 2600 3.5 Ghz and added 16 MB RAM (mainly for Photoshop and not for FF as it will not use it) and I was happy thinking that that with this NEW much faster computer FF will fly and be much faster.

BUT REGRETABLY, this has NOT been totally true, I mean it is much faster than before, and uses the 8 cores, BUT it keeps being SLOW. I was expecting to find it MORE usable and more manageable as it happens with other filters for Photoshop.

Quote
tetonimages wrote: I have most of the filter packages from OneOne, NIK, Topaz, Zycod, Alien Skin, and several other filter packages on my system, and none of them are even remotely as slow as Filter Forge.

YES, I also have and own this same filter Packages and NONE of them is as slow as Filter Forge, and even less with the new latest versions just released that they have optimized them to make as faster as they could and use the available software technologies to be able to get the most from the computer power to be used by the software.

SpaceRay, Wed, 22 Feb 2012 01:29:14 -0500

Quote
tetonimages wrote: Most images are 2754 x 4129, 8 bit (I use 16 bit on all the other filters when possible), and in the AdobeRGB color space. Most of my images are photos and the filters I use most often are the daubs, painterly strokes, and artistic effects.

YES !!! This is the default standard resolution size in 2012 with the modern images and photo quality, and is not at all a unusual high resolution, and most of the filters available for photoshop have been optimized and upgraded to be working with this kind of resolution and be usable and as fast as they can make it.

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tetonimages wrote: I wrote FF's tech support prior to upgrading to 3, asking if they fixed the "slowness" problem and the response was they didn't know anyone thought it was slow. They wanted more details which I supplied, but I never heard back.

This is a SILLY answer form FF Inc. , how can they say "they didn't know anyone thought it was slow " :?: :?: :?:

I have showed and given more details that FF 3.0 was STILL slow and was the same as FF 2.0, and they also did not give any good answer why this was possible. So as I have said above, FF 3.0 has the same render engine as FF 2.0 and have NOT " fixed the "slowness" problem" :cry:

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tetonimages wrote: When I end up clicking cancel after ten minutes after seeing only about 10% of the status bar filled, I'd call that slow. I'd love to use FF daily, so maybe they can do something to make it much, much, much faster.

YES; YES YES!!!! I agree with you. It happens the same to me. Many times I see a very interesting, beautiful and awesome filter and then get motivated to work with it, BUT then MANY times it happens that when you want to use this at a higher resolution of at least 2000x2000 or 3000x3000 it is VERY SLOW.

I ALSO like you end up LOTS OF TIMES canceling the results and the rendering after some time, specially when after 15 minutes it only have filled about 20% or 30%. AND this is with a very fast CPU as I have !!!!!! :evil: :cry:

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tetonimages wrote: I read some of the other posts on this topic, and many pointed to problems with an under powered system, but that is not the case here. The program is simply slow in rendering both the preview image and worse on the final image. M. Jackson

Yes, You are right, I have also seen them, and also thought that the possible problem was the lack of a faster computer, and that is why I upgraded my computer, only to find that as you say the problem still exist (well it really has become much faster than before, but still being slow) and so case in NOT only on the computer power, is THE PROGRAM that has a bad and slow render engine and is not optimized to be able to get the most of the power of the computers available now.

SpaceRay, Wed, 22 Feb 2012 01:36:10 -0500

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Morgantao wrote:

If you dig around on the forums you'll see that other than the quad core processor, none of what you have in your computer makes much difference.

1) FF can't use more than 1.5GB RAM. doesn't matter if you have 4GB or 40GB of ram, FF won't use it. FF has it's own custom built memory manager, that is 6 years old, therefore OBSOLETE. 6 years in RAM time is like 95 years human time. In other words, FF is senile.

2) You can have the best graphics card on the planet, heck THE UNIVERSE, it won't matter because FF doesn't (And never will, according to FF inc.) use any hardware acceleration solutions such as OpenGL, CUDA etc.

3) FF isn't 64bit. It can run on 64bit machines, but it won't utilize 64bit functions that would make it faster and more efficient.

I totally agree with you and is very true what you have wrote.

FF 3.0 ONLY cares and can get benefit from a very powerful CPU chip and will and get the most from all the cores available real or virtual ones.

FF will not be able to get any benefit form having LOTS of RAM, and will not care at all the kind of graphic card you have, and is not a 64 bit filter, and there is NO plan to make it 64 bit as it have happened already with other companies updating many filters available for photoshop to 64 bit during 2011.

FF is senile :D in respect to RAM, Graphics card and computer technologies speaking, as the core engine keeps being the same as many years ago, and as you say very well, 6 years in actual computer technology and software is like 95 years old.

tetonimages, Wed, 22 Feb 2012 10:35:19 -0500
To clarify, I have version 3 and got some sort of message saying there was an update. I let that load, then continued. No speed increase I could see.

I am running Windows 7 with Photoshop CS5 in 64 bit mode. FF is loaded as a plug-in there. Based on the information supplied above, I am not getting much boost out of having lots of ram, video accelerators, or a 64 bit system.

Nice concept, but it is difficult to use when it is so slow on a normal sized photo image.

Cheers,
M. Jackson

SpaceRay, Wed, 22 Feb 2012 12:10:46 -0500

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tetonimages wrote: To clarify, I have version 3 and got some sort of message saying there was an update. I let that load, then continued. No speed increase I could see.

You had FF 3.006 and now they have released the FF 3.007 so this is why you got that message, BUT in this update there was NOT any speed included (really I think that there has not been any speed increase added since FF 2.0) so there is nothing wrong there

If you go to this thread you will what included the 3.007 update ---> http://filterforge.com/forum/read.php?FID=5&TID=9505

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tetonimages wrote: I am running Windows 7 with Photoshop CS5 in 64 bit mode. FF is loaded as a plug-in there.

I have the same, Windows 7 64 bit with Photoshop CS5 Extended in 64 bit mode, and FF is loaded as a 64 bit compatible plugin (although the plugin itself is 32 bit) and it works right.

SpaceRay, Wed, 22 Feb 2012 12:12:24 -0500

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tetonimages wrote: Based on the information supplied above, I am not getting much boost out of having lots of ram, video accelerators, or a 64 bit system.

Well this is true on the FF software side part, as the only important for FF is the CPU power and can ONLY use 1,5 GB RAM.

BUT what is not true is that you are not getting much boost IN GENERAL and globally if you are using FF with Photoshop, because if you have LOTS of RAM Photoshop will use the parts of the memory that FF does not use, and share it with Windows OS, and Photoshop will run faster having more RAM, so it will be better when using FF as a plugin.

If you had only 4 GB RAM, all three would be struggling to use the RAM and would be much slower.

SpaceRay, Thu, 23 Feb 2012 02:19:24 -0500
I want to let KNOW that Filter Forge is NOT ALWAYS SLOW, is not a bad software at all, is just that the rendering engine and core parts that process the FF filters could be optimized and updated to the new technologies and be able to get benefit from the 2012 computer power.

Independently of the computer power, the render and preview speed depends and is tied to WHAT FILTER you are going to use and WHAT RESOLUTION you want to have the result of the filter, on small ones will be faster than on higher resolutions that would be slower.

There are MANY FILTERS that are very usable and FAST to use even on high resolutions, and also there are MANY FILTERS that are slow or very slow, and also many in between of both.

tetonimages, Thu, 23 Feb 2012 09:21:46 -0500
I don't want to belabor the point. After being frustrated it was taking too long on numerous filters I tried, I did a Google search on the Internet and found lots of instances where other people were complaining. I was curious if I was doing something wrong. I watched a couple of videos clips where it seemed to be faster, but they were only 600 x800 web images. I am working on 2754 x 4129 often, and even larger if I stitch together several images into a panorama. Yes, I have used a few of the filters that were tolerably quick, but it seems the ones I need for my photos are the slow ones.

I am hoping my post will highlight there are people out here having trouble using the software as it is written. I like the product for what it can do, but it certainly needs an engine update to take advantage of the money I spent on high end hardware. I use it when I can, as I paid for it already, but I don't think I could recommend it to anyone until they do a major overhaul.

M. Jackson

SpaceRay, Tue, 06 Mar 2012 00:06:54 -0500

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tetonimages wrote: After being frustrated it was taking too long on numerous filters I tried, I did a Google search on the Internet and found lots of instances where other people were complaining. I was curious if I was doing something wrong.

YES, is true I have also been frustated and wanted also to see if others are having problems of slow rendering and also have found that there are many other people that is complaining about the low speed and slowness of the filter forge when increasing a little the resolution and so after having tried the trial of Filter forge they decided not to buy it and look for other possible alternatives.

Also on some company forum employees thinking that is not worthy to buy FF for a company where the time is money and can´t spend so much time waiting for the slow render of FF.

I thought also that I could be doing something wrong but is not MY problem, it is FF rendering engine that is slow even with a very powerful CPU like a Intel i7 Quad Core 2600K.

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tetonimages wrote I am working on 2754 x 4129 often, and even larger if I stitch together several images into a panorama. Yes, I have used a few of the filters that were tolerably quick, but it seems the ones I need for my photos are the slow ones.

YES, I also work with similar resolution that is ONLY 11 Megapixels and is the standard now for photos, and I also have the same as you making panoramas with the photos so it would be larger, and have also used some filters that make a fast result in a few seconds BUT then later other interesting and useful filters can take up to 15 to 20 minutes to make a render result of this, and for me this is intolerably slow.

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tetonimages wrote I am hoping my post will highlight there are people out here having trouble using the software as it is written. I like the product for what it can do, but it certainly needs an engine update to take advantage of the money I spent on high end hardware. I use it when I can, as I paid for it already, but I don't think I could recommend it to anyone until they do a major overhaul.

I hope the same, and is true THERE ARE people out here that we are having trouble to use the program with the actual render engine. I also like and love the product, BUT also agree that absolutely NEEDS and overhaul and engine update or optimize it for speed or whatever could be done to make it faster.

I have also spent 1200 $ on high end hardware, but FF does not care about it, only uses the multicore CPU.

I have had the experience to recommend it to 3 other persons and told them to try this, and all the 3 persons after downloading the trial and some filters, told me that the software was very good and very interesting BUT was let down very much with a SLOW render engine and they could not wait so much time for applying the effects to a simple 10 megapixels photo.

So I think that it should be the highest priority for FF 4.0 to do something about the render speed. The competition is getting higher and soon will be other companies releasing other much faster softwares and FF will be behind them and will loose much.

Ramlyn, Sat, 10 Mar 2012 09:41:50 -0500
I use a Fujitsu desktop LX70T/D, with Windows XP in Japanese and Photoshop CS4.
What to say..... Can be an advantage having a system built some years ago? I don't know if FF may run faster than in a newer system.

Yes, some FF filter is slow, but not all.
I also have Topaz and Nik. If I apply some effect on large pictures, they aren't much faster than FF.

Morgantao, Sat, 10 Mar 2012 18:33:24 -0500
Ramlyn, You don't see a difference in speed between FF and Nik + Topaz, BECAUSE you have an older machine.
If you use the same 3 software on a new machine, FF will be faster, as the CPU is faster, but Nik and Topaz will be WAY WAY WAY faster, because they use the CPU, GPU, more RAM etc...

Imagine you're now walking up a hill - That's hard work (Old computer).
Now imagine you have a bicycle. It's easier to ride up hill (FF on new computer).
Now imagine going up that hill in a sports car. That's ALOT faster and easier (Nik and Topaz on new computer).

SpaceRay, Sun, 11 Mar 2012 00:46:40 -0500
I am very sorry that you have an old computer and understand you very well, because I have had a very old computer using also Windows XP (bought on 2005 and never upgraded to windows Vista) until middle of 2011 and then decided to make the investment to upgrade my computer buying a new motherboard, a intel i7 2600 Quad Core and some new ram (keep the same other components the same)And with only this 3 new things the difference is really huge. Using now Windows 7 home.

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Morgantao wrote: If you use the same 3 software on a new machine, FF will be faster, as the CPU is faster, but Nik and Topaz will be WAY WAY WAY faster, because they use the CPU, GPU, more RAM etc...

I agree that it because is an old computer and with Windows XP, NIk and Topaz will be much faster because they have rewritten all the plugins to be 64 bit, use the most RAM they can, have GPU acceleration, AND also have optimized code for using the intel Z68 chipset of Sandybridge and make it faster.

The new oneOne software perfect suite 6 has been completely rewritten and transformed to make it much faster and better than before and taken to the 21st century and is much better now that it is able to get the most fr om your computer.

Is really a big pain and very sad (and something terrible for me and a very good thing for the competing companies) that it seems according to what Vladimir and GMM have said, that seems that FF team will not rewritten the FF code, and will keep it the same, and will keep building the future versions on this, and this has the huge limitations:

1 - It has it´s OWN memory manager that is lim ited to 1.5GB so making it 64 bit would be the same as it does depend on FF memory controller.

2 - As said by Vladimir is not possible to make any kind of GPU acceleration because the way FF is built and is not possible to use Cuda, OpenGl or OpenCL, or any other possible GPU acceleration. THE GPU makes a really HUGE and awesome difference as you can in the Pixel bender plugin that uses GPU as makes all IN REALTIME, zero waiting.

3 - The only thing that is possible and well done is the possibility of getting the most of the CPU you may have and it has a good multicore support (well at least on the Professional version)

eserver, Thu, 15 Mar 2012 01:46:00 -0400
Just some of the blunders you have to go through considering what limitations you have to work with in the software. I mean, there are those few software that would only take into consideration some of the resources and unfortunately, FF, which we all agree could use a lot more, has those limits.

I think that the way you could go around this is to change to another, but it is just too good to pass on.

GeorgeR, Thu, 15 Mar 2012 02:17:05 -0400
I just can't understand (2) there. The graph architecture of FF is absolutely perfect for CUDA or OpenCL. I've written a similar system with some of the same filters (although aimed at procedural terrain generation) for OpenCL and it's actually kinda easy.

SpaceRay, Thu, 15 Mar 2012 03:49:23 -0400

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Vladimir Golovin wrote in 2009 here: We investigated a CUDA port (we talked with nVidians and received with a pre-release CUDA card from them) but unfortunately our code doesn't lend itself well to the CUDA approach.

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uaun wrote:
Being able to use a texture generator that uses the GPU is AWESOME.
Can you imagine if FF included OpenCL/CUDA support....would be darn awesome.

I've begun to transition my FilterForge filters to Substance Designer, to avoid any such (speed) issues in the future with FilterForge.

If, by chance, FilterForge changes this GLARING ISSUE SOON, I would continue using FilterForge, however, if they go without addressing this BAD ISSUE, I will likely eventually move to Substance Designer, and not use Filter Forge any longer.

____________________________________

I've already moved to substance designer, its far more powerful than FF, and is REALTIME. I still use FF on occasion, but its hard to go back to a cluttered system (without folders for organization), and the lack of realtime filter previews. I hope this changes in FF4.

Morgantao, Thu, 15 Mar 2012 04:49:47 -0400

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GeorgeR Wrote: I just can't understand (2) there. The graph architecture of FF is absolutely perfect for CUDA or OpenCL. I've written a similar system with some of the same filters (although aimed at procedural terrain generation) for OpenCL and it's actually kinda easy.

It's not the first time FF inc prefers NOT to do things that are kinda easy to do.
If you read the forums you'll find at least 10 easy to do features requested over and over again. :evil:

Some examples off the top of my head:
- Personal filter folders
- Ability to add personal keywords to filters
- CUDA\OpenCL support
- More noise components
- Ability to arrange\name filter presets
- Ability to delete factory presets
- Ability to lock settings when randomizing
- Several bug fixes, like the blend component alpha bug

I'm sure I could think of more if you give me 5 minutes...

SpaceRay, Thu, 15 Mar 2012 06:03:25 -0400
YES, i agree with you morgantao, very well said

SpaceRay, Tue, 17 Apr 2012 01:27:13 -0400

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Morgantao wrote: It's not the first time FF inc prefers NOT to do things that are kinda easy to do.

Yes, is true, it seems that they only prefer to do the things that they think that are priority and important to them and not listening to the FF users and followers that are really the ones that support FF Inc.

I have seen lately that others companies are asking to the users what would they motivate and like to find in the next version that will make them upgrade or buy the new version. It seems that FF does not care much about this.

Before Vladimir was an active part of the forum, and now he is no more here, and as far as I know, GMM is the ONLY one that is in the forum helping and working for FF Inc.

Sign Guy, Tue, 17 Apr 2012 10:37:14 -0400
FWIW, I can tell you that the OP of this thread is one of the most highly respected members of the sign trade you could imagine. He has written numerous articles in our trade journals and his work has won many awards. If he recommends a product, the result is the sale of it many times to his admiring followers.

Here's a link to his website.

SpaceRay, Tue, 17 Apr 2012 11:49:20 -0400
There are many respected professional and very important persons that could recommend software but I think that as they need to make designs in high resolution they can´t recommend something that is slow as FF, only for fast filters that could work, but not for others. Althoug FF would be very good to work for website graphics as they are low resolution and they work much faster.

Perhaps FF is not interested in the professional market and only want to get what they can from the amateur and hobby market.

Sign Guy, Tue, 17 Apr 2012 12:25:21 -0400
More like they programmed themselves into a corner. ;)

Not the same thing but I remember a guy a few years ago who came to me with a picture of the Statue of Liberty. He had a hot dog cart and wanted a logo created. So he says to me ... "This is what I want, except instead of a torch, I want her to be holding a can of soda. And instead of a book, I want her to be holding a foot long hot dog. And behind her, I want the New York skyline. And in the sky I want the name of my company with the initials modeled after this ring I bought my wife."

