Hello.
I’m Ben Brownlee for Boris FX and I’m going to do a quick walkthrough of some of
the new features for Continuum 2021.5.
This new release continues the path that was set with the 2021 release.
We now have nine new filters that fit into the Cinematographer’s toolkit.
Big new features for Particle Illusion, which build out the features from the 2021 release.
And a big boost for Avid users who are using the 90 new filters released this year.
I’ll be focusing on the extensions to the Cinematographer’s Toolkit in this video.
If you’d like to learn more about the new Particle Illusion, please check out the separate
video with John Dickinson.
In Continuum 2021, the Cinematographer’s Toolkit became part of the Continuum family.
These filters are designed to simulate real-world optical camera filters, lenses, film stocks
and grain, lens flares, optical lab processes and many more traditionally analogue effects.
In the 2021.5 update, we’ve got even more new filters
available.
To find these filters, we can search for BCC+ and see these new HDR-ready, GPU-accelerated
effects.
Of the nine new filters available, we have some that deal with colour for example; Flashing,
Haze, and Two-Strip.
We have a utility plugin for putting clips together - Composite.
And some stylization effects including a uniquely featured Vignette and Film Grunge.
Let’s start with the colour filters.
Two-Strip emulates the early forays into colour film, where two strips of black & white film
negative were filmed simultaneously through red and green filters.
These were then combined after processing to create a colour image.
Famous examples of Technicolor’s two-strip processes were The Black Pirate and the 1925
version of Ben Hurr.
The two strip filtering was unable to render all colours true to nature, but an emphasis
was put into keeping skin tones looking right.
Or at least recognisable.
The digital version gives you a lot more control and immediate feedback.
This lets you get an eye-catching signature look, while still maintaining full control.
You can also mix back the strength of the effect with a simple slider.
Two-Strip gained a new lease of life in the feature film “The Aviator” by Martin Scorcese,
where a digital process was used to get the look.
The BCC+ Two Strip filter uses this same technique as a result of consulting with the movie’s
visual effects supervisor.
Haze lets you improve image clarity and cut through the, well, haze of your image.
Controls are very simple, consisting of just two sliders.
Haze reduces haze, and the Temperature allows you to compensate for the coldness in the
image.
Easy.
And a great way to improve definition.
Flashing simulates a lab process, which allows you to use photographic filters to lower the
contrast of your shadows or highlights.
In the lab you would expose a small amount of light to the film at various stages of
the developing and printing process.
In the filter, things are much more straightforward.
No need to do a countdown with a stopwatch.
Control your brightness parameter in either Shadows or Highlight, and even introduce a
bit of colour into the mix too.
All the Cinematographer’s Toolkit filters have access to the FX Editor.
This is a host-independant way to look through presets, edit the effect, add favourites or
even create your own presets.
I’ll find a starting point that I like, and can either adjust parameters here, or
hit OK and finish off my changes back in the host.
Flashing is usually used to bring sympathetic colours into your image, but there’s nothing
stopping you from changing a couple of parameters for a much more graphic look.
Fluorescent couldn’t be an easier filter to use.
This emulates a physical filter that you would use to compensate for the green tint that
fluorescent bulbs give to images.
Whilst some films use this to instill a certain uneasy look, usually it just makes people
look a bit ill.
Grab the slider, and pull it over until the green has been neutralised.
Much better.
The final colour filter we’ll be looking at in this short overview is F-Stop.
The F-Stop filter adjusts channel exposure values in increments equivalent to photographic
lens f-stops.
I can control Master Exposure here.
Alternatively, work on customisable ranges for Shadows, Highlight and Midtones, giving
me full flexibility.
Colour channels can be ganged together, or tweaked separately for fine-grain changes.
We’ll move over to explore the Composite filter.
Composite is designed to make it easy to add two layers together, which is especially useful
in editing applications that may not be too flexible when layering images together.
On its face, this is a straightforward filter, but it has a lot of options for how we put
these together.
I can add blur, colour correction, transformations and even film grain to the clip.
I don’t even have to use a clip with an existing alpha channel.
I can use a luma or colour channel to generate up a new matte.
It’s easy to reference other clips too, and get a bit creative with a couple of clicks.
The first of the more stylised filters to look at is Multi-star.
This emulates a physical filter that goes in front of a camera lens and creates star
shapes out of specular highlights.
The advantage we have doing this digitally is that we can change our mind about how big
and bright we want them, how many points the star has, and even decide what our luma range
is for where these glints are created.
Be subtle.
Or drop any ruse of subtlety and just have big, colourful glamorous fun with Continuum’s
Multi-star.
Next up is Vignette.
Continuum’s new Vignette filter is GPU accelerated and offers some unique features that makes
it invaluable in your toolkit.
We can keep it simple, and just adjust colour and opacity.
But then we can come in and customise the shape.
I can make perfect ellipses and rectangles, or add a more organic feel as if this was
created by a real lens.
I find that a little bit of distortion helps
to make the effect feel more natural.
I’ll slide the Randomness around until the vignette just sits properly on my image.
I don’t just have to use colour with my Vignette.
I can also add blur.
I could go light and subtle, but even with it cranked up, I am still able to play this
through without slowdowns.
Building on this idea is Film Grunge.
A great way to transform your pristine image and give it the feel of beaten up film.
Unlike film damage overlays, how much you beat it up is entirely your creative choice.
We can mix up any combination of Dirt, Hair, Scratches, Stains, Splotches, Gate Weave,
Flicker, Vignette and Grain.
I’m going to turn off dirt and start with hair.
I’ll mix the right amount of hair that I’m looking for.
This is all procedural, so I can adjust up these settings until I have the look I want.
Now let’s head to scratches.
We have a similar amount of control here too.
For example, if I want these scratches to simulate scratches from a film that’s been
through the projector a few too many times, I can invert them from black to white.
So now it looks like the emulsion has been scraped off through overuse.
Great.
I could keep dirtying my image even more, but I’ll stop here and look at the Gate
Weave.
This adds a bit of controllably random movement to the image.
I’ll keep this fairly subtle, but feel free to go extreme if that’s what you want.
And to finish the look, we also have modules for Vignette and Film Grain.
These work just like they do in the individual filters, but it’s great to have them all
contained in one place.
Now I’m finished, all that’s left is to save this as my own preset and I have this
to use again and again.
That’s a quick look at the new filters added to the Cinematographer’s Toolkit.
It’s very easy to lose yourself in a lot of these filters, as they are so responsive
and fun to use.
If you’re working with Continuum in Avid, there are some big improvements with how these
new filters work.
Applying one of the new filters shows some core Avid features that Continuum is known
for.
This makes it easy to apply multiple effects to titles without affecting the underlying
layers, or ensure that you’re generating Broadcast Safe levels within the filter.
Finally the True Bypass switch gives you an easy way to see the unfiltered result without
physically removing the effect.
I can use this to create a little before/after, just to make sure I like the result I’ve
created.
Continuum 2021.5 is available now for Adobe, Avid, and selected OFX hosts.
And these are just some of the new features.
To see more about Continuum and check out licensing and upgrade options go to BorisFX.com.
You’ll also find hours of free tutorials for Continuum and the range of Boris FX products.
All at BorisFX.com.