Sapphire Plug-ins v2024.5 for Avid Products

Sapphire Plug-ins v2024.5 for Avid, General User Info

What's New In This Version

New Features:

MacOS: New metal support for the following effects:

BlurDirectional
BokehLights
Convolve
DefocusPrism
DissolveGlare
Flashbulbs
Glare
NightSky
RackDefocus
Whiplash
ZDefocus

Windows and Linux: Improved memory usage for the following effects:

BlurDirectional
BokehLights
Convolve
DefocusPrism
DissolveGlare
Flashbulbs
Glare
NightSky
RackDefocus
Whiplash
ZDefocus

Windows and Linux now use CUDA 12 which provides better support for Ada and Hopper generation NVIDIA cards.
Configuration Editor tool to control Sapphire settings.
Preset Browser performance improvements.
New LensFlares

Known Issues:

If Avid is open when the installer is run, Avid may crash. If Avid crashes after install try making sure the preset browser isn't running in the background.
Not all S_UltraZap presets are visible in S_Effect.
ColorFuse: ColorFuse presets don't render in the preset browser.
Sometimes Mocha tracks slowly. If this happens, close mocha, re-open mocha, then play through the clip inside mocha. After the clip is cached in mocha, tracking will proceed smoothly. Sometimes if the clip is tracking slowly an "unable to track" error will also pop up.
UltraZapMocha: Sometimes, a straight line will apear in the zap. To fix this, add an additional control point in mocha in the part of the mocha spline that corresponds to that straight segment. Adjust the control point until the straight line segment goes away.
If Sapphire 2021.5 OFX is installed at the same time as 2021.0 (either AE or AVX), lensflare presets may not show up inside 2021.0. To fix this, all Sapphire plugins installed on a single machine should be 2021.5. If the second installation of Sapphire cannot be upgraded to 2021.5, the Sapphire 2021.0 plugins may be re-installed to restore the 2021.0 compatible LensFlare presets.
Mac OS, Big Sur: if you open mocha and then open the preset browser, the preset browser will fail and generate an error. If this happens, the host will have to be restarted to fix the preset browser.
UltraZap: On an open spline zap may do unexpected things when mixing vary-endpoint and looping parameters.
Mocha: The Mocha UI does not correctly locate the default OCIO config file shipped with Sapphire. To use the default OCIO config file shipped with Sapphire, use the OCIO environment variable to locate said the config file.
LensFlareAutoTrack: green/green and yellow/yellow mode will give different results if hotspot_shift is set to a non-zero value on interlaced footage.
Mocha: Mocha point tracking widget starts in the wrong place in green/green mode on interlaced footage.
PixelMosh and DissolvePixelMosh: These are random by design. As such, please be aware that slight pixel differences between CPU and GPU renders may be noticeable. For the best results when applying S_PixelMosh to clips, please utilize a professional codec and file format, such as a ProRes QuickTime movie, as opposed to a web video codec that employs inter-frame compression, such as H.264 in an MP4 file format.

Compatibility Notes:

Improved Feedbacks: Feedbacks in Sapphire 2024 have been revamped to work better when frames are rendered out of order. This means that frames can be rendered in any order both in the timeline and when rendered to disk. It also means that the feedbacks may look slightly different compared to prior versions of Sapphire. The differences should be minimal, but are most noticable when using a mask. The mask is now only from the current frame. The full list of effects changed by this feature is:

S_Feedback
S_FeedbackBubble
S_FeedbackDistort
S_Trails
S_TrailsDiffuse
S_TimeAverage
NearestColor

Sapphire 2022 has been updated to use CUDA 11 in order to support NVIDIA's latest Ampere cards. (RTX A4000, A5000, and A6000). As a result some cards from 2012 are no longer supported. Sapphire 2022 works with CUDA compute capability 3.5 and higher.
In v2019, LensFlares using MutliSpot and MultiStreak elements would look different inside the Flare Designer across operating systems. In v2019.5 this was fixed, but as a result LensFlares may look different from v2019 when loaded through the Flare Designer. Old projects will continue to look the same as they did in v2019 when loaded into the host or rendered, but may look different after loading in the Flare Designer.

Color Management with OpenColorIO

OpenColorIO (OCIO), is the open-source color management solution fromSony Picture Imageworks, Sapphire 2020 can apply and read a color profileto provide consistent colors across internal applications, such as thePreset Browser, Flare Designer, and Effect and Transition Builder. TheFlare Designer and Builder applications now feature an OCIO panel toconfidently manage the color output to any monitor. Also, Sapphire 2020features a new effect called S_OCIOTransform, which allows Sapphire toapply an OCIO transform inside of any application, bringing OCIO ColorManagement to many applications that have yet to adopt the OCIO standard.

All OpenColorIO information below applies both to Color Management within the Sapphire Preset Browser, Sapphire Effect and Transition Builder, and Sapphire Flare Designer as well as to the new OCIOTransform effect in Sapphire 2020.

To use OpenColorIO in Sapphire, there are three ways to specify the OpenColorIO configuration file.

