www.filterforge.com - Feature Wishlist

Component Instances

AussieDecalf — Wed, 27 Aug 2025 18:24:40 -0400

AussieDecalf, Fri, 08 Aug 2025 18:21:08 -0400
I was making a filter and had a 2 color scheme, and I was threading that color input into 10 different component nodes. that put input lines stretching all over the editor window, which made editing more confusing.

I wonder if it's possible to make instance copies of components. Like linked copies. I could imagine this working very easily for the controls components, but maybe it could also work with the other components.

Having multiple instances of a color control component means i could have that node input right next to the component it is attached to for each thing it is inputting to, and that means no more long confusing crossed lines.

Rachel Duim, Sun, 10 Aug 2025 10:35:37 -0400
Do you know how to use Groups? It allows the same code to be placed in a group and used more than once. Let me know if you need more explanation.

AussieDecalf, Thu, 14 Aug 2025 16:27:35 -0400
I tested that out, but it doesn't create linked instances for control components. It works well enough for other components. The control components that are inside groups also do not show up in the filter controls unless there is another control component fed into the group input.

I guess I should have been more specific that I am wanting control components to work like this, and have two control components be treated as the same component. Specifically so I can use multiple control components as inputs, and then have the filter treat all those control components as one control in the filter settings. If there is a way to make this work with groups, then let me know. I might be missing something.

GMM, Mon, 18 Aug 2025 05:48:13 -0400

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AussieDecalf wrote: have two control components be treated as the same component

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AussieDecalf wrote: treat all those control components as one control in the filter settings

Have you tried connecting a single Control component to multiple parameters?

AussieDecalf, Wed, 27 Aug 2025 18:24:40 -0400

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GMM wrote: Have you tried connecting a single Control component to multiple parameters?

Yes, that is the normal way of doing it. The feature I am referring to is to not have to do that. It's not a big deal when there's only 2-3 components a control component is connected to, but when you get giant filters and one control component being fed into 20+ inputs, then you get a visual spiderweb of crossed lines. The idea is to have control component instances always close to it's input, so there is no messy crossed lines that make the workspace confusing.

Would it be possible to have a TEXT import into FF as a component?

SpaceRay — Thu, 12 Jun 2025 03:02:55 -0400

SpaceRay, Mon, 06 Feb 2012 02:25:35 -0500
I have seen that it is really VERY HARD AND DIFFICULT to make any kind of text or numbers inside Filter Forge and it involves a complex combination of components to get JUST ONE letter or number.

I think that it would be really useful and interesting to have in FF 4.0 a new component that could be able to import and render real text and numbers.

1 - Import text from outside FF

2 - OR if not possible you could be able to write the text yourself inside FF

I do not mean to be able to use a whole page of text, this is NOT the meaning of my suggestion, I just want a FF component to write SIMPLE LETTERS AND WORDS, or build a short phrase, not full texts.

I am NOT asking to have a full text editor inside FF, not at all, ONLY to be able to use one letter, or build one word, or one short phrase", thatÂ´s all.

It would need also a way to choose the font you want to use.

Also another suggestion is that it could be useful if the Letter or Word could be used as shapes, I mean like for example the same as "free rectangle"

Thanks very much

CFandM, Mon, 06 Feb 2012 04:06:08 -0500
Theres been plenty of discussion on this topic before....
SEE HERE

SpaceRay, Mon, 06 Feb 2012 14:28:54 -0500
Thanks very much for the link CFandM

BUT THIS THREAD IS FROM 2006 !!!! 6 years ago and nothing has been already been done about this ? :( :cry:

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Vladimir Golovin wrote in 2006!! Actually, we considered embedding vector shapes, and text is not very different in this regard. Hovewer, to make filters look the same on different platforms, we'd have to embed the entire font into the filter, which is currently problematic.

It seems that must be really very problematic and very, very difficult to make because they have been already 6 YEARS CONSIDERING embedding vector shapes in FF :D

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Vladimir Golovin wrote in 2006!! Regarding the font feature -- technically, fonts are a special case of vectors, and in order to implement fonts we'll have to implement vectors first. Which means loading them from PSDs (via the plugin interface, which probably means getting a newer SDK, which has a scary license agreement) and AIs (probably the same story with the AI SDK). Vectors would involve a new kind of components (with brand-new color!) which requires propagating the support for vectors across the entire infrastructure (renderer, GUI, preview, files, filter library, website etc etc.) That's a lot of work, so I can safely say that vectors -- and therefore fonts -- won't be included in v2.0.

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Vladimir Golovin wrote in 2006!!

Regarding the font feature -- technically, fonts are a special case of vectors, and in order to implement fonts we'll have to implement vectors first.

Which means loading them from PSDs (via the plugin interface, which probably means getting a newer SDK, which has a scary license agreement) and AIs (probably the same story with the AI SDK).

Vectors would involve a new kind of components (with brand-new color!) which requires propagating the support for vectors across the entire infrastructure (renderer, GUI, preview, files, filter library, website etc etc.)

That's a lot of work, so I can safely say that vectors -- and therefore fonts -- won't be included in v2.0.

1 - Why is needed to convert fonts to vectors ? Why is not possible to use the fonts by itself because they are already resizable and can be enlarged without loosing quality.

Probably is the same reason as Photoshop. I know that Photoshop uses text input, BUT as said by Vladimir all the fonts are converted to vectors inside Photoshop for writing and editing, and then when finished editing you raster them and convert into a normal image.
__________________________________________________________________________________

2 - Would you need to make the text first in Photoshop and then import it into Filter Forge ?

Would not be possible to create the text inside Filter Forge ?
__________________________________________________________________________________

3 - Does it mean that the main problem with text and vectors is that is needed to upgrade or update to a newer SDK ? :?:

What does it mean that "it has a scary license agreement" :?: Why is it scary for FF ?

So the main problem that this has not been implemented inside FF in 6 years already, is because is needed to have a new SDK?
__________________________________________________________________________________

WOULD BE POSSIBLE TO INCLUDE VECTORS COMPONENTS IN FF 4.0 ?

It was not going to be included in 2.0 because of a lot work involved, and is understandable and logical, but it has NOT been included in FF 3.0, and then I wonder if it will be probably included in FF 4.0 ?

Morgantao, Mon, 06 Feb 2012 14:29:10 -0500
In other words:
DREAM ON! :D

SpaceRay, Mon, 06 Feb 2012 14:39:26 -0500

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Morgantao wrote: In other words: DREAM ON!

YES :D :D

But I really wish and hope very much that this feature does NOT belong to the MorgantaoÂ´s future theory and will it really be available in FF 4.0.

Please, see MorgantaoÂ´s future theory below :D

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Morgantao wrote: Sorry, that option is to be implemented in FF 136 (Coming out September 2214). Untill then there's nothing you can do to have fonts or vectors included in Filter Forge.

opossum, Mon, 06 Feb 2012 17:39:21 -0500
This technique of creating display fonts has worked for me for years. It does not limit a designer to the features, fonts or textures of any one program. The only drawback is that the quality of vector images is not significantly affected by resizing; bitmap images are. Over time, you learn to adjust for that.

Take a look at Xara if you want a graphics program which makes it easy to use vectors and bitmaps in the same graphics program. Xara's text formatting capabilities are excellent ie. kerning., line spacing. You can even change the individual letter size or font in the middle of a word...on the fly.

Every time a software company tries to be all things to all people, the software goes from being "user friendly" to "user hostile" which is why I still use older copies of Adobe Photoshop, CorelDraw and Xara which don't have all the latest "can't live without features".

BTW, I made all of these using Carl's filters and nothing else in Filter Forge stand-alone mode.

Mardar, Mon, 06 Feb 2012 18:36:33 -0500

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opossum wrote Every time a software company tries to be all things to all people, the software goes from being "user friendly" to "user hostile" which is why I still use older copies of Adobe Photoshop, CorelDraw and Xara which don't have all the latest "can't live without features".

THANK YOU! I have thought this very thing for years. I still use an old Jasc Paint Shop Pro program from 2005! If there are thing I need that it doesn't have I find another program to do that job. I use Inkscape for vectors. It's free, easy and just what I need. Doesn't get any better than that. LOL I think trying to jam a lot of things into Filter Forge isn't always the way to go either. It isn't an all in one program, it is a filter program plain and simple. ;)

Morgantao, Thu, 23 Aug 2012 04:17:08 -0400
The answer to your question is:
Either yes, or no... Probably maybe, but even that's uncertain :D

Skybase, Thu, 23 Aug 2012 04:27:39 -0400
We never know until the day of the release :p

See if you think about it functionally FilterForge has basically been giving you only the things you ultimately need to produce a certain style. Plus it works with Photoshop so some of the functionality comes from that. So if you stem from those thoughts you can basically say "probably not in 4.0." as a logical answer.

If you develop functionality for software you'd understand this better. Basically there are logical steps to take and manage before you implement a specific function. In this case a text component would be better off by being part of something like a "custom shapes component" (like having a mini Illustrator) instead of a absolutist, rigid, gradient-controlled component. The transform components are mildly a pain to use if you want to rapidly edit the position of a bunch of objects. So to me it seems cooler to just add a small GUI-based component allowing for free manipulation of shapes, text, and maybe even images.

I'm not against the idea of just the text component or anything, I just think it'd be much more intuitive and creative, more functional to have a larger component encompassing more possibilities. And creatively speaking its either you ask for extremely rigid components with hard-to-control functionalities over components with lots of freedom.

That's how I'd see a software like this handling text / custom shapes. Not that I would rule out possibilities, I just think that way about stuff like this. ;)

GMM, Fri, 27 Dec 2024 09:36:42 -0500
~~SpaceRay~~ Everyone, rejoice and try out the new Text component! :-)

Rachel Duim, Sun, 29 Dec 2024 23:48:32 -0500
Great job. The font faces support Unicode (UTF-16) and I've posted an example of the symbols and diacritics you can use.

Both the Mac and Windows version can't enter Unicode in the text field of the Text component. Can this be fixed... please pleeease! Currently I have to cut and paste these characters to get them in FF14.

SpaceRay, Fri, 03 Jan 2025 13:03:12 -0500

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GMM wrote: SpaceRay Everyone, rejoice and try out the new Text component!

WOW !!! After 12 years it has finally happened that is available!!! and what is better and great that is much better included the text component than what I could wish and imagined with different options and features available.

Thanks really very much

Have just started and is really an incredible new feature that has much more settings that I could imagine and is very well done and clever, although I still not know how it is made and how it works some parts so will see it and experiment to know more

Rod_D, Thu, 12 Jun 2025 03:02:55 -0400
Hmmmmm... So now it is time to create a filter that will decorate one font character at a time to create custom fonts for gimp. ;)

My Custom Font website

On a side note it would be nice to see a 3D component.

Would be good to have in forum a ADD-ONS specific category

SpaceRay — Wed, 19 Mar 2025 23:37:37 -0400

SpaceRay, Wed, 19 Mar 2025 23:37:37 -0400
I have thought that now that there are available more add-ons available to buy and use from filter force team

In the way that there is an Ultraforge category, there could an Add-ons category that could include all the topics about the 3 available ones

Filter forge Backup and Librarian

Animator

Visual Batch Renderer

So this way these add-ons could have more visibility and get more promoted and people may want to buy them better when there is specific place to post about questions about these add-ons

I think it would be good for get more views for these awesome tools now that they have also a specific tab at the top as shown here

Wish you all the best

GPU Revisited

JB55 — Fri, 03 Jan 2025 13:10:36 -0500

JB55, Mon, 23 Dec 2024 14:22:42 -0500
Any plans to incorporate GPU rendering? I can see the topic was last discussed in 2012.

GMM, Tue, 24 Dec 2024 05:07:19 -0500
GPU rendering is implemented in a separate product called Ultraforge.

SpaceRay, Fri, 03 Jan 2025 13:10:36 -0500

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JB55 wrote: Any plans to incorporate GPU rendering? I can see the topic was last discussed in 2012.

It was told already that regrettably and sadly there seems to be no way to use GPU rendering inside Filter Forge because on the way it was built.
There are some threads that explains in detail this topic but sorry that do not know where

Color range selector

Ramlyn — Fri, 15 Nov 2024 02:34:34 -0500

Ramlyn, Sat, 02 Nov 2024 01:31:56 -0400
I think it could be useful to have a component that can extract a color range from a picture.

Photoshop, GIMP, or other graphic editors can do it simply choosing to select an area of the picture by color and clicking on it.
Filter Forge can't do the same way, but maybe a similar result can be obtained giving the chance to the user to choose two colors. The component should select the whole color range between the two inserted colors.

SpaceRay, Thu, 14 Nov 2024 22:41:11 -0500
Yes I agree that it would be good, useful and interesting a custom specific component

Meanwhile of waiting for FF team to decide about this, you can also see the already available filters that are in the FF library about this topic that maybe you can use in some way

I do not know if it could be similar to what you may want and are suggesting, but may be something that is already available and can test it

Will tell what filter are related to this later

Rachel Duim, Thu, 14 Nov 2024 23:04:40 -0500
I’ve done the math for selecting a single color in Color Range Picker with Median. I’ll think about how that might be adapted for 2 colors.

Ramlyn, Fri, 15 Nov 2024 02:04:20 -0500
Thanks Rachel Duim and SpaceRay.

I know Color Range Picker with Median. It is a nice filter, but what I mean is someway different.
I try to explain.

First of all the component, when a color is selected, should select only that precise color, with all its characteristics.
Let's suppose that I pick the color AFFFAA:

Ramlyn, Fri, 15 Nov 2024 02:07:32 -0500
It must select in the picture only AFFFAA, considering all its RGB and HSB values.
It must not pick up also 5D5FF53, even if the two colors have something in common.

Ramlyn, Fri, 15 Nov 2024 02:31:36 -0500
This is the first important point.

The second point is how can we enlarge the action range?
We could have two solutions.

1) Let's consider AFFFAA as the center of a circular area with ray 0. Using a value 0 we would select only that precise color. Increasing the value to 1,2, ..... , the circular area would expand and we would have a wider color range.

2) A second option would be, as I already explained, selecting two colors. Let's consider two colors: AFFFAA and 1F5D1B.
The line connecting the two points would be the diagonal of a rectangle. That rectangle would be the area of our color range.

Ramlyn, Fri, 15 Nov 2024 02:34:34 -0500
As explained before, it would be important that the selection does not include colors that are outside of our selection range.

New components

Ramlyn — Sat, 01 Jun 2024 23:18:49 -0400

Ramlyn, Wed, 24 May 2023 13:35:36 -0400
I'm sure that many filters creators would like to have something completely new to play with.
Making something completely new would probably pass through having completely new components.
Then we should help the FF team to understand precisely what kind of component we may want, giving them some clear idea.
I don't mean to give them the code and let them simply add it. But at least doing a little bit more than simply saying "I want a 3D environment", because it would be a too huge thing to do and it doesn't simply require a component.

Then, let's post below this message some component idea, and let's see what FF team can do.

GMM, Thu, 25 May 2023 06:44:55 -0400
New components are high on our to-do list. I hope at least some of them will make into FF13.

Ramlyn, Thu, 25 May 2023 14:15:11 -0400
Thanks GMM. :D :D :D

Ramlyn, Thu, 25 May 2023 14:19:17 -0400
As for me, a Bomber with not overlapping particles, if it is possible to do, would be a great thing to do. It would open a lot of new possibilities. Many creators tried to obtain it in more or less complicate way, but the results are too slow and not satisfying.

Rachel Duim, Thu, 25 May 2023 16:07:34 -0400
+1 on non-overlapping particles in Bomber/Bomber+. I have also wondered about allowing particles outside the 0...1 particle space for Bomber/Bomber+. I suspect this is probably a stretch code-wise or impossible, but I can dream. My other dream is somehow making more grey inputs into green ones, or a component that adapts regular values into grey inputs.

Beat, Thu, 28 Dec 2023 08:57:14 -0500
I would like to propose the following new components :

Components that can do basic calculations, like Adding, Subtracting,Multiplying and Dividing.
I know that this can be done with RGBMath components, but they are overkill and unnecessary complicated for the purpose that I envision.
I would like to have the new, simple arithmetic components to make adjustable dependencies for control values.

E.g. I have 2 Threshold components, parallel and will blend them.
I have 2 Sliders A and B to control the 2 threshold values. Now I would like to make a third slider C, that moves both Slider A and Slider B up and down, but keeping the same difference between Slider A and Slider B.

In general, to be able to setup more complicated slider networks to control the actual calculating components.

Ramlyn, Sat, 01 Jun 2024 15:42:00 -0400
Is there any chance to see in this update a selection in the Bomber for overlapping / not-overlapping particles?

SpaceRay, Sat, 01 Jun 2024 23:18:49 -0400

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Ramlyn wrote: As for me, a Bomber with not overlapping particles, if it is possible to do, would be a great thing to do. It would open a lot of new possibilities

I absolute agree and would be the greatest thing the bomber could have because it would really change everything and would be possible a huge new way to use bomber in a great way, and would be a big thing to have against others

Is not needed to make it perfect no-overlapping, it could be done with a circle shape like it is done for circle packing, because inside the circle are included all the other polygonal shapes

A possible best way maybe and possibly would be with a spacing slider so you can customize the space that is between particles and adjust as wanted, but of course I am do not know if it would be possible, so you can do it in the best technical way you may like and want

Thanks very much

Be able to input video into bomber and not only still images

SpaceRay — Mon, 08 Jan 2024 11:14:15 -0500

SpaceRay, Mon, 08 Jan 2024 11:14:15 -0500
Hello, please, I have that using After effects or DaVinci Resolve you may be able to create video collages with multiple videos on the same screen, but you can not apply effects to these videos

So, I wonder if now that FF13 is released with more video features, it could be possible to use multiple videos as individual input for bomber, or other component instead of only still images

Maybe this is not possible because if FF may be slow for still images, maybe having multiple video would be much more slower to process them and too slow

And if FF is not powerful enough, could Ultraforge do this?

