Which one is better? Nuke or Fusion

Heres' what you need to know about Nuke and Fusion before you start your compositing journey.
A special thanks to ‪@InLightVFX‬ and ‪@AlfieVaughan‬ for being awesome dudes and inspiring me to finish this video.
*Couple of notes:
1) Several people have pointed out you can have shortcuts in Fusion. I appreciate the insight.
I still think it's weird BMD didn't implement it better.
2) I don't delete comments, that's a YT issue. Sorry if your comment doesn't show up.
3) Thank you to everything who has contributed to this discussion in a meaningful way. I'm glad we can all learn from each other.
Alfie's video: • Professional Nuke Arti...
Jacob's video: • Should you use LAYERS ...
Channels to check out.
VFX education:
‪@AlfieVaughan‬
‪@InLightVFX‬
Nuke education:
‪@CompositingMentor‬
‪@Rebelway‬
‪@theagsway‬
‪@CompositingAcademy‬
Fusion education:
‪@MillolabTuts‬
‪@SimonUbsdell‬
‪@VFXstudy‬
‪@prophetless‬
Should mention as well
‪@pixeltrain3d‬
Great comparison on Fusion Studio and Resolve Fusion.
Resources:
Nukepedia - www.nukepedia.com/
Steak Under Water - www.steakunderwater.com/
Fusion-Keyboard-Shortcuts - vfxstudy.com/wp-content/uploa...
Courses mentioned:
Resolve 17 End to End - www.groundcontrol.film/resolv...
Advanced Compositing for VFX - www.rebelway.net/advanced-com...
Templates: ko-fi.com/kyleheilig
Socials and Resources: bio.link/kyleheilig
Join us on Discord…
Jake Wipp’s DaVinci Resolve Discord
www.jakewipp.com/discord/join
Mr Alex Tech’s Discord
/ discord
Jay Lippman's Discord
/ discord
0:00 - The common question
0:40 - Interface
3:00 - Functionality
5:30 - Software packages
7:48 - Common tasks
9:54 - Available resources
11:14 - Which one is right for you?

[@cbengua]

02:28 you can use CTRL+P (Pass Through) to disable nodes in Fusion. It's listed.

[@111ch1a1d111]

Weird. Video is FILLED with errors that have to be corrected by commenters. Like dozens of errors. Just a heads up to anyone watching this.

[@rano12321]

pretty much. So many misinfos. I like how he says he knows both because he uses both and then proceeds to be wrong almost about everything about Fusion.

[@imiy]

Explain

[@rano12321]

@@imiy He was wrong about Fusion not having hotkeys He was wrong about Fusion not being able to quickly switch on and off a node, He was wrong about Fusion nodes not having comments/notes, He was wrong about not being able to snap nodes without the grid He was wrong about not being able to do buffer split in Fusion He was wrong about Fusion not having scopes and graphs to color match. He was wrong about pretty much 90% of the video.

[@imiy]

@@rano12321 hotkeying process is really fucked up though. I've spent half of the day figuring and setting it up, and then after the restart it didn't even save what i set up🤡

[@rano12321]

@@imiy Look up the manual. It does the job for me.

[@G.I_BRO_SHOW]

Fusion got the one off payment and I own it instead of subscription

[@AlfieVaughan]

Oops! Sorry I won the race on the video idea haha. Great minds think alike! It's interesting seeing it from the perspective of someone who knows Fusion better. My video was quite one sided 🤣

[@terr20114]

Steakunderwater has a Nuke2Fusion thing that you can install that gives fusion Nuke's shortcuts. T for transform, m for merge etc.

[@dabblerlabs]

Thanks for the tip. Love your videos btw.

[@terr20114]

@@dabblerlabs Wow! Thanks for checking out my videos.

[@jensgeumann7564]

In fact, Fusion even has 4 screens. You can load an A and B buffer for each viewer and then compare with a swipe.

[@gamingrealism5553]

I use Fusion for my work as a VFX Compositor in cinema production, and Fusion it's a powerful software.

[@gamingrealism5553]

@@Readthis880 yeah, but the warper will go perfectly if we add more point anchor. I do that for motion graphic, and it was good, the company was happy, no revision.