By default, Sapphire will use the config.ocio file found in Sapphire's installation directory.
To set OCIO system wide, set the OCIO environment variable to point to the desired config.ocio. This will ensure that all host applications and plugins that use OCIO will use the same OCIO settings.
- We strongly suggest working with an IT department or IT professional to help setup environment variables, as there can be underlying conflicts with pre-existing settings.
- Windows:
  - Open "File Explorer"
  - Right-click on "This PC" and select "Properties"
  - On the left, navigate to "Advanced system settings"
  - At the bottom, click on "Environment Variables"
  - In the top section labelled "User variables for...", click "New"
  - In the dialog that pops up, enter "OCIO" in the "Variable name" box, and the full path to the config.ocio file in the "Variable value" box.
- Mac OS:
  - Open a Terminal - This can be found using Spotlight
  - Type: "launchctl setenv OCIO /full/macos/pathway/config.ocio" (without quotes). Note: this will not remain set after a reboot.
  - To set the environment variable so that it persists through a reboot, the above command needs to be called through a .plist file in /Library/LaunchDaemons.
To set OCIO for Sapphire only, set the ocio_config flag inside the s_config file that shipped with Sapphire and can be found in the Sapphire installation directory.
- Windows: C:\Program Files\BorisFX\Sapphire 2024.5 AVX\s_config.text
- Mac OS: /Applications/BorisFX/Sapphire 2024.5 AVX/config/s_config.text

Loading a Plug-in

The plug-ins appear in the Effect Palette under the Sapphire categories.

You can drag a plug-in onto a track just as you would any othereffect. After you apply a plug-in to a track, select Effect Mode todisplay the Effect Editor which allows you to adjust the controls andparameters for that effect.

On DS, the Sapphire presets have moved to an easier location. Youshould now find the Sapphire effect presets in the DSPresets/Image Effects/Sapphire folders. You canapply Sapphire effects directly on clips, as transitions, or in a tree,and you can load a Sapphire effect either from a preset or using the AVX2Host preset in Image Effects .

Browsing and Selecting Presets

You can load and save presets for effects using the Load Preset and Save Preset buttons near the top of the effect palettewindow in all Sapphire effects.

Loading:

In the preset browser you'll see all the presets available for thecurrent plug-in, both Boris FX-supplied presets and the ones you'vecreated yourself. You can filter by tags on the left side to quicklyfind the look you're interested in.

The main top window shows the preset on your footage (unless theplug-in can't access the AE layer for some reason, in which caseyou'll see a poster frame) and various information about the preset.

At the bottom you see all the presets; you can enlarge or shrink themwith the slider at the bottom. You can also switch to a table viewthere, as well as viewing the preset on your source, over black, orover the sample footage. You can also see the source all by itselffor comparison.

Saving:

Clicking Save Preset brings up the Save Preset dialog. Hereyou can name the preset, and add various other information.Particularly important is the tagging system; you can apply as manytags as you want to your presets. You can even create new tags. Tagsare grouped into categories, so all the color names appear underColors, for instance.

You can create new categories as well, by typing into the Categorydrop-down menu after clicking Add New Tag.... Boris FX recommendssticking to the shipped categories when possible, for compatibility.But adding your own tags within categories (new color names, forexample) is encouraged.

More Info:

While the preset browser, save dialog, or flare designer are open, themain AE window will be unresponsive. This is normal. Close thepreset browser or flare designer and AE will wake up again.

Certain parameters, like Lens Flare hotspot, are not saved in presets;we thought it would be less than useful for the flares to jump aroundas you load presets.

It may take a few seconds to load the preset browser if a plug-in hasmany presets. Be patient.

The Preset Browser has a "Use Static Thumbnails" checkbox in certain effects.When checked, the thumbnails use a pre-rendered image to improve performance.If "Use Static Thumbnails" is not checked, the thumbnails will render on thefootage the Sapphire effect has been applied to back in the host.

If playing through the preview window in the Preset Browser, Flare Editor, orEffect Builder, is using too much memory, "Render on Still" is availablein the view menu. This will reduce the memory usage of the preview windowby rendering all frames using the same host frame.

The preset browser may be configured to load presets from and/or save presetsto user specified locations. The load location and save location may bedifferent. If the locations are different, load will show presets from both the loadlocation and the save location. Save will only use the specified save location.

There are three options for setting the load and save paths:

To set load and save paths per user, use the "Browser Settings" dialog. To do this: open the preset browser, go to the Edit menu and select "Browser Settings".
To set the load and save paths for all users of the machine, use the INI file. To do this, edit the sapphire-app-settings.ini file in the Sapphire directory:
- Windows: C:\Program Files\BorisFX\Sapphire 2024.5 AVX\sapphire-app-settings.ini
- MacOS: /Applications/BorisFX/Sapphire 2024.5 AVX/config/sapphire-app-settings.ini
To set the load and save paths in a script, use the Sapphire environment variables: SAPPHIRE_LOAD_PRESET_PATH and SAPPHIRE_SAVE_PRESET_PATH.

Note: Values set in environment variables will override the INI file. Values set in the "Browser Settings"dialog will override both.

Using the Sapphire Effect Builder

Builder lets you design completely new effects by combining severalSapphire effects together. The result is a new effect that does whatall the different effects you add to the workspace do, but it can beapplied and used as a single effect.