I am very sorry that I have NO idea about the technical workings of FF but and maybe I am asking something silly or impossible

Thanks very much

Adding webm to forums

Rachel Duim — Fri, 29 Dec 2023 05:30:24 -0500

Rachel Duim, Sat, 23 Dec 2023 23:42:45 -0500
It would be nice if the Image button on the forum page could be amended to allow webm (in a loop) since creating webm videos 1 meg and under are easy to do.

Carl, Fri, 29 Dec 2023 05:30:24 -0500
sounds good idea

Storing filter and settings as output image metadata

ALZHEM — Mon, 18 Dec 2023 08:51:29 -0500

ALZHEM, Fri, 15 Dec 2023 13:54:49 -0500
Well... what I said already in the topic basically.

ComfyUI has already that amazing feature that saves all the parameters you used to generate an image inside the actual image as metadata.

Another great feature related to this is that, by dragging an image generated by FF back to FF, it could pick the correspondent filter and change the parameters automatically, AND give us a small pop up to confirm if we want to download the filter in case we don't have that filter previously downloaded.

That would be an amazing tool for the community to share their work.

ALZHEM, Fri, 15 Dec 2023 13:56:07 -0500
And if the filter is small... maybe the filter could also be saved inside the image...? Just ideas

GMM, Mon, 18 Dec 2023 08:51:29 -0500
Looks like you've invented RARJPEG – an ancient method of sharing binary files on forums that only allow you to attach images :)

For those who don't know, one can append any data to the end of a JPG file, and the image will still display correctly. One can also add any data in front of an archive, and the archive will unpack correctly.

So, you could pack your filter into a zip/rar/7z archive, then call [CODE]copy /b image.jpg filter.rar result.jpg[/CODE].
This result.jpg will show up as an image but can be renamed to a .rar file and unpacked. This can even be automated in a command-line script.

I doubt it will make into Filter Forge but thanks for your input anyway!

Dropdown list

James — Wed, 22 Nov 2023 11:20:23 -0500

James, Sat, 24 Jun 2006 21:34:31 -0400
I was suprised that there was no dropdown list control, i think it would make things much easier rather than having to use a slider ect.

Also it would be nice to have a rotate module :D

uberzev, Sat, 24 Jun 2006 21:48:44 -0400
Yeah, dropdown would be great especially for things like blending modes.

Vladimir Golovin, Sun, 25 Jun 2006 03:58:25 -0400
Dropdown (a.k.a List Control) was put on indefinite hold because it was going to take too long to implement (it requires a serious redesign of Filter Forge's infrastructure for control components).

Regarding the Rotate component -- we wanted to include it but we had to drop this idea because rotation breaks seamless tiling on non-square images (also true for Scale, which breaks tiling and is very slow when used with bitmap based components).

James, Sun, 25 Jun 2006 04:56:21 -0400
ok, is there any tricks to do rotation though?

James, Sun, 25 Jun 2006 05:03:29 -0400
Also what about fixed rotation, so 90 180 ect so its angles that would not mess up seamless textures? would this work?

SpaceRay, Mon, 09 Nov 2015 00:54:48 -0500

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Vladimir Golovin wrote in 2006 Dropdown (a.k.a List Control) was put on indefinite hold because it was going to take too long to implement (it requires a serious redesign of Filter Forge's infrastructure for control components).

I think that reading this it means that we will not be able to have any kind of drop down menu on settings panel to choose by text the blend modes? Because if it needs a redesign of FF then I do not think it will be able to do it just for this

Maybe instead of a dropdown menu, there could be a possible alternative, like opening a small panel or window to choose the blend mode from a list with a checkbox or radio button

I feel lost when I have to use blend modes with numbers and have to keep looking at what number is corresponding to each one In a printed list I have beside my monitor

SpaceRay, Fri, 17 Apr 2020 05:53:49 -0400
This was in 2006 already 14 years ago!!

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Vladimir Golovin wrote: Dropdown (a.k.a List Control) was put on indefinite hold because it was going to take too long to implement (it requires a serious redesign of Filter Forge's infrastructure for control components).

If the dropdown is the problem, is not really needed and surely there could be other possible alternative way, for example just use a text slot as it happens already in the remapper inside the filter where it is shown the name of the selected blend mode, so it would appear the name in the settings control instead of a number

Skybase, Fri, 17 Apr 2020 22:23:14 -0400
14 years later we're still talking about this. Unbelievable.

Sphinx., Sat, 18 Apr 2020 05:14:09 -0400
I imagine a custom Drop Down control working like this:

1. Add a number of options where you specify a title, e.g. "Darken", "Lighten" and "Pin Light".
2. Give each option an internal integer/number/map list value, e.g. 2, 5 and 10

Regarding #2 and format of internal values: There could be several variants of Drop Down for different types: Map List, Integer, Value and Boolean. This essentially comes down to the inner workings of FF (i.e. I have no idea if there is any real difference between Map List and Integer).

Nice to have: For the sake of simplicity, when you connect an empty drop down to a component map list input with a fixed number of options (like "Mode" in "Blend"), the Drop Down should be set up with these values from start. You can then remove the options you don't want or rename them.

Here is a mock-up to tickle your senses and inspire the awesome developer team (once they are done fixing the script init issue that is :-D). Note that I may have mixed up concepts around integers and map lists here... I'm sure you catch my drift:

emme, Sun, 19 Apr 2020 08:47:35 -0400
+1

Good mockup. This needs to be done.

Furyofaseraph, Sun, 08 Oct 2023 11:53:43 -0400
I was about to post a request for a dropdown list control - good thing I searched: I'm surprised to see that this request is 17 years old... that's half the time I've been on the planet.

Despite that, gonna throw a +1 out there, because a Dropdown would solve several issues where a creative and convoluted workaround is required.

Beat, Wed, 22 Nov 2023 11:20:23 -0500

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Vladimir Golovin wrote: Dropdown (a.k.a List Control) was put on indefinite hold because it was going to take too long to implement (it requires a serious redesign of Filter Forge's infrastructure for control components).

What I don't understand is that Vladimir states that it is very much work to implement a drop-down menu, but he has the drop-down menu already in many places in the editor environment.
Why is it possible there and not (as in ANY normal software application) in the User Interface?
it is so basic !

Tag Sorting

Prototype458 — Fri, 20 Oct 2023 08:11:53 -0400

Prototype458, Thu, 19 Oct 2023 09:59:53 -0400
so i been using filter forge awhile now but the thing that constantly bothers me is that i have to sort filters myself to optimize my own workflow

the current way of textures and effects is all over the place and sure i can use search but say i want sharpening not all sharpen effects wil be found as it would be under a different name

this makes the program a bit annoying to use even while it can have neat results

so my request would be more management features for filters

GMM, Fri, 20 Oct 2023 05:53:24 -0400
Prototype458, welcome to the forums!

The recommended way to manage filters is through favorites. You can create a complex folder structure under favorites.
If you want to rely on search you'll need to create a copy of the filter under 'My filters', then edit this copy to include your favorite keywords.

Prototype458, Fri, 20 Oct 2023 07:52:37 -0400
thank you

yeah that what i been doing but it takes ages to fully setup

it is how the cookie crumbles with filters being made by users they aren't always consistent examples are differences between lightness, brightness and gamma which gets mistaken alot and words that mean the same thing spread across filters and there are filters in the misplaced category aswel with not the correct tags so you cant find them in search either

what i plan to do is going to take a long time aswel and that is update every filter for speed so that means components, turning off anti-aliasing and following a rulebook for controls of the filter being consistent

also in settings it could be handy to just have a setting that turns off anti-aliasing and to always start filter forge in reduced preview size

with anti-aliasing some filters take way to long to render compared to having no anti-aliasing and in my opinion anti-aliasing should be a after thought

sidenote :
would i be allowed to share filters i updated with the changes i mentioned on the forum or is not that a good idea due to you guys also selling the filter packs with every filter im currently updating the default filters that come preinstalled with filter forge 12 if its a no ill keep it to myself

but if there is another way to sort out filter forge that would help the initial problem of opening filter forge with maybe alot of those filters then spending like a hour to find 1 filter that actually does what you want then opening it again for maybe another effect and this stays the same as long as you dont sort stuff yourself which takes time which not everybody is willing to spend

GMM, Fri, 20 Oct 2023 08:11:53 -0400

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Prototype458 wrote: it could be handy to just have a setting that turns off anti-aliasing

That's what the large 'Draft Mode' button does

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Prototype458 wrote: to always start filter forge in reduced preview size

Unfortunately the draft mode is not saved between Filter Forge sessions but this is a good suggestion.

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Prototype458 wrote: would i be allowed to share filters i updated with the changes

Sure, as long as you give credit to the original author.

Component to Fill Contiguous Regions with Parametric Colors

Furyofaseraph — Sun, 08 Oct 2023 18:15:42 -0400

Furyofaseraph, Sun, 08 Oct 2023 18:15:42 -0400
Much like how Tiles/Tiles+ lets you have the "Tile" regions where you can select a color and adjust HSL range, I would love to have the same thing but using an Arbitrary white-region/black-border.
Basically, the idea is that any contiguous white [or near white, threshold, what not] region gets fill-colored by a HSL-range adjusted color - next contiguous region gets colored similarly.

heck, there *could* be an option to "expand boundaries" by a given distance so that the black borders can be potentially "swallowed" by the now-colored region (much like how if you set Tiles to have a Mortar Width of 0).

This could also let one HSL-adjust-colorize any number of existing pattern components: Stone, Techno, Blocks, and so on, without that component necessarily being built with capability that in mind. Doubly so with an Edge-finder + threshold combo.

Editable and Organizable Snippets?

Furyofaseraph — Sun, 08 Oct 2023 15:44:26 -0400

Furyofaseraph, Sun, 08 Oct 2023 15:44:26 -0400
I see there is a "Snippet" list underneath the "Library Filters" flyout in the browser - obviously those being the snippets that I've downloaded, but none of my snippets are listed under "Custom Filters", or anywhere else in the browser. I have no way of accessing or organizing my bank of snippets without creating a temporary filter. To say nothing of the inability to place them into any kind of folders...
Can we have a way to browse and organize our own snippets?

At present, the only way that I know that one can edit an existing snippet that you have saved is to create a new filter, create the snippet, ungroup it, make the tweaks that you want, delete the old snippet from the component list, and then create a new snippet (ostensibly with the same name).
Could there be an easier way to edit an existing snippet preset?

Tint Chaos for Bomber Component

Novaesky — Wed, 27 Sep 2023 12:56:25 -0400

Novaesky, Fri, 08 Sep 2023 09:10:27 -0400
Finding myself really missing something like a Tint Chaos slider for the Bomber component. Opacity chaos doesn't quite do it, if for example you want to simulate a bunch of objects at different depths, but they overlap. But a Tint Chaos set to black could work well I think.

Or maybe there's some other way of making it work, I don't know. I've tried using the depth map but I can't seem to get it to work properly.

Rachel Duim, Fri, 08 Sep 2023 19:32:30 -0400
I would do tint chaos this way using Bomber+ (plus) using the Randomizer sub-component. Changing Variation then gives you the chaos you want. FF7 and above. UPDATED: added chaos slider

Rachel Duim, Fri, 08 Sep 2023 22:29:09 -0400
You did mention black, so here is the model I use on most of my paint filters (Impressionist Curve, Detail Painter, etc). There is chaos for Hue, Saturation, and Lightness.

Novaesky, Mon, 11 Sep 2023 05:21:00 -0400
The HSL chaos worked great for me! Thanks so much! :)

Novaesky, Tue, 12 Sep 2023 16:41:03 -0400
Thanks again for your help. Here's the resulting filter: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/16483.html :)

Rachel Duim, Sat, 16 Sep 2023 21:33:46 -0400
You are welcome! What's great about the Randomizer in the Bomber+ loop is that you can use it on any component input. Rocky River Bed is great.

Novaesky, Mon, 18 Sep 2023 03:43:46 -0400
I will definitely use it in the future as well!

SpaceRay, Wed, 27 Sep 2023 12:56:25 -0400
This seems to be good and interesting, will se how it work

New Effects Categories for Animate Filters or search to find them

John Foll — Fri, 01 Sep 2023 09:23:18 -0400

John Foll, Mon, 13 Jun 2022 10:50:56 -0400
Need a way to find all animated filters. I don't see any categories for them. I can search for "Animated" and it find some, but it also finds many that are not animated. I recently bought the Studio version instead of upgrade to the Pro version because I need to build animations for Videos.

GMM, Tue, 14 Jun 2022 08:56:21 -0400
You can distinguish animated filters by the clapboard icon at the top right corner of the filter thumbnail.

John Foll, Wed, 15 Jun 2022 09:45:51 -0400
How does that help you find them in the thousands of filter? I don't want to look at each filter in the library to find the animated filters obviously.

GMM, Wed, 15 Jun 2022 12:26:13 -0400
It's not looking through thousands filters, it's looking through a couple dozen.

The first animated filters were submitted on December 17th, 2021. So you'll need to open the library page for that date:
https://filterforge.com/filters/recent-page5.html
and browse four pages forward.

Marcus_EU, Wed, 30 Aug 2023 02:27:34 -0400
The thing is the preview is just a still. To be able to judge what you get, it should be at least a short preview movie (10-15 second) of the animation.

GMM, Fri, 01 Sep 2023 09:23:18 -0400

Quote
Marcus_EU wrote: it should be at least a short preview movie (10-15 second) of the animation.

Loading a page with 15-second animations would consume hundreds of megabytes of traffic. For some people this is about a weekly traffic quota.

Rearranging file locations

Kraellin — Thu, 27 Jul 2023 19:11:33 -0400

Kraellin, Tue, 05 Mar 2019 16:42:25 -0500
Hi devs,

I've a request to allow us to move or re-direct a path to our "My..." settings, eg, "My Filters" and so on.

I've recently bought a new computer and it has four harddrives, C:, for my system stuff, D:, for program files, and E: (mirrored), for my data files. This makes it very easy to back up my "I don't want to lose these" files, like my filters and user made environments and so on. I can get normal filters from the library or use the back-up tool within FF, but I cant move the data files of the 'MY' category without losing the path. I'm not sure how difficult this would be from a programming standpoint, but it seems like it shldnt be that hard. Any chance we could get this? I only have so much room on each drive and I'd like to devote programs and data to their appropriate drives.

Craig

Rachel Duim, Tue, 05 Mar 2019 18:54:33 -0500
** Deleted ** this is not possible using soft or hard links as I previously posted.

GMM, Wed, 06 Mar 2019 05:29:53 -0500
Please check out the Custom storages help section on adding your own filter location to Filter Forge.

Lucato, Thu, 27 Jul 2023 19:11:33 -0400
Hi folks! I'm sorry, I know it is a very old thread, but today I had to install my FF12 in my new OS/HD, and I had a bunch of OLD filters already in the OLD library versions of FF version, and each filter was at the texture folder/subfolders, the same for Effects folders/and subfolder, and so on. By using the "Custom Storage help Section" suggestion above IMHO doesn't help at all, once all filters I had goes into the one folder, without beeing organized as it was in the original root/tree. I know it wold be moved one by one, but what a pain to move each one among thousand and worst than that is to know in what subfolder it was. So, I would agree with Craig that FF dev team would think a way where user would set the wished PATH for installing filters when installing FF and also be able to change after a installation, and FF would move them wherever it is set as a bunch of software does.

Anyway, I got to solve it in other way and for those that are looking for the same, one solution was to copy the original FF root in the HD for filters to my other wished HD, and added all my older filters in the same folders it was, and later I didn't create a soft or hard link, but used a junction link instead from my wished place to Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\Filter Forge 12 also copy my favorites.xml to have the favorites I had before. All working good until now, but would be much easier to have the option into FF to set filters path. ;0)

Also FF dev team would put in front of each folder name the X amount of filters into the folder or on the footer such info. ;0)

All the best. Lucato.

FF13 (BETA13) - Render multiple frame ranges

STEPH08 — Wed, 19 Jul 2023 03:30:47 -0400

STEPH08, Wed, 19 Jul 2023 03:30:47 -0400
FF13 (BETA13) - Render multiple frame ranges :ff:

Please add to the v13 the possibility to render multiple frame ranges like this:
01-10, 21-30, 51-60

thank you

Portrait / Landscape presets

Rachel Duim — Wed, 28 Jun 2023 22:10:26 -0400

Rachel Duim, Wed, 28 Jun 2023 22:10:26 -0400
It would be great if non-square presets were allowed in submitted filters. I realize that a website redesign would be required, so as a compromise perhaps allowing the 10th preset and beyond to be non-square. This way the website would not be affected. I also realize that the preset thumbnails are rendered as square and are not rendered correctly (XY Anchor?). I've been working on more elliptical filters of late and would like to show what the filter can do. FWIW

small wishes

ronviers — Sat, 20 May 2023 12:31:36 -0400

ronviers, Sat, 20 May 2023 12:31:36 -0400
I'm sure all these things have already been wished for so this is just my personal bump:

Snapshot with A/B wipe
Render time progress with total time saved with snapshot
Render region
Pause render
Pause evaluation
Allow nodes to be named
No duplicate names allowed in library
Dark theme option

Render GIF animation with transparent background

L95 — Tue, 21 Mar 2023 10:53:09 -0400

L95, Tue, 14 Mar 2023 03:29:19 -0400
I couldn't find any search results regarding how to export a GIF animation with a transparent background. I applied the "Comic Book" filter to my GIF which has a transparent background, and that filter does not appear to alter the image when rendered to an image sequence. However, when rendered to a GIF the file loses its transparent background. If this is not a bug and/or I'm doing something wrong, then I think this feature should be added.

L95, Tue, 14 Mar 2023 11:53:45 -0400
Just to clarify, the filter does alter the image. What I meant is that it doesn't remove my transparent background when rendered to an image sequence. This behavior should also be the same when rendering to a GIF, but it's not.