$450 later, this is what he got:

The moral of the story is that nothing is impossible and the customer is always right.

tetonimages, Tue, 17 Apr 2012 13:44:33 -0400
Fred,
Thanks for the nice comments earlier. There are lots of things to like about Filter Forge. If it was at least tolerably fast, I'd use it a lot. And you have to give them some points for allowing people to talk about them on their own site, even if some of the comments are not too favorable to them. You'd hope they are watching their own boards and making notes of what people are suggesting. At the same time, I would really like to see comments from the FF staff letting us know their position on some of the comments or let us know they are actually working on speeding it up. As it is, other people are quoting other people saying what they might or might not be going to do in the future.

Maybe the part that rubs me wrong here is the occasional email letting me know I can upgrade my account with a lifetime upgrade purchase on a product that doesn't seem to be getting upgraded or updated. I might be tempted to buy the upgrade package it there were going to be real upgrades and if they make it work on my faster machine.

I purchased AutoFX's Dream Suite Ultimate a few days ago. Just like FF, their processing of large photo image files with their painterly effects is terribly slow. I wrote them a letter and heard back from them the next day letting me know they are working on the necessary fixes and it would be available relatively soon. Some of the filters work quickly enough in their package, too.

Like I keep saying, I like the concept and I like some of the filter effects....just make it faster....and soon!

Here's a link to an image I used one of FF gouache filters on:
Teton Images

M. Jackson

GMM, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 05:59:26 -0400
I wonder how many people complaining on the speed have ever changed their memory usage limit from the default 60% value (in Tools > Options > Rendering).

Sign Guy, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 07:52:41 -0400

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I wonder how many people complaining on the speed have ever changed their memory usage limit from the default 60% value (in Tools > Options > Rendering).

I don't think I have ... for a few reasons. 1) I probably use FF in its standalone mode 9 out of 10 times, 2) Literally everything I do in Photoshop CS 5.5 is very fast except when I work in Filter Forge from within Photoshop, and 3) This is the first time I've heard any suggestion from FF Staff as to what might improve on the slowness issue.

BTW, the Quote feature of the FF forum hasn't worked for me for a month or more. Is anyone else having a problem with it?

tetonimages, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 08:54:16 -0400
GMM,
Will changing the settings in the stand alone version be in effect when you use the PS plug-in? And, how much more would you suggest over 60%?

MJackson

tetonimages, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 09:42:42 -0400
GMM,
I went to the Rendering window, then the help menu for Rendering. It says this:

"Memory usage limit
Sets the maximum percentage of physical memory available to Filter Forge. The default value is 60%, the minimum is 10%, and the maximum is 90% – Filter Forge never uses up all available memory. Regardless of the slider value, Filter Forge will never consume less than 128 MB and more than 1500 MB of memory."

So, if I have 12 gigs of ram, and if I set the preferences to 50% (or 6 gigs on my system), the most it will try to use is 1500 MB? It seems strange you'd come here and tell the complainers to bump up the default memory allotment if it will only access a little more than a gig. I could set my rendering percentage down to 20% and it wouldn't really matter?

MJackson

Sign Guy, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 10:48:08 -0400
Here's a typical example on a Quadcore Win XP PC at default standalone settings in Filter Forge 3. Image size is set to 600 x 600. Rendering of the default preview takes 2 minutes 48 seconds. Not counting any other activity, if I tweak the settings 10 times, my system will need 28 minutes just to show me the results.

If I turn off anti-aliasing, the preview time is less than 20% of the time needed for a 5 sampling (the default?). However, the selection of any other filter or preset turns the anti-aliasing back on. It seems to me that just adding a checkbox to Options to turn off the anti-aliasing there instead of on a filter/preset by filter/preset basis would be a big help.

SpaceRay, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 10:53:46 -0400

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GMM wrote: I wonder how many people complaining on the speed have ever changed their memory usage limit from the default 60% value (in Tools > Options > Rendering).

I have already changed it long time ago and is at 90% and is STILL very slow on many of the filters if you put a 3000x3000 resolution. With very slow I mean that it would take between 15 to 25 minutes to render the result.

tetonimages, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 10:56:36 -0400
Fred, you are talking about a small web image. I am trying to modify 46 meg, 8 bit photo images roughly 11" x 16" at 300 DPI. They are coming out of a Nikon D4. If I can't get the program to handle a file of that size, I need to use other software. That's why I invested in a quad core system with 12 gigs of ram. Right now, I set FF back to defaults and it is crashing on files this large. I sent in a report and got back a notice it is a "known issue". I only sent in one report, but I bombed the program at least another five times trying different settings.

M. Jackson

SpaceRay, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 11:00:05 -0400

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GMM wrote: I wonder how many people complaining on the speed have ever changed their memory usage limit from the default 60% value (in Tools > Options > Rendering).

Here below you can check which are my settings that I have put since I installed Filter Forge 3.0 last year

Please GMM, Could you tell me if all this settings are right and the best for FF optimization?

Thanks very much for your help

SpaceRay, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 11:03:11 -0400

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tetonimages wrote: I am trying to modify 46 meg, 8 bit photo images roughly 11" x 16" at 300 DPI. Right now, I set FF back to defaults and it is crashing on files this large

Are you using FF in standalone mode or as a plugin for photoshop? :?:

I myself can´t also make any large render on FF without have 98% of the times problems in Standalone, BUT the problems get solved many of the times when you use FF as a plugin

tetonimages, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 11:06:48 -0400
I saved a file, closed Photoshop and Lightroom and opened the large file in FF standalone. I don't think it can handle a file that large.

M. Jackson

Sign Guy, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 11:08:15 -0400

Quote

Fred, you are talking about a small web image. I am trying to modify 46 meg, 8 bit photo images roughly 11" x 16" at 300 DPI. They are coming out of a Nikon D4. If I can't get the program to handle a file of that size, I need to use other software. That's why I invested in a quad core system with 12 gigs of ram. Right now, I set FF back to defaults and it is crashing on files this large. I sent in a report and got back a notice it is a "known issue". I only sent in one report, but I bombed the program at least another five times trying different settings.

M. Jackson

Mike, I never use the 600 x 600 size. Almost always work at 3,600 x 3,600 (12" x 12" @ 300 PPI). They don't crash my system but typical render time is 45 minutes to an hour with anti-aliasing turned off. I chose that size in my example to eliminate image size as a contributor to the slow performance being experienced.

SpaceRay, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 11:16:56 -0400

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tetonimages wrote: I saved a file, closed Photoshop and Lightroom and opened the large file in FF standalone. I don't think it can handle a file that large.

Please, open Photoshop, load the large file you want, and the activate FF as plugin and choose the filter you want and see if this still gives you problems. It will be still slow BUT will be able to render the file although it will take much time but will finish without error.

Also rise the memory to 90% and put the settings as I have shown above to see if this can solve the errors.

Morgantao, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 14:28:40 -0400
In the last 5 posts or so there are the same issues reported for pretty much ever...

Memory usage of 1.5GB max, while the system has 6 or 8 or 12 GB.
Slowness with relativly small images.
FF going belly up with "bad allocation error" all the time....

For crying out loud, FF inc, DO SOMETHING!!!!

SpaceRay, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 17:49:32 -0400

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Morgantao wrote: For crying out loud, FF inc, DO SOMETHING!!!!

Do you really still believe that FF Inc. will do something ???? :?: Do not think so looking what have done already until now, that only do what they want and if they like the idea some could suggest.

DO FF INc. care about the errors and what the users are questing, I doubt it much.

FF Inc. does NOTHING to give any information about what they are doing and do not give any news in the forum anymore
Does NOTHING to solve the error that are "known issues" since long time ago.
Does NOTHING to improve the speed and only rely on the user make a good construction of the filter.
Does NOTHING to increase the amount of RAM FF can handle.
Does NOTHING to solve simple things that could be done easily but they do not care to do it.

tetonimages, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 17:57:09 -0400
I'd say most of what you are writing now has been fairly well covered earlier in this thread. Apparently, someone at the home office is reading the thread, so that's good.

Instead of bashing them to death, I'd like to invite them to offer suggestions on improving performance if that is possible. GMM?

I used FF today on a smaller image and was using a different couple of filters. Some work fast enough. I thought I saw a thread or a blog somewhere in which the author listed some of the filters that are slow and some that are quick. Some of the filters were developed by third party users and they might not meet the minimum requirements. Maybe the developers at FF could rewrite some of the slow ones?

M. Jackson

Morgantao, Wed, 18 Apr 2012 18:26:14 -0400

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tetonimages wrote: Maybe the developers at FF could rewrite some of the slow ones?

Apparently the developers at FF don't write or rewrite anything these days...

The only thing we see or hear from FF inc. is GMM, who does his best to help out with technical difficulties and question on the forums.

Other than that, the most you could hear from FF inc is that your problem is a "known issue".

* The developers don't release any new filters.
* They don't help streamline existing filters.
* They claim alot of user requests can be done by users with LUA scripts, but they never release a LUA snippet or demo code.
* They don't fix bugs that are known for some time now, including malfunctioning filter nodes.
* They don't intend on adding GPU acceleration support.
* They don't intend to remove the 1.5GB memory cap.
* They don't do anything about the lack of organization tools when there are 8816 (Yes, that's eight thousand, eight hundred and sixteen!!!!!) filters and counting.
* They don't do anything to improve the render engine.

Should I really go on?

I love FF, and I think there are tons of great filters I can use for years to come. But if anyone asked my oppinion if they should buy the software, I couldn't just say yes.

Sphinx., Thu, 19 Apr 2012 01:59:40 -0400

SpaceRay, Thu, 19 Apr 2012 02:01:36 -0400

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tetonimages wrote: Instead of bashing them to death, I'd like to invite them to offer suggestions on improving performance if that is possible. GMM?

We are bashing them to death BECAUSE they do NOT give any information or give any suggestion on improving Filter Forge, eother the perfomance or whatever, and all the suggestion we have done seem to be TOO MUCH WORK!

I love FF and that is why I am doing this because is a pity that such a great software is let down by programmers, developers or however is involved that reallly do not care about improving the software in the IMPORTANT parts that are a problem, even they do not give the bug fixes needed.

Morgantao, Thu, 19 Apr 2012 04:11:45 -0400

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stop whining and get into optimal filter construction already

LOL Sphinx, I agree whith you to some extent.
Alot for the filters can be made fater if they were optimized.
But there are alot of issues that are not related to filter optimization.

I, for one, don't mind much the render speed. Ofcourse I would love to see FF render engine upgraded, but it's not my main problem with FF and FF inc.

Take for example the thread about merging Carl's Gorilla filter with my Shadow and highlights filter. You yourself say the likely culprit is the memory restricion that FF has. Why don't they fix that?
And take all kinds of bug reports, such as alpha channel getting screwed up in blend. What's being done about that?

If you look at the list I posted above, only 2 items (GPU support and render engine) relate to filter speed.

Sphinx., Thu, 19 Apr 2012 04:32:40 -0400
Sorry Morg, that was my signature - the actual message is just the three cry babies.

Morgantao, Thu, 19 Apr 2012 04:52:16 -0400
I know, I just thought this iis as good a place to comment about your sig as any ;)

BTW, you know that saying "You don't look a gift horse in the mouth", right?
Some of us still pay for the horse. We have the right to look at the cavities in it's teeth. And complain about them. :D

Sphinx., Thu, 19 Apr 2012 05:20:28 -0400
Yep, and as the paying customer base I am sure they listen to you. What I am experiencing is a once flourishing, but now dying community.

First step in this direction was the "Dispute over filter rights" (which caused many longtimers to stop publishing quality filters - both aesthetically and performance wise - including myself), and now we have the "Slowness dispute", which seem to be directed towards FF alone (which is very wrong).

It brings ALOT of negative attention to the forums and people slowly drop off.. (also because it reads SpaceRay all over the place.. relax buddy.. let people breathe!)

If a filter is slow send your complains to the author, not FF. Complaining to FF is like complaining to the paper factory if you're unsatisfied with the story in a book.

GMM, Thu, 19 Apr 2012 05:25:14 -0400

Quote
Sign Guy wrote: BTW, the Quote feature of the FF forum hasn't worked for me for a month or more. Is anyone else having a problem with it?

I'm afraid our CMS doesn't work well with your browser. The problem with quotes is discussed here.

Quote
Sign Guy wrote: the selection of any other filter or preset turns the anti-aliasing back on. It seems to me that just adding a checkbox to Options to turn off the anti-aliasing there instead of on a filter/preset by filter/preset basis would be a big help.

This is a good suggestion – feel free to repost in the Feature Wishlist forum where it has more chances to be seen.

Quote
tetonimages wrote: So, if I have 12 gigs of ram, and if I set the preferences to 50% (or 6 gigs on my system), the most it will try to use is 1500 MB?

M. Jackson, you belong to a small group of power users with a 64-bit system. Yes, I know they're gaining popularity but the great share of users are fine with a 32-bit system and 2–4 GB RAM. In your case shifting the slider won't help but on an average 32-bit system setting the slider to 905 should speed things up a bit.

I'd recommend you spend some time optimizing the filters you use. Considering your huge resolutions, 10 minutes spent to optimize a filter performance may result in saved hours of rendering afterwards. Just remember that most filter authors test their filters and filter speed on default 600x600 images.

Quote
SpaceRay wrote: Please GMM, Could you tell me if all this settings are right and the best for FF optimization?

No, these settings result in only 50%-60% of the maximum speed on your system. Uncheck the 'Anti-alias sources' and 'Use double-precision output cache' and you'll definitely see the improvement. Also, switch to the Interface tab and make sure you have either 'Use cache preservation' unchecked or Progressive previews set to Off – but not both enabled!

SpaceRay, if you need to discuss this further please start a new thread: I'd appreciate if whining happens here and technical discussions take place somewhere else ;)

Quote
tetonimages wrote: I'd like to invite them to offer suggestions on improving performance if that is possible. GMM?

Sorry? I'm not the decision-maker here, you are free to propose improvements but it is Vladimir Golovin who decides on implementing things.

Quote
Sphinx. wrote: Slow filters are slow either because: A: the filter construction is not optimal B: FF is slow and lacks GPU support I place my bets on A.. stop whining and get into optimal filter construction already :-)

Sphinx, thank you for your support!

Morgantao, Thu, 19 Apr 2012 05:52:24 -0400
Sphinx, I know there was a discussion over the right of filters, but that was long before my time...
Can you give me the clifnotes on what it was that made you and the others stop posting your filters?

GMM, I know this thread has become a whine and bash free for all, I just want to tell you that none of it is directed towards you.
You have my utmost respect, and I'm sure everybody else here agrees that you are the only one we can expect to recieve honest answers from.

GMM, Thu, 19 Apr 2012 06:41:01 -0400

Quote
Morgantao wrote: GMM, I know this thread has become a whine and bash free for all, I just want to tell you that none of it is directed towards you.

I don't object to whining as long as it is concentrated here and doesn't occur all over the forum. We also never delete critical comments as some other companies do, except for obvious cases of abuse like obscene language etc.

tetonimages, Thu, 19 Apr 2012 08:32:59 -0400
GMM,
Thanks for posting your suggestions here. I will spend some time making sure I have the right check boxes turned on. I ran one of the filters last night with mostly default settings and going to FF through the Plug-In in Photoshop. It took 20 minutes, but it didn't crash.

If you go all the way back to the first post I made in this thread, the post was stating that I had read quite a few comments about people using an underpowered machine and getting slow rendering speeds as a result. I was pointing out the problem for me wasn't a slow machine, but it is more likely the fact I am wanting to process larger files.

I'd suggest FF should be writing for 64 bit systems. You are way behind already. I don't think you will find many 32 bit systems being sold anymore, and surely not by graphics minded buyers. I bought my 32 bit laptop in September of 2008 at a time when it 64 bit systems were starting to become popular, even though some of the programs were not ready for it. But that was 3 1/2 years ago and 64 bit has definitely come of age. If the company is not going to embrace 64 bit systems, I'd suggest that is a self inflicted death sentence for the company.

I happily buy a FF4 upgrade it were going to be 64 bit.

Please come back here often and help us with suggestions on optimizing our settings. This thread went on a long time without any response from FF (you), but seeing your name in the thread and seeing suggestions makes me feel a lot better. Please pass on some of these comments to Vladimir Golovin.

M. Jackson

Aztec

solarmanJc — Fri, 22 Mar 2013 23:58:31 -0400

solarmanJc, Fri, 22 Mar 2013 23:58:31 -0400
I am looking for and would like to find some Aztec Paneling for 3d model space craft
anyone know where I might find some

Thanks so much

FF4 Beta Each time I try to download filter open photoshop cs6

wisconsinpat — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 18:01:19 -0400

wisconsinpat, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 15:30:27 -0400
FF4 Each time I try to download filter open photoshop cs6 and I go to filter forge filter is not there. Tried numerous times different filters goes straight to CS6 windows 7 and filter not added getting tons of crashes

Please see video
http://www.screencast.com/t/7B8RwnVPp

CFandM, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 18:01:19 -0400
Long Time, No Hear Pat.. :) Glad to see you are still around this place.. :)
It looks as if the filters are just not downloading...Try downloading the filters in stand-alone mode before opening Photoshop....Might be faster downloading as well.. ;) :)

In total

realityengine — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 05:30:46 -0400

realityengine, Sun, 17 Mar 2013 20:07:08 -0400
i've spent over $350.00 on filter forge. you still attempt to force us to upgrade to get more out of us. you're forcing me to piracy. good job.