Starting Builder

To use the Effect Builder, apply S_Effect or S_Transition (both in theSapphire Builder category) to a clip, or between two clips in the caseof S_Transition. Then press the Edit Effect button to bring up theBuilder interface. Create the effect in the builder interface, thenwhen you return to Avid your new effect will be there, withall of its published parameters.You can also load effects you've defined before, using the Load Presetbutton in these effects.The builder interface is composed of several panels, described below.

Panels

The builder interface is where you create and customize your neweffect. All the panels are movable and resizable so you can customizethe layout for your particular work style.

Components

The Components panel lists all the Sapphire effects. They're listedby category, and you can search for any one you want; you can alsoorganize them alphabetically. To add an effect to your workspace,double-click it or drag it onto a line on the node graph, or ontoanother node to add it after that one.

The Tools category contains tools that are only available in Builder:

Color: creates a solid color
Composite: a simple premultiplied composite. Use when theforeground clip already has an alpha channel.
Blend: dissolve between two clips using a Matte input. Use when the foreground clip does not have an alpha channel.
Crop: crop to a rectangular area
Cutout: crop input to an arbitrary shape, given by a Matte input. The Matte multiplies with any alpha channel that's already present.
SetAlpha: add an alpha channel to a clip which doesn't have one, and premultiply.
Sticky Note: write notes in the workspace

Preview Window

The preview window is where you see the result of the effect you'recreating. It has a play bar so you can see any animation in thenodes you've added. You can also play through transitions if you're usingS_Transition.

Node Graph

The Node Graph is where you build the new effect. Processing flowsfrom the Source node to the Result node; you add whatever effects youwant in between to build a processing pipeline. Using multi-inputeffects like S_Layer or S_MathOps, you can also combine the outputs oftwo effects (or stacks of effects) into a single result.

In the node graph you can move, connect, disconnect, disable andpreview nodes. Right-clicking on a node brings up a context menu ofuseful items.

To connect a node to the graph, drag it onto any line. If it waspreviously connected somewhere else, this will move it. You can alsodrag a node onto another node, which will connect it after the othernode. Shift-drag a node to disconnect it.

Parameters

The Parameters panel is where all the parameters for the currentlyselected node can be edited and published back to Avid.It only shows parameters for one node at a time; to editparams for a different node, just select it in the node graph. Youcan rename the current node here; just type a new name into the NodeName box. You can also load a preset for the current effect from theParameters panel, choosing from the Boris FX-provided set of thousandsof presets or ones you've created yourself.

The checkboxes on the right side are used to publish params to Avid;published params show up as params in the finaleffect where users can make further changes or add animation.Non-published params don't appear in Avid at all; this canbe useful to simplify the params of the effect you're creating, orprevent users from accidentally changing important parameters. Theywill still take on their correct values, but users who just apply yourS_Effect preset won't be able to see or change them.

Animation

Each parameter has an animation button that allows you to defineanimations. In Transition mode, most nodes will have a predefinedparameter already animated in a way that makes sense for a transition,but you can change these. There are various animations you can choosefrom:

Ramp Up or Down (starting from zero or one): increase or decreasethe value of the parameter as the transition progresses. Usethis, for instance, to blur the outgoing and incoming clipsoppositely to get a blur dissolve.
Up/Down (starting from zero or one): increase to the midpoint,and then decrease again. Use this, for instance, to add a "hit"of brightness or glow in the middle of a transition to get aflash-frame transition.

You can further adjust the shape of each curve by dragging thesliders for Slow In, Slow Out, Start Time, End Time, Mid Time, andSlow Middle.

Creating Effects

Adding Nodes

You can add nodes to the graph by double-clicking them in the Componentspanel or dragging them from that panel into the graph. If youdouble-click, the new node will go after the currently selected node,or just before the result if no node is selected.

To connect two nodes, drag the connecting output arrow from the sourceto the destination, or drag from the destination's input circle up to thesource's output. To connect multiple nodes to the same source node,you have to use the latter method, dragging from the destination tothe source.

You can neaten the layout of the graph at any point by usingEdit -> Clean Up All.

Previewing nodes

To preview a node anywhere in your graph, i.e. to see what that node'soutput looks like, click Preview selected node at the bottom of thenode graph, then select the node you want to examine. Its output willappear in the large preview window above.

Mask/secondary inputs

Many Sapphire nodes have secondary inputs; these appear as smallcircles on the left or right side of the node. Mousing over thatcircle will show the name of the input. The most common secondaryinput is a mask. A simple way to use these is to create a mask usingS_Vignette (set to Vignette Only mode) or S_Shape. Connect the outputof that node to the mask input of the desired node to use it as a maskfor that node.

Starting with Sapphire 10 Builder has a Mask node which represents the clip(or path) connected to the Mask input in the host. Connecting the Mask nodein Builder to an input of an effect will pass the clip from the host to theeffect. The Mask (and Background) nodes are only visible in Effect Builder,not in Transition Builder.

Layering with S_Layer

Often you will want to combine two images. S_Layer and S_MathOps aregood ways to do that. S_Layer composites with alpha by default, whileS_MathOps adds the two inputs by default. S_Layer can also be used tocombine two images using a mask: connect the mask to its side Maskinput, leave it set to Normal mode, and turn off its Comp Premultparameter.