[@akyhne]

Another resource for Fusion, is the old owner's channel of Fusion, which is still on KZbin. The channel is called Eyeon software, if I remember correctly. Although it's about a very old version of Fusion, the basics are the same, as in modern Fusion software.

[@KrunoslavStifter]

I don't think its possible to make any kind of legit comparison in 13 min video between these two programs because there are so many situations where one has the edge over the other. But you can say in broad strokes that Fusion is far cheaper option making it more accessible to many people who are not part of the VFX houses, teams or big film making studios. Its about as capable as Nuke for pretty much anything you want to do, but its not as common in mentioned places because the "industry" has opted out for Nuke instead of Fusion. Its not that Fusion is not capable its just the way things went for variety of reasons that are more political than anything. Similar how Avid and ProTools got a hold on the industry. These days Nuke tends to be preferred option for many VFX houses, and freelancers who work for these houses have to adopt. Fusion remains great and much cheaper but just as capable alternative that is also gaining new market share by people who are moving to resolve from premier pro and are looking to also replace or supplement After Effects. So Indy production, so called content creators etc. Also worth mentioning is that there are more and more motion graphic artists who work with Fusion instead or or supplement to After Effects. And there are lot of editors who need ready made motion graphics and other things they pull from fusion which is part of resolve. Also worth mentioning is that Nuke as well as Fusion are expanded by third party plug ins and scripts and off course Fusion has Reactor for custom macros and Nuke has similar thing. Tutorials are about the same, although more are made for Fusion because there are more users now or resolve so all kind of motion graphic stuff is accessible. If you go to be a junior VFX artists in some studio, probably they will train you on Nuke. If you are starting off alone probably Fusion is good way to start since its cheaper and accessible. But either way you learn its not too hard to use the other once you understand what you want to do, they are both node based compositors with lots of similarity and support same OFX plug ins. Scripts are similar but obviously slightly more tailored to users who made them for specific tasks. Other than that. Its hard to go wrong with either one, and depending on your interest and needs you might want to start with the one that will get you there faster. Simple as that.

[@MauroSanna]

Regarding Fusion price: you pay 300 bucks only once, one off. All the updates and major releases are free forever. You don't have to pay every time you upgrade.

[@theagsway]

Thank you very much for the mention in your description. I really appreciate it. 😊

[@witozaar5988]

Thank you for this awesome video and all the references!

[@ocdvfx]

You can use the flipbook in conjunction with the audio read node, reference the audio read you would like to attach, when it's finished caching your flipbook. It will play the sequence with sound

[@dabblerlabs]

Thanks for the tip.

[@DaemonPredator]

I agree with you on AE, hahaha. There's a reactor script to emulate Nuke's common shortcuts.

[@Leprutz]

it is like you said. When working in the industry as a compositor Nuke is a must have. But the same Job can be done with Fusion too. In the end it is really up to the user. I am no compositing guy. I am more the director and editor. But as an editor Davinci Resolve, Fusion comes in handy for some small time effects to really push you production.

[@XtraCreamy]

Thank you for explaining this!

[@matejivi]

Thank you this was very helpfull! Subscribed. Need more deep Compositing tuts for Fusion!

[@spydergs07]

Fusions newer AI masking tools are beyond amazing. They are create SUPER clean tracks.

[@DonTNguyen]

Our studio had Nuke artists do motion graphics and it was painful and felt like pulling hairs. In the end they hired a really good After Effects artist that took care of all the motion graphics.

[@DonTNguyen]

we're also testing Autograph by Left Angle very interesting to see more options when it comes to motion graphics and compositing. @@dabblerlabs

[@ApexArtistX]

Go fusion

[@manylearn744]

I was about to make this video, you beat me to it! Good stuff! I really felt the section about viewport assignment in nuke vs fusion. My current janky workaround in fusion is to add a switch node and use it kind of like a jank nuke viewer node and pin it in the inspector. Far from ideal. Oh and fusion nodes do have notes, they're just on the setting tab of each node.