SpaceRay, Tue, 14 Mar 2023 17:45:24 -0400
I am not sure if I understand it, but if you are using a transparent GIF with a filter, then the filter must be also compatible with transparent background, and should be possible to remove the background to make it transparent

If the filter has a color control for the background you can easily remove the background by adjusting the alpha channel (THE A value to zero) and so you can keep the transparency on the output

You could show an example of what you have and you get that is wrong and show what settings you are using, so we can see if it can be modified to get what you want

I have not tested yet to modify a video file in FF so I am not sure if this is right

L95, Wed, 15 Mar 2023 23:42:01 -0400
Hopefully, the example below clears things up. The is something that happens in other software too, in which a sequence of images that have transparency when rendered to a GIF will no longer have transparency.

L95, Wed, 15 Mar 2023 23:52:53 -0400
Hopefully, the example below clears things up. The is something that happens in other software too, in which a sequence of images that have transparency when rendered to a GIF will no longer have transparency.

GMM, Tue, 21 Mar 2023 10:53:09 -0400
L95, welcome to the forums and thanks for your message. Indeed animated GIFs are rendered without transparency, this is by design, unfortunately. As a format, GIF is horribly outdated, we recommend you use APNG instead that correctly preserves transparency.

Numerical switch

Ramlyn — Wed, 22 Feb 2023 03:26:34 -0500

Ramlyn, Wed, 22 Feb 2023 03:26:34 -0500
Our present two kinds of Switch component are very useful to choose among different results, different colors, different curves.
But many times we need to input a range of numbers, supplied by Value Controls, Slider Controls, IntSlider Controls or Grayscale Controls.
The present switches are not exactly "straight forward" in doing it.
Would it be complicate to add a numerical switch component?
I believe it would be useful to have one.

3ds Max Filterforge integration

Macphisto — Thu, 05 Jan 2023 10:32:50 -0500

Macphisto, Mon, 19 Jun 2006 08:11:00 -0400
Hi, I like the seamless texture map generated by Filterforge, but maybe useful a plugin that allow to set control for texture in a max material.

Vladimir Golovin, Wed, 05 Jul 2006 04:26:20 -0400
Yes, good idea, it is already on our long-term list.

nutella, Fri, 30 Jul 2010 17:28:31 -0400
Seems like this thread is over 4 years old. So I was wondering about this plugin as well. Simbiont plugins exist for a few programs, and is also supported by Vray as a SimbiontMaterial.

Will Filterforge be a competitor to DarkTree? The interface and shader generation is very similar to it.

Darrell Plank, Sun, 21 Aug 2011 04:52:12 -0400
Another year has gone by and no reply to this. I would love to see this also.

thhm, Mon, 30 Apr 2012 06:54:50 -0400
hello 2012! :D

SpaceRay, Mon, 30 Apr 2012 08:09:21 -0400
According to the Vladimir long list of things to do, it seems that you have to wait another year or two, as lots of things that has been promised by Vladimir and he said was a good idea and put them on the list has not yet been done or released.

I wish I did not have to say this about Vladimir, but regretably is the truth as you can find many thread from 2006, 2007 and 2008 that have promises that have never been done.

I think that the best is to use the DarkTree software that has already built in support for 3DMax www.darksim.com

Skybase, Mon, 30 Apr 2012 12:33:31 -0400
The day when this happens I'll be very happy. Until then I'm sticking to Substance designer.

Shawn Olson, Mon, 08 May 2017 23:56:28 -0400
Old thread obviously. But time to revive.

Grabbed Filter Forge today because one of my co-workers was using it and I think the collection of filters seems pretty cool.

As a longtime Substance user, I've always been happy to be able to use Substances inside Max natively. Having a FilterForge map in Max that works like a the Substance Map (with outputs of all the diffuse, normal, etc) for materials would make FF so much more enticing for those of us who use Max.

BorisK, Thu, 11 May 2017 04:41:58 -0400
Agree with Shawn. Sure it will be cool feature!

Shawn Olson, Fri, 12 May 2017 14:31:10 -0400
Vote for Filter Forge in Max. Let Autodesk know you want this feature.

Shawn Olson, Thu, 06 Sep 2018 07:25:52 -0400
Just bumping again as I'd love to see this.

Shawn Olson, Fri, 10 May 2019 16:03:52 -0400
Adding another bump. Any progress Vladimir?

Shawn Olson, Tue, 21 Dec 2021 12:53:07 -0500
I'm now a 3ds Max product manager at Autodesk, so my interest in a Max integration has only grown! :) I'd love to hear if there has been any investigation into this.

GMM, Wed, 22 Dec 2021 08:45:05 -0500
Shawn, could you please send an email to the support team with your suggestions.

Shawn Olson, Thu, 05 Jan 2023 10:32:50 -0500
Another year, another bump. I sent a message to the support team as well. :)

Request for Render Farm: multiple command line instances

ALZHEM — Sun, 11 Dec 2022 23:01:30 -0500

ALZHEM, Fri, 10 Jun 2016 18:19:34 -0400
Hi all.

I am working on a new version of my FFFarm, and this one I want to make it public (before I couldn't as it was developed for a company I worked for in the past).

FFFarm will allow you filter sequences, select filters and presets, choose formats, etc. Great to create your own filtered videos (like using Photoshop's batch process but way cooler).

But there is still one extra thing I would like to get, and this is the ability to run multiple instances of the command line FF (something similar to what After Effects does when rendering)

The main reason is the full processing power of our machines is never used when rendering a filter, so why not running 2, 4, 8 instances of FF to get all done much faster? I can even check the ram and CPU load and run more or less instances to use the resources smartly.

Is this something we could get? Maybe in the final version of FF 6...? Please...? :D :D :D

Thanks!!!

Skybase, Fri, 10 Jun 2016 23:17:21 -0400
Oh +1 for this.

earthbound, Fri, 10 Apr 2020 01:51:57 -0400
Did you ever get to finish that FFFarm new version and post it anywhere?

Also, +1 for multiple running instances.

Fatal Strategies, Sun, 11 Dec 2022 22:58:43 -0500
It sounds like this "FFFarm" idea never came into being. Are there any real-life options that exist currently for outsourcing our FF video renders?

I've been limited to rendering at 1024x768 resolution (the source material for a huge audio-visual project I'm working on). Certain animations are out of the question altogether , even at that resolution.

Substance Designer is fast, but it's not very intuitive from an artistic standpoint, and the documentation is beyond worthless (still no idea how to get it to animate anything.) Most of the other source material I am composing in Blender (which has render farm support). It's great but I have a lot of sequences in FF that Blender can't replicate.

The FF renders look beautiful even at 1024x768 but enlarging them to full-screen is not pretty. 1920x1080 would be ideal, but my computer would be occupied for the next year or so, meanwhile I cannot work. Regular search engines have not yielded anything promising... So this seems like the only place to ask... Filter Forge veterans and experts... is there some super secret Filter Forge-friendly render farm that wants a bunch of my business??

Fatal Strategies, Sun, 11 Dec 2022 23:01:30 -0500
I just re-read the original post and I think I might have misunderstood; this wasn't referring to an 'actual' render farm but some kind of add-on which is no longer relevant. Nevertheless, I'm still wondering if there are any render farms out there who would be able to help with a bunch of FF animations.

Rectangular images need an indication of the center

STEPH08 — Wed, 09 Nov 2022 18:02:44 -0500

STEPH08, Wed, 09 Nov 2022 18:02:44 -0500
Can you please add a center indication (spot or cross) to the rendering window?
This is especially useful when the image size is rectangular and you want particular textures/filters with configurable x/y axis to be precisely centered.

Thanks

Rendering time should be always displayed after the rendering strip or

STEPH08 — Tue, 01 Nov 2022 10:10:44 -0400

STEPH08, Tue, 01 Nov 2022 10:10:44 -0400
...or even on the rendering strip !
Thanks

(The permanent visual pop-up for rendering time is annoying)

FF 11 Plugin

KenS. — Sun, 30 Oct 2022 15:58:36 -0400

KenS., Sun, 25 Sep 2022 11:49:01 -0400
It seems that FF 11 Plugin work with PaintShop Pro 2022. Does it work with PSP 2023. I can't seem to get it to install.

KenS., Sun, 25 Sep 2022 18:04:09 -0400
Ok I got it working with Paintshop Pro 2023. Correction, it's installed, but still doesn't work. Re-installed PSP 2022 and re-installing FF 11 after install PSP 2022, adjusting the file path in PSP. Got it working. Did the same steps with PSP 2023. But get a error message, then when you close the message you get the second message. "Paintshop Pro Plug-in passed bad parameters". The codes change every time you try to open FF 11.

KenS., Sun, 30 Oct 2022 15:58:36 -0400
Finally got FF 11 and FF 12 plugin to install without error messages in Paintshop Pro 2023.

Video? You should switch the engine from CPU to GPU.

STEPH08 — Thu, 27 Oct 2022 10:44:51 -0400

STEPH08, Mon, 24 Oct 2022 05:04:25 -0400
I am into video editing and I regularly receive an upgrade offer for the Studio edition. Modern video editing software is extremely powerful, fast and GPU-based.
I think it is a good strategy for the FF team to enter this field, but the CPU based engine needs to be changed to GPU computation !
Even on a powerful gamer laptop with the latest i9 and lots of memory, filter rendering for a single image can be extremely slow.
I can't imagine how painful it is to add some effects at 60fps in full HD or more.

STEPH08, Thu, 27 Oct 2022 10:44:51 -0400
Today I played with imported mp4 1920x1080 60fps vids. It's really cool to add filters that are unavailable or very difficult to imitate with a dedicated video editor. But the quality of the filtered output is low, pixelated.

I have a 6 second clip to download with 400 frames rendered in about 20 minutes, very nice effect ! (it would take hours to render several minutes of video)
Secure download 3MB mp4 here

Requests:
+ add appropriate video output quality settings,
+ find a way to maintain the sound of the imported vids,
+ add the ability to render different presets on the same timeline with a smooth transition/crossfade between them,
+ optimize the CPU calculations taking into account all the features of the new generation CPUs.

One of the next times I get an offer for the Studio version, I subscribe.

Filters using non-square previews images

Ramlyn — Sat, 15 Oct 2022 13:41:11 -0400

Ramlyn, Thu, 13 Oct 2022 12:48:02 -0400
I made a filter and when I tried to submit it, I got the following message:

Ramlyn, Thu, 13 Oct 2022 12:54:30 -0400
It is good that Filter Forge has non-square images that we can use for testing the filters on them without the need to load our own ones.
But it would be better if these images could be also used in our filters too.

CFandM, Thu, 13 Oct 2022 16:32:32 -0400
I got that submitting one of my filters. So just had to select one of the square images for the preset and resubmit it. So now I always check that before submitting.

Ramlyn, Sat, 15 Oct 2022 13:41:11 -0400
Yes, I did the same thing too.

Anyway, sometimes, selecting an image instead of another, because of its different color or different shape, can give a better idea about how to use the filter. That's why it would be useful that also the non-square images could be used when uploading the filters.

Be able to have the FF Filter Snippets INSIDE the filter editor to use

SpaceRay — Fri, 14 Oct 2022 06:31:14 -0400

SpaceRay, Thu, 02 Aug 2012 01:13:18 -0400
My suggestion is to have INSIDE the Filter Editor a new pane, or tab, or whatever, where you could have direct access to the FF filter snippets that you have downloaded and available in your FF library

The main point of making Snippets is to help others making filters, so it would be much better if they could be available fr om inside the Filter Editor directly

As it is now, there are lots of interesting, useful and great snippets available in the FF Library, but the problem with them is that they are OUTSIDE of the filter editor, so if you are making a filter and you want to add a snippet you need to do the following

* save the filter you are working on
* close filter editor
* search in the FF library for the snippet you want
* open the snippet in filter editor
* copy all the components of the snippet
* close filter editor
* search again for the filter you have been working
* paste the snippet in your own filter

As I see it, is a lot of things to do for ONLY using one of the snippets in your own filter.

AND what happens if you want to have 2 snippets ? Duplicate all this twice !!

So as suggested in the begginning if the Filter Snippets could be available INSIDE the Filter Editor it would be MUCH faster, easier, useful and time saving, and would be as follows.

While working on your filter in filter editor

* open the tab or pane wh ere the Filter Snippets are
* search for the snippet you want
* select it or double clicking would be copied to your filter

ThatÂ´s ALL !!

Or an alternative possible way if this is not possible or difficult

* open the tab or pane wh ere the Filter Snippets are inside filter editor
* search for the snippet you want
* select it or double clicking would open a new filter editor window with that snippet inside
* copy the components of the snippet
* close the snippet filter editor window
* paste the snippet in your filter

I think this would be very useful, time saving and very good to have

Thanks very much

Morgantao, Fri, 24 Aug 2012 18:04:09 -0400
+1 million ;)

Skybase, Fri, 24 Aug 2012 21:23:59 -0400
Macros: probably been suggested a million times but we need it badly.

SpaceRay, Sat, 25 Aug 2012 02:52:57 -0400
I have thought that perhaps there is something MUCH easier than all this above, and is simply to allow to open TWO filter editor windows instead of only one and I do not think that allowing to open 2 filter editor windows would be something complex to do and would be much simpler solution.

I mean that if you can open TWO filter editor windows, you could open two different filters at the same time and so it would be really easy to copy and paste components between them

Also you could make a special filter that would work as an storage place to keep all the components you want ALREADY CONFIGURED as you want and not with the factory defaults presets, and also you have YOUR FAVORITE GROUP OF COMPONENTS as a kind of snippets (using the color control component to identify them with text like if they was stickers) and so would me much easier to have things in one place instead of searching for them in the FF list.

Quote
Skybase wrote: Macros: probably been suggested a million times but we need it badly.

Considering the suggestions that has been done already, I think it needs 5 millions times until FF Inc. decides to include and make the suggested feature ;) :D

SpaceRay, Sat, 25 Aug 2012 05:19:11 -0400
Another way I have just thought is to have two columns pane in the right side, I mean that now you can open the components window or pane will all the available components, and could be added another same window/pane that could have the FF snippets that you have downloaded so they could be very easy to use.

Also in this same new window/pane could be possible that you could add your own choosen components with your own configurations.

SpaceRay, Mon, 27 Aug 2012 04:59:29 -0400

Quote
Skybase wrote: Macros: probably been suggested a million times but we need it badly.

How Macros would help to make this feature suggested above possible inside FF?

As far as I know Macros are a list of commands or actions that perform something inside the program. For example, in Photoshop, the recorded "Actions" are like macros. This is like a mini program or a script that works inside the program.

BUT I am sorry I canÂ´t think how a macro could be useful to have the FF Library Snippets included in the Filter editor window

Skybase, Mon, 27 Aug 2012 07:58:37 -0400
Good job SpaceRay, you completely failed my test on Macros.

I'm kidding, most people don't understand what the hell I'm talking about. So you basically scratched the definition of a macro in regards to Photoshop. Photoshop (or anything else like this) is a step-by-step operation based program and so when we talk about macros in that program, it's about repeating the steps again.

In FilterForge the application is different but the idea is the same. Imagine being able to zip a bunch of components into 1 single component. Each component IS an operation, a group of components performing to create a specific result would be a macro in this case.

So when I say "macro" I'm not talking about running the software using a set of actions, I'm talking about a set of operations inside of the editor.

SpaceRay, Mon, 27 Aug 2012 08:41:55 -0400

Quote
Skybase Good job SpaceRay, you completely failed my test on Macros. I'm kidding, most people don't understand what the hell I'm talking about. So you basically scratched the definition of a macro in regards to Photoshop.

As I did not understand it, is the reason why I have asked :D

You have explained it very well in the Loop component thread

Quote
Skybase From the The idea of macros is like scrippets. You know how you typically copy-and-paste huge loads of nodes? Well imagine bundling the set of operations into 1 component and using that as a component. That's a macro. The ability to bundle a bunch of operations is very very useful because you can nest specific operations instead of having components everywhere. It makes sense to use the macro as a FOR LOOP since it's a bundled package of a couple nodes. So that basically allows us to expand into different levels of visual complexity without having to find work arounds or copy-and-paste huge loads of the same thing.

Quote

Skybase
From the The idea of macros is like scrippets. You know how you typically copy-and-paste huge loads of nodes? Well imagine bundling the set of operations into 1 component and using that as a component. That's a macro. The ability to bundle a bunch of operations is very very useful because you can nest specific operations instead of having components everywhere.

It makes sense to use the macro as a FOR LOOP since it's a bundled package of a couple nodes. So that basically allows us to expand into different levels of visual complexity without having to find work arounds or copy-and-paste huge loads of the same thing.

BUT if all above is true, and I understand it right I still do not understand how would be possible to have the FF snippets that you have downloaded from the library inside the same window of the filter editor

UNLESS you mean that each snippet (group of components) could be converted to a macro AND then could be stored in some way inside the components part, so this way would really be like I am suggesting and would be good to do it this way.

GMM, Mon, 27 Aug 2012 08:49:18 -0400

Quote
Imagine being able to zip a bunch of components into 1 single component.

I won't promise anything specific but please wait for the 4.0 beta :)

Morgantao, Mon, 27 Aug 2012 14:08:02 -0400

Quote
I won't promise anything specific but please wait for the 4.0 beta

Sounds promissing :D

Quote
UNLESS you mean that each snippet (group of components) could be converted to a macro

Yep, that's the idea. If you could group a set of components you use all the time, as one big component, you could call it a macro. To take it one step further, if you want to repeat a certain operation 5 times, you could group the whole bunch of nodes togather and put the macro 5 times, instead of having a gazilion components repeating on the editor. That is untill we have a loop component, which will do the same for us. :)

SpaceRay, Fri, 14 Sep 2012 04:44:43 -0400
Now that you can GROUP components in FF 4.0, and make a new component from a snippet, it would be really good if you could INCLUDE or ADD this new group to the components list, OR be able to add this to the filters list in a way that you do not have to close the filter editor to be able to put this new group inside the already open filter.

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 14 Sep 2012 04:54:28 -0400
Bringing user-added or downloadable grouped snippets (both official and community-made) into the FF interface is definitely a good idea. We've had some internal discussions about it a while ago.

Don't expect it in this release though, as we already have a lot of work on our hands (the main thing being fixing the groups).