Creating Transitions

You can use Builder to create transitions as well as effects; juststart with S_Transition. In this case, the node graph will start witha default dissolve transition between the outgoing and incomingclips. You can play through the transition to see how it looks.

You have tremendous flexibility when designing transitions; you canadd effects to the outgoing and incoming clips, you can change theunderlying transition, and you can add effects to the result.

You can also change the speed of the the underlying dissolve byselecting the Transition node and adjusting Dissolve Speed; if youincrease that speed, the dissolve will happen more quickly in themiddle of the overall transition.

Saving and Loading Effects

When you press OK to close the Builder interface, you will be taken backto Avid with the current effect as you've defined it. Thateffect will be stored with your project; to take it to a differentmachine you don't have to save any external files. (Pressing Cancelleaves the effect as it was before you started the builder UI.)

You can also save effect definitions as "presets", to share with otherusers or to define a look for a show or project. These presets aresimple text files, so you can send them via email or put them on ashared drive. They are cross-platform, meaning they work on all videosystems which support Sapphire and Builder, for instance After Effectsor Premiere. These presets can be loaded back into Builder for furtherediting, and they also appear in the preset browser when loadingpresets for S_Effect or S_Transition.

Restrictions

There are a few restrictions on what you can create with Sapphire Builder.

Popup params: Popup params (params that have a menu of choices)can't be published to your Adobe product. You have to set them as desiredwithin the builder interface.
Too many params: If you publish too many params, we may notbe able to show all of them in Avid. Builder will warn youin that case; you can simply un-publish all the params of one or morenodes. That will free up space for publishing something else. Youcan use the master checkbox at the top to un-publish all the params ofany node.
Param groups: Some Sapphire effects collect their params intogroups. In Builder, the groups are used for effects within thecomposite builder effect, so the lower level groups are removed.
Temporal effects: Some Sapphire effects can't be used asnodes in Builder, notably temporal effects (effects that modifytime) such as S_TimeWarpRGB and S_Retime.

Using Mocha in Sapphire

What is Mocha?

Mocha is a planar tracking and masking utility that can save time onthe most difficult motion tracking and masking shots. It tracks theentire area of the mask, not just individual points, to significantlyreduce the tedium of manual keyframing.

Mocha looks for 3-d planes in the image: pixels that move together.Screens and signs are clear candidates, but Mocha can also trackfaces. It can handle objects obscured by foreground elements, and cantrack unlimited layers all at once.

There's a lot more to Mocha than we can explain here; there are plentyof tutorials online at http://borisfx.com.

In Sapphire, Mocha works as a mask for the effect, similarly to themask input, but with all the tracking features of Mocha. For instance,in S_DistortRGB, the mask affects the amount of RGB distortion. InS_Glow, the mask masks out the areas you want to emit glowing light,without chopping off the smooth edges of the glow.

How to use it

Apply a Sapphire effect

Most Sapphire effects now feature Mocha planar tracking integratedwithin the effect. Certain effects were omitted because utilizing amask made no logical sense; for example, none of the S_Transitioneffects incorporate S_Mocha, and the Z_effects which require a Z_depthmatte to work were also skipped.

Click Edit Mocha to launch Mocha

When you click the Edit Mocha button, you will launch the Mocha UI,which will allow you to create and track a mask for use back with theselected Sapphire effect in your host application.

Create a spline

You can create a shape to track within Mocha utilizing either anX-spline or Bezier splines. X-splines are recommended for most uses.

Draw one or more splines around the planar areas you would like totrack.

Track it

You can use backwards and forward tracking from whatever frame you'reparked on. You can often get a great result with default settings, butif you're getting a lot of drifts, try increasing the Min K Pixels Used .

Save and exit back to host

For your mask to appear back in your host application, YOU MUST SAVEAND EXIT. If you exit without saving, all you current work willbe lost. Always save and exit!

Adjust in Sapphire

You can make additional fine tuning adjustments after tracking inMocha by opening the "Mocha" pulldown in your selected Sapphireeffect. Additional softness and position/scale paramters can befound here, as well as checkboxes for soloing/hiding/inverting theMocha mask.

Moving masks between effects

Sometimes you track a shot with Mocha in one Sapphire effect and wouldlike to reuse the track in a different effect. The simplest way is toexport it from the first effect and re-import into the second effect.

go into Mocha with Edit Mocha , then File > Export to export the Mocha project to a file.
Exit Mocha and delete the old effect.
Apply the new effect, Edit Mocha , and File > Merge the project from the file you saved.

Editing and Designing Lens Flares andother elements

Clicking Edit Lens in LensFlare, or Edit Style in Glareor Flashbulbs, opens up the Lens Flare Designer.

The Flare Designer lets you completely customize a lens flare. Youcan add or remove elements, copy them, customize how each elementlooks, and even how it reacts to the center or edge of the image. Youcan also interactively move the flare around to see how it will lookas it moves.

All the panels of the Flare Designer are movable, so you can adjustthe user interface itself to suit your work flow. The main panels arethe view window, where you see the flare you're working on, theElements panel which lists all the elements of the flare, and theProperties panel, which lets you adjust the properties of thecurrently selected element (or elements). There's also a toolbar ofelement templates at the top.