Mardar, Sun, 17 Mar 2013 22:11:27 -0400
Upload some more filters and earn a life time update. I'm a 60 year old janitor with no formal training in computers. I know next to nothing about the Filter Forge program. Just check out my filters for proof of it. And I only bought FF 1 and 2. I got 3 for free and now I am a life time updater. If I can do it, you can too. :D

Skybase, Sun, 17 Mar 2013 22:45:11 -0400
Mr. Diaz, that's very professional of you. I've seen your work, they're great, but you should be ashamed at what you just said. That's like the equivalent of a client saying, "I don't need to pay an artist, I can find the pictures he's been making on Google."

I can't believe somebody with the level of your work, background, and involvement with various companies I respect would say, "you're forcing me into piracy." Like what kind of a "professional artist" writes that on a public forum? You do realize you're carrying quite a lot of respectable work plus a respectable carrier that some people strive to become. It's extremely unfortunate, and extremely regrettable seeing a fellow artist with similar trade blow a sassy 1 line comment on the official forums of a software company.

I strive to be somebody in your position too, you know? "Game Designer" "Environment Artist" come on. Shame I'm making commentary against one.

And as Mardar said, you do have an opportunity to get yourself lifetime upgrades. PRETTY SURE with your skills you can totally mange it and it'd be worth your time.

Yuya Takeda
2D/3D generalist

realityengine, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 00:18:14 -0400
how is it shameful? ive legitimately paid for a service and now im not allowed to use the old builds of the software ive paid for. I do not know of ANY other software that keeps you from using it and forces you to upgrade. I use photoshop, maya, crazybump, illustrator, flash and countless others and you know what? they still allow us to use them, not force us to upgrade to new versions because filters are forcefully upgraded to a format that no longer works with older versions. I would not be writing this if I still had access to 2.0 filters on a 2.0 client and so on. I can understand us not being able to access the newer filters, but to disable ability to use the old ones is not acceptable.

SpaceRay, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 02:54:51 -0400

Quote
realityengine i've spent over $350.00 on filter forge

Have you bought Filter Forge without any kind of discount? :?: :?:

Quote
you still attempt to force us to upgrade to get more out of us. you're forcing me to piracy. good job.

I do not agree with you at all, as nobody is forcing you to pay for a upgraded version, you are always free to decide IF you want to upgrade or not.

Filter Forge ONLY forces you to update the software when a new FREE version of the same you already have is released and available, although even then you can still keep using it without updating, although you will not be able to download any new filter.

And if you do not want that Filter Forge (FF) keeps asking you to pay for upgrades, there is available a very easy thing, buy a lifetime upgrade, and so you only pay once and never again will you be asked to pay more for any future upgrade.

And the upgrades with the discount available is cheap and affordable and does not cost a high amount as other softwares may ask you for upgrade, and I think that now is about around 50$

And is very bad from you to say that this is forcing you to piracy, because this is not true at all from my personal point of view, this is because you already have the intention to use it illegally and is bad to suggest that this is the reason for piracy.

Quote
ive legitimately paid for a service and now im not allowed to use the old builds of the software ive paid for.

You ARE allowed to use any old filters available in the online library and you can use always and for free any of the filters for your software version. I can use FF 2.0 if I want to without any problem, only thing is that I can´t use any FF 3.0 filters.

As far as I know ANY other software ask you always to pay for any upgrade they may have and any future filters, feature or plugin that uses those new features are only for the ones that decided to upgrade, but you are not forced to upgrade, it´s up to you to do it if you want to have any of the new features of that software and also the possible associated plugins, filters, or whatever this other software may have only available for that newer version.

If you mean that some filters that have been available for FF 2.0 and then later has been upgraded to FF 3.0 and then is not available anymore for FF 2.0, is like the evolution the AUTHOR of the filter wanted and is not that FF have forced him to do it.

Also most of the filters are submitted and owned by their authors and not made by Filter Forge company, and the upgrade or not of the filters depends totally on the author and FF will never ask him to upgrade it so it uses the newer version and so it could force to others to upgrade to keep using it.

realityengine, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 03:00:33 -0400
ray, I paid for a professional license that allowed for higher resolution textures. I had paid for an upgrade to 2.0 as well. I wouldn't be so livid if not for the fact that now even though I have paid for this 2.0 upgrade, I cant install 2.0 filters because it tries to forcefully make me upgrade to 3.0 in order to use them. In the gallery it will clearly state what version the filter is for, but on attempt to install, the program tries to update to a version of a license I do not own.

Skybase, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 03:33:42 -0400
Wait what? That's not normal FilterForge behavior. I do remember getting some little ad for FF3.0 but you never had to comply.

Regarding updates (not upgrades), you can still use older versions, and you can stick to a certain build by ignoring any new updates. I myself sometimes use 2.011 when the latest version is 2.014 (I think) for FilterForge 2.0. This means I just can't use filters made using 2.014 (or whatever) but I can still use anything below including all the 1.0 filters. The program is quite backwards compatible, just not upwards compatible.

And errr upgrades aren't forced at all. You can still use 2.0 even if 3.0 is out there.

You can ask on these forums or via support for older versions or maybe even request specific builds. You still have access to them by request and they're still usable.

There are many programs out there that kinda force updates. The major Adobe products do have quite a wide compatibility range but that's because they have such a huge range of users. The market's smaller for FilterForge I think. Products such as Native Instruments Reaktor, Quartz Composer, Synthetik Studio Artist, Propellerhead Reason (to a degree), UI Software Artmatic, and various others do have similar update schemes where even a 0.1 version difference can lead to files being incompatible vice versa. They also apparently do this to prevent piracy.

Hope that explains a bit. I suggest making a request for older versions by support or put one on the forums.

yeah ok... I kinda took it harsh on you. But I swear that first post was just simply rude and I couldn't believe it came out of somebody with some status. I just don't think you should have wrote that, even if you had the right to. At least the problem's solvable as far as I know. I'd rather help.

SpaceRay, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 03:57:03 -0400
Is true that although not directly available Filter forge versions can be requested if wanted

Even also perhaps older filter versions can be requested from the author IF they still have it available

As said by Skybase many other software also have a similar upgrade scheme and is not only FF

realityengine, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 04:31:04 -0400
im currently doing some extensive testing of the filters. im getting errors that crash the client now when loading certain 2.0 filters, but not the upgrade notice. I HAVE the proper client for my license, so downloading some other version doesn't seem to be needed.

GMM, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 04:33:07 -0400

Quote
the program tries to update to a version of a license I do not own.

It doesn't.

SpaceRay, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 05:06:15 -0400
I think that instead of saying those things that are not right, and to be able to help you better, it would be much better that you could explain:

what is really happening with your filter forge,
what is wrong and not working?
what is the update message telling you exactly?
what license and version have you bought?
what is the thing that you really want, and what is really what you want to use and can´t?

If it is known better what is happening they will be able to help you much more and try to solve it if it is possible.

Because from my point of view, just saying what you have said already does not help to understand it and help you.

Vladimir Golovin, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 05:29:13 -0400
Frank, could you please clarify your problem? Is it about an update prompt when you're trying to download filters made with newer versions of FF? Or the splash screen notification about the availability of newer versions of FF? Could you please post a screenshot?

FF never obsoletes older versions. If you own one, you can use it indefinitely. All older versions are still available for download (the links aren't posted on the website but you can request them at support). However, if you have an older version, you may not be able to download filters made in newer versions, which is perfectly reasonable: for example, FF1.0 doesn't have newer features like HDR colors, so it just cannot load and render filters that make use of these features.

Also, in all our communication "upgrades" and "updates" mean different things. "Upgrades" are from an earlier major version (e.g. 3.x) to a newer major version (e.g. 4.x), and are paid, usually discounted. "Updates" are from an earlier minor version (e.g. 2.003) to a newer minor version (e.g. 2.007) and are always free.

And finally, if you think there is a problem with FF, or its pricing, or updates, or whatever else related to it, please contact our support:
http://www.filterforge.com/contact/

Vladimir Golovin, Mon, 18 Mar 2013 05:30:46 -0400

Quote
im currently doing some extensive testing of the filters. im getting errors that crash the client now when loading certain 2.0 filters

That's definitely not an expected behavior. Please contact support.

Gradient + Curves madness!

Davide Barranca — Wed, 13 Mar 2013 20:13:18 -0400

Davide Barranca, Sun, 10 Mar 2013 19:27:25 -0400
Hello everyone,
I'm pretty new on the FF scene so it's maybe appropriate that I first introduce myself briefly: my name is Davide, I'm from Italy and I make my living doing photographic post-production and pre-press jobs (mainly in the art business) - besides that I do code PS extensions and scripts.

Which is the why I've finally found my way in the FF world (in the past, from time to time, I've visited the FF page but only very recently I've felt kind of an irresistible magnetic effect ending up with a buy ;) ). Since I'm still in the steeper part of the learning curve - and alas I've few time to spare playing with the plugin - I'm now just lurking under the hood of existing filters with a sense of wonder. Damn how many talented minds there are!

One of the first things that I've found surprising is the way you people master gradients and curves in order to get... well almost everything. So I've started exploring myself using the tools I'm more familiar with, namely Photoshop and Scripting (still quite scared by FF somehow :) ). I came up with something that you may find trivial (because FF is vastly superior on that respect), but from a strict Photoshop-centric point of view is far from being obvious: basically I've coded a script that allows me to parametrically draw PS curves (i.e. I input Javascript math functions).

Well, funky things start to appear when you mix such curves with gradients. I've shown a bit of my findings here, that I'd like to share with you both as a way to thank all the people who's in turn shared their own work, and, possibly, as a source of inspiration to the newcomers like me willing to start exploring this fascinating world!

Kind regards

Davide

CFandM, Wed, 13 Mar 2013 20:13:18 -0400
Welcome to the fun Davide.. :)
Interesting experiment.. :)......

Buying Filter Forge

Ian MacRae — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 04:15:58 -0400

Ian MacRae, Sun, 10 Mar 2013 14:00:33 -0400
I own a sign shop and use Signlab for sign design
I occasionally need to add texture (metal / wood etc) to designs
Trying to decide to buy Basic or Standard Pkg
I can't see where I would design filters but
Does the Basic pkg give me access to the full library and when it says access to I assume that library free? Right?
If you buy basic and soon discover you want to progress, can you upgrade to Standard
for a nominal?

SpaceRay, Mon, 11 Mar 2013 04:15:58 -0400

Quote
Does the Basic pkg give me access to the full library and when it says access to I assume that library free? Right?

It is clearly put in the buy page that you will have acess to ALL the whole and complete filter library without any limit, the only problem is that you will not be able to modify any of the filter in the basic edition

Quote
If you buy basic and soon discover you want to progress, can you upgrade to Standard for a nominal?

YES, as far as I know, you can always upgrade from one version to another even inside the same number version and pay the difference, even from one number to another, for example upgrade Basic FF 3.0 to Standard FF 4.0 (when available)

Quote
Trying to decide to buy Basic or Standard Pkg

Well this may be easy, as the only difference is that you may be able to modify or create your own filters.

Maybe you wil not want to create your own filters, but perhaps you may want to modify existing filters in some way

DIFERENCE BETWEEN Basic and Professional

Are you going to use or need textures of more than 3000 x 3000 pixels?

Do you want to have a faster rendering time by using Multi-core cpu rather than just a simple and loney core?

Considering that Filter Forge is already usually slow with many filters in Multi-core cpu, I think that would be really worth to try the basic version, and see if this is good for you.

Would you need to have render maps for 3D software or are you only going to make simple 2D textures?

Needing recommendation on a filter

COConsulting — Sun, 10 Mar 2013 15:11:25 -0400

COConsulting, Sat, 09 Mar 2013 03:01:08 -0500
I am trying to create artificial height to a layer in Photoshop. I have tried a few different filters to no effect. Here is what I am trying to get the final effect to look like (see photo below).

I have created a makeshift way by duplicating the layer and changing the color to a darker shade of the original, then off setting that layer by a few pixels. This pretty much does the job, except on corners you can see the off set. So, I would love to find a filter that would do this automatically. Here is the original I am trying to match up.

Skybase, Sat, 09 Mar 2013 04:34:34 -0500
You're perfectly on the right road with extrusions in Photoshop. Offset, copy, offset, copy... which is what I would have done. We could easily produce the technique right inside of FilterForge of course.

There are methods using the smudge component, but this often leads to results that don't look as wonderful. I personally think just the classic offset-copy method does a clean job extruding outwards in fact may be significantly faster than smudge with antialias enabled.

I built a small "tech demo" that I think answers your basic needs which I'm pretty sure I understood you right. This is kinda like a nice foundation so you can add more to it too. The filter just does the copy-offset method and just adds a couple parameters to help automate it. By default, it accepts images with alpha layers and utilizes that to build which ever way you offset it.

Percentage SHOULD be small values (0.1 ~ 1 works very well). I just didn't bother to put a range on each of those sliders. Shading just adds shading to the extrusion (Shading at 0 will give you a purely black shadow). Offset X and Y just gives you control which way the extrusion will go (Values between -1 ~ 1 recommended but not limited to it.) Tech Demo mode was a thing I made to test the filter. It just uses a perlin noise with alpha with high contrast to make the maps but it's really an unnecessary mode.

Hope this helps!

COConsulting, Sat, 09 Mar 2013 14:54:57 -0500
Skybase, thank you so much! That is exactly what I was needing! Seriously, worked for about 7 hours yesterday just trying to find someway of doing this. Thank you for your help!

With some tweaking I should be able to get it very close to the original. How did you choose the color to use for the extrusions? Is there a way to be able to choose the color from the user's side? Or is it taken from the original picture? Here is a side-by-side comparison.

Again thank you!

Skybase, Sat, 09 Mar 2013 20:56:18 -0500
The current method only lets you extrude based on the original image, so there isn't much control over the output. You can only shade. If you have the pro version of FilterForge you can modify the filter by adding a simple hue/saturation node at the beginning of the tree.

COConsulting, Sat, 09 Mar 2013 23:41:12 -0500
Makes sense. If it gets the extrude on the original, then I may make the original a darker green, and then have another "flat" image with the texture filter on top of the extrude. That could solve it. Thank you so much again Skybase for your help.

Skybase, Sun, 10 Mar 2013 00:08:03 -0500
It's nice because I now have a starting point for another filter. :)

Sphinx., Sun, 10 Mar 2013 15:11:25 -0400
Smudge based attempt

Library server working again

GMM — Sat, 09 Mar 2013 11:42:19 -0500

GMM, Sat, 22 Aug 2009 01:33:06 -0400
You can download and submit filters again :)
Minor fixes are to be applied today. If you notice that something isn't working as it should please let us know.

Totte, Sat, 22 Aug 2009 05:31:21 -0400
I don't know if it's related, but I got a crash (mac OS X version ) after I submitted, and then the contact form didn't like when I wanted to post the crashlog, Said > 4096 bytes whatever i tried to post( was to long at first, but I cut down)

cheers,

/Totte

Kraellin, Sat, 22 Aug 2009 08:23:53 -0400
thanks, gmm :)

CFandM, Sat, 22 Aug 2009 14:25:13 -0400
Great News...:beer: :ff:

Totte, Sun, 23 Aug 2009 00:54:04 -0400
Are the download and usage counters working?
I got a feeling they stopped working when library server went down, and that they still doesnt work.

ronjonnie, Mon, 24 Aug 2009 05:06:20 -0400
Thanks GMM,

Great job! All appears to be working A/OK.
Counters are also back & working. :ff: :loveff:

Ron

Betis, Mon, 31 Aug 2009 14:41:43 -0400
I haven't seen submissions in 4 days, are you sure it's fixed?

Totte, Mon, 31 Aug 2009 14:46:10 -0400
I have submission that havent been processed since August 26th, I guess they are busy fixing the problems or as Vlad wrote somewhere, building the infrastructure for 2.0, which I guess also is about mocking with the servers...

Betis, Mon, 31 Aug 2009 14:51:48 -0400
That would make sense, thanks for clearing it up :)

Kraellin, Tue, 01 Sep 2009 08:19:28 -0400
the server is down. i couldnt get in using the 'old' method, either.

Betis, Tue, 01 Sep 2009 08:50:55 -0400
*Raises an eyebrow in interest*

ronjonnie, Tue, 01 Sep 2009 11:37:55 -0400
Up & running again. :loveff:
Pray it is all back and working @ 100%.

Ron

Kraellin, Tue, 01 Sep 2009 12:41:16 -0400
hmmm, not working for me, yet. i'll try later.

ronjonnie, Tue, 01 Sep 2009 17:11:27 -0400
Well,...

Now, it is not working, unable to connect to the server?? Sigh! :cry:
Pray it is back @ 100% soon.

Ron

Once Upon, Tue, 01 Sep 2009 18:54:01 -0400
Still not able to submit a new filter, and I have an awesome one. :) At least I think it is awesome.

Daniel Ramsey, Tue, 01 Sep 2009 23:57:06 -0400
unable to connect to the server...not able to submit a new filter :?:

Totte, Wed, 02 Sep 2009 00:04:56 -0400
And not one single download counted since August 26, probably not any usage count either...