SpaceRay, Fri, 14 Sep 2012 05:02:42 -0400
Thanks very much for answering, if this would not be possible now, what about a very easy alternative that is just be able to OPEN TWO FILTER EDITOR WINDOWS?

More information here --> Allow to open TWO filter editor windows to be able to copy components

Skybase, Fri, 14 Sep 2012 05:38:23 -0400
Man... I've never seen such an avid software user that begs the developer to see other threads of individual interests.

SpaceRay, Fri, 14 Sep 2012 10:29:29 -0400

Quote
Skybase Man... I've never seen such an avid software user that begs the developer to see other threads of individual interests.

:D :D

I am very interested in this, as I think that this would be really useful and very helpful and would really love to see this being implemented in FF 4.0, and I do not think (really do not know) that this could be really very difficult to make.

Skybase, Fri, 14 Sep 2012 10:31:00 -0400
lol I'm really just surprised how intense some of the forum posts are going at. ;)

SpaceRay, Sun, 07 Jul 2013 15:29:54 -0400

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote on September 14, 2012 Bringing user-added or downloadable grouped snippets (both official and community-made) into the FF interface is definitely a good idea. We've had some internal discussions about it a while ago. Don't expect it in this release though, as we already have a lot of work on our hands (the main thing being fixing the groups).

I did not answer before to this comment from Vladimir, as I want to thank and I am glad that you find it a good idea, and I understand that you may have had a lot of work all these months since september last year and could not think about this feature, and I think that probably now after fixing the groups, you had a lot of work with the Loops and also with the forthcoming Filter Manager, so I will wait patiently to see if there could be any possible news that could mean that it could be considering to have this inside FF 4.0 or not.

I am not requesting, or asking to have any information about this, just to remind about this feature and wait patiently and calm until something appears from Vladimir, GMM or the FF team whenever it happens.

angelize, Mon, 26 Aug 2013 22:36:40 -0400
I think this should be included in FF4.0 you've done the groups but this would make them much more useful.

SpaceRay, Wed, 28 Aug 2013 05:54:39 -0400

Quote
angelize I think this should be included in FF4.0 you've done the groups but this would make them much more useful.

I totally agree with you, now that the groups are available, it seems that is ONLY a organizing and aesthetic thing, and although good and useful, does not offer much more.

You can now use groups to make your own snippets, and convert this snippets as custom components, but this is totally useless if you canÂ´t save it and use it inside another filter, I mean that now it is saved exactly same way as any other filter, so you canÂ´t load it while making a filter.

So as is put in the title of this thread, it would be really be MUCH more useful and helpful if the groups could be already inside the Filter Editor and not outside as they are now.

LOAD or IMPORT FILTERS, GROUPS OR SNIPPET

Another different way to have also groups as snippets or custom component, would be if inside the Filter Editor you could LOAD or IMPORT external filters, groups, or snippets.

So for this you would not need to have a custom components bar.

SpaceRay, Sat, 07 May 2016 17:53:45 -0400
this thread was 3 years ago, and now still in FF 5 is still the same awkward way to be able to use the snippets

Quote
SpaceRay wrote: As it is now, there are lots of interesting, useful and great snippets available in the FF Library, but the problem with them is that they are OUTSIDE of the filter editor, so if you are making a filter and you want to add a snippet you need to do the following * save the filter you are working on * close filter editor * search in the FF library for the snippet you want * open the snippet in filter editor * copy all the components of the snippet * close filter editor * search again for the filter you have been working * paste the snippet in your own filter As I see it, is a lot of things to do for ONLY using one of the snippets in your own filter. AND what happens if you want to have 2 snippets ? Duplicate all this twice !!

Quote

SpaceRay wrote:
As it is now, there are lots of interesting, useful and great snippets available in the FF Library, but the problem with them is that they are OUTSIDE of the filter editor, so if you are making a filter and you want to add a snippet you need to do the following

* save the filter you are working on
* close filter editor
* search in the FF library for the snippet you want
* open the snippet in filter editor
* copy all the components of the snippet
* close filter editor
* search again for the filter you have been working
* paste the snippet in your own filter

As I see it, is a lot of things to do for ONLY using one of the snippets in your own filter.

AND what happens if you want to have 2 snippets ? Duplicate all this twice !!

Is a pity that there is no easier wa to use the snippets in the same way as the components that are in the components list

SpaceRay, Mon, 17 Oct 2016 01:30:06 -0400
Already in August 2012 was started this thread as I thought that one of the greatest additional advantages of having groups would be able to make your own components and use them as snippet, so you could save a group and be used in other filters as a component

Well, we are now in October 2016, reaching the official release of FF 6.0 and there is no news that after so much time waiting, this will be included

This would be really a very useful and helpful thing to have

there is another same topic related thread of 2013

SpaceRay, Tue, 25 Oct 2016 06:05:50 -0400
Is really a great pity that in FF 4.0 was given the awesome, amazing and very useful and helpful groups and then after it has been leaved in half and do not continue building over this great feature being able to SAVE those groups and be used in other filters

And seems that for FF 6.0 there is no news that it could be included

raabix, Tue, 25 Oct 2016 09:35:32 -0400
Yes, I could not agree more. I keep creating filters with groups that just exist to copy-paste existing noise snippets into the filter that I am working on. I think someone should just put together a mockup that shows the feature how it is supposed to be implemented, just to give some inspiration. For the time being I could also live with having two node editors open to copy from one to the other.

PayPaul, Mon, 23 Jan 2017 18:55:13 -0500
I was able to initialize a copy of three nodes by holding down the CTRL key in Windows in a filter and yet when I attempted to paste them into a new filter I got this error message:

Failed to set event state (event 000000001AFC4BC8).

Yes, a feature to copy and paste snippets into a new filter would be immensely helpful.

SpaceRay, Wed, 25 Jan 2017 14:16:27 -0500

Quote
SpaceRay wrote: And seems that for FF 6.0 there is no news that it could be included

Finally this very useful and helpful feature is not included in FF 6.0. I do not know how is possible that groups was already in FF 4.0, and now in FF 6.0 there is no way so save groups as a snippet or as a component.

Quote
raabix wrote: Yes, I could not agree more. I keep creating filters with groups that just exist to copy-paste existing noise snippets into the filter that I am working on.

YES, I also totally agree, that I also have many filters that the only purpose is to have them for copy-paste the part I need for another filter, but the problem is that I must follow all the steps shown on first post, so I try to avoid it when I can.

Quote
raabix wrote: For the time being I could also live with having two node editors open to copy from one to the other.

Yes, if you could have TWO node editors windows, would be very helpful, as you could very easily copy from one filter to the other but you canÂ´t have two filters open at the same time, and canÂ´t have two FF at the same time

GMM, Fri, 14 Oct 2022 06:31:14 -0400

Quote
SpaceRay wrote: it would be really good if you could INCLUDE or ADD this new group to the components list

Check out the latest FF12 update :)

Drag & drop snippet from filter list in main window into editor

rgoer — Fri, 14 Oct 2022 06:29:32 -0400

rgoer, Tue, 03 Jun 2008 13:57:47 -0400
I would love to be able to drag a snippet and drop it into the filter I'm working on in the editor, without having to close the editor, open the snippet, copy the nodes needed, close the editor again, open my filter back up, and paste the snippet nodes in.

Am I doing something wrong? Is there an easier way?

uberzev, Tue, 03 Jun 2008 22:13:41 -0400
There definitely should be an easier way to add snippets to a filter. My suggestion would just be to integrate the filter browser directly in the editor.

Kraellin, Wed, 04 Jun 2008 12:31:17 -0400
this was requested way back and goes along with a sort of function library for use in FF, that library being comprised of imported snippets and other filters. it also goes hand in hand with that thing of compressing large routines down into a single component and being able to call that component up from the filter.

i like uber's method, too. having access to other filters from within another filter is a great idea.

i could also see having more than one editor open at a time for quick copy/paste operations. tabbed editor windows :)

rgoer, Wed, 04 Jun 2008 14:51:40 -0400
kraellin I like all of those ideas :)

Kraellin, Thu, 05 Jun 2008 13:37:19 -0400
thanks. it's a bit interesting to read all the wishlist stuff ;) we've (users and FF team) have some doozies suggested.

GMM, Fri, 14 Oct 2022 06:29:32 -0400
Good things come to those who wait! Check out the latest FF12 update :)

Capsules: Custom Components

Crapadilla — Fri, 14 Oct 2022 06:28:00 -0400

Crapadilla, Sat, 10 Jun 2006 07:43:32 -0400
Filter designers pretty often find themselves repeatedly recreating certain setups of components, for example when generating circles or squares from profile gradients. Therefore, it would be nice to have a way to encapsulate these standard "recipes" into user-created custom components, which only make the relevant controls visible in the filter editor interface. They would be saved to the components toolbox (under the new category "Custom"), yet remain fully editable when dragged into the editor, and would be visualized as a single component node. Upon editing, they would again reveal their internal component-network, either by entering a sub-level of the filter editor or by expanding to a window overlay.

Kraellin, Sat, 10 Jun 2006 08:52:10 -0400
ah, snippets as 'components'. good idea.

craig

Vladimir Golovin, Mon, 12 Jun 2006 07:40:48 -0400
Or subroutines. Yes, they are already on our plan.

Christian.B, Sat, 23 Jul 2022 05:25:02 -0400
Definitely a good idea. I was creating a pie chart and one slice would have been a component and the pie chart, the mother component.

GMM, Fri, 14 Oct 2022 06:28:00 -0400

Quote
Crapadilla wrote: Filter designers pretty often find themselves repeatedly recreating certain setups of components

Check out the latest FF12 update :)

FF Forum to support embedded video links now that FF 11 has video

SpaceRay — Thu, 25 Aug 2022 12:25:25 -0400

SpaceRay, Thu, 25 Aug 2022 12:25:25 -0400
I have seen that in the forum there is no way (at least as far as I know) to use an embedded link of a video that it could play a video directly on the forum page without going to the page that is hosted the video

All the videos I have seen that are show directly on the forum seems to be uploaded to the forum with the current image limit size and using GIF format

Now that FF 11 Studio is able to export and process video it could be good, great, useful, handy and lovely that the forum could be able to show embedded videos from a hosted video website like YouTube, Vimeo or whatever you use and show the video on the same forum page without going to the hosted video page

Because now the only option is to put a link in the post as shown here with the title of the video

Awesome Youtube video about Animation inside FF before FF 11 by Skybase

But in this way it does only send you to the hosted video page and not shown here on the forum

Because if you use the IMAGE button with the video link it does not work

[img]https://youtu.be/HVqAEJQML6g[/img]

So maybe there could be a new VIDEO button to put the link

I am sorry that I have no technical knowledge about this topic and if this is really possible or not considering the software that is being used for the forum and if it may be compatible

Thanks very much for any possible help

Feature Wishlist

Vladimir Golovin — Wed, 24 Aug 2022 16:15:24 -0400

Vladimir Golovin, Tue, 17 Apr 2007 08:44:20 -0400
Here's the unofficial feature wishlist compiled by the members of Filter Forge community. Before adding your own features to this page, we recommend to discuss them on these forums.

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

Crapadilla, Wed, 18 Apr 2007 16:48:20 -0400
The Feature Wishlist is now 'clickified' for added convenience! :D

StevieJ, Wed, 18 Apr 2007 16:59:31 -0400
Wow!!! This is now a well-oiled machine.....even started linking topics to their place discussed in the forums.....

Excellent Work!!! :)

uberzev, Thu, 26 Apr 2007 02:47:59 -0400
Nice job 'Dilla. I'm neglecting my pet wiki page but you've done a great job with the Feature Wishlist. I have one suggestion and that's to stick all the feature requests that have been shot down into one section.

Crapadilla, Thu, 26 Apr 2007 09:42:45 -0400

Quote
uberzev wrote: I have one suggestion and that's to stick all the feature requests that have been shot down into one section.

Or we color-code them according to how much 'FF team appreciation' each request got. :D

StevieJ, Thu, 26 Apr 2007 11:31:27 -0400
Does that mean all my requests will be in black :D

Crapadilla, Thu, 26 Apr 2007 11:33:38 -0400

Quote
StevieJ wrote: Does that mean all my requests will be in black Big grin

Yours will be rainbow-colored! ;)

StevieJ, Thu, 26 Apr 2007 11:49:40 -0400

Quote
Crapadilla wrote: Yours will be rainbow-colored!

Alrighty then, I'm in :D

Kraellin, Thu, 26 Apr 2007 14:16:27 -0400

Quote
Yours will be rainbow-colored!

and glass :)

Daniel Ramsey, Thu, 01 Jan 2009 16:59:51 -0500
lol

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 27 Mar 2009 05:18:37 -0400
Wel'll be taking a closer look at the list sometime during the coming months, so if anyone have anything to add or update, please do.

(Edit: Dilla and everyone, excellent list -- saved me a lot of time!)

Crapadilla, Sun, 08 Nov 2009 12:27:55 -0500
I've reworked the feature wishlist a little and added some more entries. There are quite a few new feature requests to add, so it'll take a while...

RawSunlight, Wed, 28 Sep 2011 04:44:49 -0400
Hi Vladimir,

Firstly, I love this program! Great work!

I had a couple of requests:

1. A separator so we can (at least visually) group controls into sections
2. The ability to add post process to a result. i know this sounds ridiculous, but actually, when you have 'surface' selected, sometimes it would be so much easier to add a gamma or brightness/contrast to tweak the final result, rather than to have to go through each of the inputs pre. result......... maybe what I'm suggesting is in fact a pre-result component? :)

Finally, do you have any plans to add integrated support for any 3D packages, like Dark Trees does?

RawSunlight, Mon, 10 Oct 2011 15:25:07 -0400
Might be nice if Filter Forge created a new layer with the resulting filter effect, rather than just replacing. Sure, you can duplicate layer first, but it might be nicer if FF did it?

Demo about to run out, but it's been a real pleasure. As soon as I can afford it, I'll be purchasing a copy!

Crapadilla, Mon, 14 Nov 2011 13:51:24 -0500
The feature wishlist wiki article has been updated to reflect the changes that came with commercial release of v3.0.

Most notably, there is a section for Scripting feature requests now. ;)

I've also mined the forums a little and added feature requests of the past year or so.

Crapadilla, Tue, 15 Nov 2011 10:41:33 -0500
The list has grown considerably again... :D

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote elsewhere: Man... just looking at this list makes me sick!

:devil:

SpaceRay, Tue, 15 Nov 2011 11:45:54 -0500

Quote
At the beginning you can see: [4.0]Features that are confirmed for the next major release are color-coded in green.

I have seen all the list and there is NONE GREEN color coded features confirmed yet :D

Crapadilla, Tue, 15 Nov 2011 13:52:57 -0500

Quote
SpaceRay wrote: I have seen all the list and there is NONE GREEN color coded features confirmed yet

Indeed. That's because no features have been confirmed for FF 4.0 yet. I expect to color-code features once we enter the FF4 beta. ;) :D

Sphinx., Wed, 16 Nov 2011 06:30:43 -0500
Great work Dilla! You seem to have caught most of my requests :-D So where should we put bugs that have not been fixed for several versions? Perhaps its all about the wording: I wish they'd add the feature to the dev team strategy that fixing long standing bugs are higher prio than adding new features :-P

Crapadilla, Wed, 16 Nov 2011 06:59:00 -0500

Quote
Sphinx. wrote: Great work Dilla! You seem to have caught most of my requests

Thanks. I didn't check the Scripting forum for requests, so if you find that any are missing... ;) :D

Quote
Sphinx. wrote: I wish they'd add the feature to the dev team strategy that fixing long standing bugs are higher prio than adding new features smile:-p

I'll make a new category "Dev team strategy" then... :D

GMM, Thu, 17 Nov 2011 02:03:03 -0500

Quote
Sphinx. wrote: So where should we put bugs that have not been fixed for several versions?

Feel free to create a wiki page or section for that.

Sphinx., Thu, 17 Nov 2011 02:38:56 -0500
Perhaps a section called "Longstanding bugs and issues" for bugs and issues in the grayzone of being a bug or a feature request..

Crapadilla, Thu, 17 Nov 2011 06:42:27 -0500
Features that have been 'implemented' by the FF community via LUA script solutions are now color-coded in sky blue. This pertains to component feature requests, obviously.

I might have missed some script filters, so script authors: please check if your solution has been overlooked!

This brings me to an another idea:

What about an 'Open scripting problems' wiki page that collects yet unsolved scripting challenges and tracks the community's progress in tackling them?

Crapadilla, Thu, 17 Nov 2011 13:26:27 -0500
No takers? ;) :D

SpaceRay, Sat, 18 Feb 2012 08:56:02 -0500

Quote

Crapadilla wrote:

Quote
SpaceRay wrote: I have seen all the list and there is NONE GREEN color coded features confirmed yet

Indeed. That's because no features have been confirmed for FF 4.0 yet. I expect to color-code features once we enter the FF4 beta.

OK, thanks for the info, so must wait until FF 4 beta then :)

BUT I still think and suggest that it would be good to have SOME information of what FF team is already working on for FF 4.0 beta.

CoffeeCrazy, Fri, 17 Aug 2012 19:02:12 -0400
Today out of boredom I decided to play around with text in Photoshop and run them through filters. I was thinking "Hey, wouldn't it be cool if FF could do cool things with text?".

So I finished my image. 10 FF passes, 30 minutes of editing later:

Came here to see if this was a planned thing, and it is! Very glad to see it!

SpaceRay, Fri, 17 Aug 2012 22:40:09 -0400

Quote
CoffeeCrazy "Hey, wouldn't it be cool if FF could do cool things with text?"