[@asphaltandtacos]

Nuke does have a better node tree. I find masks in Fusion to be a bit annoying. You can’t combine multiple masks in a single node. Both programs are solid. Fusion does have color correction tools although the Color page in Resolve is better for color grading. I believe that Filmlight does have a color correction tool that works natively in Nuke which might be a better choice. EDIT: Fusion has added a multi polygon tool in the most recent version which is in beta at this time.

[@kcoppa]

2:15 Stand alone fusion has shortcuts. 4:46 Fusion also has A / B comparison. You activate it on the viewer you want and send the nodes you want to compare to the same viewer. Pirates of ConFUSION does advanced tutorials on Fusion. One thing that really bugs me about fusion is there is no shortcut to connect nodes. I would love to highlight two nodes press a button and it connects to an input. Then there would be another button to swap if necessary. Great video by the way!

[@millolab]

For some reason my comments keep being deleted, I guess. This is not nice. Looks like you don't like constructive criticism.

[@millolab]

@@dabblerlabs that’s weird. But I’m glad you didn’t delete it. I was thanking you for the link to my channel and pointing out a few flaws of your vid.

[@gamingrealism5553]

@@millolab ahh, this one of the best tutor for Fusion. You guys can learn from him, and also Pirates of Confusion.. where is he? he's the best too. I use Fusion for vfx compositing in cinema production (Disney+ and Netflix), Fusion it's a powerful software. Thank you btw for your tutorial @millolab

[@TangleWireTube]

Alfie’s video, & specifically your comment on that video saying you had just made a similar one, is what brought me to your channel 😂 I subscribed so I wouldn’t miss this one when it released. Not all bad that you waited 6 months. Cheers 🍻

[@TangleWireTube]

@@dabblerlabs no doubt. It was great. I’ve used Fusion for years. Never really dived into Nuke. Your perspective has been one of the most informed I’ve seen on the topic so far. While I love the general workflow comparison, what I would really love to hear are what if any functions are exclusive to each program? You touched on this a little (ie audio and mograph) but dose Nuke have any compositing tools that Fusion doesn’t have answers too / vice versa? (Also on Fusion courses I would recommend Con-Fusion’s Pirate series. CMIVFX use to have several great courses in Fusion back when it was with Eyeon, but they’re no longer around.)

[@salmannafeesacademy]

Great video thanks, btw you can ise the shortcut key command + p or ctrl +p while selecting a node to disable it or "pass through" to be more specific.

[@TriniWeekes]

Thanks Dabbler appreciate this

[@Virosaa]

Nuke is way too expensive

[@nahkubnah]

Great vid. really informative thanks a lot!!

[@dabblerlabs]

Glad it was helpful!

[@alexmuller452]

at the end of the video you said "I can't believe I recommended after effects". I believe a video will come with you saying, "I can't believe I said fusion doesn't have those features". It is necessary that such a video comes, as multiple comparison arguments you mentioned against fusion are false, unfortunately. Not to say that fusion is better or otherwise. It is just false info that should be corrected. Just so it doesn't seem a fusion users are trying to attack you, I will explain where the false comparison arguments are: 1- As mentioned by others in the comments, Fusion has node shortcuts. 2- The viewer AB buffer function is also available in fusion, you can in fact have as many viewers as you want, and each one has an AB buffer function in it. in the upper left corner next to the Zoom percentage, you can activate it. You can also fast switch between them using comma "," and dot "." buttons. 3- Stand alone version of Fusion has actually performance advantages over the one in Davinci and is widely used, might be even more used than the one in Davinci. So much that BMD wanted to discontinue it before but the community fought for it so much that it was kept and further developed. 4- Node renaming issue can also be solved, i literally googled "is there a way to change the automatic naming convention fusion has when copying nodes" and the first result had the solution. please check this article: www.steakunderwater.com/wesuckless/viewtopic.php?t=291 Please don't take it as I am attacking your video or channel, I am kindly asking you to ask more experienced people before you share info, a lot of professionals hang out in discord channel "Pirates of Confusion" and we all welcome anyone to ask questions in our friendly community, you are welcome to join. I am not the owner of the channel, just a casual member there. Invitation: discord.gg/7Vs3F4pJ best of luck.