Aron Granberg, Wed, 02 Sep 2009 01:26:34 -0400
For me it isn't working at all.
I still get the Unable To Connect To The Server message :?:

GMM, Wed, 02 Sep 2009 04:26:57 -0400
Everything seems to work on our side... please try again.

Totte, Wed, 02 Sep 2009 04:35:04 -0400
Works now, to post filters anyway, but still having filters "in queue" since august 26th that I cannot post updates to as the original posted filter haven't been processed yet.

GMM, Wed, 02 Sep 2009 04:37:01 -0400

Quote
Totte wrote: having filters "in queue" since august 26th

Our filter approver has just returned from her vacation leave. Please wait a bit more :)

Totte, Wed, 02 Sep 2009 04:39:32 -0400
Aha, that explains things ;-)
Time to create a "back-from-vacation-filter" then ;-)

ronjonnie, Wed, 02 Sep 2009 05:43:47 -0400
Up & running again. :ff:
Pray it is all back and working @ 100%. :)

Ron

Kraellin, Wed, 02 Sep 2009 17:01:20 -0400
yup, workin for me too :)

ronjonnie, Thu, 03 Sep 2009 05:07:11 -0400
Yes, the server is working again.
I don't think the counters are working.
I noticed the 40% discount 5 days left
has been there awhile also...
maybe they extended the days?

Very thankful the server is back! :loveff:

Ron

Totte, Thu, 03 Sep 2009 05:18:36 -0400
Yes, I see the same download counts, have been stuck for a week...

GMM, Thu, 03 Sep 2009 05:28:09 -0400

Quote
Totte wrote: I see the same download counts

We'll double-check but the counters seem to work at the moment. Could anyone else please confirm this?

Totte, Thu, 03 Sep 2009 07:27:01 -0400
Now the download counters suddenly jumped (one from 34 to 82), had been 34 for almost a week.
So it looks like it is up and running again, good work!

ronjonnie, Thu, 03 Sep 2009 11:30:26 -0400
Yes,the counters are working again! :)
Thanks GMM for looking into the problem.

I pray they & the server remain @ 100%!

Ron

Vurt, Thu, 10 Sep 2009 17:04:25 -0400
..and now its not working.

Will14, Thu, 10 Sep 2009 23:02:11 -0400
Server out but my web is up.

GMM, Fri, 11 Sep 2009 03:12:54 -0400
Our DNS server (not the library one) suddenly went offline.
Now everything should work ok.

Totte, Mon, 14 Sep 2009 04:11:43 -0400
Seems to be down again (cannot log in to post a filter).
Can log onto here using the same credentials though.

Totte, Mon, 14 Sep 2009 04:37:43 -0400
And suddenly it works again.... :)

ronjonnie, Mon, 14 Sep 2009 05:35:15 -0400
Server appears to be A/OK.
Waiting for submitted filters to be posted.

Happy Filter Forgeing. :)

Ron

Oicutey, Sat, 17 Oct 2009 19:51:48 -0400
I'm not able to download any filters. So I'm assuming this is the same problem? Never opens in FilterForge.

Carl, Sat, 17 Oct 2009 20:14:44 -0400
try the obsolete library to download that some times works when the open in FF is out :)

Totte, Sun, 02 May 2010 08:52:42 -0400
Those download counters seems to be stuck again, for the past two weeks or so...

GMM, Tue, 04 May 2010 03:19:37 -0400

Quote
Totte wrote: download counters seems to be stuck again

We have restarted the counters, please check them up.

Carl, Tue, 04 May 2010 22:55:30 -0400
doesn't seem to have changed :| :)

Totte, Tue, 04 May 2010 23:38:55 -0400
Still stuck .

GMM, Wed, 05 May 2010 05:49:53 -0400
We have changed something else. Please try again :)

Totte, Wed, 05 May 2010 06:00:35 -0400
Works, download count jumped from 0 to 64 for my Jetty filter ;-)

twoflowers, Sat, 09 Mar 2013 07:10:12 -0500
is the library server currently offline? as i can't check for updates nor install any filters :(

SpaceRay, Sat, 09 Mar 2013 11:42:19 -0500
it happens that sometimes during a few hours it may be offline or not working, but usually after some time it is solved and back and working again

I have tried just now to download a filter and it works right and there is no problem in this moment

Mini Tutorials

Ghislaine — Sat, 09 Mar 2013 01:52:05 -0500

Ghislaine, Fri, 15 Jun 2012 00:07:54 -0400
Tutorial 1 - Spirogrammes

As the first mini tutorial I start with the basis of a simple spirogram designed with squares. The main components are frame, rotate and blend, nothing else (no controls, no other components). Here enclosed the basis of the method.

Note that the images are in black and white to start with ease and get to the essential of the technique used.

We start with a frame, which has the following settings:

1. black color everywhere except for the inner frame that will take the white color;
2. margins width : 45;
3. bevel : contour.

Ghislaine, Fri, 15 Jun 2012 00:09:28 -0400
Here enclosed the basis of the method multiplied by nine selections or sources giving different results each other. Note that this file contains few controls so you can see for yourself what the settings can give as result. The controls are not remapped and is thus wanted to let you find the right settings.

In this new filter, you will find the same frame component for all sources and with the same settings; also a scale component with a scale control only for sources 8 and 9; a control for the frame width, finally a control for corners. Sure you'll find a switch component with a control selector. Nothingelse.

Ghislaine, Fri, 15 Jun 2012 00:12:20 -0400
Here an explanatory diagram.

1. Note that the settings are the same for all rotations (Origin X: 0.5, Origin Y: 0.5; Percenage: 100).

2. For all sources (1 to 9), rotate always input to foreground of the blend component and blend is always input to background of the next blend component. All opacity sets to 100. All mode set to lighten mode.

3. For image no 1, all rotations were settled at 0.02 except for the last rotation which was settled at 0,13. The best thing to do is to explore the value of the last rotation. Try to 0,12, 0,15, etc., and see the result. In fact, the last rotation is used to double the final blend, but not always. It depends on the desired final result. At the very end, a final blend is used to assemble the final rotation and blend. (Refer to the filter.) Once done, you can adjust the final rotation, the result is visible in the final blend.

4. For image no 2, all rotations at 0,3 except for the last. For image no 3, all rotations at 0,4 except the last. Image 4, all rotations at 0,5. Image 5, all rotations at 0,6 except the last. Image 6 : first rotation at 0,1; second at 0,2; third at 0,3; 4th at 0,4; 5th at 0,5; 6th at 0,6.

Now just see the difference between those images. Result : more highter is the rotation more space we have between squares and less components it takes.

Ghislaine, Fri, 15 Jun 2012 00:14:29 -0400
Here a second explanatory diagram.

Images 6 and 7 show different patterns. (See sources 6 and 7 of the filter.)

Images 8, 9 and 10 are related to the setting of the control "corners". (See sources 8-10 filter.) Play with the adjustment, put different values
and see the results.

Images 11 to 14 are related to component "scale". If desired, you can double even triple the spirogram. To do this, you must reduce the size of the spirogram using the appropriate settings of the component scale. And more you have spirograms to reduce, more you have scale and frame components. These last frames are used to hide what we do not want to see outside the smaller spirogram.(Refer to sources 8 and 9 of the filter.) For those frames, black color everywhere is applied. You also must adjust the other frame's settings.

Finally, play with all the settings to see what is good or not. Once satisfied with your settings, you can use remapping for controls that you add for the users or fix your own settings for controls that you do not want to add in your filter. Note that the spacing between spirograms 11 and 12 are different, depending on the setting used for the frame width.

FOLLOWING ... the circle in connection with the component scale.

(Write tutorials in another language than his own ... oh boy !... that's sport !)

Morgantao, Fri, 15 Jun 2012 05:30:56 -0400
Cool stuff. Keep 'em coming!
I like how you build it with every example. You start with the bare minimum, and each step you add moe things to it. :)

Ghislaine, Fri, 15 Jun 2012 09:35:43 -0400
Thanks Morgan. Glad you like that. It is a lot of work, double work for me with the english, but when needed, I have my friend google translate but google is not so perfect. I have to correct him.

Start with the bare minimum is the purpose of the exercise. I wrote a lot of tuts on the forum where I'm modo, but it was easy because in my language. As we must be all designers somewhere, we are visual persons who need images : it is more helful for the understanding.

Before I continue with circles, we will have to add some colors to the spirograms. I propose few color tricks for that kind of stuff.

The following diagram shows various ways on how to add color to spirograms.

Sources 1 and 5 have only one color. The color of source 1 comes from the color control input to inner frame. The color of source 5 comes from component hue/saturation which is placed at the end of the final blend (blend input to source of the hue/saturation component). Then you add a slider to hue, another to saturation and you put the desired settings. As for the lightness, you leave it to zero.

Source 2 : color added by the threahold component (last blend input to source of threahold and then input to high the same color control as source 1). To low, input a color control and put enabled for image and for alpha. So users will be able to choose their own image, a color or an alpha channel as background.

Source 3 : input to inner frame a profile gradient and set colors with 2 color controls (in the filter, color control for color 1 is the same as source 1)

Source 4 : a color control input to inner frame (in the filter, I used the same as source 1). Now to the last blend, a slider control input to the opacity and an intslider control input to mode. By clicking the filter controls above the result, you will see what setting to fix by playing with these two new controls. In the filter, the mode for the source 4 was settled to 3(= multiply) for image with green dots and settled to 8 (= color dodge) for the image with 6 squares.

Source 5 : (see source 1).

Source 6 : here a bit more complex. Add a free gradient that you input to inner frame. You must input 2 color controls for color 1 and 2 (in the filter, this is already fixed). The other settings for this component : set start X and start Y to 0,5. Type must be set to radial and continuation to flat. Then add a slider control that you input to End X and another slider control input to End Y. And set their numbers until you get the desired result (you must see 2 colors for best result). Finally, an intslider control input to profile. Play with all those settings until you find the best results. (In the filter, End X settled to 87, End Y to 30, Profile 4.)

Source 7 : a little bit more complex that source 6. Colors come from 2 profile gradients, the first one rotate 0, the other one rotate 90. Now with assemble RGB, input the first gradient to R, the second one to B. Then input assemble RGB to inner frame. This gives four nice colors. But we can bright those colors with level component. So input the last blend to source of level. Then a slider control to black point, a slider control to gamma, another slider control to white point. Finally input a checkbox to Preserve color. And set all these slider controls. In the filter, you will see my settings by choosing the 9th preset (= source 7).

Source 8 : I let you discover by yourself how I made that.

Note that I input the free gradient (source 6) to outerframe. You will find the difference.

Ghislaine, Sat, 16 Jun 2012 20:24:12 -0400
Here the filter with colorful spirograms. You will find the same basic source multiplied by 8.

Ghislaine, Wed, 20 Jun 2012 21:07:06 -0400
PART II

In this part, the basis of spirograms is designed with circles. The filter contains two different spirograms with the same base (circles). For these spirograms, the main component is the free ellipse. For spirogram no 1: rotate and blend; for spirogram no 2: scale and blend.

Note that the images are also in black and white to continue with ease and get to the essential of the technique used. You can also add colors as shown in the post above.

Spirogram 1

1. Start with free ellipse with these settings : radius 0,45; origin X 0,5, origin Y 0,5; bevel at contours and squash at 50. Now connect free ellipse to source of an offset component.

2. Offset component settings : offset X 0,2, offset Y 0,14, pourcentage 100. Now connect offset component to source of rotate component.

3. All three next rotate components have the same settings : rotation 0,06; origin X 0,5, origin Y 0,5; pourcentage 100.

4. Add three blend components, all with 100 to opacity. You must connect each rotate to foreground of the blend.

5. Now connect offset component to background of the blend. Note that all the other blend must be connect to the background. (The same as we did for spirograms based on squares.) You must see 4 circles in the third blend.

6. Connect this third blend to source of a 4th rotate and to background of a 4th blend. Settings for this new rotate : rotation 0,25; origin X and Y 0,5. And connect this rotate to foreground of the 4th blend. You must see 8 circles in this last blend.

7. Now we introduce a new component called Flip with these settings : origin X and Y 0,5; and check both flip X and flip Y. Connect to source the 4th blend.

8. Finally, add a last blend (the 5th) and then connect the 4th blend to background of this last blend and flip component to foreground. connect the 5th blend to result and save your filter.

Note that all blends must be in lighten mode.

I do not post any images or filter today, but in a next post to give you the chance to make this filter by yourself.

CFandM, Thu, 21 Jun 2012 05:29:51 -0400
Good work Ghislaine :)

Ghislaine, Thu, 21 Jun 2012 09:30:05 -0400
Thanks CF.

If someone tried to create this filter, you can post it here or an image from it.
I'll put images and filter tonight. For now, just this

Ghislaine, Thu, 21 Jun 2012 11:54:02 -0400
PART III

As we will have 3 spirograms, we must add a switch component. To this switch, connect an intslider to selector (you have to rename, example : Choose a spirogram) and set the max value to 3 and check use remapping. Than connect the first spirogram to source 1, the second to source 2, etc. (Refer to the filter.) This intslider control gives to users the choice of spirograms.

Spirogram 2

1. Use a second free ellipse with these settings : radius 0,78; origin X and Y to 0,5; bevel to contours; squash 0 and bevel width 2.

2. Add 6 scale components, all scales must have the same settings : scale 0,87, origin X and Y 0,28; pourcentage 100. Than connect the free ellipse to source of the first scale component.

3. Add 6 blends with all the same mode and opacity: lighten and 100 opacity. Than connect the free ellipse to background of the first blend.

4. Connect all other scales to foreground of the blend and all blends to background of blend component. You must see in the last blend 7 circles with different sizes. This result is only the first part of spirogram no 2 and also the spirogram source 3 (you must connect this result to source 3 of the switch component).

5. Now add a scale with these new settings : scale 0,55; origin X and Y 0,8; squash 0; percentage 100. Connect the last blend to source of the scale. Note that you have to space a bit this new scale component, this because the filter needs to get clean and comprehensive. (Refer to the filter)

6. Add 3 rotates and all settings for these 3 : rotation 0,14; origin X and Y 0,5; percentage 100. Than connect the scale to source of the rotate.

7. Add 4 blends with the same settings : opacity 100, mode lighten.

8. Now connect the rotate to foreground of the next blend and scale to background of this blend. You repete the same processus (all rotate connected to foreground and all blend connected to background). Refer to the filter. Note that you must set the rotation to 0,57 for the last rotate component if you want a perfect spirogram with 7 circles. You can play with this last rotation setting and change for 0,60 or 0,40 and see what it gives : very bad spirogram !

9. Finally, connect the last blend to source 2 of the switch component and see the result.

10. As we have the same settings for squash and bevel width of those 2 free ellipses, and we also want to give users the opportunity to fix their own settings, we add a slider control to squash of those 3 free ellipses and set it to 50 (= 0 without slider control). Same thing for the bevel width : set the value of 2 for the slider control and check use remapping. (Refer to the filter.)

Note that I made a mistake by writing 50 to squash in the post above. It might be 0 without slider control (the 50 goes with the slider control).

Here enclosed the basis of the method.

Examples are coming with another trick ...

Ghislaine, Thu, 21 Jun 2012 15:25:31 -0400
Here the first explanatory diagram.

Ghislaine, Thu, 21 Jun 2012 15:31:15 -0400
Here the second explanatory diagram

Ghislaine, Thu, 21 Jun 2012 15:34:51 -0400
Here a third explanatory diagram

Version 1 shows you this as the third spirogram. But with a new filter (coming soon)
this spiro become a variante of spiro 2.

Ghislaine, Thu, 21 Jun 2012 15:37:03 -0400
Here the last explanatory diagram

Ghislaine, Thu, 21 Jun 2012 15:40:09 -0400
Here the trick that I was talking about.

The only difference between this second version and the first one is in the final. When we have just 3 spirograms, it is not necessary to add a switch component. It exists another way. So in this version :

1. Add a new blend at the end of spirogram no 1 and connect the last blend of the spirogram no 1 to background of this new blend.

2. Add another blend to the end of spirogram no 2 and connect this blend to foreground of the new last blend of spirogram no 1.

3. Now use a checkbox and connect it to opacity. You have to rename this control, example : Spiro 1 / Spiro 2. This will give to users the choice between spirogram no 1 and no 2. (Refer to the filter)

4. To get a third spirogram, add a checkbox to opacity of the last new blend of spirogram no 2. (Always refer to the filter.) You have to rename this new checkbox, example : Spirogram 2 variante or what you want. This will allow users to choose between spiro 2 and its variante. You must connect the 6th blend (which was the third spiro in the version 1 of this filter) to foreground of this blend as shown in the filter.

The last blend of spirogram no 1 is connected to the result. That's it and that's all for this part III.

Here the second version of the filter

Morgantao, Thu, 21 Jun 2012 15:58:48 -0400
Very nice!

You're really getting some original shapes here :)

SpaceRay, Fri, 22 Jun 2012 05:45:07 -0400
Very good, interesting and useful!!!

Thanks very much for taking the time to make all these!!!

Ghislaine, Tue, 17 Jul 2012 22:11:23 -0400
Tutorial 2 - How to create hearts

Basis for the creation of heart

In this tutorial, I will post 4 different and easy ways on how to make hearts. I share some new ways that I have discovered by playing with the filter editor.

First way

Create a heart with only four components:

1. profile gradient
2. bias curve connected to profile of profile gradient
3. free ellipse
4. offset to center the heart

Here the basis of this first way.