You can already use text inside FF 3.0 although NOT directly as you can see in some of this list of threads from the forum

And you can write a text outside of FF and bring it to FF like an image instead of a text

and ThreeDee found a cool way to be able to use text INSIDE filter forge (see the Threedee filter list)

Quote
Well it took some work, but I have successfully made a font with modifiable characters and, even better, custom text input capabilities! As in:

And you can use Filter Forge effects inside text in FF 3.0

Use selections to fill the inside of Fonts with Filter Forge textures

see the links in the search for more info

SpaceRay, Fri, 17 Aug 2012 22:43:47 -0400
I would really love and would be a really GREAT and very useful think to have directly support of fonts inside FF like Photoshop have, but for this to happen FF needs to have Vector support, and Vladimir that this would be included in FF 4.0, so letÂ´s hope that this will be available in FF 4.0 and will not have to to do all this tricks and workarounds to be able to have text inside FF

zenpunk, Tue, 09 Oct 2012 14:44:25 -0400
I'm sad to see "Animation" in red on the FF4 feature list. I'm waiting for this before I upgrade again... hopefully FF5? :(

It doesn't have to be an actual plug-in for an animation program like AE ... just give it the ability (with a real GUI, not the command window or scripting) to set a bunch of settings on a filter as the "start setting" and then a bunch of settings as the "end settings", and specify a number of frames. Click render and, boom, you get a folder of images from the start settings to the end settings.

Kind of silly this wasn't in FF 2.0, so much for 4.0, no? Couldn't a coder do this in like 5 minutes with scripting or something? Just take that script and make a nice little "tools menu" window gui for it. Build it into the program for morons like me who are afraid to even open the command window.

Thanks,
Waiting patiently for FF 5.0, I guess :cry:
Mark

Sharandra, Tue, 09 Oct 2012 15:14:45 -0400
Have you tried out SjeitiÂ´s Batch Renderer?

It does what you want. :-)

zenpunk, Tue, 09 Oct 2012 20:20:07 -0400
Thanks Sharandra. That looks like it might be a little closer to what non-programmers like me can handle, but, still, it looks far from what's practical or easy to use as an everyday graphics tool. I don't know how to make a ffxml file, and wouldn't know what to do with a bat file. And even if I did, it just seems like so many steps just to try an animation. I think it would really open up FF to a whole new audience if they just included this feature. Maybe the FF devs should hire this Sjeiti guy to put it in their program. I bet it would take him about a minute. ;)

Thanks for the tip, tho... much appreciated.

LyricsGirl, Wed, 18 May 2016 22:28:38 -0400
Feature Request!

Hi, I'm new to FF but it has certainly helped me pass so much time while I recover form chemo...

Playing around with many of these awesome filters you guys have made... I am wondering.. is there a way to SAVE a filter SETTING in my Favorites folder? I have mt fave filters there... but can't find a way to save a variant, meaning if I like something I have 'discovered' by playing in the Settings of a filter I have to churn out as many images using the variant before I either close the program or move onto something else. This would save heaps of time. i have attached an image created from Strip Rip by Scriptorium. ( Thank you!)

Thanks in advance! :D

Angela

zenpunk, Thu, 19 May 2016 17:18:53 -0400
To save a preset, in the presets tab click on the little triangle menu and select "Add Preset".

Hope this helped... not sure what version you are using... I'm still in version 3, still awaiting simple animation controls, which apparently aren't in the upcoming 6 either... :cry: :cry: :cry:

LyricsGirl, Thu, 19 May 2016 18:08:36 -0400
Hi Zenpunk

Thank You! that is what I was wanting. I am using V5.00.
I am finding all these filters keep me engaged so long! Maybe once I have worked out the theory behind many of the filters I will give back to the filter community and create my own. I agree with you on the animation controls as well as a few others too! :)

LyricsGirl, Thu, 11 Aug 2016 01:23:26 -0400
Wishlist Item:

Ability to create PROJECT FOLDERS in same place as Favorites Folder. Then when working on a project you can quickly collect main filters you want to use and when you have completed the project you will have a handy collection of all filters used that you can list for future adjustments, additions or similar projects.

I know I can drag a filter to the Project folder, but that means it is no longer in its original place.. Or am I missing something here? Need something that works same as for Favorites.A right Click and selection of folder in the pop up right click menu.

Thank You!!!

:D

Indigo Ray, Thu, 11 Aug 2016 19:21:00 -0400
Hi Lyrics Girl. You can already create folders within your Favorites. Just right-click Favorites (or My Favorites) and select New Folder...

Then, drag the filters you want into that new folder you created. It won't move the filters, it just creates a shortcut. I'm not sure you can do this just by "right click and selection of folder", but dragging works.

LyricsGirl, Thu, 11 Aug 2016 20:11:55 -0400
Aha!!!!

Many Thanks!!!! That worked.

Being able to do this I can set up a folder for each main project with individual image creation folders e.g. Model Village #1 / Pub 1, House #1, #2, #3 etc.
And drag a link to the main materials I want to use for each image I create. I can do this before I start so I dont waste time during the creation process except for the odd filter or two I missed.

This si a totally new creative thing for me -= many years phoito and video editing & compositing now into image design and printable images... to go with a story I am writing...

All you Creative Filter Geniuses - Thank You all so much!! Greatly appreciated. Filters are a bit over my head, so I will use them and show you later my creations! :ff:

kirkl13, Sat, 21 Oct 2017 19:56:37 -0400
1. Saving and drag&drop groups,
bypassing a node command like "M" in Blender and auto connecting nodes. (just borrow the whole node system from Blender, it's perfect there and open source)

2. Substance Designer styled "slope blur", a way to imitate depth erosion.

3. a number to pre-made artist friendly adjustable masks and effects. Cracks generator, rust generator, scratch generator , color drips/smears generator, streams generator, erosion generator, crumble paint generator, etc.
In a word a number of artist friendly groups already set and working still allowing to go deep down and redo them from scratch. I would pay for them separately. Hate to waste my time searching through a mess of mostly useless custom filters.

4. Depth aware/ deep pixel vector styled composer with usual select and move/ scale .rotate tools. Scatter/repeat along a spline etc. Kind of Bomber thing that you could rearrange manually. Allegorithmic had something like that in their Substance designer predecessor but then they killed it.

PosterFaces, Wed, 28 Nov 2018 06:35:49 -0500
Hi! I would like to have a feature of copying and pasting component block WITH ALL INPUT CONNECTIONS and Use Remapping data. Manually recreating this input connections after duplicating component is such a waste of time!

Thanks.

GMM, Mon, 25 Jul 2022 11:21:44 -0400

Quote
PosterFaces wrote: I would like to have a feature of copying and pasting component block WITH ALL INPUT CONNECTIONS

Should be available in FF 12 :)

Ghislaine, Wed, 24 Aug 2022 16:15:24 -0400
Hi Vlad !

It will be nice to add a new category as Landscapes. Because there is a lot of this. Landscapes are not pattern, misc or something else. PLEASE ! :) :) :)

Support for WebM

Christian.B — Sat, 06 Aug 2022 08:52:42 -0400

Christian.B, Sat, 06 Aug 2022 08:52:42 -0400
I made a filter which is basically a frame with a rotating highlight, that frame would be used as an overlay.
So, the video file should be small and ideally support transparency and WebM (VP8, VP9) fits that bill.

It also plays in the browser ^^

For now, one has to export as PNGs, then use ffmpeg like this:

[CODE]ffmpeg.exe -i frame%4d.png out.webm[/CODE]

Where "frame" is the name of your sequence.

Be able to duplicate a component WITH the connected links included

SpaceRay — Wed, 03 Aug 2022 21:22:02 -0400

SpaceRay, Fri, 17 Apr 2020 02:17:57 -0400
You can copy and paste any FF component, BUT the big problem is that you ONLY get a copy of the component itself and NOT all the links that are attached to it from previous components

So I am suggesting that it could be possible to duplicate a FF component and be able to optionally include all the links that this components has already available from the previous components (duplicate the links but not the previous components themselves as it happens now) and with the remapping values too if there are any

EXAMPLES

1- Simple example,
if you have a switch component with 10 components, and duplicate it, you ONLY get the switch component alone amd you have to connect again all the ten components, so it would be really good, useful and helpful if you could choose to copy also all the links that are attached to this component

2 - Complex example,
if you have a bomber component with many components and many controls attached to it with different remapper values then when you copy all the links are lost and all the controls and remappers and you have to loose much time to do it all again and it can take a long time to put all again and is much work

3 - there are sometimes that you may need to duplicate the same component 4 or 5 times, so is very boring and much work and time to repeat the linking of the duplicated component with all the previous component one by one again and again

ALREADY IS POSSIBLE TO DUPLICATE A WHOLE SUBTREE

This is not a workaround to be able to do what suggested above because it will duplicate also the all the components.

I am suggesting this above because I know is possible to do it because now is already possible to copy a whole subtree of components with all the links

So if you select a component and then right mouse click to open the menu and you choose the "Select Subtree" option then it will select ALL the previous components that are connected to this selected component with all the links, and then you can select "Copy" and when you paste it will paste a copy of all the selected components with the links

The big problem is that this can be a very big selection and you only want to have just only the selected components with only the links attached to this component and you can not delete the unwanted components because the these are different components than the ones you already have

So regrettably you can not use to duplicate because it also duplicates all the components and what you want is to use the components that you already have and is recommended and wise to use as few components as possible and reuse them when you can

So this is why I suggesting to be able to duplicate a component WITH the links already connected to the already available components without duplicating them

Grimbly, Sun, 19 Apr 2020 10:19:00 -0400
I agree with this idea completely and have felt like this should be an option for a while now. It would be very helpful. It's the default method for copying any component in Grasshopper3D and it's proven to be very helpful there.

I looked at the XML files for FF filters a while back to see about using Knime to generate upgraded versions of filters as a means to auto-upgrade my filter library to the latest nodes. Based on what I saw I do think this copy/paste option is something that could be done.

I would say though, as handy as this would be it would be nice to have both the current method and this new alternative as options. I haven't yet figured out how to copy/paste things in Grasshopper without the existing connections and it does tend to get in the way at times and slow things down when the nodes in question have a lot to process and I didn't care for the connections to begin with.

More options are always nice. Losing existing options in favor of new ones isn't.

So, let us have both :)

SpaceRay, Mon, 04 May 2020 04:07:29 -0400

Quote
Grimbly wrote: More options are always nice. Losing existing options in favor of new ones isn't. So, let us have both

I agree with you and of course that it would be needed that there is both options, and is in the same way that it is now that you can OPTIONALLY select the subtree of components and so you can just copy only the component or the whole subtree of components

Quote
SpaceRay wrote: So I am suggesting that it could be possible to duplicate a FF component and be able to optionally include all the links that this components has already available

At start I have already told that it should be optionally as seen here

SpaceRay, Sat, 16 May 2020 02:10:17 -0400
I have seen that when you copy and paste a slave component fr om Bomber plus it makes a new link to the bomber plus so it keeps the link to the bomber plus and you do not have to connect the new slave to bomber plus

In some way is what I am suggesting here to duplicate also the links of the components, although of course I understand that duplicating OPTIONALLY all the possible links that the component may have and limiting it to ONLY the links of this alone component and not of all the subtree is much more difficult than the slave link

Of course this is much easier to do the link of the slave, as it is only linked to the bomber that is just one component, and by default is has been already programmed to behave in this way.

GMM, Mon, 25 Jul 2022 11:14:43 -0400
Should be implemented in FF12 :)

SpaceRay, Wed, 03 Aug 2022 21:22:02 -0400
Great news and good to know that this will be available and will be very useful and time saving and a great help to build faster filters duplicating parts withouta having to relink all the parts and the connections

Thanks very much for including this

FF Function library in lua

Sphinx. — Sun, 31 Jul 2022 15:16:26 -0400

Sphinx., Mon, 28 Jun 2010 06:56:16 -0400
It would be really useful if we had access to common functions of the native FF components, specially the RGB Math series. I believe you SSL optimized much of it and being able to call these optimized routines in a script would really be great.

Vector and color processing purely coded in lua is not very optimal, and I'm sure you already have an extensive FF library of common functions which could be registered as C functions in lua, and thereby allow us to use them in scripts :)

StevieJ, Mon, 28 Jun 2010 22:23:27 -0400
+2 ..... :devil:

David Roberson, Sun, 31 Jul 2022 15:16:26 -0400
I don't know if there's a chance this suggestion will take root and blossom, but I'll add my +1 to it in hopes it can.

Add Animated Filters Render to Mp4 file and preview animation

John Foll — Wed, 15 Jun 2022 12:31:49 -0400

John Foll, Mon, 13 Jun 2022 10:56:00 -0400
It would be nice to able to render an animated filter to Mp4 file. I can now manually import these into a Video Editor and create a video. It would also be nice in the view showing the image to click on a preview button which would show the animation. I know I can keep clicking the next button, but having an animated preview would make it easier to see how the animation looks before importing into a NLE Video Editor.

GMM, Tue, 14 Jun 2022 08:54:14 -0400

Quote
John Foll wrote: It would be nice to able to render an animated filter to Mp4 file

FF12 will be able to render an animated filter into MP4 and other popular video formats.

Quote
John Foll wrote: I know I can keep clicking the next button, but having an animated preview would make it easier to see how the animation looks

At the moment it's unlikely due to performance issues. The recommended workflow is to set your image dimensions to a small value like 300x300 so that it renders quickly, tweak the settings until you're satisfied with the result, then set the final dimensions and wait for the result.

John Foll, Wed, 15 Jun 2022 09:48:09 -0400
Where do I go and what do a click on the save to mp4? I thought all that could be done was to save to png files or other image files with numbers after their names? I looked thru the help a bit and that is what I saw. I may have searched a bit too.

GMM, Wed, 15 Jun 2022 12:31:49 -0400

Quote
John Foll wrote: Where do I go and what do a click on the save to mp4

Wait for Filter Forge 12. In FF12, select File > Render Animation and set the Output file(s) field to Video File:

https://filterforge.com/images/version...mation.jpg

Add ability of entering text which would render font in Image or Anima

John Foll — Wed, 15 Jun 2022 09:31:49 -0400

John Foll, Mon, 13 Jun 2022 11:07:34 -0400
Right now there are tremendous capabilities in Filter Forge to create textures and also to animate them. You can create your own filters to do an amazing amount of things. I realize that adding Font Rendering is probably outside of the scope of Filter Forge. But I need an app that generates image files for an animation or mp4 files from an animation for using in any NLE Video Editor. Right now Adobe After Effects and Premier is cool, but I don't know how much longer I will keep my subscription due the re-occurring fees - you cannot buy it outright. I have other programs NLE programs like Vegas Post, HitFilm Pro and DaVinci Resolve. But the graphics renderings are pretty cool in Filter Forge - and with the relatively new ability of creating animations in Filter Forge 11 that leads me in this direction. I realize that some of this capability might be available in ThePluginSite apps or Plugin Commander Pro. And yes I know I might be able to do this in Blender, but that seems like overkill. I don't think Blender would be as good at generating textures or animated textures or filters as FilterForge.

SpaceRay, Tue, 14 Jun 2022 06:04:09 -0400

Quote
John Foll wrote: I realize that adding Font Rendering is probably outside of the scope of Filter Forge.

Yes, regrettably for now there seems to be no news about including support for text or font rendering, I mean writing a whole text with custom fonts inside FF because It would need that FF is compatible with vectors, because the fonts themselves are vectorial

YOU CAN USE BITMAP FONTS in FF unless you use bitmap fonts with PNG transparency where FF is already compatible and possible now but you must build the words yourself manually
Inside FF or you know scripting It is should be possible perhaps to make full words automatically as it happens with scripting in After effects for bitmap fonts

Would it be possible to have a TEXT import into FF as a component?

There are others threads about this topic if you search un forum for fonts por vector support

John Foll, Wed, 15 Jun 2022 09:31:49 -0400
Yes I figured I could import images of individual fonts. In some ways that might be better - for typography tricks. The reason why I want text is I want to animate it or morph it, etc with FilterForge! It seems like the power of FilterForge might exceed some of the other animation tools, not sure but I think so. I know it is a tool for images, but I see its use for making animations for videos. I thought it well worth it to get the Studio version for that reason.

Repper Type Function Using FF Engine

Valhalla — Sat, 04 Jun 2022 05:39:38 -0400

Valhalla, Sat, 28 May 2022 05:53:29 -0400
I use a subscription program called Repper Pro that allows you to make patterns from part of an image. It's literally a medium-size image, a resizable box, and a large pattern output image like P4M. I think a function like this would be epic in Filter Forge and its infinitely more powerful engine. It could be its own tab, and the box area could run the FF filter on that part of the image or a pattern function PPM, P4M, P3M1, P6M, Cross Weave, Ladder, Octagon, and the many others.

Here is an image of Repper in action. The program is actually white, I restyled mine because white kills my eyes.

Here's what I think it would look like inside Filter Forge.

Rachel Duim, Sat, 28 May 2022 12:38:54 -0400
Something like this is possible. Bomber+ is capable of doing the “screen” on top. So a repper filter is on my list of to do’s. You’re 2nd on the list…

SpaceRay, Sat, 28 May 2022 13:41:52 -0400

Quote
ValhaIIa wrote: I use a subscription program called Repper Pro that allows you to make patterns from part of an image.

Well, as far as I see it this may be very similar to Worlds Kaleid by Robert Webb on Google store android app that I like very much and is awesome

And as I did like it really very much I already thought about making a similar thing for FF but regrettably I have not finished it yet, and do not know when, but is good that is someone interested in this.

I have been studying and making a research on how this is done and be able to replicate and copy it to Filter Forge and how to make the tilings correctly and be able to select the part of the image that you want to use

There is also another plugin for Photoshop for Windows and Mac Kaleido FX by Human software but I do not have it and have not used it.

SpaceRay, Sat, 28 May 2022 13:45:57 -0400
I have seen that Repper uses Wallpaper Group tilings also and all these are already available in Filter Forge in the library

Compilation of filters of different tilings, tesselations & recursion

Go where is put BASIC 17 WALLPAPER GROUPS AVAILABLE IN FF made by Rachel Duim

And also available is Tile-O-Matic by Rachel Duim

Quote
ValhaIIa wrote: The program is actually white, I restyled mine because white kills my eyes.

How did you restyle it to have a dark UI? I agree with you that white is bad and is much better with a dark background. The FF forum is white and I would love that it could be dark too.

