Boris FX has released its 2022 updates for Continuum, Sapphire and Mocha in keeping with its recent trend of autumn product updates. Check out all of the licensing subscription and update info at www.borisfx.com. Or for those of you anxious to give the Boris product line a try, free trials also may be downloaded.
Let’s go product by product.
It remains complete and there is virtually no other product that can compare to it in the wide range of 350 or so plug-ins, 4000 presets, planar tracking, beat reactor and convenient FX browser.
With each incremental update of the Boris product line, migration of Boris’ carefully-executed acquisition strategy between tools becomes more tightly woven.
In Continuum 2022, we first see an emphasis on speed. Adobe Multi-Frame Rendering is now supported as well as native Apple M1 chip support. The BCC+Film Stocks plug in adds over 60 movie looks and the BCC+Lights (I confess that this is one of my favorites) adds over 50 gobo presets. The BCC+BeautyStudio plus in is accelerated with full GPU processing. The FX Editor sports a new UI. Most significantly, BCC+ now incorporates integrated Mocha tracking and masking.
Historically, Boris introduced pixel choosing and tracking practically in pre-historic times. But it came into its fullness with the acquisition of Mocha and Continuum Complete 2022 advances this Mocha planar-tracking integration. It also provides versatility and convenience for those who do not have a stand-alone Mocha Pro license but still require fast and accurate planar tracking.
There is a new filter in the BCC blurs category—Blazin’ Blurs. It creates its effect by blurring or smearing pixels in forward or backward directions along the Z axis with the option to rotate those pixels around the Z axis.
Another Boris acquisition folded into Continuum is Particle Illusion. The 2022 update adds fluid dynamics to the 3D particle generator. This essentially means that emitters can produce real-world particle motion that operate by principles of physics for more realistic motion flows or swirls. It wouldn’t be Boris without presets, so another 20 or so presets are included. Finally, going back to an overall theme of the 2022 updates, Boris touts up to 5x faster processing speeds.
Continuum Complete also builds upon third party integration by integrating Maxon C4D models with Title Studio. Some 15 models were created with Cinema 4D and they may be downloaded separately at no extra charge from a link on the Boris site.
Again, for those who do not wish to license the entire Continuum Complete suite, it is possible to license 20 individual “BCC Units” which contain all of the plug-ins of that particular category in BCC Complete. Full licensing details are on the BorisFX site.
Originally the darling of broadcast TV and commercial lighting effects, Sapphire has matured into a suite with 270+ effects and 3000+ presets, a transition builder and Mocha integration.
Sapphire 2022 sees Sapphire for Photoshop. Boris began its foray into still imaging with Boris Optics and Photoshop integration for Sapphire is a natural. Applying an effect to in image in Photoshop will allow that creation to be shared with any Sapphire-supported host or simply to be used as a visual enhancement of the native image.
Of course, native M1 support is there as well as Adobe Multi-Frame rendering and for Windows users, NVIDIA CUDA 11 support for Ampere cards.
New to Saphhire 2022 is the S_ColorFuse! Plug in. This allows combining up to 3 LUTs in different opacities or combinations across an image, with CUDA, Metal and GPU acceleration.
The S-UltraZap plug in now supports Mocha tracking and Mocha spline tools. Previously supported only in After Effects, it is now supported in all Sapphire supported hosts.
And, of course, a purported speed increase up to 20%.
Mocha continues to evolve with of course M1 support and Adobe Mult-Frame Rendering support.
Several modules and workflows have also seen improvements.
Insert Module now has warped surface compositiong driven by PowerMesh. This can also be rendered with motion blur. A new workflow allows Match Moves to be achieved in one AE effect rather than multi effects using AE precomps.
There are several improvements in tracking workflow as well including RGB channel tracking, multi-link layers, quick stabilize, enhanced rotoscope exports for Nuke and Silhouette, and PowerMesh exports.
Note that while Mocha Pro has host-integrated plugin options, these need to be purchased by host unless purchasing the standalone Mocha application or the entire Boris FX suite. These latter packages include a multi-host plug in option.
We hope to be doing a deeper dive into some of these new Boris Continuum, Sapphire and Mocha Pro suites. The 2022 updates enhance speed, versatility, and workflow for a key set of tools for visual effects artists.