Note that hearts in this tutorial come without anything else, just full and simple hearts. You will have to add other components and play around by yourself to discover a lot of possibilities. I just give the basis.

Ghislaine, Wed, 18 Jul 2012 21:55:05 -0400
Second way

Create a heart with only four components:

1. free ellipse
2. free gradient
2. impulse curve connected to free gradient
4. offset to center the heart

Here the basis of this second way. Note that those 2 first ways are already known.

Ghislaine, Wed, 18 Jul 2012 22:20:49 -0400
Third way

Create a heart with five components and without curve:

1. free gradient
2. free ellipse
2. rotate to get the heart in the good direction
4. scale to get the heart in the good size
5. threshold to get a full heart

Note that it is not necessary to add threshold if you just need the contour of the heart.

Notice : you might see all settings of each component and make your own tests by changing the settings. See the results.

Here the basis of this third way is unknown. That is the way I used for my filter Heart Effect on Photo and Image that you can see here.

Ghislaine, Wed, 18 Jul 2012 22:35:48 -0400
4th way

Create a heart with five components and without curve:

1. free gradient
2. free polygon
2. rotate to get the heart in the good direction
4. scale to get the heart in the good size
5. threshold to get a full heart

Note that it is not necessary to add threshold if you just need the contour of the heart. The only different thing between this way and the third one is on the polygon.

As said above, you might try your own tests by changing the settings and see what is happened as result. Do not forget that each way is only a basis and not the end of the filter.

The basis of this 4th way is unknown. I have also used this 4th way for my filter Heart Effect on Photo and Image that you can see by clicking the link above.

Have fun to whom is interesting to create hearts !

Skybase, Wed, 18 Jul 2012 23:38:23 -0400
Here's some critique: The 4th ways is probably the "easiest" to think about I guess. In terms of node-flow this is probably the least efficient and not so great in terms of construction. The reason for this is pretty simple: the rotate and scale can be both achieved in the free gradient instead of being dealt externally.

In other words, you use the free gradient to your advantage to do those two operations together. I think your first method highlights that well and that's perhaps one of the best ways to construct the shape since it results in less nodes and more control compared to the 3rd and 4th.

I think you did a good job with the first method though. That's the best so far in part because it's giving us the shape without dealing further with complex structures. This allows for more leg room in the future when you or anybody else has to deal more things.

Of course we can make tons of ways to construct the same shape but as an author look for ways that's efficient and elegant. I think it overall helps people when the node structures are simpler and therefore easier to deal with. ;) But that's like me for now. Haha this is awesome. Glad tutorials are coming! Keep them going :D

The screenshot below shows basically a simple method to avoid the use of transformation components. In this case, I synced up the start Y of the free gradient and the origin Y of the free elipse component. This allows it so that the gradient can be shifted up or down without worrying about odd shapes happening.

Carl, Thu, 19 Jul 2012 03:14:49 -0400
nice Gigi :)

Ghislaine, Thu, 19 Jul 2012 09:48:50 -0400
Thanks Carl ! :)

Skybase, thank you! Thanks to your intervention, I can eliminate rotate component. But for my purposes, I have to add a scale component to increase the heart.

However, I still clean your way by removing the step curve which does not seem necessary. Look at the example below.

Ghislaine, Thu, 19 Jul 2012 10:02:31 -0400
5th way

Create hearts with just two components, without curve and without slider control (this 5th way was inspired by Skybase) :

1. free gradient
2. free ellipse

You will see a scale component, it's necessary for my needs. You also can see an outline for the heart... it's also for my needs. So I had to eliminate the step curve to get this outline. Before changing the bevel of the free ellipse, I saw that it was not necessary to add a step curve to get a nice full heart. Without the step curve, this leaves free the bevel in order to have the outline of the heart.

No need slider control for the start Y. Just set the free gradient at 36 to start Y. But for the outline heart, this is set to 36.

Here the 5th way

If someone else has other ideas on the subject, feel free to post your methods here. By working together we get to make things better.

Morgantao, Tue, 24 Jul 2012 16:35:14 -0400
Kewl stuff ;)

SpaceRay, Fri, 08 Mar 2013 22:12:07 -0500
WOW! I have seen that you have added many more useful and interesting things.

Please, would you be so kind to keep teaching us about this good and cools things?

Thanks very much for sharing all this knowdlege and mini tutorials

Ghislaine, Sat, 09 Mar 2013 00:59:44 -0500
Thx Ray ! Yes, I will continue to add more tuts soon. I just need to finish my new website before to do it. :)

SpaceRay, Sat, 09 Mar 2013 01:52:05 -0500
Thansk to you and good news that you will make more tutorials, do not worry, take all the time you need and make them whenever you can and want.

Will there be a Manual in PDF (or printable in some way) for FF 4.0?

SpaceRay — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 22:52:13 -0500

SpaceRay, Fri, 01 Mar 2013 14:54:50 -0500

Quote
GMM wrote in 2009 Unfortunately no PDF version at the moment, though we may consider it in the future.

Well now is the future, 3 years after ;) :D

so I am asking again

Will there be a Manual in PDF (or printable in some way) for FF 4.0?

Thanks

Ghislaine, Fri, 01 Mar 2013 15:42:12 -0500
Good idea the PDF ... :)

GMM, Tue, 05 Mar 2013 08:02:44 -0500
SpaceRay, I remember another thread about your efforts to convert our chm help into PDF. I thought you had some success in that.

SpaceRay, Wed, 06 Mar 2013 02:54:49 -0500
Please, anyone else have had sucess converting the FF 3.0 manual to PDF that have HYPERLINKS and they work right, and would be kind to upload it to the forum?

Thanks very much

Quote
GMM SpaceRay, I remember another thread about your efforts to convert our chm help into PDF. I thought you had some success in that.

Well, in the other thread I have been able to have some kind of success making it although it does not keep the hiperlinks so it is only possible to be used for printing and is not interactive and well as the one fr om the real help manual wh ere you can use it also without printing.

And even if I had a sucess, I think that the manual will be changed for FF 4.0 and so I would have to do ALL and everything for the conversion again from start. so this is why I have put this thread dedicated to the FF 4.0 version.

Quote
lipebianc +1.000.000 PDF Manual? Very useful, especial for reading on tablets, etc!

Is true, although you can also use the internet browser on the tablets, it would be much better to have it in PDF (or epub or any other different format) so it would be better and easier to use.

CFandM, Fri, 08 Mar 2013 17:51:41 -0500
Well the program that I use for creating the Shapes Pdf can be found at the link below and is free and Open Source...
SCRIBUS

SpaceRay, Fri, 08 Mar 2013 22:52:13 -0500
Thanks CFandM, good to know, but I now finally have the original Adobe Acrobat X Professional as I have subscribed to the Adobe Creative Cloud (with 40% discount) and so now I have ALL the Adobe software available and even some exclusive ones.

Companies using FF?

Burt — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 08:35:11 -0500

Burt, Thu, 07 Mar 2013 00:02:28 -0500
Are there any animation or film companies using Photoshop? I'm wondering if use is widespread enough that as my skill increases I can add that to my LinkedIn resume as a skill.

SpaceRay, Thu, 07 Mar 2013 00:35:16 -0500

Quote
Are there any animation or film companies using Photoshop?

:?:

using Photoshop? As far as I know there are lots of them for sure

Perhaps you mean, animation and film companies using Filter Forge instead of Photoshop?

I do not know

I thought that maybe they may do not like FF much because it does not have fast preview and is sometimes slow, but considering that this companies has a very high budget they would have very powerful computer, much more than the ones we have so they should not have a problem with this.

I have seen that they buy things like the new Intel Quad Xeon 32 cores (4 Xeon chips not quad core on a quad chip motherboard) that cost about 12.000$

Skybase, Thu, 07 Mar 2013 01:21:57 -0500
Photoshop is pretty much used everywhere and everybody will have some adobe software in their studio computer anyway.

Typically companies don't exactly say what they use. The obvious ones are obvious but the in-house tools, python scripts, countless vfx utilities, and many others rarely get mentioned unless the company that develops them asks for testimonials or specific opinions. There can be "trade secrets" heh.

I can safely say that my friends across a variety of studios have used FilterForge sometime in the past to do something to their work. They mostly would be making bitmap texture tools and otherwise. But I don't know which studios specifically use it in their workflow. Pretty sure there are a couple.

Burt, Thu, 07 Mar 2013 02:59:20 -0500
I have a lot of Photoshop experience. Not so much on Illustrator and haven't used InDesign. Not a lot of 3D experience either - some SketchUp and 3DS Max years ago when I had a student license.

I know 3D companies sometimes have procedural texture guys and thought if any studios are using FF to build custom filters for inhouse use it could eventually be one more line item on the resume. Every bit helps. :)

GMM, Thu, 07 Mar 2013 03:42:29 -0500

Quote
Are there any animation or film companies

There really are. I would prefer not to disclose specific names but a Japanese motion picture company of Californian origin have purchased several dozen copies of FF.

Also, many gamedev studios, including the most prominent ones, use FF for making textures.

Burt, Thu, 07 Mar 2013 08:35:11 -0500
Ah I meant using FF of course - darn old brain. Anyway that is good to know. I will work on it a bit more and try to get down at least the basics of scripting. Thanks.

How to import filters Photoshop and Pixelmator

povilasn — Mon, 04 Mar 2013 12:39:59 -0500

povilasn, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 06:32:19 -0500
Hello,
I'm new in photoshop. How can I import new filters from Filter forge library to photoshop. And may be some one knows it is possibility to import these filters to Pixelmator.
I'm using Mac (Lion)

Thanks for your help.

SpaceRay, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:00:36 -0500
Well, you can´t export filters from Filter Forge (FF), and you can´t use any FF filter outside of FF, so you can´t importa any FF filter into Photoshop directly.

The only way available to use FF filters inside Photoshop is through the FF plugin (this should have been installed when you installed Filter Forge)and use the FF interfac application to import the images from photoshop to FF and the send theback to Photoshop.

If FF is not installed in Photoshop, just copy the right and corresponding .8bf version of FF into your Photoshop filters folder.

Also you can see these other threads links here below:

Can FF be used directly from photoshop?

Would be possible to use filter of FF in Photoshop as included inside?

About Pixelmator, you can try to copy the filter forge plugin (.8bf) to the Pixelmator and see if it works and if Pixelmator could be compatible

You can see also this tutorial article -->How to Install and Use Plugins in Pixelmator

povilasn, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:26:30 -0500
Thank you for answer, I'm sorry but just use Mac, it's still for me too hard understand "If FF is not installed in Photoshop, just copy the right and corresponding .8bf version of FF into your Photoshop filters folder. ". Could you tell where I can find this file and in which directory I must copy it. :?:
Thank you for help

SpaceRay, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:42:28 -0500
Have you installed Filter Forge in your MAC ?

The plugin should have been installed already automatically inside Photoshop, have you checked if Filter Forge is included in the filters list ?

If not installed, you could try to install FF again.

And if what you want is to install in Pixelmator, I am sorry but I do not have a MAC so I do not know how to do it manually.

povilasn, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:44:12 -0500
Yes I installed it to Mac, but can not find FF filters in Photoshop filter list. :cry:

SpaceRay, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:45:46 -0500
The FF filters ARE NOT in the Photoshop filter list, ONLY the Filter Forge plugin, so you must activate the FF plugin, and when the FF window opens from photoshop you will be able to see the FF filters.

The filters CAN Never be inside Photoshop because they are not compatible, and as said before ONLY work inside Filter forge

If you are going to use a filter that needs a base image you MUST have this image ready BEFORE activating the FF plugin

povilasn, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:48:13 -0500
Yes I understood that, but there is no FF plugin (I use Photoshop element 9, may be that is the problem?)

povilasn, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:51:12 -0500
It's imposible to import new plug-in, jus I need to know which file I need to choose for that

SpaceRay, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:52:22 -0500
No, FF is totally compatible with Photoshop elements 9 as you can see here

http://www.filterforge.com/download/hosts.html

Can you try to install again Filter Forge and see that when installing it finds the Photoshop elements installation ? And so then the installer will put the FF plugin inside Photoshop.

I can´t tell where is the plugin located in the MAC version of FF as I do not know.

povilasn, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:54:11 -0500
Ow, its write, that for MAC is just Adobe photoshop CS, but not elements :cry:

SpaceRay, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:57:52 -0500
So you have ALSO installed Adobe Photoshop CS ?

And you have installed Photoshop elements AFTER installing Filter Forge ?

Then you need to reinstall Filter Forge and tell it that you want to use ALSO the Photoshop elements 9 when the installing window will ask you where you want to install the plugin

povilasn, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:59:13 -0500
O.K. I'll try to do that again and then write you.
Thanks for your time
;)

povilasn, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 10:11:01 -0500
So I tried, but the program didn't ask me about this possibility, to instal the plug in, thats because it is mac not PC, and it does not work with elements 9, I'll try with Photoshop CS4, will see how it will work

SpaceRay, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 10:14:45 -0500
FF works also on Photoshop Elements 9 on MAC (why would not work?), if you have also CS4 it must work for sure, unless there some strange thing in your MacOS, or are you doing something wrong that does not let FF install correctly.

As far as I know is NOT because you are using a MAC that it can´t install in Elements 9

Which version of Filter Forge is it ?

povilasn, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 10:17:30 -0500
No in the page that you gave me http://www.filterforge.com/download/hosts.html is written that in Mac works just with Photoshop CS (for windows elements too, but not for Mac)

povilasn, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 10:18:05 -0500
The new one (3), just bought

SpaceRay, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 10:28:31 -0500

Quote
povilasn wrote: No in the page that you gave me http://www.filterforge.com/download/hosts.html is written that in Mac works just with Photoshop CS (for windows elements too, but not for Mac)

Oh,yes, I am very sorry that I have seen it badly, and did not see that MAC is ONLY compatible with Full Photoshop CS2 to CS5, and not elements.

I do not know if it could be interesting for you to read this thread here

What are the differences between using FF as standalone and as plugin?

povilasn, Sat, 17 Dec 2011 10:30:39 -0500
But anyway thank you very much for your help. Now I know my problem, and I will look for photoshop cs ;)

Rod_D, Tue, 20 Dec 2011 04:52:06 -0500
You should only need copy and paste the Filter Forge.8bf plugin into Photoshops plugins folder.
That is all i had to do for Photoshop CS5 12 Extended anyways.

SpaceRay, Tue, 20 Dec 2011 08:24:58 -0500

Quote
Rod_D wrote: You should only need copy and paste the Filter Forge.8bf plugin into Photoshops plugins folder.

The problem is that he doesn´t now WHERE is the Filter Forge .8bf on MAC, and I do not know either, so this is why I have recommended and suggested to install again the filter forge and so it will be installed automatically

Artemis, Mon, 04 Mar 2013 12:39:59 -0500
a year late for this but copy and paste the Filter Forge 3 universal x86 into the plug ins folder inside photoshop cs6 and relaunch your photoshop (this is for mac) ..... hope it helps anyone who is still trying to figure it out.

Where Do I Contcat Tech Support???

Colorblast — Sun, 03 Mar 2013 20:18:13 -0500

Colorblast, Sat, 09 Feb 2013 00:15:16 -0500
I can't seem to see where to contact tech support. I tried to send them a message in the "Contact" but my Bug report exceeded the number of characters permitted.

Carl, Sat, 09 Feb 2013 01:18:12 -0500
you could post it here

GMM, Wed, 20 Feb 2013 04:18:05 -0500
Colorblast, is this an Apple bug report? Only the first several paragraphs are important, you can omit the stack contents.

Colorblast, Sun, 03 Mar 2013 20:18:13 -0500
Hi GMM, all ok. The latest version seems to have fixed the rendering bug problems. I use a Windows PC. Cheers all. Thx.

Does filters that make self generated results more slower than others?

SpaceRay — Sat, 02 Mar 2013 07:58:17 -0500

SpaceRay, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 06:54:42 -0500
This question may be silly perhaps, but I have been using many times different filters and usually I have found that when you use the filters that belong to the category of self generated results by FF and do not depend on any source image are slower or much slower than usually the ones that are not self generated, of course that there are exceptions in both cases.

After having seeing this thread Ways to Reduce Your Render Times and also others about the same topic I wonder

Does the filters that make self generated results are usually more slower than others that depend on a source image?

Or in another way, does Texture filters are usually more slower than the Effects filters?

As said above, there may be always exceptions and some Effect flters that may be much slower than a texture filter

Skybase, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 07:58:17 -0500
Well in general texture filters will be slower anyway since we're generating everything from nowhere. But I can also bet you that if you sample enough filters, the render times of both effects and textures would turn out 10% different. :p

Version 4 Has Stopped Working

MS Photo Artist — Sat, 02 Mar 2013 06:53:47 -0500

MS Photo Artist, Fri, 01 Mar 2013 21:50:23 -0500
I just attempt to run Filer Forge 4 and got a "This program version is outdated and cannot be used anymore. Please download a newer version from www.filterforge.com" message. Is anyone else getting that message?

ThreeDee, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 03:25:38 -0500
The beta is limited to 30 days, unless you get a key from the link on the beta page to extend it.

SpaceRay, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 04:11:25 -0500
ThreeDee, he (or she) did not say that the 30 days have expired, he said that FF is asking to download a new update.