Rachel Duim, Sat, 28 May 2022 17:53:17 -0400
After more investigation, Cairo tiles are a challenge, but I think I can do it. Bomber+ is not the way... this is for transformation tools. This link on Aesthetic Cairos illustrates both the solution and the difficulty tiling pentagons. There are infinite ways to tile irregular pentagons. The best solution looks like using collinear (sides the same length) pentagons. I'll post again when I figure out the weird angles suggested by the link.

BTW, I have done a non-Cairo pentagonal faux-tiling, Six Pentagons.

Here are the angles I'll try for the Cairo tiling.

Valhalla, Sun, 29 May 2022 17:35:40 -0400
Thanks, Rachel #2 on the list; you're the best!

Hi SpaceRay, thank you very much for the info; I'll be checking it out after I post this.

How I styled repper:
I first used edge to save the app to my desktop with three add-ons and kept everything I edited as overrides in the dev tools, stylish add-on, and hoverify. I'm still working on a few panels that keep reverting. I'll probably resave it with JSTricks or Tampermonkey installed so I can inject the CSS every time a panel changes. I wasn't thinking about panels reverting the first time I restyled it all. Luckily they are elements I don't have to look at very much.

Once I get around to fixing it, I'll send you the script, but it will be a while. I'm dealing with severe mental health issues right now. Even replying to this post has my heart rate at ~170.

Anywho, open up dev tools:
Edit some CSS, then click Sources, (google enable Chrome/Edge/Firefox overrides) and save as override. About 95% of saved CSS will stick. I use the same style for every single website I use.

Rachel Duim, Sun, 29 May 2022 21:58:50 -0400
Here is the fundamental hexagonal element (4 Cairo tiles), so all I really have to do now is tile the plane and work on the UI.

Valhalla, Mon, 30 May 2022 15:08:27 -0400
Incredible! I can't thank you enough for this!

Questions:
What can I do to help? If you need Photoshop work done or something, please let me know.
What are you using to create this type of stuff, and are there any good tutorials to get me up to speed?
What pattern methods are you adding?
Are you using LUA?

Also, if you check my posts, there's a thread in the filters forum where I've converted over 300 EXR to FilterForge environments. Just search for: CC Filter Forge Environment Library - Monthly Updates

I will resume work this fall, but my reason for stopping in the 300s is explained on the thread.

Video of every pattern method inside Repper Pro.
YouTube - https://youtu.be/-UVfA-CuyDg

Rachel Duim, Mon, 30 May 2022 23:41:36 -0400

Quote
Questions: What can I do to help? If you need Photoshop work done or something, please let me know.

I'm a graphic artist, and GIMP is my game. Used to use Photoshop but abandoned Adobe years ago. So, you are providing EXRs, seems fair enough to me.

Quote
What are you using to create this type of stuff, and are there any good tutorials to get me up to speed? What pattern methods are you adding? What are you using to create this type of stuff, and are there any good tutorials to get me up to speed? What pattern methods are you adding? Are you using LUA?

My career was in programing, now I'm not using it for the "industry". Most of the material I use to figure out tiling and tessellations is on the Internet, plus you need a good sense of geometry, whatever that means... The Cairo tile was done with Filter Forge. Others would know more about tutorials, no scripting in my tile work in FF. Here are some of my sources:

Euclidean tilings by convex regular polygons
n-Uniform Tilings
Wallpaper group

In FF the transformation tools are the heart of creating tiles. Flip, Offset, Rotate, and Scale get a heavy workout. The best thing I can suggest is looking at the Wallpaper Group filters I've done. Much simpler than a Cairo tile.

Here's an example from the newly created filter.

Valhalla, Tue, 31 May 2022 07:44:04 -0400

Quote

I'm a graphic artist, and GIMP is my game. Used to use Photoshop but abandoned Adobe years ago. So, you are providing EXRs, seems fair enough to me.
My career was in programing, now I'm not using it for the "industry". Most of the material I use to figure out tiling and tessellations is on the Internet, plus you need a good sense of geometry, whatever that means... The Cairo tile was done with Filter Forge. Others would know more about tutorials, no scripting in my tile work in FF.

I never actually tried GIMP, even though it's top-notch open source(?) photo editing software on par with Adobe. Well, that's what I've been told by many. Thank you for the sources; I'll be checking them out. I can't wait to see the finished product. :) Also, awesome preview, it's flawless!

I'm converting EXRs to FFENVs that can be dropped directly into the environment folder; then restart FF, and the environments will show up. I wrote a script to automate it and let it run for a month. I still have a ton of HDRIs that need converting to EXRs and then FFENVs. Thankfully, HDRI to EXR takes seconds, unlike EXR to FFENV, which can take many minutes per conversation. I converted a high resolution EXR just to see and it took over a day for zero difference.

SpaceRay, Thu, 02 Jun 2022 15:52:53 -0400

Quote
Rachel Duim wrote: Here's an example from the newly created {Cairo} filter

Well, it is finally available and ready to use and looks really awesome

Cairo tiling by Rachel Duim

Valhalla, Thu, 02 Jun 2022 23:12:31 -0400
YES! Thank you so much, Rachel; I also realized you left a lovely message on my other thread, so thank you very much for that; it means a lot. Also, thanks for letting me know, SpaceRay! Today is a good day, a super epic filter by Rachel and Diablo Immortal open beta release. I love the FF community; everyone is very helpful, from providing info to flat out making filters for you; FF has it all, and the chat is always pleasant. Especially SpaceRay and Rachel, you two are great people.

-Andrew

Rachel Duim, Fri, 03 Jun 2022 20:34:09 -0400
Thanks for your remarks. I enjoy working on these, they are a challenge and a learning experience. I'm always curious and looking for new ideas and for that I thank you.

Valhalla, Sat, 04 Jun 2022 05:39:38 -0400
Hi Rachel, I can't thank you enough for creating this filter; it's helped me understand the pattern creation process inside FF, and I freaking love it. :D Now I can make filters that I'd deem worthy of uploading using your filter as a reference in the future.

Also, if there is a list of environments you want, please let me know, and I'll convert them soon as I read your message. I don't care if they're 2x the recommended size.

I really should see an eye doctor for glasses and an ear doctor for tubes or whatever they do for ears that drain constantly and bleed often. The tinnitus is hell; it's like a movie after a bomb or flash grenade goes off, except it's 24/7. The constant high-pitched noise makes it hard af to hear, and it's tripled in loudness since it started in my teens. It's loud enough that I don't forget about it, like blinking my eyes or breathing.

Thanks again for the hard work!
-Andrew

Bomber Improvements

Neil Blevins — Thu, 31 Mar 2022 01:39:00 -0400

Neil Blevins, Mon, 18 May 2015 20:20:40 -0400
Would like to see a few extra features added to bomber:

* Mappable Particle Density: So you hook a pattern up to this feature and anywhere the pattern is black kills all particles, white means maximum particles, and grey means something in between.
* Grid Row And Column Distance: Would like the ability to increase or decrease the spacing between either rows or columns of Particles.
* Poisson Distribution: As well as the current grid pattern, or a random pattern by increasing the transform chaos values, I'd like to see a poisson distribution mode, that scatters the objects in an organic but relatively even manner, great for avoid interpenetrating and for achieving certain natural phenomena. Take a peak at the images below:

http://umbcgaim.wordpress.com/2010/06...rousel-275

http://umbcgaim.wordpress.com/2010/06...ing-stuff/

Thanks!

- Neil

Skybase, Mon, 18 May 2015 21:58:13 -0400
Mappable Particle Density - The chance parameters currently deal with the particle density allowing you to control where particles should be and where they shouldn't.

Grid Row And Column Distance - This doesn't exist as a single parameter but if you use the repeat params and scale, these should compensate a little bit of what you're getting at. Again, not exactly to description.

Poisson Distribution +1 for this. lol come on FilterForge, you can do it.

Neil Blevins, Tue, 19 May 2015 14:33:18 -0400
RE: Chance parameter: thanks for letting me know, that works great!

- Neil

Neil Blevins, Wed, 27 May 2015 19:28:42 -0400
Oh, and added wish...

Ability To Limit Random Rotation to Increments of 90 Degrees: for architectural, grid related patterns.

- Neil

Indigo Ray, Thu, 28 May 2015 07:29:15 -0400
90 Degree Rotation-- You can already do this! Not with "rotation chaos", but with "rotation". Better see this example than me trying to explain myself. ;) You can modify the tone curve to get other angle increments. A quick check-box would be convenient, though.

Poisson Distribution-- Reading the description, isn't that what other people here on the forums have been trying to do for a while? Like the close-packing sphere stuff? Well, FilterForge added the edge detector with several algorithms, so I bet they could do the same for this.

Skybase, Fri, 29 May 2015 03:46:37 -0400
You can also round values via RGB math if you don't want to use the curves component for whatever reason.
On the round node, set the granularity to this hex color: 404040

It does the same thing as the tone curve + stairs.

SpaceRay, Sat, 30 May 2015 01:57:50 -0400
I agree with the suggested improvements and I think that filter forge 5 should have the great and amazing bomber upgraded or updated with new features

One of them that I have already suggested is to be able to have a spacing and separation slider between the particles, so you can control them more precisely

And the best would be to have an option to avoid having overlapping particles, I mean that they always could be positioned in non-overlapping places.

Some examples in these threads

Pattern Filling

How would you make this variable dots pattern in FF?

Make this in FF? - Digital Circlism - Artwork with hundreds of circles

Is someone here capable of making a filter that can do this

Vladimir Golovin, Mon, 05 Oct 2015 07:31:22 -0400

Quote
Ability To Limit Random Rotation to Increments of 90 Degrees: for architectural, grid related patterns.

Neil, this will be possible when we release the new Bomber with Slaves. Essentially, you will be able to customize each particle individually, and, in your particular case, this customization may include a randomized 90-degree rotation via the Transform -> Rotate component.

Rachel Duim, Mon, 05 Oct 2015 12:49:32 -0400
Looking forward to trying out the new option. Is this in the next beta version?

Ramlyn, Tue, 06 Oct 2015 20:39:31 -0400
It sounds very interesting. Looking forward to try it. :)

SpaceRay, Tue, 06 Oct 2015 22:45:06 -0400
Thanks Vladimir for the news and good to know, this seems to be interesting, although I really do not understand what it means to have bomber slaves, and what this will change in the way the bomber is used, will have to wait to see how it works and what it does

Vladimir Golovin, Tue, 27 Oct 2015 14:26:10 -0400
Here's an illustration of how it works, except the Slave is not yet finalized, it will be called Randomizer and behave exactly as the one in Loop does:

Skybase, Tue, 27 Oct 2015 19:07:45 -0400
Kinda like a Particle ID node?

Sphinx., Wed, 28 Oct 2015 03:29:28 -0400
That looks great, Vlad! Thumbs up for the simplification of the Bomber particle/chance inputs too!

Crapadilla, Wed, 28 Oct 2015 04:08:06 -0400

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote: the new Bomber with Slaves

Will it be possible to have an arbitrary number of particle slaves (i.e. will the Bomber+ be an "N-particles bomber")?

I'm asking because in your example image I'm seeing just one slave and - more importantly - just one particle input on the bomber.

Vladimir Golovin, Wed, 28 Oct 2015 09:19:48 -0400
@Dilla:

1. As with Loop, you can have any number of copies of each slave, each with different parameters, and you can even feed slaves into each other.

2. Even with one slave, you can achieve any number of particles. You are not limited to a single component between the slave and the particle input, which means you can include a subtree that parametrically produces any number of particles, of any shape or form. The only limitation is that you have to build all your variation using Map (green) inputs only, because the gray inputs cannot be affected by slaves.

@Sphinx: We've simplified it even further: we removed Tint, Tint Amount and Tint Mode inputs. All this can now be done in the Particle subtree.

@Skybase: Yes, that's the general idea, but the final Bomber+ won't include Particle ID. The slave will be exactly the same as Randomizer in the Loop.

Vladimir Golovin, Wed, 28 Oct 2015 09:21:13 -0400
@Dilla, on the other hand, good point. Since you can only vary green inputs using slaves, having a single Particle input limits you to only one set of gray parameter values in the Particle subtree, while in the original 5-particle bomber you had 5 such sets.

Vladimir Golovin, Wed, 28 Oct 2015 09:26:29 -0400
@Myself: We could cram multiple sets of gray parameter values within a single subtree if we had a Switch component with mappable Selector input, as opposed to a gray Selector input in the current switch. I think this can currently be done via a hierarchy of Blend components, but having a dedicated component would make this easier.

Vladimir Golovin, Wed, 28 Oct 2015 09:36:33 -0400
Here's another experimental slave for the Bomber+, Octave. It exposes the number of the internal layer (controlled by Details, Roughness, Layering and Layer Order) on which the particle resides. In this example, particles on the bottom layer (the bigger ones) are colored by the leftmost color of the gradient, while smaller particles take their color from the rightmost parts of the gradient:

Crapadilla, Wed, 28 Oct 2015 10:40:05 -0400

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote: [...] you can include a subtree that parametrically produces any number of particles, of any shape or form.

What if the subtree for each particle was different (i.e. they are not parametrically produced variants of a single sub-tree "procedure")?

Will there be a "particle selector" slave that feeds a "particle switch" component (which would possibly be polymorphic, because of variable number of map inputs)?

What about per-particle Chance?

Vladimir Golovin, Wed, 28 Oct 2015 10:50:59 -0400
@Dilla: I decided to include a Map Switch component to help with particle switching situation / N-particle bombers. The component will include 10 inputs and will allow both discrete and continuous switching between them based on a mappable selector. The component will be fully general, i.e. not limited to use with Bomber.

The spec, so far, is as follows:

Map Switch: HDR Color
Category: Processing.
Perks: Size_enabled = FALSE // for programmers.

Source 1: HDR Map (Color)
Source 2: HDR Map (Color)
Source 3: HDR Map (Color)
Source 4: HDR Map (Color)
Source 5: HDR Map (Color)
Source 6: HDR Map (Color)
Source 7: HDR Map (Color)
Source 8: HDR Map (Color)
Source 9: HDR Map (Color)
Source 10: HDR Map (Color)
Selector: LDR Map (Grayscale)
-------------
Max Source (IntSlider 1...10)
Mode (Dropdown: Continuous, Round, Floor, Ceil)

Logic: Lerp, not Blend.

Optimization: when Max Source == 1, Selector can be safely ignored (because the component degenerates to a lerp between Source1 and Source1). Just pass through the Source1 along with its aazones.

AAZones, continuous case: combine aazones of the 2 Sources being lerped (and I'm not sure we should bother with checking wheteher the lerp amount is 0 or 1).

AAZones, discrete case: originally I thought about just passing through the aazones of the Source being used. BUT, since the Selector is mappable, in discrete cases we can have sharply-bounded regions of Source A and Source A+1 in the image. We need an aazone for each of these two regions.

Vladimir Golovin, Wed, 28 Oct 2015 11:01:50 -0400
@Dilla: Regarding the implementation of Chance using the Map Switch / Bomber+ combo, you can plug Bomber's Randomizer slave into the Selector, which will get you a uniform probability distribution over the Source inputs being used (limited by Max Source), each of which can have a completely distinct subtree.

To modify the distribution, you'll need to modify the Selector signal you feed into this component. For example, running it through a Tone Curve / Bias combo will let you bias the probability distribution towards higher or lower Sources.

Crapadilla, Thu, 29 Oct 2015 05:18:22 -0400

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote: I decided to include a Map Switch component to help with particle switching situation / N-particle bombers

Glad to read that. :beer: :loveff:

It occurs to me that chaining/nesting particle switches should provide enough "room" for all my "expansive particle set" needs.

Crapadilla, Thu, 29 Oct 2015 05:32:04 -0400
@Vlad:

So currently you've shown ElementID and Octave data being exposed via the Bomber+ slaves. What other data do you plan to include?

Sphinx., Thu, 29 Oct 2015 05:39:26 -0400
Dilla - since they removed the Tint option and thereby our only option to piggybag data used at particle level for rotation, ordering, squashing and what not, we can expect them to add slaves corresponding to all particle level inputs, right Vlad? ;-)

(by particle level I mean data sampled once per particle and not per output x,y, like for example rotation)

SpaceRay, Thu, 29 Oct 2015 07:20:06 -0400
Thanks for the news and showing it, good to know

As I personally understand all the technical parts that has been put here and how this new bomber slaves will be able to help I would like to ask

What benefits and advantages will bring the new bomber+ with slaves?

What thing can be able to do with bomber+ that was not possible before?

How will it change the way the bomber is used?

Thanks for any help and hope is it explained less technical that it is usually done.

Ramlyn, Thu, 29 Oct 2015 11:16:29 -0400
Just wondering... Will the new bomber be faster than the normal one?

Vladimir Golovin, Thu, 29 Oct 2015 12:07:14 -0400
@Dilla re: Other data to expose via slaves: I thought about this a lot, but at the moment I can't come up with anything reasonable other than Particle ID (exposed via Randomizer slave) and octave / layer (exposed via Layer and Normalized Layer slaves).

@Sphinx re: Slaves for particle-level data: At the moment we don't plan to add slaves for exposing things like actual particle rotation, actual particle scale etc. This can be done, but the complexity / usability ratio seems to be low for these slaves.

@Ramlyn re: Speed: No, I don't think the new bomber will be radically faster. Maybe there will be some very minor speed improvements due to the fact that we removed fixed-function logic for tint, chance, particle switching etc, but I wouldn't expect anything drastic.

@SpaceRay re: Benefits vs the old bomber: Any number of particles instead of just 5; each particle can be customized / randomized individually, and such customization may depend on particle center, rotation, scale, squash and the internal layering of particles within the bomber. To achieve all this, you need to use the new slave components, that's why we're releasing it as an advanced version of the basic bomber.

Vladimir Golovin, Thu, 29 Oct 2015 12:08:18 -0400
New slaves + Map Switch in action:

Vladimir Golovin, Thu, 29 Oct 2015 14:06:20 -0400

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote: @Dilla re: Other data to expose via slaves: I thought about this a lot, but at the moment I can't come up with anything reasonable other than Particle ID (exposed via Randomizer slave) and octave / layer (exposed via Layer and Normalized Layer slaves).