View Panel

The main view window is where you see how your flare will look; youcan click and drag to move the flare around. You can see it over thebackground or just over black, adjust the gamma, and Solo only theselected elements. Use Plug-in Settings makes the flaredesigner import the plug-in settings currently active in the hostapp. If you have that selected, the flare will look the same back inthe host app when you're done designing it. On the other hand, if youwant to create a "reusable" flare preset, it's probably a good idea toun-check Use Plug-in Settings so the flare will look good with defaultsettings in the plug-in.

Elements Panel

The Elements panel shows you all the elements, with thumbnails. Ifyou mouse over them, an overlay shows where they are in the main viewwindow. When you click on an element to select it, it also flashesbrighter in the main window to help you find the element you'relooking for. Clicking Identify in the Properties panel doesthe same flashing.

Parameters Panel

The Parameters panel is where you adjust all the details of a singleelement -- or multiple elements together, if you select multipleelements in the Elements panel. (Use Shift-click or Control-click toselect multiple elements.)

There are a few common control types. Sliders with numbers to theleft control numeric params; you can drag the slider thumb, but youcan also drag in the number text field to increase or decrease thevalue. You can also click in the number field and type any value youwant.

Color controls are just a swatch of color; click to bring up astandard color picker.

Some elements have a Gradient; there's a special gradient control toadjust those. The stops are below the color swatch; you can drag themleft and right to move them. Drag down to delete. Click in the colorgradient to add a stop there. Control-drag to "stretch" neighboringcolors, and shift-drag to push neighboring colors. The trianglesabove the color gradient allow you to control the interpolation of thecolors between stops. Ring Thickness lets you easily turn a spot orfan of rays into a ring; turning Ring Thickness down from 1 hollowsout the center. This lets you still have fine control of the colorswithin the ring, even if it's very thin.

Different element types will have various parameters you can adjust,but here are some common ones:

Position: Where the element occurs, along the line between the hotspot and pivot point. Position 1.0 is at the hotspot, 0.0 is at the pivot. Note that you don't have to stay in that range; you can use any value you like. Bigger than 1 will be past the hotspot, and less than zero will look like a reflection because it's on the other side of the pivot point.
Size: How big the image is.
Rel Width, Rel Height: Use these to squash and stretch.
Rotate: Rotates the element around, in degrees.

There's a Reset button at the bottom of the Parameters panel to resetthe current element(s) to all default settings. That's undoable too.

More Information

If you open the flare designer from the plug-in, you can just click OKto close the window when you're done; your current flare will be usedin your project and saved with it. But you can do more than that; youcan save the flare definition to disk separately, so you can recall itlater, or use it in other flares. You can also open the flaredesigner directly from the Start menu or Applications folder to createflares independent of your host product. In this case, useFile...Save Lens As... to save the flare definition. That dialogwill allow you to name the lens and tag it so it's easy to find later.

Note that saving a lens this way does not save your plug-insettings; it only saves the lens flare definition itself (the thingsyou can change in the flare designer). You can save a preset in thehost application to save everything -- the flare and all the regularplug-in parameters.

While the preset browser, save dialog, or flare designer are open, themain AE window will be unresponsive. This is normal. Close thepreset browser or flare designer and AE will wake up again.

Online Documentation

All Sapphire Plug-ins include a Help button just below theeffect name in the Effect Editor window. Push this button to bring upa window showing the current version of Sapphire Plug-ins, yourlicense status, some documentation about the current plug-in, andlinks to more detailed HTML documentation.

Online documentation in HTML or PDF format can also be accesseddirectly. On Windows go to Start -> Programs -> GenArts Sapphire AVX-> Online Help (HTML) or (PDF). On Mac, go to theApplications/BorisFX/Sapphire 2024.5 AVX folder and double click on OnlineHelp.html or .pdf.

Processing Titles and Keys

Sapphire v2024.5 allows you to easily process a title or key withoutaffecting the background. To do this, drop a Sapphire Plug-in onto atitle or key and then select the Apply To Title/Key checkbox inthe Effect Editor. This causes the plug-in to process the fill andmatte of the title together. By default it will also combine thisresult with a background that is one track below, but the Background input selector allows choosing "This Track" or"None" for the background instead.

When you replace a title effect in this way, any animation curves inthe title are lost, and only the matte and fill clips remain. If youwant the title to move, you can instead use the Crop/Transform parameters describedbelow to perform the moves within the Sapphire effect.

You can also apply more than one Sapphire Plug-in to a title or keywithout affecting the background. To do this, drop the first effectonto the title and select Apply To Title/Key as above. Butthen change its Background input to "None" to prevent it fromcompositing. Next, apply another Sapphire effect by alt-dropping iton the first effect, but leave Apply To Title/Key unselectedthis time. You can alt-drop any number of additional effects in thisway. In the final effect, set the Background to "1 TrackBelow" to composite the final result. Note that only the first effectshould have Apply To Title/Key selected, and only the lasteffect should have a Background selected. You should use only Sapphire effectsbetween this first effect and the final composite, because othereffects will probably not pass the alpha channel through in acompatible way.