Quote
If you are using Filter Forge 4.0 beta and it suddenly displays a 'your Filter Forge is outdated' message and refuses to launch, don't panic and just download the fresh beta from http://www.filterforge.com/download/beta4/

So there is no problem, just download the new Beta 1 and install it over the old one and it will be fixed

Also GMM have already put a thread about this topic here

Your beta may ask to download a newer version

MS Photo Artist, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 06:53:47 -0500
Thanks. That fixed the problem.

Does filter Forge have by default Antialias 5 samples in all filters?

SpaceRay — Sat, 02 Mar 2013 06:48:54 -0500

SpaceRay, Tue, 10 Jul 2012 19:51:41 -0400
I have seen that on most (or all) the filters I have seen it has activated the Antialias 5 samples Edge Only

Is this Antialias activated by default when installing Filter Forge ?

Are there any filters that have the presets with the antialias NOT active ?

I wonder WHY is this activated ON ALL the filters when perhaps is not ALWAYS needed and this is very important for optimizing the render speed.

I think that you should be ABLE TO CHOOSE if you want it activated or not as this it realy matters a lot

AND you CAN´T change the Antialias setting as it is included already inside the factory preset of the filter and you can´t modify or update a factory preset

Yes, I know that you can turn off the Antialias BEFORE rendering, but while trying different presets you can´t turn it off because each time you click on a new preset it will be changed back to Antialias 5 samples.

AND there can be a great difference in rendering time

2000 x 2000 Actual Size Mode
Antialias 5 Samples, Edge Only
Ambient Occlusion ON
8.53 minutes

2000 x 2000 Actual Size Mode
Antialias Off
Ambient Occlusion ON
1,50 minutes

Test done with Simple Stone filter with intel i7 2600K 3.5 Ghz

Carl, Tue, 10 Jul 2012 20:19:46 -0400

Quote
SpaceRay wrote: I have seen that on most (or all) the filters I have seen it has activated the Antialias 5 samples Edge Only

I often have it turned off on appropriate filters I submit to the library [ such as Romancing the Gorrilla ] some filters definately don't need it :)

SpaceRay, Wed, 11 Jul 2012 01:24:35 -0400
Thanks Carl, good to know that you have taken care of turning it off when it was not needed.

SpaceRay, Wed, 11 Jul 2012 03:03:09 -0400
The main question here is

Is this Antialias 5 activated by default when installing Filter Forge ?

I mean if it it this way, then this is active without you knowing that it is active and this affects much to the speed so you should be able to know that this is active and that not always is needed.

Carl, Wed, 11 Jul 2012 03:28:48 -0400
yes it's default to 5 when you start building any filter, if you have added any presets and want the filter to have AA turned off, you have to update each preset manually :)

SpaceRay, Wed, 11 Jul 2012 03:46:22 -0400
Thanks Carl for letting me know that FF has AA 5 by default when building any filter, I did not know that and I have seen that this is very important for render speed and perhaps you are hurting much the perfomance of the filter when really the AA may not be needed.

Quote
Carl wrote: if you have added any presets and want the filter to have AA turned off, you have to update each preset manually

Yes, this is a bad thing, but this is this way, UNLESS you turn it off when you begin making the filter, BUT if you turn it off when you begin you probably do not know if you will need to have AA, because it would be the same afterward, if you make the presets afterward you would to manualy turn the AA ON of every preset manually

BUT what is worst of all is that YOU CAN´T MODIFY the AA preset of factory presets

Skybase, Wed, 11 Jul 2012 04:04:00 -0400
... don't you just mean you want anti-alias settings globally instead of locally?

Meaning you want to be able to just turn off AA overall instead of doing it on a per preset-basis. I'd find that a desirable feature.

GMM, Wed, 11 Jul 2012 05:31:10 -0400
Carl is right: AA settings are stored in the filter presets. Filter Forge by itself doesn't have a default AA setting, it uses the value stored in the preset.

On the contrary, Filter Editor does suggest a default setting of 5 AA samples. As only few filter authors care to select the optimum AA value, most filters retain this default setting.

SpaceRay, Sat, 28 Jul 2012 23:00:36 -0400

Quote
Skybase wrote: ... don't you just mean you want anti-alias settings globally instead of locally? Meaning you want to be able to just turn off AA overall instead of doing it on a per preset-basis. I'd find that a desirable feature.

YES, exactly, it would be very good to be able to choose and have the option of turning OFF ALL AA overall even overriding the preset inside the filter so it keeps always OFF if you want to.

I agree that this is a desirable feature

Quote
GMM wrote: Filter Forge by itself doesn't have a default AA setting, it uses the value stored in the preset.

As said above, it would be good if FF could have a checkbox with a AA default settings

1 - Use preset´s AA (this would be by default as it is now)

2 - Use your own AA configuration (if you put 10 AA would be applied on all presets even it is stored 5 AA on the preset)

3 - Turn off all AA overriding any presets configuration (so you if you want to just test and make some experiments that do not need much quality, you could be able to turn off any AA configuration stored on the presets)

Quote
GMM wrote: On the contrary, Filter Editor does suggest a default setting of 5 AA samples. As only few filter authors care to select the optimum AA value, most filters retain this default setting.

Curious that the 5 AA samples setting is put in the Filter Editor and not in the FF normal use, that I suposse uses for the presets whatever AA setting you have in that moment.

I agree with the idea of the default 5 AA Samples to keep the quality of the filter, but I suggest that also when USING this filters presets we could choose to override this settings if we want

Quote
GMM wrote: As only few filter authors care to select the optimum AA value

Well, I would care If I could new what could be the best and optimum AA value in each filter, and how to choose the best setting in each filter and see if it is not needed or it would need a higher one, knowing that this is very important also for the speed of the filter but also for the quality, so there should be a balance of the two.

SpaceRay, Sat, 28 Jul 2012 23:04:56 -0400
In the FF Help you can find this explaining the Anti-Aliasing menu and what each option does but there is not much about how to use this in an optimum way and how to choose the best setting depending on the filter you are making

Skybase, Sun, 29 Jul 2012 02:13:13 -0400
what? :p

AA is totally up to you, it's a consideration of quality vs time. I mean sure, there is a optimum way of looking for that one AA setting that works with both time and quality but my point is you'll just have to do it manually. Fortunately there are some rules of thumb.

When you see Jaggies or "edges that look pixelated" you raise AA one notch. If those wonky pixels go away you can stop and call it "optimal."

Here's a example, if your filter has a ton of hard edges densely packing one small area, you'll need to increase AA samples to avoid fuzzy pixels. You can also attempt to solve part of this issue by enabling "Jitter sampling" in your FilterForge Options > Render tab but that doesn't get rid of every problem.

SpaceRay, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 04:38:43 -0500
Thanks for your answer Skybase and is useful

Quote
SpaceRay In the FF Help you can find this explaining the Anti-Aliasing menu and what each option does but there is not much about how to use this in an optimum way and how to choose the best setting depending on the filter you are making

Quote
Skybase what? :-p AA is totally up to you, it's a consideration of quality vs time. I mean sure, there is a optimum way of looking for that one AA setting that works with both time and quality but my point is you'll just have to do it manually. Fortunately there are some rules of thumb

You are right Skybase, I think I explained it badly, because as you say well the AA is up to you and depends of what yourself think is optimum and how much quality vs render time you want

What I wanted to say above is that on the help page, the antialias are described all the options and settings well, BUT there is no tips, hints or suggestions on what is the best way to configure the settings according to speed and how much would increase the quality vs render speed and how to combine in the best way all the possible setting of AA

From your own experiences that FF users may have, I wanted to know what combinations of the 3 settings would work best and is a starting point to work with and combined it with AO if needed

What I was asking is as you say some rules of the thumb you mnay have, or hints and tips. Fortunately there are some rules of thumb

or like this useful advice and comment about how AO works Anti-alias and ambient occlusion (bad result)

Skybase, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 06:29:28 -0500
Here are some "rules"

1. If you get fuzzy edges (see post above) and you don't like them, your samples are too low, bring it up a notch until you don't see fuzzy messy edges in high contrast areas.

2. Edges only is a good measure. It's faster than all pixels since it only applies anti-aliasing where it needs to be.

3. Use diagnostics to see what FilterForge is doing so you get a better sense. There are times when FilterForge will do wonky things. The point of "show diagnostics" is to display the data driving the anti-aliasing. If you don't get what you're looking at and what you should do with it... don't bother with this tip.

4. Default settings are generally good enough for everything. 5 Samples, edges only... preeettyy much the best. I've rarely set my sample count above 17 and rarely use all pixels.

5. If it looks good, so be it. There are "Happy settings" you'll always land on just keep that to yourself.

SpaceRay, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 06:40:08 -0500
Thanks very much for sharing this useful tips and "rules"

The great problem I have is that FF is in some cases slow or very slow previewing the result to see if it would need more AA or if it would not be needed, as ALL the filters have 5 samples AA, but not always is that really needed. And also the same with AO

Will have to test and experiment more with this AA and A0 settings and follow your rules and see what I can do to make a better workflow.

Thanks again

Skybase, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 06:48:54 -0500
You know you can do AA in post? outside of FilterForge?

Ways to Reduce Your Render Times

Crapadilla — Sat, 02 Mar 2013 06:47:39 -0500

Crapadilla, Mon, 18 Feb 2013 16:20:18 -0500
[*] Refrain from bitching on the forums.
Go to the top right area of the webpage. Click on Logout. Go render an image with Maxwell, or VRay, or whatever. Chill. Appreciate the relativity of all things. Then return here and read on.

[*] Tweak the FF Rendering Options.
Go to Tools > Options > Rendering and increase maximum RAM usage to 90%.
Uncheck Anti-Alias Sources for bitmap-based components.
Uncheck Use double-precision output cache.
Check Optimize blur-calculations.

[*] Reduce image resolution.
Render a smaller resolution and scale the image up afterwards.
[ Ask yourself if you really need that blurry perlin noise rendered at 8K... ]

[*] Turn off Anti-Aliasing.
Go to Filter > Anti-Aliasing in the Main UI and set AA samples to Off.
Make sure AA is set to Edges Only.

[*] Disable Multi-Pass-Preview.
Go to Tools > Options > Interface and set Multi-pass preview to 'Legacy'.
[ The multi-pass previews increase filter interactivity but can slow down the final rendering considerably in some cases. ]

[*] Disable Ambient Occlusion.
Go to the Lighting tab on the Filter Controls, click the outer ring of the environment preview area and set Shadowing to 'None'

[*] Optimize your filter construction.
If rendering is slow, chances are the filter is not optimized. Read the forums. Read the manual. Read the wiki. If all fails, post your filter and ask the community for help.

Did I miss anything?

Sharandra, Mon, 18 Feb 2013 16:48:53 -0500
Sticky!! :D

Especially love the first one! :D

Vladimir Golovin, Tue, 19 Feb 2013 08:10:52 -0500

Quote
Go to Tools > Options > Rendering and increase maximum RAM usage to 90%.

In light of the recent hunt for the Bad Alloc bug, this is a bit complicated.

Setting the RAM usage slider to the max (90%) minimizes cache churn but leaves little room for memory fragmentation. Conversely, keeping in the middle (50-60% or so) increases the cache churn but leaves more room for memory fragmentation.

We're currently doing rendering tests in 64000x64000 pixels resolution. The test filter is a bomber plugged into a blur with a small radius. With RAM consumption set to 90%, the Bad Alloc appears almost instantly (the effect of memory fragmentation). With 75%, the error takes a night to appear. The test on 50% RAM consumption is currently underway, but it looks good so far. I'll report the results as soon as it finishes.

Vladimir Golovin, Tue, 19 Feb 2013 08:19:34 -0500
On the topic of the thread:

[*] Getting a good cooler for your CPU might also help.
I've upgraded my PC from a 3-year old Core-i7 to a recent Ivy Bridge Core i7 CPU with a monstrous cooler, but the rendering speed increase I'm seeing cannot be justified by the CPU upgrade alone. From the looks of it, the speedup is at least an order of magnitude. I suspect the speedup is due to the fact that my CPU is not thermally throttled anymore.

Crapadilla, Tue, 19 Feb 2013 11:03:41 -0500
So let me get this straight: Setting maximum RAM usage to 90% does not leave any space for memory fragmentation while setting it to 50% does? Now I'm confused.

Does this mean that FF just willy-nilly fragments around in the RAM space beyond the percentage set with maximum RAM usage? Scandalous! ;)

Skybase, Tue, 19 Feb 2013 20:42:09 -0500
<li>[Advanced] Smart surface-filter previewing before major render processes
You can "preview" surface filters without rendering the full result with lighting and shading. This effectively allows for significantly faster previews and better interactivity instead of waiting on the shaded result to render. This does not result in faster renders, but it's just a nice way of seeing results before they happen.

Go to Filter > Render Maps and choose either diffuse, bump, or normal maps. These images are essentially "parts" of the final surface filter and each contributes to the overall look and are typically rendered out separately. However, we can use them for preview purposes as well.

1. Diffuse is your color image of the surface filter without the shading. This renders just the flat texture allowing you to see just what the colors are going to be like.

2. Bump, as the name implies, is the bumpiness of the shaded output. This is a black and white image represents the "height" of the texture. Imagine seeing mountains fr om the top, the snow on the top of the mountains represents higher ground, the darker areas are wh ere the valleys are.

3. Normal, this is quite difficult to explain, but at the bottom level it's again the bumpiness but with lighting involved. It's a special image containing a lot of detailed information about how bumpy things will get, how light will affect the scene.

Overall, you can combine these in your head to get a good idea how the overall filter will look in the end. Your filter interactivity will go up since you're only rendering parts of the result. Once you're done previewing and tweaking the texture to your liking, go back to Filter > Render Maps and choose off to see the final output.

Vladimir Golovin, Wed, 20 Feb 2013 00:43:49 -0500

Quote
Does this mean that FF just willy-nilly fragments around in the RAM space beyond the percentage set with maximum RAM usage?

Dilla, the memory consumption slider limits the total amount of allocated memory, but not the total amount of address space consumed, which will be larger due to empty space between allocated blocks. This happens because blocks of different size are allocated and deallocated (i.e. freed) in an unpredictable order.

GMM, Wed, 20 Feb 2013 04:18:00 -0500
Thanks Crapadilla, this is a much needed thread. Made it sticky.

I would add a hint for Basic users: if your filter has a slider named Blur Radius, or Details, or Roughness, or whatever, try setting it as low as possible.

Crapadilla, Wed, 20 Feb 2013 06:13:47 -0500

Quote
Dilla, the memory consumption slider limits the total amount of allocated memory, but not the total amount of address space consumed, which will be larger due to empty space between allocated blocks. This happens because blocks of different size are allocated and deallocated (i.e. freed) in an unpredictable order.

But FF will still only allocate a total of 1.5 GB of RAM ever, correct? Which means that the higher I set the maximum RAM usage, the less address space is available for memory fragmentation, and the earlier the Bad Alloc bug occurs.

Looks like this RAM limit needs to be re-examined. 64-bit? ;)

Quote
Thanks Crapadilla, this is a much needed thread. Made it sticky.

My pleasure, GMM. :D

GMM, Wed, 20 Feb 2013 06:29:49 -0500

Quote
64-bit?

Carbon API :(

Crapadilla, Wed, 20 Feb 2013 06:57:54 -0500
<---- on Windows 7 ;) :D

GMM, Fri, 22 Feb 2013 03:34:07 -0500
Another speed hint: check the health status of the disk with the FF temporary folder.

We recently had a case of a customer complaining about ridiculous, improbably long render times. It turned out his HDD was accumulating hardware errors quickly. On modern systems this may not lead to data loss but remapping bad blocks decreases the writing speed tremendously.

If you are rendering champion-size images you may want to point the temp folder to an SSD or at least defragment the hard disk. I doubt the speed increase will be significant but this will never hurt. Note that rendering a 64k x 64k image may require up to 200 GB of free disk space.

xirja, Fri, 22 Feb 2013 10:36:47 -0500
As a subset of:

• Optimize your filter construction

I have found the replacement of simple 'blend' and 'alpha' operations by 'threshold' a key time saver:

• Threshold Clipping

SpaceRay, Wed, 27 Feb 2013 18:53:15 -0500

Quote
GMM If you are rendering champion-size images you may want to point the temp folder to an SSD or at least defragment the hard disk. I doubt the speed increase will be significant but this will never hurt

How does the FF temp folder works and affects to the render speed?

According to this then would it be better to use a SSD for the FF folder and render perhaps a little bit faster?

I will have to try this and see what difference can be really as I have a SSD but now the FF temp folder is on a normal hard disk.

SpaceRay, Fri, 01 Mar 2013 15:17:05 -0500
I have found a thread I made some time ago to ask also about things to be considered and ways to reduce and be aware for render speed and can be seen here

What is important and priority for FF render speed ? NOT HARDWARE !

Here there is also a long list of things, that I think perhaps it could be good to copy it here too.

Quote
Crapadilla 64-bit?

Quote
GMM Carbon API :(

Quote
Crapadilla <---- on Windows 7 ;) :D

No anymore answer about it after about what would happen in windows 7 that does not have Carbon API :D

I know that Adobe Photoshop was written in one version for windows 64 bit but they could not do it at the same time for MAC because they have their code for Carbon API, and Apple changed the MacOS to Cocoa API so all had to be rewritten again and took more than one year to make it, and they have a great and huge developers team.

I do not know really much about it, but I think that if the only thing that would help converting FF to 64 bit (which most probably would take a huge amount of work) is that it could use more memory, would not be good as FF has it´s own memory manager and so unless they rewrite it or change it, would be the same.

