In the opening of new James Bond movie, I saw a cool clip of two people-shaped, moving flames, and I said to my wife, “I bet I can make that.” Sure enough, I had enough plug-ins to get the job done. That just feels good. Knowledge is power, and this review will introduce you to some software companies whose products can make you money, while helping you to hang on to your clients during this economic downturn.

Digital Film Tools

The Composite Suite from Digital Film Tools (DFT) includes 28 visual-effects plug-ins that were, until recently, only available in-house at a Los Angeles-based film-effects facility. As such, they are tools designed to be used every day to solve some of the various problems that arise in a commercial production house.

For instance, let's look at the Edge Composite plug-in. Sometimes, when you are compositing green-screen footage, you end up with a clean edge around your talent, but when you composite that image over a background, you end up with a mismatch that just doesn't feel right. Edge Composite lets you drop the background clip into an image well to blend it into your foreground image. This is done with an adjustable-edge matte that has controls for adjusting the brightness, contrast and more. Suddenly, your foreground image matches your background image, and it looks like they were originally a single shot. This plug-in takes a composite image and kicks it up to the next level.

The Composite Suite has a bunch of handy tools, and they are all of high quality due to DFT’s processing. The plug-ins include (within each compositing plug-in) all that is needed to combine multiple images: color correction, blur, grain, matte manipulation and edge blending using 16-bit processing –– even if your system is limited to only 8 bits. This 16-bit RGB jump in processing makes a difference in how your images will look after being rendered.

I’ve played with DFT's Composite Suite for hours, and it’s a great set of tools for the editor who wants that perfect Hollywood-studio look. And, at under $300, the Composite Suite offers this “Hollywood Magic” all for about $10 per plug-in. You can download a demo at www.digitalfiltools.com, but make sure to use a set of plug-ins that match your computer's OS.

Another awesome plug-in from DFT is their zMatte set of tools. This set is just amazing for green-screen work. I took some problem blue-screen footage, and dropped the zMatte keyer plug-in on it. Instantly it was perfect. You could even see individual hairs –– there was no fringing –– and they blended into the background in a natural manner.

zMatte is easy to use, yet provides the needed tools when faced with good, bad or ugly shots. The set has high-power tools, such as multiple-matte creation, automatic spill suppression, sophisticated matte and edge manipulation, and color correction. It just blew me away. At under $400, it's a great deal for the serious compositor, or anyone who has some badly shot green-screen footage.

Oak Street Software

If you’re doing green-screen work, you know that you need a keyer. With an unlimited budget, you can have the best chroma keyer that money can buy. But what if your budget is a bit tight? The VKey2f FxPlug keyer plug-in from Oak Street Software Inc. does a good job for under $60.

The Vkey2f is a vector-based keyer, which is different from a legacy chroma-keyer in that it is not affected by shadows. Vector keyers also generate a graduated key that preserves fine detail that would be lost with a traditional keyer. I tried it on DV and HD clips with great results for the money. Will it work for you? Try the free demo. You can download it at www.oakstreetsoftware.com.

Zaxwerks

3-D graphics are not only nice, they’re also a great way to wow your client. The downside is that extensive training and practice is required to use the complicated 3-D programs available. Now you can use the ProAnimator FX plug-in from Zaxwerks to make high-quality 3-D animations right inside of FCP. 

ProAnimator FX is user-friendly, because it gives us FCP editors and Motion artists a way to easily create stylish 3-D animations in our editing suites, using familiar-looking tools and methods. ProAnimator FX has some very useful features. For example, you can put an image in the Image Well to use as a reference while you are creating your masterpiece. I found that having a background reference helped a lot while trying out the many text animations, motion paths, camera angles and lighting, or when selecting the actual materials and colors for my text. Since all of the camera angles and motion paths were presets (like in Apple’s LiveType program, but in 3-D), I got awesome-looking graphics in just a few minutes. The program comes with presets to get you started, but you can custom make any move that you can conceive.

ProAnimator FX is really easy to use, but the process is a little different than what I’m used to doing in FCP. The two main differences are that you operate on a matte, and you must remember to change the quality switch to “Software” before rendering.

It's all pretty painless. First, you go in under Effects/Generators and create a Solid Color Matte, which you then drop on the timeline. Then you go to Effects and drop the ProAnimator FX plug-in onto the Solid Color Matte, rather than the background track. When you select the ProAnimator FX track and go to the Effects tab, you will see a place marked to “Click to Edit.” When you click there, the interface will open up and you are ready to rock.

When finished, you close the interface, and you are back on the FCP timeline. If you need to make changes, just click the “Click to Edit” button again, and make your changes.

In addition to animating 3-D text, you can also animate a logo. The difference with the ProAnimator FX plug-in is that you can do it all in a few minutes, without having to use keyframes. Animating a logo in 3-D using the Zaxwerks ProAnimator FX plug-in is amazingly fast, even for an editor who is not familiar with 3-D animation.

It's easy to learn as well. On a scale of one to ten, the learning curve on this product is about a two. Basically, you just import the logo as an Illustrator file, and you can animate the text, as well as the different Illustrator layers. Zaxwerks has a cool video tutorial on their website (www.zaxwerks.com) that will walk you through the whole procedure.

The ProAnimator FX plug-in costs $695. If you can use FCP, you will easily master the ProAnimator FX plug-in –– and once mastered, it will quickly pay for itself.

CGM

You already know CGM. Their CGM DVE Vol.1+ (the old version of plug-in package v1.0) was included with Final Cut Pro 3 and Final Cut Express (FCE). They are written in FCP's “native language,” so all CGM transitions and filters function seamlessly, fully supporting YUV rendering, 10-bit YUV, 32-bit YUV and RGB, as well as multiprocessing in OS 9 and OS X. And since they are designed to render at the sub-pixel level, you get smooth movement within the rendered clip.

CGM effects are actually “true” FCP transitions, rather than Adobe After Effects filters that have been modified to run in FCP, so they don't suffer from luminance shifts since they render in YUV space. The plug-ins support all frame rates in standard and high-resolution video (up to 1920 x 1080), and the Intel processor and RTExtreme HD architecture of FCP and FCE. Also, rendering is optimized for maximum speed on all available Apple computers as well as Motorola, IBM and Intel.

The CGM DVE Complete is a set of 187 filters, transitions and generators for use in FCP and FCE. It’s available online at www.cgm-online.com for only $369. I tested all of the filters and they all work very well, but the set has some unique plug-ins that really get my creative juices flowing. I especially like the Binoculars Pro, which gives you a view through the lenses with a range meter. This is great for commercials (where the shopper is “looking for bargains”) or when the hero is scoping out the bad guy. The Handycam does the same for a video camera, and includes a flashing red “REC” and moving time code. It looks realistic, and it’s something your client doesn't see every day. Rounding off this trio, Photo Camera shows you what your footage would look like if you were watching it through the viewfinder of a still camera.
The uniqueness of these filters allows you to raise the production value of your projects. For example, imagine that your story has a photo shoot with an inexperienced model. Instead of just having shots of the model and the photographer, you can add close-ups of the model as seen through the camera lens. Now, your audience can see the flash of uncertainty in the model's eyes as the camera sees it, while the rest of the onlookers at the shoot miss it.
After reviewing more than 500 plug-ins, I have come to a conclusion. The logic goes something like this: To compete in this business, we are constantly expected to create new and exciting images, and plug-ins can give you fresh looks and new ideas. Therefore, to stay on top, you can never have too many plug-ins.
Digital Film Tools
www.digitalfilmtools.com