If you have your own separate matte and fill tracks you can alsocombine and process these together in a similar way. First make sureyour matte is on a track above the fill, for example matte on v3, fillon v2, and background on v1. Drop an effect on the matte track (v3)and select Apply To Title/Key in that effect. The Backgroundtrack selection defaults to "1 Track Below" which now is v1 because"This Track" becomes v2 and v3 combined. As above, you can applymultiple effects by setting the Background to "None" on the firsteffect, alt-dropping additional effects, and setting the last effect'sBackground to "1 Track Below".

In general, to view the alpha channel of a clip, you can use ChannelSwitcher and set some or allof the RGB channels to Alpha.

The above methods are not necessary if you want to process a title andits background together with the same effect. In this case you canjust alt-drop the effect on the title (instead of drop) andleave Apply To Title/Key unselected. When Apply ToTitle/Key is not selected, the input track menus will include anadditional option for "2 Tracks Below" because one of the plug-in inputtracks is not used up by the matte channel.

The Wipe and Dissolve transition effects do not include an Apply To Title/Key option, because they are required by AVX to accept only 2 inputs, and therefore can notreplace a Title which requires 3 inputs.

If you are using Xpress DV and processing a title with multiplenested plug-ins, make sure you turn OFF real time mode. Real timemode will corrupt the alpha channel being passed from one plug-in tothe next.

Crop and Transform Parameters

Sapphire Plug-ins include a Crop/Transform Input parametercategory, that includes parameters for cropping, scaling, and shiftingthe input clips before they are processed by the effect. The Sourceclip and other optional inputs are cropped and transformed, butBackground inputs are not affected.

Crop Top, Crop Bottom, Crop Left, Crop Right are used to selecta rectangular subsection of the image to be processed. A "Show CropWidget" mode button on the far right column of the Effect Editorbrings up an onscreen control for setting this rectangle visually, anda "Hide Widgets" button at the top/right removes it from view.

A Crop Output option is provided for some effects. When thisis selected, the cropped area is processed as if it was the entireframe. This can be used to avoid soft edges around the crop area thatmay be created by effects such as Blur.

Scale adjusts the overall size of the input images. You canuse this to scale while preserving the aspect ratio of the image, oryou can use Scale Rel X and Scale Rel Y to scalehorizontally or vertically by different factors. Shift X and Shift Y translate the input imageshorizontally or vertically. The values of the shift parameters arein units where 100 equals one complete screen width. A "ShowTransform Widget" mode button in the far right column of the EffectEditor brings up an onscreen control rectangle for setting the scaleand shift visually, and the "Hide Widgets" button at the top/right removesit from view.

When an image is cropped or transformed to expose areas beyond itsedges, the border areas are made transparent, and if you selecta Background input, it will show through in these areas. Inthis way a "picture in picture" effect can be created using anySapphire Plug-in that has Crop/Transform parameters.

When Warp or Distort effects' Wrap parameters are set to "Tile"or "Reflect" the cropped source image will be wrapped on these newcropped or transformed boundaries. In this case, the result willstill fill the frame, and the borders will not be transparent asusual. This makes it easier to avoid artifacts when distorting a clipwith bad edges, but if you prefer transparent borders, set the Wrapparameters to "No" instead.

The Crop and Transform parameters are not available for temporaleffects which might require access to other frames of the input, suchas GetFrame, TimeSlice, FieldRemove, and FilmEffect.

Resolution, Clamp Output To Legal, and Bypass Effect

Sapphire Plug-ins also include these additional controls, located atthe bottom of the parameters in the Effect Editor:

Resolution is a popup menu that allows the renderresolution to be reduced to Half, Third, Quarter, and so on, forfaster testing. Return this to Full resolution for the best qualityresults. This parameter is not provided on DS which has its ownresolution controls.

Clamp Output to Legal causes the output colors to beclamped between broadcast-legal black and white. If off, the plug-inmay pass through or generate non-broadcast-legal super black or superwhite. On DS, this parameter only affects image formats that supportsuper-blacks and whites, such as 16bit and float.

Bypass Effect ignores the effect and the primary input clipor title is output unmodified when checked. This can be useful forquickly comparing your effect to the original image.

Resetting Parameters To Defaults

Every plug-in has two buttons that allow restoring its state todefaults. These buttons are located at the bottom of the effect'sparameter page, and they act in slightly different ways.

Reset Parameter Values sets the effect's parameter values totheir default values. However this does not reset keyframes, inputtrack selections, or the state of the Apply To Title/Keycheckbox.

Reset All restores all of the effect's state to its defaultincluding clearing any keyframes, as if the effect has just beenre-applied to the track from scratch. If you hit either of these byaccident, an Undo (Ctl-Z or Apple-Z) should reverse its effect andbring you back to the previous state.

GPU Acceleration

Many effects can use theGPU to speed up rendering. This requires an NVIDIA graphics card whichsupports CUDA, such as a GeForce 280 or 285, or Quadro FX 5600 or5800. If a suitable GPU is found, a GPU Enable button will appear inthe Help dialog. GPU acceleration is enabled by default if it'savailable, but if you experience performance or stability problems,you can turn it off by deselected the GPU Enable button.