Skybase, Fri, 01 Mar 2013 22:43:53 -0500
No need to copy it over. No offense but most of the writing there is convoluted and confusing, none of it is succinct. Part of it would be a repost of the tips mentioned above. However, here are some mentions in that post that are still worthy of mention.

1. Standalone is slightly faster than the plugin version - data needs to be transfered fr om FilterForge to Photoshop during a render, whereas the standalone version doesn't have that extra step. It's quite hard to observe this really... I wouldn't see this being too much of a tip for reducing render times.

2. "Edges only" is probably your best option for Anti-Aliasing. There have only been a few cases wh ere I preferred "all pixels" as an option. Read more about stuff here: http://www.filterforge.com/more/help/...gMenu.html

Several other mentions regarding image resolution, output, and otherwise ... are relevant but have been mentioned.

SpaceRay, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 04:44:21 -0500

Quote
Skybase No need to copy it over. No offense but most of the writing there is convoluted and confusing, none of it is succinct. Part of it would be a repost of the tips mentioned above

You are right and of course that I would not just make a copy of all the text as it is already in that thread, as it would be a duplicate and is not needed that, and also as you say is convoluted and confusing in some parts, and some parts would be repeated, WHAT I thought is to make a better and organized shorter version and so it would be more useful than how it is now in the other thread.

SpaceRay, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 05:36:08 -0500
Is curious that there has not been explained more about the important Ambient Oclussion (AO) and Antialiasing (AA) impact on render times that can make a filter much faster or slower depending on the settings and of course if the filter uses it or not, and do not just say, turn it off.

Also have to know and be aware that most of the presets already have stored the AO and AA settings and they can be on or off, or can be high settings and so have a very slow rendering, and there is no way to override this unless you change it manually each time, which can be done for preview and test purposes and then when render the final image you can activate again them for the high quality you may need or want.

RENDER SPEED TEST WITH OR WITHOUT AA AND AO

Here I have made some render speed test to show how much is the impact of these AO and AA

I have some interesting results I have been making in some tests with Simple Stone by jitspoe filter

These have been made with an intel i7 2600K 3.5Ghz

The first 3 ones is of NO use for the real render time when saving the render result to use it somewhere, the real true time IS when you have the Actual size active

2000 x 2000 TEST

2000 x 2000 Reduced Mode (600 x 600)
Antialias 5 Samples, Edge Only
Ambient Occlusion ON
29.91 seconds

2000 x 2000 Reduced Mode (600 x 600)
Antialias Off
Ambient Occlusion ON
11,15 seconds

2000 x 2000 Reduced Mode (600 x 600)
Antialias Off
Ambient Occlusion OFF
6,90 seconds

2000 x 2000 Actual Size Mode
Antialias 5 Samples, Edge Only
Ambient Occlusion ON
8.53 minutes

2000 x 2000 Actual Size Mode
Antialias Off
Ambient Occlusion ON
1,50 minutes

2000 x 2000 Actual Size Mode
Antialias Off
Ambient Occlusion OFF
12,72 seconds

AND ALSO I HAVE MADE A 6000 x 6000 test to see much better the render time difference

I have made another test with 6000 x 6000 that shows much better the difference in time between one mode and another and activating or not them

6000 x 6000 Reduced Mode (600 x 600)
Antialias Off
Ambient Occlusion OFF
3,90 seconds

6000 x 6000 Actual Size mode
Antialias Off
Ambient Occlusion OFF
1.56 minutes

6000 x 6000 Actual Size mode
Antialias 5 Samples, Edge Only
Ambient Occlusion OFF
7.53 minutes

6000 x 6000 Actual Size mode
Antialias Off
Ambient Occlusion ON
1 Hour 18 Minutes 43 seconds

Activating the Ambient Oclussion is 1 HOUR AND 16 MINUTES MORE !!!! and in this special case the real difference is very low.

I am sorry that I do not dare to make a 6000 x 6000 Antialias ON and Ambient Occlusion ON test :D

AMBIENT OCCLUSION (AO) and ANTIALIASING (AA) settings used for the above tests

The ambient occlusion setting used here in the tests are the default ones that came with the filter as shown below here

Here below is the Antialiasing configuration for the tests

Also for more information it may be interesting this other thread

Ambient Occlusion and Anti-alias process

SO it seems that the Antialias and Ambient Occlusion makes the filter MUCH SLOWER with a great difference

Between 8.53 minutes with Antialias 5 samples and 1,50 minutes without Antialias is really a GREAT difference.

And Here I show the real size of the render to see that there is no real difference in quality (at least for me) that could justify waiting for the 8.53 minutes instead of 1,50 minutes without.

Although of course that ALL is subjective and depends very much of which filter you are using and the source image and the quality you would like and the resolution needed, so you have to see how much AO and AA would be balanced to get the best render speed.

There are filters that the AA and /or AO is a must have, but there are filters that it's just a waste of render time and not worth it.

Here Below is WITH antialias 5 samples (default value in all the filters)

and here is without Antialias

And this below is without Antialias and without Ambient Occlusion

In the above I do not see any difference, but in this one there is some difference in the shadows

As said above depends very much of the filter using and the result you may have to know if you would need more or less AA and AO

Skybase, Sat, 02 Mar 2013 06:47:39 -0500
Just that we're on the topic of ambient occlusion (ao)

<li> Advanced: Faking the Sense of Depth and the Apperance of Ambient Occlusion. Part 1

We've mentioned turning ambient occlusion (AO) off completely, but there are times when we want the extra sense of depth in a shader based filter. The problem with AO is that it's slow (you can see SpaceRay's uber long post above), but we can kinda get close to the apperance of ambient occlusion and consequently add extra shading in our output.

First, feed your depth map into a highpass filter, increase the contrast and set the radius to a larger value than 10 (this value depends on the filter. By doing so you should get a gray image with some shadow-like apperance. Blend this in with your color map with "hard light" blend mode which should make the image look shaded. Do note however, the colors do get thrown off due to the way hardlight blend mode works. In such instances, if you're picky, you'll need to compensate that. This part is up to you.

Of course, this is if you seriously want some extra feeling of depth and the apperance of ambient occlusion. The high pass component itself is a mildly render-heavy component. But when it comes to comparisons, this of course is faster.

Reminder: Keep in mind that this technique is not how AO works. I mention AO as an aesthetic touch and this method is totally a different from what ambient occlusion does. What I'm describing here is merely a method to possibly remove a slow process and not necessary going to speed your filter. But you'll get nicer appearances in less time :)

What is important and priority for FF render speed ? NOT HARDWARE !

SpaceRay — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 15:42:27 -0500

SpaceRay, Mon, 26 Sep 2011 03:05:19 -0400
Hello,

I have been testing many different photos and I have seen that the render speed is really very different depending on what image you choose (resolution and complexity), the filter you choose, probably the preview you use ...

Some images and filters combinations takes only a few seconds, and others take many minutes, and some even reach for 1 hour or more.

As i do not know how Filter Forge works I want to make some questions:

Quote
1 - What are the things that are important, priority and relevant for the render speed of Filter Forge ?

2 - FILTER FORGE FILTERS

I have seen that the many different filters have many different render speed depending on what the filter does, and if it depends on a source image or renders the image generated only by FF code without any source image. Photo filters are much faster than Creativity filters, so I want to ask

Is there a way to know really which filters are faster and which are slower ?

3 - STANDALONE VS PHOTOSHOP PLUGIN

Does Filter Forge have exactly the same speed if used as a standalone without any other software running than used as a photoshop plugin inside Photoshop ?

Is faster if run standalone vs plugin ?

I mean that as FF is a very resource hungry application, is it faster if used as standalone vs used as photoshop plugin ?

As standalone, it does not need to share the computer resources with any other software, and as a plugin it must share the resources with another very resource hungry application, photoshop.

Perhaps this depends also if you have much more RAM for both, I mean, if you have just 2 GB or 4 GB for both, or if you have 8GB, 12GB or even 16GB RAM, so as FF can´t use more than 1,5 GB RAM, but Photoshop can use the other ram that FF is using as is a native 64 bit and is programmed to get the most our of RAM.

4 - IMAGE COMPLEXITY

How important is the source image or photo you choose ?

I mean in how simple or complex is the photo, is slower to render if it has lots of complex colors, and faster if the photo is simple with few colors ? Or is the same for FF ?

5 - IMAGE SIZE

Of course, the resolution of the original source image will be a very important thing, because higher and bigger resolution, higher render speed time. BUT I wonder if:

Is the resolution proportional to the render speed or is it exponential ?

I mean if I have a 1000 x 1000 photo and then resize it to 2000 x 2000, will the render speed be just proportionally or be exponential?. I have tested that when you go to higher resolutions the speed is more non proportional and is more exponential as renders are higher resolutions.

Is the speed of a 1000 x 1000 and a 4000 x 4000 exactly same photo, just proportional the render speed ? ( the 1000 is a reduction from the 4000 photo)

6 - IMAGE PREVIEW

Does it Filter Forge render at the same speed if using reduced preview than actual preview size ?

Because it seems for me than when using reduced preview after selecting "save image as" is faster than saving the same image with the actual size preview activated.

Perhaps this is because it must make double render for the actual screen preview and for saving the image. Or perhaps this is an ilusion I have and is not true, as I do not know how FF works.

7 - ANY OTHER IMPORTANT AND RELEVANT THINGS ?

Probably there could be other important things that I have missed here and are revelant for the Filter Forge render speed. So, please, if you know anymore things, just put them here.

Thanks very much for your help

NOTE for Hardware as far as I know the most important is the CPU speed and as many cores as you have and even virtual cores as intel HT technology, as RAM, graphic card and hard drive speed is not important for FF.

GMM, Mon, 26 Sep 2011 09:54:01 -0400
Some one-line replies to your questions.

1. You've named most of the speed-specific aspects.

2. This list should give an overview of any filter's speed.

3. There is an overhead for transferring data to and from the host. Expect the standalone version to be 3-5% faster.

4. It is geometry, not the color count, that matters. Please refer to our articles on AA: [1], [2].

5. I've seen your previous comments on exponential speed increase but we've never reproduced that. A 2000x2000 image should render ~4.02 times it takes to render a 1000x1000 image.

6. If you click 'Save Image As' before the preview is ready then Filter Forge will need some resources to finish preview rendering, otherwise it doesn't matter.

7. Progressive previews (legacy and off are faster), the Rendering tab options, parameters of certain components (noise detail, blur radius etc), occlusion quality, AA level and the most important factor – suboptimal filter design.

SpaceRay, Sat, 01 Oct 2011 03:33:33 -0400
GMM Thanks really very much for all the answers

It is very interesting to know the answers.

2 - FF Filters Speed

About number 2 about filter speed, this list is very good and very interesting and useful and great to know as I did not know about it, thanks very much, BUT for this to be used you must enter inside the filter editor and see HOW the filter is built and see all the components used, and do not how the combination of ALL the components toghether are affecting the final real speed. Yes, perhaps if all belongs to the Fast categories it will be fast anyway.

Now I will ask again the same questions in a different way

Please, Is there a way to know really which filters are faster and which are slower without having to open the filter in the filter editor and look for the components that have been used ?

3 - Standalone VS Plugin

Is it ONLY the transferring data to and from the host that will make the plugin a 3-5% slower ?

I mean, that if the FF standalone would be run in a fresh computer start without any other software running it would have ALL the computer resources for himself and so it will not need to share the CPU processing with any other software running at the same time.

If FF is run as a plugin it will need to share the resources, and it have less CPU processing or will need to share more things, and I thought that this would be a thing that could make it somewhat a little more slower, but if you say that the only problem is the transfering data and FF does not care if the resources and CPU Power is shared or not, is interesting to know.

4 - Image complexity

Interesting to know that is the geometry and not the color amount what is really important, So looking at your answer FF does not care in terms of speed if it has only 4 colors, 16 colors, 256 colors, 4096 or 16 million colors and how this colors are populated and distributed in the image. I will put later an photo example to make it more clear, as is said an image is better than thousands words.

5 - Exponential speed increase

Perhaps you have not been able to reproduce this, but I have been able to do it with 14 different test renders with Vladimir Creepy filter and also with a few other filters.

I know that a 2000x2000 images is NOT the double of 1000x1000 because if make the math and multiply 1000x1000 = 1.000.000 and 2000x2000 = 4.000.000 and so FF has to process 4 times more pixels, and in this is very little difference in time, but what happens when you try to render a 4000x4000 = 16.000.000, is it really 16 times slower than the 1000x1000, i can say that the answer is no, at least in the test I have made this is not true, although I have not made extensive tests.

Is the resolution source size proportional to the render speed ? Or asking the same question in another way

Will a 4000 x 4000 source photo be 16 times slower than the same photo reduced to 1000 x 1000 pixels using with both the same filter ?

And what would happen with a 5000x5000, will it be 25 times slower ? And with a 6000 x 6000 should be 36 times slower I do not think so looking at the test results I had as when rising the resolution the speed difference is more slower and not proportional.

SpaceRay, Sat, 01 Oct 2011 03:34:39 -0400
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6 - I will have to make some test to see this and how it works

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7 - OH YES!!! You are right I forgot that is also important the options choosen on the rendering tab of Tools--> options and also if you choose different options in Anti Aliasing and Render maps

And also the quality and optimization of the filter construction as shown very well in this interesting link you have put

The DOs and DON'Ts of Filter Construction

GMM, Tue, 04 Oct 2011 10:08:11 -0400

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SpaceRay wrote: Is the resolution source size proportional to the render speed ? Or asking the same question in another way Will a 4000 x 4000 source photo be 16 times slower than the same photo reduced to 1000 x 1000 pixels using with both the same filter ?

It should be. A 4000x4000 image should render ~16.1 times longer than the same 1000x1000 image.

If you're willing to test this I would appreciate if you do the test in the command-line renderer. First, it eliminates all possible preview-related and other GUI delays; second, it's much easier to describe and reproduce the result. Also, I don't recommend extensive testing of huge resolutions: if you find an issue with a 60000x60000 render I don't think our testers will be happy to spend hours trying to reproduce it ;)

SpaceRay, Tue, 21 Feb 2012 09:53:48 -0500

Quote

GMM wrote:

It should be. A 4000x4000 image should render ~16.1 times longer than the same 1000x1000 image.

If you're willing to test this I would appreciate if you do the test in the command-line renderer.

First, it eliminates all possible preview-related and other GUI delays;

second, it's much easier to describe and reproduce the result.

Also, I don't recommend extensive testing of huge resolutions: if you find an issue with a 60000x60000 render I don't think our testers will be happy to spend hours trying to reproduce it

Sorry that I forgot to say thanks for your answer.

I will be testing this when I can and see what happens.

The 6000x6000 resolution does NOT take ALWAYS hours to render on ALL the filters, on some of them this is very fast (specially on the photo effects ones) and it would not be a problem, BUT I think that you are really referering the other filters that really take that time to render as many of the very complex FF self generated graphics.

Do not bother I will not give you a hard time sending problems to the FF team with very slow filters.

GMM, Wed, 22 Feb 2012 02:30:41 -0500

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GMM wrote: If you find an issue with a 60000x60000 render

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SpaceRay wrote: The 6000x6000 resolution does NOT take ALWAYS hours to render on ALL the filter

I really meant 60k x 60k, not 6000x6000 :)

SpaceRay, Wed, 22 Feb 2012 02:37:35 -0500

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I really meant 60k x 60k, not 6000x6000

60000? OH sorry, I have bad sight,is TRUE is 60.000

I have missed one zero, a very slightly error :D 6000 x 6000 is "nearly" the same as 60000 x 60000 :D

Obviously I would NEVER EVER test FF in 60.000 pixels, because if I would do this, I would have to leave FF rendering, go for a week away and then I would hope that when I came back it could just be finishing :D

Morgantao, Wed, 22 Feb 2012 03:06:09 -0500
Imagine rendering a 60k x 60k filter with max antialiasing all pixels :D
I have the perfect filter in mind ;)

SpaceRay, Mon, 27 Feb 2012 01:25:31 -0500

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Morgantao wrote: I have the perfect filter in mind

Sorry that I do not have any kind of telephatic skills to be able to read your mind :D so please, could you tell us which filter you have in mind, or perhaps you want to keep it secret for yourself.

Also I think that in my opinion it would be totally useless to have a 60k x 60k image result.

Why would you need to make this HUGE monster ?

This would have 360 Megapixels !!!!

This would render 10.000 times slower than the same image rendered at 600 x 600 (360.000.000 / 360.000 = 10.000)

If it would take 10 seconds to render at 600 x 600 , at 60k x 60k would take nearly 28 hours !!! (10.000 x 10 = 100.000 / 3600 = 27,7)

Morgantao, Mon, 27 Feb 2012 02:46:50 -0500
I was thinking about the ink filter that you had a thread about making faster :)
You said it gets very slow if you go above 600x600, so imagine the time it would take if you make it 360 Megapixels :D

Oh, and there are many uses for a 60k x 60k image. You could cover the moon with it, for example :D

SpaceRay, Mon, 05 Mar 2012 23:41:34 -0500

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Morgantao wrote: I was thinking about the ink filter :D

:D I knew you were thinking of this Ink Ghost filter :D But this is not really an example of speed, you should choose another one.