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote: @Sphinx re: Slaves for particle-level data: At the moment we don't plan to add slaves for exposing things like actual particle rotation, actual particle scale etc. This can be done, but the complexity / usability ratio seems to be low for these slaves.

Scratch that. I'm exposing the actual center of the particle after all offsets and chaos via Center X and Center Y slaves; and the actual rotation, size and squash of the particle after chaos via Rotation, Size and Squash slaves.

(I just had a very interesting idea of what's possible with Center X and Center Y. Let's see if it pans out.)

Betis, Thu, 29 Oct 2015 20:18:50 -0400
This is gonna be so rad, Vlad. :-p

Crapadilla, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 03:51:26 -0400

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote: I'm exposing the actual center of the particle after all offsets and chaos via Center X and Center Y slaves

I'm really hoping this will help with a little issue I've been having... ;)

Sphinx., Fri, 30 Oct 2015 04:04:00 -0400

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote: Scratch that. I'm exposing the actual center of the particle after all offsets and chaos via Center X and Center Y slaves; and the actual rotation, size and squash of the particle after chaos via Rotation, Size and Squash slaves. (I just had a very interesting idea of what's possible with Center X and Center Y. Let's see if it pans out.)

That is good news. The way I've been using the bomber lately is by using opaque particles with "local coordinates", i.e. red channel = particle x, green = particle y and blue is all black. Then here comes the piggyback trick: if I want to get the actual particle size, rotation, squash, depth index etc I plug in a map input into the relevant particle property AND a copy into the Tint input (blue channel only) which is set to 100% and Tint mode is Linear Dodge. The output of the bomber now contains coordinates I can use with lookup to map the actual particle texture and some other property, like e.g. the depth index of the particle. Nice.

The slave component version I asked for is much nicer and allow you to work with more than one additional particle property and use the blending of the bomber more conventionally..

Btw. you do not expose all possible particle properties as slaves, please dont remove the Tint..

Skybase, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 04:20:49 -0400
I was wondering about tint.

Would it be like XY coords from a bomber --> Lookup hooked up with some input --> blend with a the particle image--> bomber?

Sphinx., Fri, 30 Oct 2015 05:47:42 -0400
Well, the Tint is fetched once per particle, so if you feed Tint the same input as you use for some other particle property like depth map, size or rotation, you can extract that from a channel afterwards like I described

The particle input is simply contructed from two gradients (representing X and Y coordinate space for the particle) into an assemble RGB (with only R and G used, blue remains zero). The tint then takes another Assemble RGB with R and G = 0 and B = the source you use for a particle property

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 06:36:05 -0400
It worked.

There was one thing that bothered me about bomber slaves, namely that the particle customization was basically limited to randomization. The new Center X and Center Y slaves fix this by letting you create customizations that aren't based on randomness:

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 06:51:26 -0400
@Sphinx - you don't need the fixed-function Tint anymore, nor do you need any extra slaves to implement one. Here's a crude implementation of Tint using Blend together with the Center X + Center Y + Lookup technique:

Sphinx., Fri, 30 Oct 2015 06:57:31 -0400
Sweet! That currently requires two bombers to achieve.

Will you be adding a Depth / Layer Index slave too? (i.e. what you draw from the Depth Map input)

Sphinx., Fri, 30 Oct 2015 06:59:27 -0400
I don't use Tint the intended way - what I mean is that Tint currently makes it possible to get the same sort of functionality as the slaves... so if you remove Tint, but don't implement all particle level input properties as slaves, then you limit the actual possibilites..

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 07:11:12 -0400

Quote
Sphinx. wrote: so if you remove Tint, but don't implement all particle level input properties as slaves, then you limit the actual possibilites..

Quote
Sphinx. wrote: Well, the Tint is fetched once per particle, so if you feed Tint the same input as you use for some other particle property like depth map, size or rotation, you can extract that from a channel afterwards like I described

Plug the new slaves Center X and Center Y into a Lookup, and plug "the same input as you use for some other particle property" into Lookup's Source input. See my examples in this thread. Simpler and cleaner than the trickery with Tint.

(Or am I missing something?)

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 07:12:19 -0400
A cool trick with the new Rotation slave: All particles are randomly rotated and by default are black, but the particles whose rotation approaches 90 degrees are colored white:

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 07:17:56 -0400
Another cool trick with the Rotation slave: despite the fact that the particles are randomly rotated (via Chaos), their fill pattern always stays vertical. That's because the particle rotation is compensated by rotating their pattern backwards by the same amount (get the rotation via the Rotation slave, then subtract it from 1.0):

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 07:24:49 -0400
Dilla, and everyone, can you come up with any other data you'd like to be exposed via slaves? For example, particle bounds in some form (as four points, or in some other form), or perhaps the center coordinates of the grid cell in which the particle resides (that is, the particle center before Offeset H/V and Chaos H/V are applied)?

The only other thing I can think of at the moment is exposing the actual opacity of the particle, after chaos / roughness / details / layering method adjustments. That is, the slave could expose the exact actual opacity that will be used to render the final particle. But is this necessary? What are possible use cases?

Technically, it's possible to expose all these data, but we're risking over-complicating the component.

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 07:36:34 -0400
Speaking of the general strategy for exposing bomber data via slaves, we want to expose only thosee per-particle data that are calculated inside the bomber, and cannot be replicated outside of it.

Sphinx., Fri, 30 Oct 2015 07:37:15 -0400
Vlad, you're right, my bad. With a coordinate for the particle it is easy to lookup those values. Bye bye Tint, you served me well :D

Perhaps data related specifically to the octaves?

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 07:40:42 -0400

Quote
Perhaps data related specifically to the octaves?

Which ones exactly?

Sphinx., Fri, 30 Oct 2015 07:57:32 -0400

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote: Quote Perhaps data related specifically to the octaves? Which ones exactly?

Well, I'm not sure it makes sense really now that I think of it, but I was thinking about scale, distribution etc per octave, and not per layer

SpaceRay, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 08:03:08 -0400
this Bomber+ will not appear in any beta version, and will only be available in the final version of FF 5.0 sometime next year?

If this is complex as it seems, and can have multiple combinations of components, I think it would be better to test it first and see if there could be some bugs so when releasing the final version is good and well done.

Quote

Vladimir Golovin wrote:
@SpaceRay re: Benefits vs the old bomber: Any number of particles instead of just 5; each particle can be customized / randomized individually, and such customization may depend on particle center, rotation, scale, squash and the internal layering of particles within the bomber. To achieve all this, you need to use the new slave components, that's why we're releasing it as an advanced version of the basic bomber.

Thanks for the answer and details, it looks very interesting and useful, specially that you can use ANY number of source particles instead of 5, I really wanted to have that as you can build more things with more source images.

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 08:29:54 -0400

Quote
SpaceRay wrote: this Bomber+ will not appear in any beta version, and will only be available in the final version of FF 5.0 sometime next year?

No, the new bomber won't make it into the beta. It will be released with the final release of 5.0 later this year.

Quote
Sphinx. wrote: Well, I'm not sure it makes sense really now that I think of it, but I was thinking about scale, distribution etc per octave, and not per layer

I was thinking that as well, but it's still vague. I don't yet have a precise use case in mind. So, let's apply the Sacred YAGNI of Occam: if we can't come up with a use case, let's avoid adding additional complexity to an already complicated system.

Vladimir Golovin, Fri, 30 Oct 2015 09:41:18 -0400
(In other news, for Bomber+ we increased the maximum Density from 5 to 20).

Unit component

ThreeDee — Thu, 31 Mar 2022 01:09:59 -0400

ThreeDee, Thu, 28 Mar 2013 06:57:27 -0400
Would it be feasible to add a Unit component, which would just pass one value forward for each outgoing branch (or loop iteration for FF 4)? This would be useful in those cases where you really just need to output a single value (grayscale or RGB) for RGB Math etc. It would have a Source input and pick the 0,0 (or .5,.5) value from it and forward it to any downstream sample calls. I would assume this to be much faster than having to evaluate every sample separately, like (I believe) all the current components do.

ThreeDee, Mon, 01 Apr 2013 08:23:04 -0400
Since this need was brought up by the new loop component, it might actually be better to add a Variable slave component wherein one can pass a single numeric result to the next stage of the loop, similar to the Randomizer, but user set. Also in this case, one would have to be able to pick the variable fr om an RGB or grayscale image, so the same idea as above but lim ited to the loop.

Sphinx., Mon, 01 Apr 2013 15:55:43 -0400
I used RGBA channels for that purpose in the Julia filter. That lead to the suggestion that FF added multichannel support in the sense that we can add additional channels which will be processed similar to r,g and b. But that is probably a lot of work and your suggestion seem more plausible. One could imagine 4-6 Aux HDR Inputs in the Loop node which can be "fetched" via slave nodes (even cooler would be to have a dynamic solution with x number of auxes). :-)

ThreeDee, Tue, 02 Apr 2013 03:18:33 -0400
Perhaps the simplest implementation of this idea would be to make the Lookup component have a "Flat fill" option to it where it would assume that the X and Y coordinates do not vary (pick the center point or 0,0 point and then look up that coordinate from the Source. The important thing is that the component would only have to look the point up once (per loop) and pass that value. (As opposed to sampling it for every pixel + every subpixel needed for antialiasing.)

I wouldn't mind a similar solution as a Loop slave component. The main thing is to be able to pass one value in the same fashion as the slave components.

Back to the attempted Non-overlapping circles filter, if I replace the Lookup with a Randomizer, I can render one thousand loops or more. But attempting to look up ONE sample from Accumulated, I get to about 7 iterations. The situation should be comparable: Pass one random value or pass one sampled value. Yet one runs linearly, the other exponentially unless something is changed.

Unfortunately the current implementation wrecks about 9 out of 10 loop-based ideas I have.

ThreeDee, Tue, 02 Apr 2013 03:22:37 -0400
My latest attempt gave me a good descriptive word for this phenomenon: It is njyldgarkn annoying!

I tried to make a filter that would generate proper letter spacing for a line of type. I can get up to 10 letters (non-antialiased) before my hair starts to fall off from waiting.

(The letters are picked by random, variation 24 gave me this Scandinavian-sounding swearword.)

Vladimir Golovin, Tue, 02 Apr 2013 09:16:33 -0400
(I'm thinking about this. Implementation-wise, Loop is very tricky, especially when the mappedness of things is involved.)

Vladimir Golovin, Mon, 08 Apr 2013 07:14:37 -0400
(Note to self: the variables that we pass cannot be numeric / gray because numerics are evaluated before the sampling begins and can't be recalculated during sampling. So they must be map / green).

ThreeDee, Mon, 08 Apr 2013 11:02:27 -0400
It appears (to an outside observer like myself) that every iteration passes new Position, Iteration and Randomizer values. So you are saying that all iterations of these values are evaluated (in the internal "Prepare" function) before sampling begins, so that they are in fact constant throughout sampling?

So this probably means that even the "Flat fill" option in some components works this way -- it actually does a lookup for every sample although they come fr om a lim ited number of source coordinates?

The funky part is, it is very easy to script a "sample once, pass the same value thereafter" Script component, but it won't work with a loop, for it will pass the same initial value for every subsequent iteration of the loop. Which is why I tried to sample the Iteration slave component to detect when the Iteration changes. In theory it would work, in practise there must be something I don't understand or know, for it doesn't.

Most fundamentally, IF I can make something happen with a LUA script, you could make it happen internally, because the logic is basically the same, right?

Vladimir Golovin, Tue, 09 Apr 2013 09:38:53 -0400

Quote
It appears (to an outside observer like myself) that every iteration passes new Position, Iteration and Randomizer values. So you are saying that all iterations of these values are evaluated (in the internal "Prepare" function) before sampling begins, so that they are in fact constant throughout sampling?

No. All slaves are Map components, therefore their result is calculated in their get_sample() method (that is, on demand) depending on the number of the current iteration.

(Don't forget that you can plug map components -- including other slave components, even from the same Loop -- into inputs of slave components).

Quote
So this probably means that even the "Flat fill" option in some components works this way -- it actually does a lookup for every sample although they come fr om a lim ited number of source coordinates?

Yes, but the the effective number of actually evaluated lookup samples is reduced by the sample cache at the output of the component which is being looked up.

Regarding the rest of your post (actually, thread), I'm still trying to wrap my head around all this. It haven't clicked yet.

ThreeDee, Tue, 09 Apr 2013 13:38:27 -0400
Ok, thanks, that clarifies it. And no, I hadn't noticed that the Slave component inputs are green!

Quote
Regarding the rest of your post (actually, thread), I'm still trying to wrap my head around all this. It haven't clicked yet.

But I assume that you understand the basic problem I am trying to resolve, right?

Vladimir Golovin, Wed, 10 Apr 2013 08:12:43 -0400

Quote
But I assume that you understand the basic problem I am trying to resolve, right?

You are trying to pass a single numeric value, obtained within the loop subtree, to the next iteration of Loop, preferably via a slave component. Correct?

(Actually, during the development of the Loop, I had a vague idea of a multi-variable Loop, that is, the one that somehow accumulates several results during its evaluation, but I haven't found how to combine all these multiple sub-results into a single output result).

(Update: If I'm not mistaken, having multiple Accumulated -> Subtree -> Accumulator paths within a single Loop would fix your problem: you would simply pass your value to the next iteration by directly passing it to one of the additional Accumulator inputs, without mixing in previous iteration. On the next iteration, the value could be obtained via the via the corresponding additional Accumulated slave.)

Sphinx., Wed, 10 Apr 2013 14:31:15 -0400
Until you guys figure out the awesome generic auxiliary/multi channel fix (in line with grayscale and color mapped you would introduce multichannel mapped inputs), I think the idea of adding a handful additional accumulator paths is a great compromise :-)

ThreeDee, Fri, 12 Apr 2013 01:53:57 -0400

Quote
You are trying to pass a single numeric value, obtained within the loop subtree, to the next iteration of Loop, preferably via a slave component. Correct?

Yes, exactly, without incurring the overhead of the component sampling for every pixel and thus causing an exponential loop.

Either as a slave component, or if a single-sample lookup could be implemented for Lookup, that would probably work as well.

ThreeDee, Fri, 12 Apr 2013 01:56:52 -0400
Additional accumulators: That could work, if it avoids the branching issue. I don't know if branching the accumulator internally (as opposed to the filter tree) makes a difference or not.

SpaceRay, Thu, 31 Mar 2022 01:09:59 -0400
This was suggested in 2013 and as far as I know is still not available in 2022 in FF 11

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote: (I'm thinking about this. Implementation-wise, Loop is very tricky, especially when the mappedness of things is involved.)

Quote
Vladimir Golovin wrote: (Note to self: the variables that we pass cannot be numeric / gray because numerics are evaluated before the sampling begins and can't be recalculated during sampling. So they must be map / green).

I know it may be difficult and tricky but I would be good to know if this can be possible or not now with all the components of FF 11 and be possible for FF 12?

Thanks

Custom Channel Export / Render Queue

Martin Naumann — Wed, 09 Feb 2022 05:53:20 -0500

Martin Naumann, Thu, 03 Feb 2022 10:19:56 -0500
1. Render Queue
Using animations makes bulk rendering really easy, compared to FF10. But IMO this could be even better if it would be possible to put presets and channels from different filters in a queue. Especially for larger files, it would be a huge improvement to collect the assets on a waiting list and render them all together (at night, for example).

1. Custom Channels
Atm, channels are only used for 3D surfaces, but I think it would make even more sense to include custom channels as an export feature.
Sometimes I would like to export various texture maps of the same motif (custom channels like angular map, alpha map, bump map, and texture in this example). If I want to export them within a 2D filter (as I don't want to use the FF render) I have to create a switch component and export each of them separately.
If FF would offer an option to create more than one image output per Filter, this could be a significant improvement.

The queue could solve both problems, but both features would make it a more advanced render software.
Looking forward to the feedback!

GMM, Fri, 04 Feb 2022 08:24:56 -0500

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Martin Naumann wrote: I have to create a switch component and export each of them separately.

Could you please explain that in more detail. Why can't you use the File > Export function to save all render maps at once?

Martin Naumann, Sun, 06 Feb 2022 05:48:35 -0500
Using File > Export just allows the export of the default render maps (Diffuse, Bimp, Metallic, etc). I can not add any map channel or use them in a different way. If I want to use the Export feature of the different render maps, I have to use the 3D surface mode and I have to use exactly those maps. There is no option to export any maps or layers out of a 2D filter as well.

The second reason is that I can only render maps of one filter at once. I can not create a waiting list and render them all at once. I would be expecting an "add to queue" button when I open the export feature.

Hope you get what I mean, let me know if you still have any questions!

GMM, Mon, 07 Feb 2022 04:10:04 -0500
Vector map... angular map... wow, that's some serious filterforging going on :) I'm not a filter maker by any means.

Let's focus on your second reason. That's not entirely correct, you do have an option to render multiple filters in one command. Open a filter and select a preset to render, then press Ctrl+T and select a different filter for the second tab, then press Ctrl+T again and repeat until ~~you run out of memory~~ you are all set. Finally, select File > Export to render all tabs at once.

Martin Naumann, Wed, 09 Feb 2022 05:34:27 -0500
Oh, I see. Well, that's a feature I was not aware of :) thanks for the tip!

What do you think about the custom channel / multiple output feature?

GMM, Wed, 09 Feb 2022 05:53:20 -0500

Quote
Martin Naumann wrote: What do you think about the custom channel / multiple output feature

Can you adapt your workflow to save these multiple outputs as different filter presets? If yes, you can open those presets in separate tabs (or use the command-line renderer) to render them all in one go.

Rename Layer with Name of Filter Applied

CattailNu — Thu, 06 Jan 2022 11:47:36 -0500

CattailNu, Thu, 06 Jan 2022 11:47:36 -0500
When in Photoshop, and launching, and choosing a filter for the layer, please rename the layer to the name of the Filter that was applied. (if undesirable - this could be a preference setting).