If a plug-in is unable to render on the GPU, it will automaticallyfall back to the CPU and continue processing. The GPU status,including the type of error, is displayed in the Help dialog.

On machines with more than one GPU that supports CUDA, you can select whichGPU Sapphire Plug-ins will use by changing the value of use_gpu in the s_config.text file.

Keyframes

Sapphire v2024.5 for AVX 2 uses Avid's Advanced KeyframeModel. This allows users to have independent keyframes for singleparameters, groups of parameters, or the entire effect, and to slipand edit keyframes visually. It gives a new level of flexibility todoing effects work in the Avid, but it requires some thought to usewell.

If you prefer, you can use it just like the old keyframe model byselecting "Add to All Parameters". This setting issaved, and becomes the default when pressing the pink "Add Keyframe"triangle button in the viewer or effect editor. You can then addkeyframes at the start and end of the clip and work as you used to.

The Advanced Keyframe Model also allows you to add individualkeyframes: right-click (or Option-click on Mac) in the keyframe areaof the effect editor and you can add keyframes for only the activeparameter or group, or all open groups.

You can shift keyframes in time by holding down the Shift key whiledragging them.

One important note is that if you're not parked on a keyframe and nokeyframes are selected for a parameter, changes to the parameter valuehave no effect. Conversely if several keyframes are selected,changing the parameter value changes all the keyframe values.

For more information, see the section on Advanced Keyframes in yourAvid documentation.

About Motion Blur

Many Sapphire Plug-ins can simulate motion blur by rendering theeffect at multiple times and averaging the results together. Motionblur is controlled by three parameters:

Enable Motion Blur turns motion blur on or off.
Shutter Angle controls the amount of time that the simulated shutter is open, and thus the overall amount of motion blur. The default value of 180 degrees will blur over an interval of half a frame, which is a common setting for real cameras. A value of 360 degrees will blur over an entire frame, which is the maximum amount of motion blur possible with a real camera.
Samples controls the number of individual renders that are averaged together. Increasing the number of samples will give smoother results, but will also increase render times. If too few samples are used, there can be visible aliasing or ghosting artifacts. Faster motion will require more samples to avoid artifacts.

Mask Inputs

Many Sapphire Plug-ins accept an optional Mask input clip.Typically, this input can be used to provide more detailed control forwhere the effect should be applied and where it should not be applied.The Mask input defaults to "None" and it can be enabled by setting it to"This Track", "1 Track Below", or "2 Tracks Below" depending on whichtrack you would like to use for the Mask. (If Apply ToTitle/Key is enabled, "2 Tracks Below" is removed from the menu ofoptional inputs because the title's matte clip uses up one of thetracks.)

Glint , Glow , Glare ,and Rays ,for example, take the main Source input and also optional Backgroundand Mask inputs. If a Mask is selected, the source input ismultiplied by the mask before generating the glints (or glows,glares), so where the mask is black no glints are generated, and whereit is white they are generated as usual. This method prevents theglints or glows themselves from being partially cropped by the mask.In addition these effects use the RGB colors of the Mask input toselectively colorize the resulting glows, glints, or glares. The redareas of the mask will produce red glows, glints, or glares, and soon.

In Blur effects, the areas which are masked outare never blurred, so they do not blur into the masked-in regions. Ifa mask were instead applied afterward, the pixels behind the maskwould be blurred over the edge of the mask and into the final image.As an example, say you have a clip with white text over a blackbackground. If you put that clip into both the Source and Maskinputs of Blur, the black background will not be blurred intothe text, since the black pixels are all masked out.

For the Warp effects, the Mask input can control the amplitude ofwarping for different areas of the image. In masked out areas(black), no warping occurs. In fully white areas of the mask, fullwarping occurs. But in gray areas, the amount of warping is scaled bythe brightness of the Mask. The Blur Mask parameter can beuseful here to soften the Mask image before it is applied and avoidartifacts that can sometimes be caused by hard edges in the Mask.

Sapphire Plug-ins that accept Mask inputs also include an InvertMask parameter. This can be useful because the black/white ofAlpha images are often backwards from what Sapphire expects. NormallySapphire processes where the mask is white and shows the backgroundwhere it is black. The Invert Mask parameter defaults ON for AVX products (except DS) when monochrome Masksare expected. However for Glows, Glints, Glares, EdgeRays, andStreaks, Masks can include color information so the Invert Maskdefaults OFF for those.

DS also provides optional masking for all plug-ins which can be enabled onthe Masking page. The processed result appears where the Mask iswhite, and the unprocessed first input (usually the background) showsthrough where the Mask is black.Sapphire Plug-ins with a Mask input perform their own method ofMask processing.