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Morgantao wrote: Oh, and there are many uses for a 60k x 60k image. You could cover the moon with it, for example :D

Well, I am afraid you can´t use this 60k x 60k for this :D Because a 360 Megapixel image printed at 200 dpi would have only a size of 7,68 meters each side, or 15,36 meters printed at 100 dpi. This would take 10 GB storage space

So I really doubt much that you would be able to cover the moon with a square of 15 meters :D The moon has 1738 Km diameter.

Morgantao, Tue, 06 Mar 2012 03:59:22 -0500
You know, the actual print quality of huge billboards, or those advertisements on builtings are only 30 dpi. It's just that you see them from far away, so your eyes can't see the low resolution and the image seems fine.
Imagine how far the moon is... Probably a print res of 1 dpi, or even less will be enough.

Here's an example of what I mean:
If you step back from the computer you'll start seeing the image better. The farther away you will go, the less pixely the image would seem.

Morgantao, Tue, 06 Mar 2012 04:11:06 -0500
Also take a look at This website.
Each pixel is a square foot, and they made a "small" logo.
If you want you can watch a video about this in Youtube.

SpaceRay, Fri, 01 Mar 2013 15:42:27 -0500

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Morgantao Also take a look at This website.

I am very sorry that it has taken nearly one year to answer (6 March 2012 - 1 March 2013)

I like the "small" logo ;) :D :D that can be seen from space :D

You are right that it could be done in FF and printed really at very much less resolution :)

Render Time Experiment

Ozmandias — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 15:26:50 -0500

Ozmandias, Tue, 19 Feb 2013 08:06:24 -0500
FF Newbie. Reading the forums on how slow FF is in rendering and the various replies on how to help the little engine up the hill. I decided to conduct my own experiment. Using what I felt were the two slowest filters in the most recent 30-day trial of FF, I timed how long it took to render the included lifesaver image. I believe it is a 600x600 pixel image?

I have read the recent "Ways To Reduce Your Render Times" thread and will test the other suggestions, however, previous threads going back several years had posts from GMM and others implied that changing the RAM usage from 60% to 90% would help considerably. So that is what I focused on for this test. As you will see below, it made NO DIFFERENCE whatsoever on any of the 4 systems.

The two filters were in the "Stone" category. They were "Layered Stone" and "Crysta"

System 1 - 8yr old laptop. P4 3GHz with Hyper Threading, 1G RAM, 128MB ATI Mobility Radeon 9600, 32bit WinXP Home.
Layered Stone at 60% = 3min 51sec
Layered Stone at 90% = 3min 42sec
Crysta at 60% = 4min 24sec
Crysta at 90% = 4min 19sec

System 2 - 3.5yr old desktop. C2D E8500 3.16GHz, 4G RAM, 512MB ATI Radeon 4870, 32bit WinXP Home
Layered Stone at 60% = 58sec
Layered Stone at 90% = 58sec
Crysta at 60% = 1min 8sec
Crysta at 90% = 1min 8sec

System 3 - 2.5yr old desktop. C2D E7500 2.94GHz, 8G RAM, ATI Radeon 4350, 64bit Vista
Layered Stone at 60% = 1min 4sec
Layered Stone at 90% = 1min 5sec
Crysta at 60% = 1min 17sec
Crysta at 90% = 1min 19sec

System 4 - 1week old laptop. Dual Core i5 3210M (w/HT I'm assuming because Task Manager shows 4 CPU graphs) 2.5GHz, 8G RAM, on board HD4000 graphics, 64bit Win7
Layered Stone at 60% = 40sec
Layered Stone at 90% = 40sec
Crysta at 60% = 44sec
Crysta at 90% = 43sec

As you can see, changing the RAM usage from 60% to 90% was of no help whatsoever.

-Oz

Skybase, Tue, 19 Feb 2013 08:16:48 -0500
This is the part where I'm not technical enough but I think RAM's supposed to contribute to additional space for cached nodes. So it's more of the ability to store more data, hence your next round of edits to the filter would run faster. Pretty sure I'm right on that. But maybe I'm wrong. Would be nice to have further explanation.

Vladimir Golovin, Tue, 19 Feb 2013 08:36:02 -0500
RAM consumption is complicated. See my reply in this thread:
http://www.filterforge.com/forum/read...&TID=11020

Skybase, Tue, 19 Feb 2013 08:51:04 -0500
Vlad, I'm mildly confused. :( Should higher RAM percentages help kick render speeds up? Or is it a setting meant to deal the cache for better interactivity? I was kinda sure that changing RAM % settings don't exactly lead to faster renders... but I have question marks over my head whether that's true or not because it seems relative to that filter.

SpaceRay, Fri, 01 Mar 2013 15:26:50 -0500
Thanks for making this render time and speed tests, and also for showing it with different RAM percentage.

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Ozmandias As you can see, changing the RAM usage from 60% to 90% was of no help whatsoever.

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Vladimir Golovin Setting the RAM usage slider to the max (90%) minimizes cache churn but leaves little room for memory fragmentation. Conversely, keeping in the middle (50-60% or so) increases the cache churn but leaves more room for memory fragmentation.

I have seen in others posts that had been said that using higher RAM percentage would be better for speed, but never tested it myself if it was true or not and I have put it at 85%, but now seeing this test and it seems that the RAM at 60% or 90% would be the same, is better to keep it at 60% and avoid much more the Bad allocation bug.

Any possible estimated date (month) for FF 4.0 Beta 2 ?

SpaceRay — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 14:30:21 -0500

SpaceRay, Tue, 20 Nov 2012 22:59:04 -0500
I just to ask if there could be any possible estimated date approximately for the release of FF 4.0 Beta 2.

I do not want at all the date, just to know the month or a rough date, for example if it will be release before the end of the year, or will be sometime in January, or whatever.

I will not ask what will be included as I think this will be a surprise.

SpaceRay, Thu, 22 Nov 2012 05:32:20 -0500

Quote

Vladimir Golovin

Quote
Filter organization (tagging, folders etc.) will be a top priority in FF4.0.

We're planning this for FF4.0 Beta 2. Here's the screenshot and discussion:
http://www.filterforge.com/forum/read...&TID=10457

I think that it will take some more time to be available the Beta 2 as I think the FF developers will have a lot of work to include the whole new filter organization AND possibly also have to solve all the possible bugs and tests about it AND also think that also must fix the bugs from the Groups feature, so I bet that this will not be until next year (wish I was wrong ;) ) because of this

GMM, Thu, 22 Nov 2012 12:17:15 -0500
It's up to Vladimir to decide, but I think we're going to fix the Groups bugs first and then switch to the features outlined for Beta 2.

SpaceRay, Thu, 22 Nov 2012 20:36:21 -0500
Thanks GMM, I know that Vladimir is the one who decides, and I thought that perhaps he could have a rough idea of when would it be possible, if for December, January, or perhaps February if it would need much work to make the needed for Beta 2.

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GMM I think we're going to fix the Groups bugs first and then switch to the features outlined for Beta 2

Do you mean that is going to be released a new Beta 1 version bugfixed, perhaps Beta 1.1 or that until all the Groups bugs are fixed will not continue working on the other features for the Beta 2?

Sorry to make questions about this and I think that I should better keep quiet and wait patiently and do not bother you with this things.

Skybase, Fri, 23 Nov 2012 08:08:53 -0500
SpaceRay should wait for the information Santa to come. ;)

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 23 Nov 2012 13:19:11 -0500
It's hard to estimate because we're still dealing with the servers, but I think we can safely rule out December.

Skybase, Fri, 23 Nov 2012 13:22:12 -0500
Good luck with all the development! :D

SpaceRay, Fri, 23 Nov 2012 14:44:20 -0500
Thanks for answering Vladimir, and you are right, as it have happened the unexpected problem with the servers, you are busy also with this problem and so I agree that as december is very near, it will not happen before end of year.

SpaceRay, Sun, 27 Jan 2013 01:04:38 -0500
The last news is from 23 November, and now we are on 27 of January, more than 2 month later, and would like to know if it would be possible to know if it would be released possibly sometime in February or March, thanks.

Of course that I know that all depends on the problems and obstacles that you may find in the way, but to have rough idea.

Skybase, Sun, 27 Jan 2013 02:25:13 -0500
Biting your nails SpaceRay? :p

Vladimir Golovin, Sun, 27 Jan 2013 06:04:29 -0500
Life may have its own plans,
but from what I see,
February looks good.

Indigo Ray, Sun, 27 Jan 2013 09:10:56 -0500
Beautiful haiku, Vladimir! 8)

CFandM, Sun, 27 Jan 2013 10:35:55 -0500
February is going to be a good month.. :)

Crapadilla, Mon, 28 Jan 2013 06:07:04 -0500

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February looks good.

Marking 28th February in my calendar! :-p ;)

SpaceRay, Mon, 04 Feb 2013 18:07:01 -0500

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Skybase Biting your nails SpaceRay?

NOT at all :D I am not desperate or anxious waiting for FF 4.0 Beta 2 in any way, and do not care when will it appear, I have now put this because I have just been curious to know. After much waiting for FF 4.0 Beta 1, and having been much dissapointed, I am not now expecting or waiting for beta 2 unless there is some good and interesting reasons and news about it, and the possible thing coming with it seems that it is still a secret, and will not get anxious wanting to know more about as it happened, not again.

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Vladimir Golovin Life may have its own plans, but from what I see, February looks good.

Very good news and hope that the life allow you to make it true and it will look good in february for FF 4.0 beta 2, although if it is not possible, nothing bad happens, just wait some more. I wish you and the FF team the best.

Crapadilla, Tue, 26 Feb 2013 12:48:04 -0500
Nearing the mark in my calendar... ;)

xirja, Thu, 28 Feb 2013 15:01:14 -0500
But, but, but, bananas!

SpaceRay, Thu, 28 Feb 2013 16:37:27 -0500
Well, for me it does not matter at all that it has not been possible to release it in February, obviously there is no signed contract that it should and must be today, and it was just only a POSSIBLE release date and never means that it must be done in that date.

I understand of course that is really much better to spend some days more and test it very well and be sure that it works right and that most of the known bugs are solved and there will be only unknown bugs.

Wish the best and good for your hard work of the FF team, and take the time you may need.

Skybase, Fri, 01 Mar 2013 02:05:29 -0500
lololol SpaceRay's waiting hardcore. Make a filter dude!

SpaceRay, Fri, 01 Mar 2013 14:30:21 -0500

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Skybase lololol SpaceRay's waiting hardcore.

lol :D hardcore waiting? :D Sorry I do not think so :D As I have already said above, I am not desperate in any way, what I am is very curious but not impatient, and I can wait the time they need to make it right, and I wanted to say that as I started this thread, I wanted to let know that nothing bad happens if it takes more time to arrive.

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Skybase Make a filter dude!

I would love to really enjoy and would like to be able to make filters in the way that you or any other of the great FF experts from here, but regretably at this moment and time with my beginners skills is frustrating and not much enjoyable.

Slow ffxml file - do they get corrupted

Burt — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 13:20:35 -0500

Burt, Thu, 28 Feb 2013 13:20:35 -0500
Do these files ever get corrupted or perhaps do entries remain from old components? I am working on a big filter and have begun optimizing. There is a noticeable lag every so often and when I leave the editor when FF becomes unresponsive. I also manually moved some of my old versions of this filter to an archive folder - not sure if there is some index that needs to be updated? It is a hefty file compared to others at 113k so not sure but other filters don't freeze like this one, and this didn't do it before I started optimizing (though it did render slower before).

Layering in Filter Forge stand alone app.

gholmes1936 — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 16:20:07 -0500

gholmes1936, Wed, 27 Feb 2013 12:26:21 -0500
Is it possible to use layers in FilterForge, when using it as a stand alone application, separate from Photoshop?
Or do i have to apply one filter, save it, then reopen it in FF to apply a second filter?

gholmes1936, Wed, 27 Feb 2013 14:51:15 -0500
Or to put it another way, can i combine two filters to one image all at once?

SpaceRay, Wed, 27 Feb 2013 15:48:32 -0500
Is not possible to use layers inside Filter Forge (FF) as stand alone or even as a plugin, but you can use layers outside of Filter Forge if you are using Photoshop, I mean that you can have a layer in Photoshop and select it and apply the filter effect to that layer, and then select another layer and apply same or another different filter effect, and the combine both layers with or without blend modes.

You can´t apply TWO filters at the same time on the same image or layer, as you said, you have to load into FF the layer or image, apply the effect, render it and save it or apply it if inside Photoshop and then repeat again for another layer or image.

You can´t combine two filter to one image at once, at least without entering into the filter editor and combining both filters into only one, which it can complex and difficult and the result could be not the same and be also sometimes more slower.

gholmes1936, Wed, 27 Feb 2013 16:20:07 -0500
Thank you!

Get the filters withour updating

ALZHEM — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 15:34:47 -0500

ALZHEM, Tue, 26 Feb 2013 23:08:42 -0500
Hi all

Is there any way to download the filters without updating Filter Forge?
I know this one of the ways to tackle piracy, and it works, but also makes super annoying working with this awesome program when you have it installed in a studio and you don't have the admin privileges. You have to open a ticket, and wait for the systems guy to come, which in some cases can take a few days... Even they are getting pissed off because of my tickets! It's like one a month for the same thing, and they have to update our six computers...

Any solution? I am VERY interested in this as is one of the things that gets in the way of spreading the software through the office

Thanks :)

GMM, Wed, 27 Feb 2013 02:51:22 -0500
Sure, you can purchase the entire filter library archive.

Ozmandias, Wed, 27 Feb 2013 07:59:37 -0500
Does this archive happen to include ALL filters that have ever been submitted to the library... including those that have been removed from the library for various reasons over the years, or is it a compilation of just those that are available right now at this point in time?

ALZHEM, Wed, 27 Feb 2013 13:04:11 -0500
I had no idea this existed... wow.
My concern now is... how can we browse the library? Filter Forge 3.0 is not the best filter browser right now... although I think I read this is one of the improvements in 4.0.... right?

Also, this solves a big part of the problem, but still leaves the doubt of what happens with new filters, which are the ones using the latest version of the program, which means they will be more advanced

Thanks :)

SpaceRay, Wed, 27 Feb 2013 15:34:47 -0500
For the Filter Forge Library content there is more possible information here

Buying ONLY the Filter Library Backup online ??? What do you get ??

Quote

SpaceRay wrote:
Is included ALL the filters that are available until today on the server ?

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GMM wrote: If you buy it today, the answer is YES. We update the backup file once a week (or maybe once in 10 days)

FF Buying Options
_____________________________________
_____________________________________

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Ozmandias Does this archive happen to include ALL filters that have ever been submitted to the library... including those that have been removed from the library for various reasons over the years, or is it a compilation of just those that are available right now at this point in time?

Interesting question, and as far as I know, the FF Library you would buy will ONLY have the filters that are NOW in the online library, all updated to the latest version, and the ones that have removed will not be included. Also would not be included the filters that would be released AFTER the last backup have been done in the week or 10 days time. Please if this is not right and not this way, please correct it

_____________________________________
_____________________________________

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ALZHEM My concern now is... how can we browse the library?

The only way to browse the library you buy is to install it inside the FF Library folder as the filters are not named in the files, the have just numbers, BUT you can also search in the FF online library AND see carefully the link in the adress bar above and at the end will be a number, and this is the number that will be in the library you have bought, so you can search and install only that filter alone

I do not know if perhaps this other thread could help a little more IF you install the filters you buy inside the FF Library folder

Advantages and Disadvantages of using the OL and OLIFF Filters Library

Mini Filter Forge tutorial

plugsnpixels — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 06:23:48 -0500

plugsnpixels, Sun, 24 Feb 2013 03:55:34 -0500
Or more of a showcase of what it can do.

Free PDF, linked off of my Filter Forge page.

Several of you got credit (whenever I made note of the presets I used when creating the examples long ago!).

SpaceRay, Sun, 24 Feb 2013 06:23:48 -0500
Thanks and good to know, I will download it and see it.

Usage ranks

Sharandra — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 13:11:43 -0500

Sharandra, Mon, 11 Feb 2013 08:04:28 -0500
Are they being updated at all?
The filters I submitted on December 10 don´t show a single download, I know they have been downloaded tho.

angelize, Mon, 11 Feb 2013 15:08:28 -0500
I've been wondering about this as well.

Totte, Wed, 13 Feb 2013 05:24:37 -0500
Same thing here, I've got two filters with zip zero downloads, that have never happened before. If we don't get usage counts which can lead to HUs, the last incitement for publishing filters just went down the drain....

Sharandra, Wed, 13 Feb 2013 18:12:10 -0500
Hmm, no answer? they must be extremely busy with hunting the bad allocation error! :P

I think the usage stats haven´t been updated since the server crash and provider change.

SpaceRay, Fri, 15 Feb 2013 01:31:41 -0500

Quote
Sharandra I think the usage stats haven´t been updated since the server crash and provider change.

Is true that the downloads are not showing and the stats are kept the same, so are they broken, or they are working but not showing?

GMM, Wed, 20 Feb 2013 09:29:10 -0500
We've restarted the counter, no data was lost.

ddaydreams, Wed, 20 Feb 2013 12:26:47 -0500
Cool. I was wondering if anybody downloaded my filter, for all I knew nobody did. Now I can see 162 did.
That's encouraging. I'm more likely to share, knowing that people are benefiting from it.

Totte, Fri, 22 Feb 2013 06:03:53 -0500
Fun to jump from zero to 274 in one day ;-)

SpaceRay, Fri, 22 Feb 2013 13:11:43 -0500
Good to know that it has been solved...again