Bomber Plus -- Density -- Max value of 20 not enough

uberzev — Mon, 03 Jan 2022 05:52:47 -0500

uberzev, Fri, 31 Dec 2021 19:08:38 -0500
The Bomber Plus "Density" limit of 20 is far too low to achieve the effect I'm after. This took less than 8 seconds to render on my 7 year old PC...

Doubling and Tripling the "Repeat" value increases the smoothness, but is not a viable workaround as it changes the effect too greatly.

emme, Sun, 02 Jan 2022 22:23:59 -0500
+1

I've ran into this same limitation at times. Maybe up the limit to 100? :)

uberzev, Mon, 03 Jan 2022 05:52:47 -0500
Yeah, 100 is a nice round number. 8)

If FF wants to do a little hand-holding they could warn the user the first time going over 20 that they risk exceedingly long render times.

Alternatively just make a new component called Bomber++ :D

Please, add an animation preview to the new FF 11 filters in library

SpaceRay — Mon, 27 Dec 2021 09:01:58 -0500

SpaceRay, Mon, 27 Dec 2021 06:01:34 -0500
Hello, it is really great that finally after so many years, FF has animation although it is only available in the Studio version.

So, I think that to encourage and motivate people to upgrade to the Studio version and see what they can get, it would be really useful and helpful if the page available in the FF library filter that are for FF 11 and have an animation included it would be very good to have an option to SEE the animated version before downloading the filter.

Maybe a simple GIF or short video of the main preset being animated could be enough

It could be either put in the main page, or put a button to see the preview animated.

I think that this could motivate and encourage to upgrade to the new Studio version as probably many FF users that already have only Professional version (like me) would be interested in upgrading if they see what you can get with that filter when animated.

Animated Pattern by Kochubey with animated GIF example made by CFandM

In this thread, CFandM has kindly shared a GIF of what it looks like in action and is much appreciated.

Quote
Grimbly wrote: Any chance you could make a little gif to upload here so we could see it in action? I don't have version 11 yet but would very much like to see what I might be missing out on

This quote is the real reason why I am making this thread, as there could be many FF users like Grimbly and me that would like to see what might be missing and so decide to save to upgrade

GMM, Mon, 27 Dec 2021 09:01:58 -0500
That's unlikely to happen for a number of reasons. Filter authors are welcome to share their animations in the filter comments.

Documentation moving forward

Rachel Duim — Fri, 19 Nov 2021 01:27:45 -0500

Rachel Duim, Tue, 06 Oct 2015 19:10:14 -0400
It has been discussed off and on for a long time. Filter Forge needs better documentation. I am willing to throw my hat in the ring... I would start such a project if FF hired me. A long shot, but hey, I have a lot of experience writing these things. What I think is needed:

1) High level User's Guide - Shows how to use the tool without going into the gory details of RGB math or editing. More on use of the filters, less details on editing & components.

2) Component Reference Manual - Goes into the details of all the components, including examples of how they are used. Snippets should be included with examples for all components.

3) Filter Creation Reference Manual - Goes into the details of using the editor and creating and editing existing filters.

4) Tutorials - videos? HTML?
a) Rules for writing efficient filters.
b) Bomber.
c) Noise.
d) RGB math

This list is incomplete and a few of these things are done, all off the top of my head. I feel the Component Reference Manual would be the most useful place to start on my list. My 2 cents, 3 with inflation.

Ramlyn, Tue, 06 Oct 2015 20:41:47 -0400
Yes. I think it would be nice to have better documentation. It would also help to increase the sales of the program.

Ghislaine, Tue, 06 Oct 2015 21:33:45 -0400
+1000... I agree at 200% :)

SpaceRay, Tue, 06 Oct 2015 22:42:39 -0400
EXCELENT AND BRILLIANT IDEA AND SUGGESTION

i absolutely agree with this at 300%, as this is one of the weak points of filter forge, it should be easy to be able to learn how to use and build filters yourself if you want and take the the time to do it, but regretably there is missing good manual and tutorials

It would REALLY HELP VERY MUCH and would be really useful to have more information about how works and how to combine the multiple components available, as what we have now is only a manual that only describes briefly what each components does, and many are from the technical point of view and need to really some previous experience in that topic to be able to understand it if you do not already what it is about

Is like a manual describing what the food is, what is a tomato, a potato, salt, etc... BUT there is no reference on how to combine them in the best way, and how to get the most of them

the wiki and forum can help but surely is not enough

The problem is that this has been this same way in all these years and nothing has been done to change it, and maybe think that FF company will keep it this way

Skybase, Wed, 07 Oct 2015 04:37:50 -0400
The docs are basically really just dry reading of what the program does. I think some of the expert-level stuff ends up in the Wiki, which usually contains more "human friendly" content.

I just honestly wish it were a couple steps easier to edit the wiki, like creating forum threads like these. I know it's not hard, I just can't afford to spend hours on end writing up detailed wiki articles with formatting, for that matter, I'd rather get paid to do that.

Quote
the wiki and forum can help but surely is not enough

I mean there's already quite a load of information on both these places. Unfortunately the Forums are time-based so things get buried unless it's a sticky thread. The wiki is honestly kinda getting old so the info there needs major updating. And we probably need to plant some new articles in the desert lol.

I would honesty disagree with the "not enough" part though. The info's just scattered and there's no way to make a definitive list.
[Addendum] You know, the FilterLibrary is technically a really really good resource for "how tos" in the sense that you can pick apart filters to its core functions and start rebuilding stuff from there. Although gotta be careful with it: I would recommend looking at the editors picks more than filters in the recent list due to the fact that the filters are curated for their quality.

Rachel Duim, Wed, 07 Oct 2015 12:10:05 -0400

Quote
I would honesty disagree with the "not enough" part though. The info's just scattered and there's no way to make a definitive list.

I disagree with your disagreement ;) Especially when it comes to component descriptions. A complex product needs a reference manual. With examples, descriptions of what each component does, range of values, typical usage for each component etc etc.

For a newbie, unless you studied mathematics or programming, what is a derivative to you? You can search the forums or try to look at filters that use it, but is that really going to help? Maybe after hours of digging through filters and the forums.

And philosophically, perhaps this is where the line is drawn for Filter Forge. If you can't figure it out on your own, you probably won't use it. That may be (unintentionally) how the audience for the product is determined. IMHO.

Ghislaine, Thu, 08 Oct 2015 00:02:46 -0400

Quote
I would honesty disagree with the "not enough" part though.

I disagree.

Quote
I disagree with your disagreement smile;) Especially when it comes to component descriptions. A complex product needs a reference manual. With examples, descriptions of what each component does, range of values, typical usage for each component etc etc.

I agree with you Rick !

Ramlyn, Thu, 08 Oct 2015 00:07:04 -0400
My opinion is also connected with the sales. If FF Company wants to keep the program as a tool for professionals and for people who already have a good experience in graphic design, then all these people may not need a too specific explanation. But doing this would restrict the sales to a particular sector of the market. If instead FF Company wants to expande the type of users and buyers, it will be probably necessary to give them more explanation about how to use the program and how to reach the results they want, otherwise many people may try FF and then not buy it thinking it is too complex for them to create good filters.

Skybase, Thu, 08 Oct 2015 03:06:09 -0400

Quote
I disagree with your disagreement smile;) Especially when it comes to component descriptions. A complex product needs a reference manual. With examples, descriptions of what each component does, range of values, typical usage for each component etc etc.

Oh snap, that IS true. So it's basically not enough in the sense that there's barely any technical information on specific subjects for example math or it's just buried.

I was more so thinking about general information in terms of creating stuff in FilterForge. I did give out several example works, hints, etc over years so I feel like there's an accumulation of information all scattered throughout these forums that either nobody understood or didn't care. (I.e. Sharing Noise thread)

I think that thread might as well be part of the wiki. Hum. The thing is, I really don't know if I've contributed to people's understanding or if I just wasted time writing about my favorite tool. lol.

So I mean yeah, why not an artist-friendly documentation rather than the dry, hardcore documentation we got so far?

Another thing: If you, me, us, we or whatever are going to make creator friendly documentation, there's gotta be a section on designing with FilterForge in mind. You can write all about technical stuff but it makes no sense if you can't make good stuff with it. I think people get tech crazy these days that people forget the nature of art and design. To me that would be as important as understanding the tech.

Ramlyn, Thu, 08 Oct 2015 08:38:33 -0400
Yes, what Skybase says is right. It is not only important to cover the technical side but also giving artistic hints and information.

Rachel Duim, Thu, 08 Oct 2015 12:59:32 -0400
Thanks all for the great input.

Quote
So I mean yeah, why not an artist-friendly documentation rather than the dry, hardcore documentation we got so far?

Good point. The component reference manual would show how each component worked with other components (if a snippet or good example is provided with each description). For instance, using ArcTangent with Derivatives.

Quote
Another thing: If you, me, us, we or whatever are going to make creator friendly documentation, there's gotta be a section on designing with FilterForge in mind.

The editor reference manual would probably be the place for this. The manual probably needs a combination of "dry" sections (commands, options, etc) and sections which show how to use the editor to create a filter. This could be separate documents...

In the end, specifics on organization are less important that getting both the high level and low level information to create filters in a manual.

Michelb, Wed, 17 Nov 2021 13:14:32 -0500
Agree with you. Many software developers neglect this aspect of products. A good user manual would go a long way to teach the user how to use the product to its full potential. Specially since places like Youtube don't seem to have that many tutorials on it.

SpaceRay, Fri, 19 Nov 2021 01:27:45 -0500
I Totally agree that one of the really needed things for FF is really a much better documentation and tutorials to learn better how to use all the nodes and all the possible combinations and have the fundamental knowledge to be able to get all the really huge potential that FF really has because this is like having a super power millon dolar car and only use it at city at 50 miles per hour.

I have downloaded the trial of the ON1 Photo RAW 2022 software and has a manual of 225 pages explaining everything you may need and with many examples and how to get the most of the software. And of course there are also lots of youtube tutorials also available.

Is really a pity that such awesome, excellent, powerful and full of power software that is filter forge that has such great huge potential can not be really used the most because is needed more documentation specially for people that are beginning and may be hard to learn and can miss the opportunity to use it right.

In lots of online learning websites like Domestika, Skillshare, Udemy and many others there are lots of tutorials about mostly any other software BUT regretably NOT about filter forge, and is really a great pity.

[UI] Input Boxes to Position HDRI/Environment

Laura... — Tue, 26 Oct 2021 21:18:10 -0400

Laura..., Tue, 26 Oct 2021 21:18:10 -0400
The click-and-drag control for positioning the HDRI/Environment can be fiddly. Getting a precise arrangement and/or returning to a previous one can be all but impossible. Adding textbox controls (e.g., x-, y-, and z-axis) would help greatly.

As an example, Adobe Illustrator's implementation uses both click-and-drag and numerical axis controls.

[UI] Increment Control Values with Arrow Keys

Laura... — Mon, 25 Oct 2021 21:07:48 -0400

Laura..., Mon, 25 Oct 2021 21:07:48 -0400
Proposed Behavior
When an control's input box is selected and the user presses the up/down arrow key on their keyboard, the value increases/decreases by 1 unit.

Explanation
FF's UI seems to rely mainly on mouse input, but specifically with filter controls, I frequently find myself trying to increment values with the arrow keys (to no avail). The slider isn't always very precise, especially when the control features a large spread of values, and having to type in the desired values can be pretty tedious if you want to preview the filter for numerous consecutive values of a particular setting (6 --> [backspace] --> 7 --> [backspace] --> 8 --> [backspace] --> 9 ...). The ability to change input values using the arrow keys instead would be such a welcome change.

Beta 11: New Preview Images

Sphinx. — Fri, 22 Oct 2021 02:01:34 -0400

Sphinx., Thu, 07 Oct 2021 05:54:59 -0400
Nice with some new build in preview images :-)
https://www.filterforge.com/download/b...mages.html

It would be useful with a few simple text and shapes samples too.
Something like a Filter Forge themed "tag cloud", a "Lorem Ipsum" text image (maybe with different fonts) or a shape flash sheet.

Carl, Thu, 07 Oct 2021 07:11:41 -0400
Great to have more image choices, what is missing is any people or faces, which is a common usage of filters.
{ Look at the User gallery as an example of the percentage of images using people ]

Rachel Duim, Fri, 08 Oct 2021 12:42:46 -0400
Here is Quad Weirdness using a new preview image (Cherry Basket).

I agree, more humanity style pictures would be nice.

Rachel Duim, Thu, 14 Oct 2021 18:43:36 -0400
Another new preview image (flower + stem) into Ring Tile.

SpaceRay, Fri, 15 Oct 2021 03:39:00 -0400
GREAT THING

Great and awesome news that after so many years there will now be more preview images and that they will be shown in preview window instead of the file menu and is something very good to have, and maybe this way it could be added maybe even more images later.

Finally there are some landscape sized images (I mean NON-square images) so is great to have this too

BAD THING

I am sorry to say that although is a great idea, I think that is bad to REMOVE all the previous images because maybe the FF users with 12 years that are used to already using the default built in images may want to STILL use these images BECAUSE there are NO new images similar in shapes and format to the ones that they replace, and the new ones are not really good enough for testing and really showing truly what FF can do and make it shine.

Is a pity that there are no human images, no animal images, no flowers, no text, no round circular images like the previous lifesaver, and others....

If the previous built-in images are not going to be included anymore, the should be at least some similar images that have similar shape, format and background style than the ones removed.

GMM, Fri, 15 Oct 2021 05:50:02 -0400
No animals, no flowers and no lifesaver? Really?

SpaceRay, you should take a look at the program first and complain later, not the other way round.

Rachel Duim, Fri, 15 Oct 2021 14:41:51 -0400
Just to clarify... here are the new images + the legacy images in FF11

Rachel Duim, Fri, 15 Oct 2021 17:15:03 -0400
Here is the vegetable kabob preview into Polygonal Ring Tile

Carl, Sun, 17 Oct 2021 20:21:14 -0400
The cherry basket one looks great Rachel

Ghislaine, Mon, 18 Oct 2021 08:52:12 -0400
J'aime ta création Rachel.

Il y a plus d'images, c'est bien. Si FF team a besoin de coraux, j'en ai a la tonne et je pourrais lui en refiler une ou deux.

Rachel Duim, Mon, 18 Oct 2021 14:28:04 -0400
Merci Ghislaine. Here is one more using the new turtle preview image for the tile seed to a modified Pentaflower Too

SpaceRay, Thu, 21 Oct 2021 17:17:11 -0400

Quote
GMM wrote: No animals, no flowers and no lifesaver? Really? SpaceRay, you should take a look at the program first and complain later, not the other way round.

Quote
Rachel Duim wrote: Just to clarify... here are the new images + the legacy images in FF11

OH I am very sorry that I do not know at all that the FF 11 beta was already available for download and testing as there has not been any thread about this topic, and I was wrong thinking that the only thing available for FF11 was just this thread and was not showing all the information.

Please GMM you are allowed and free to delete my previous post and this one too, as is surely wrong and I was mistaken that the beta download was not available for me to test

Laura..., Fri, 22 Oct 2021 01:01:31 -0400
Love the new preview images! Add my vote to the request for human faces, though. Given the abundance of public domain portraits out in the wild, this seems a strange omission. There shouldn't be any legal issue with anything in the public domain, but even if that were a concern, there's always thispersondoesnotexist.com, which uses deep learning AI to generate portraits such as this one (attached) of people who do not exist.

SpaceRay, Fri, 22 Oct 2021 02:01:34 -0400

Quote
Laura... wrote: there's always thispersondoesnotexist.com,

Cool another link that makes virtual non existing realistic people and as you say these do not have any legal restrictions.

https://generated.photos
website that makes Human Generated Photos by AI very realistic of all races and ages

If you do not want to create one yourself, there are already 2,684,090 free AI generated photos faces AND what is very important is that you can FILTER very much what you may want with different options (although adding too many filter options will reduce the amount of results given)

Although maybe the reason for not putting human faces can be the available diversity and racism, and maybe I think that you can not put just one portrait, as there are many kind of humans and if put only white female and male, then black people, asian people, indian people, arab people and others could complain that they are not included and represented. About the age it should be adult.

So I think that the maybe the minimum amount would be at least 10 = 2 white, 2 black, 2 asian, 2 indian, 2 arab (the order here is by amount of people in the world)
Sorry if I do not include others, but I put the most majority and is not that I do not care of others.

Chaining and exporting filters to Layers in PS/Affinity-Large Format

PixlBendr — Tue, 19 Oct 2021 00:10:36 -0400

PixlBendr, Tue, 19 Oct 2021 00:10:36 -0400
For Upcoming versions of FF Project files:

Just bought the Pro version, would upgrade to Studio/standalone version if these issues would be solved:

When working with larger format images, creative process stymied by waiting for filters to apply. Sometimes a few hours depending on the complexity of the filter, and size of image.

Preview window at smaller, more manageable resolution is a winner.

The ability to apply multiple filters to an image would be much easier if FF project files would save each applied filter in a separate "layer".

example:
Layer 1 = Original image
Layer 2 = Original image, + Filter: Toycam-82
Layer 3 = Original image, + Filter: Retro Hipster analog Photo
Layer 4 = Original image, + Filter: Colored Bloom glow
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Result: preview window = Original image + Toycam-82. > Toycam-82+Retro Hipster analog Photo. > Retro Hipster analog Photo + Colored Bloom glow
Preview window would show the results of all 4 filters applied in sequence.

Clicking on a layer would bring up the parameter window for that filter only, which you could then adjust & readjust as needed.

Re-Sequencing filters
Layer 1 would always be the original image, but anything above Layer 1 could be shuffled, producing a different result, updated and pictured in the preview window.

If an applied filter doesn't seem to work as intended, it can be deleted, or swapped out of the stack

Hiding a layer would remove that filter from the filter chain, but not delete it from the Project file.

Chains would be save-able for future projects. similar to "actions" in PS.

Export to Layers -
Once all filters have been tweaked, and ready for export to PS or Affinity, hit "render" which will apply the filters in the Chain at full resolution, and each filter exported to a separate layer in PS/Affinity. -OR - select which filters to combine, and which ones to be exported as separate images.

Having Blending layer options would also be welcome.