Alpha Channel Processing

Sapphire Plug-ins sometimes produce transparency information in anAlpha (or opacity) channel along with the RGB colors, for example whena plug-in is applied to a title or key, or when its inputs are croppedor transformed. RGBA images output by one effect can also be passedto the inputs of other Sapphire Plug-ins. When processing RGBAimages, the Alpha channel is handled in one of three ways, dependingon the effect:

Alpha is processed as just another input channel like R, G, andB. Effects in this category include: AutoPaint, Mosaic, Blur,BlurMotion, RackDefocus, all Wipes, all Dissolves, Lens, LensBlur,LensChroma, all Kaleidoscopes, all Warps, Shake, and MathOps.
Alpha is copied from the first input to the output. In thiscase the effect doesn't use the Alpha channel, but it is passedthrough unchanged from the first input to the output. Effects in thiscategory include: BandPass, BlurChroma, ClampChroma, DuoTone,EdgeDetect, Embosses, Etching, HalfTones, Hotspots, LensRGB,Monochrome, Pseudo_Color, Psykos, Sharpen, Sketch, Sparkles, Streaks,Threshold, and Zebrafy. This is the same as what DS does if ProcessAlpha is disabled.
Some other effects pass the Alpha through by default, butinclude an Affect Alpha parameter for optionally adding to the alphachannel. These are LensFlare, Glows, Glints, Glare, Rays, and Zaps.

If our method of Alpha processing is not appropriate for yourapplication, you can usually manipulate Alpha to be what you needusing the Channel Switcher.

In some cases, it is not obvious how Alpha should be processed. Whenpossible we've chosen the method that seems best for use with'premultiplied' compositing. This is often also called 'additive'compositing and is done when the R, G and B values have already beenmultiplied by Alpha:

Result = Background * (1 - Alpha) + Foreground

For example, by default LensFlare, Glows, Glints, and Glares pass thebackground's Alpha through to the output without modification. Thisis because these effects simulate light emission. They are purelyadditive and have no opacity themselves. You should get the correcteffect if you composite the output of LensFlare (applied to an RGBAclip) over another clip using a premultiplied composite. The originalclip will composite over the background using its Alpha, and the flarewill simply add to the result.

Effects with an Affect Alpha parameter can optionally increasethe output Alpha where the flares (or glows, glints, or glares) occur,but in this case the flare elements will become opaque and will darkenthe background image behind them when composited later.

On DS, plug-ins can process the alpha channel by enabling ProcessAlpha in the Masking tab of the parameter dialog.

Pixel Aspect Ratios

For some image formats, the digital form of the image is scalednon-uniformly to produce the final viewed picture. For example NTSCresolution is normally 720x486 with an aspect ratio of 1.481.However, the final NTSC picture has an aspect ratio of 1.333. Thusthe original digital image is scaled in the horizontal direction by afactor of 0.9 and shapes rendered as circles can end up squashedslightly into ovals. The original pixels are effectively rectangularshaped instead of squares, and have an aspect ratio of 1.48/1.333 =1.111. In addition, since AVX products except DSprovide only half-height "field" images to plug-ins, the pixel aspectratio is scaled by another factor of 2 there (2.222 for NTSC).

To compensate for this, all Sapphire Plug-ins pre-stretch or shrinktheir effect in the vertical direction by the inverse of this pixelaspect ratio . We use the pixel aspect ratio from your currentsequence, but you can override these defaults for all effectsby changing the value of force_pixel_aspect_ratio in the"s_config.text" file.

Most plug-ins also have a parameter for adjusting the relative widthor height of the effect, which can be used to stretch the effect asneeded on a case by case basis.

The pixel aspect ratio makes no difference for basic pixel processingeffects such as Layer and color processing.

Customizing Plug-ins

A facility is included with Sapphire Plug-ins that allows users withsome programming experience to define and customize new plug-ins. Anumber of parameters are also available that can be adjusted tocustomize the behavior of all Sapphire plug-ins. You can forceprogressive mode, disable multi-processing, or specify lookup tablesfor more accurate processing of log format images. For additionalinformation on these, or to modify a parameter, open the config filewhich is normally located on Windows in

C:\ProgramFiles\BorisFX\Sapphire 2024.5 AVX\s_config.text

. On Mac OSX it is in

Applications/BorisFX/Sapphire 2024.5 AVX/config/s_config.text

Known Problems

Trimming clips from the head may invalidate the Mocha track.
Any S_Effect saved with an earlier version containing WarpDrops will render incorrectly after installing Sapphire 11. The effect can be fixed by clicking "Edit Effect" to open Builder, and then clicking "OK" to update the effect to Sapphire 11.
Media Composer 7.04 or later is required for full EffectBuilder support. On DS and older versions of Media Composer, S_Effectand S_Transition can load and edit effects, but will not display anyparameters.
If multiple copies of S_Effect or S_Transition are stacked on aclip, Media Composer may display the parameters of one or both effectsincorrectly. This will hopefully be fixed in a future version of MediaComposer.
When dragging on-screen widgets to adjust a parameter, theimage is not redrawn with the new values until you release the mouse.This is an AVX 2 limitation that will hopefully be fixedin future versions of Avid products.
Avid plug-in processing is supported on fields only, forfield-based media. They usually do not provide full frame data toplug-ins. For some effects such as warps, this can cause lessvertical sharpness than you would get from the same effect on otherplatforms.
In LensFlareAutoTrack the hotspot will move around if the resolutionchanges (including yellow/green to full green) and the hotspot_shiftparameter is set to any value other than zero. If using the hotspot_shiftparameter always work in full green mode.

To Sapphire Plug-ins Introduction

Sapphire Plug-ins v2024.5 for Avid Products | Boris FX (2024)