[@xanzuls]

+1

[@mfjae]

i still appreciate your insight on this, even though it took you 6 months late, lol. you still pointed out some very important and useful things that others left out. maybe you can be that guy to help us out with a fusion course that really teaches us compositing from beginner to advanced. might be hard to do but with your expereince and insight i have certainly chosen to learn fusion and i would love to learn fusion from a guy who used both industry standard nuke and regulr fusion. i would certainly buy that.

[@justinwking]

although not as good as a single short cut, you can shift space, then type letter combo in fusion for desired nodes

[@RealTimeFilms]

You can use the Merge node to switch between the 2 inputs using CTRL T. And I think there are other ways too. And you can very easy create a Merge by dragging the wire output of the foreground and drop it over the output of the background. The Merge will be created with the wires already in place. Easy to remember - foreground wire over the background wire. I would argue that's even easier and more intuitive than in Nuke.

[@dabblerlabs]

There are a lots of ways to switch the viewer, merge is probably the simplest. There are lots of small details I didn't go into. I'm just covering the larger bits.

[@RealTimeFilms]

@@dabblerlabs It was still an interesting video.

[@MillolabTuts]

did my comment just disappear?

[@xanzuls]

feels the same for me.

[@ADR69]

Ultimately the best software is going to be whatever you're most comfortable with. Resolve was the only editing suite that immediately made sense after trying most others. All that slow stuff mentioned about fusion can be made faster, it just takes a little customization. If you're a power user with fusion, you've most likely already made it yours with custom key mapping, macros, etc just like any tool in the arsenal. I always want to try new software but the lack of productivity when getting over the learning curve is too much for me in most instances.

[@TomSidProductions]

I miss the old Fusion UI, yeah the new UI matches resolve, but the the caveat is that all the customizability of 9 is now gone.

[@dabblerlabs]

I've heard that. It's a real shame. I know the color page its BMD's main thing, but I hope they put some more effort into Fusion. It's a great program, just needs some love.

[@AyushBakshi]

my biggest gripe with foundry products is their deep throat licensing... it doesn't work w/o internet connection.

[@onelaststop]

I think Fusion is even more comparable with Nuke for normal compositing tasks than this video covers if you dig into Fusion more. However, I think there is no question that Nuke is more capable for the more advanced compositing tasks and methods such as Deep. Fusion has unlimited render licenses for network rendering for Fusion Studio. DaVinci Resolve has none and Nuke gets pricey quick.

[@i20010]

Nuke is depressingly expensive, if youre in a small shop, your boss wouldnt like that price tag.

[@dabblerlabs]

Depressingly expensive is a very accurate description.

[@xpdx]

after hueghhhhks 😂

[@Smarthalayla]

Which one is better? Nuke or Fusion? Blender is way better.

[@rano12321]

as a blender user, no.

[@ale_dp9]

Definitely, Nuke, is the best software across 2d and 3d, actually with USD workflow you can achieve awesome result, just think the powerful switching in UE with new plugin developed for nuke15, also the infinite customization and the various gizmo from nukepedia, by the community are insane..!

[@rano12321]

it's very much over priced and they barely develop anything new. most of the cool stuff in nuke are developed by other studios and then foundry just shoves it in nuke.

[@ale_dp9]

I think the cost is great for the software you get, otherwise adobe suit is nice alternative :) @@rano12321

[@rano12321]

@@ale_dp9 The software has been unchanged for more than a decade and recently they've moved to subscription only system for new users where the proper version of nuke is $6k a year. Adobe doesn't have proper node based compositing suit for pro vfx.

[@VisualistAyush07]

It's time to move to nuke

[@eddy9831]

bro made me uninstall fusion(that i nvr opened) :)

[@manojachar5083]

Nuke is always better ❤❤😊

[@akyhne]

I'm sure Blackmagic will eventually pick up the pace on the development of Fusion, and get it up to speed. It used to be used a lot in Hollywood production, but has fallen behind Nuke. I'm sure, it hasn't been easy, to implement the software, into DaVinci Resolve, and has taken the focus away from huge improvements.

[@rano12321]

no

[@HenriqueCE]

12:59 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 I'm making the switch to Fusion. Most of my jobs are for motion design. AE is better for this, but I'll get through. I don't have to much of a choice. 🥲 Thanks for the video and the recommendations.