Why Blender Users Need To Learn Natron!! - Compositing relighting Tutorial

[@johntnguyen1976]

Nice! I've been excited about Natron for a while...but well constructed Natron education is a bit lacking on the interwebs. And I don't know Nuke well enough to apply any knowledge to figuring out Natron. So I was going to learn Nuke first, then tackle Natron eventually on my own. I'm still going to learn Nuke, but would 100% love more Natron content!

[@GENVFX]

Yes, Nuke is brilliant and well made. It looks so similar to Natron but they are, fundamentally, different programs. I'll do more vids about it, though, for sure.

[@johntnguyen1976]

@@GENVFX One video that isn't even close to existing anywhere...is a Natron vs Nuke comparison type video.

[@xanzuls]

I was honestly stuck between Natron and Fusion as Nuke alternative (no AE since no nodes in AE) but I've come to the conclusion of choosing Fusion as my main compositing software. Both Fusion and Natron are free. (Fusion has a free and paid version) But the free version of Fusion has more features than Natron. The Fusion free version has full 3D workspace and has 3D tools and almost majority of the paid studio version. Fusion is currently developed by Blackmagic where Natron is barely being maintained and the guys who made natron have left a long time ago and one of the guys are now making Autograph which is another AE clone. Fusion is way more stable and has much less bugs where Natron can be very buggy, unstable and slow. Fusion is proprietary and Natron is open source but tbh, most avg people don't care much about something being opensource as long it's free but even if you are using natron because it's open source you're still just learning and using Nuke under the hood because in a likely event where you'd wanna upgrade from Natron to work on bigger projects, you're most likely gonna move to Nuke and not Fusion. But Blender is free and open source as well but it's not a maya or max copy unlike Natron which is 1 to 1 copy of Nuke and that's why there are more people using Blender and the more Blender improves the more it's gonna create more competition between different DCCs but for Natron it's more likely never gonna surpass Nuke and it's most likely never gonna get big updates and gonna compete with Nuke, so using it more is basically more or less learning the Nuke workflow and supporting the Nuke monopoly. But on the other hand, Fusion is developed by a different company, the paid version of Fusion can very much compete with Nuke, the workflow is similar but different, it has tools and advantages that Nuke doesn't have like better mograph and GPU acceleration etc. If more people start using Fusion even tho it's like only $300 one time, that's gonna actually create more competition between different comp apps and that's gonna improve those even more. That's just my opinion and why I chose Fusion over Natron. If Natron works for you then sure.

[@KendisFX]

Good video! I'm also a big fan of Natron. I used Natron as compositor for all the videos on my channel, and the video with the sun explosion was even created exclusively with Natron. But I won't be using it any more soon. It's become extremely unreliable, even though my PC runs on Linux and the NVIDIA driver is up to date. I think that's because it's not being maintained very often, which is sad. The Glow Node is constantly causing problems and I can no longer render projects when I use Natron's greatest strength, the Shader Toy and the Community PlugIns, with the GPU. And CPU rendering simply takes too long. Old data keeps getting stuck in the cache and the lens flare nodes, which I really need, make the Natron crash. Maybe it is an NVDIA related issue and it works better with other GPUs.

[@GENVFX]

Couldn't agree more. I'm now using fusion in my free Resolve. Much bettererer.

[@rano12321]

Unless your goals are to stay inside only open source realm then IMO Fusion is a much better choice than Natron. Since Natron is a nuke copy, it could be only as much good as Nuke and nothing more than that and considering it's pretty much an abandoned software, you'd be better off using Fusion since the company Blackmagic is unlike most companies (Adobe, Autodesk) and against subscription. Features and stability wise Fusion is way ahead of natron. Unless you are using Natron because you wanna use Nuke in future to get a job in VFX, then you should just use the free NC version of Nuke.

[@GENVFX]

Yes, I couldn't agree more. When I did that video, Natron were making updates. It appears that all that has ended. And out of the rest, Fusion is still the best free option.

[@pipeliner8969]

great to see more Natron tutorials. It's too underrated.

[@GENVFX]

Glad you like them!

[@FilmSpook]

👍🏾👍🏾Many Thanks, my Brother!! Wishing you a Great 2023.

[@GENVFX]

Thanks and you too!

[@luciox2919]

wish blender inducts natron in their software... instead of their disorganized and decomposed nodes in their compositor

[@ShiroiAkumaSama]

I recently started to use Natron and I am surprised I didn't hear of it much earlier. I thought using Affinity Photo to edit multilayer open exr files. But with Natron thanks to some nodes I am able to get really good results rather quick. Sadly sometimes the cryptomatte node bugs a bit out. When it works it is super cool

[@GENVFX]

I think the cryptomatte needs some work, yes. If I think I'm going to be needing mattes for stuff, I tend to make them from an ID Pass.

[@kevinbillington9773]

I have started using Davinci Resolve Studio. I read on a comment that the Fusion compositing is hamstrung, I am wondering how this is so? You also get the full Fusion studio too, with the license of resolve.

[@GENVFX]

Resolve is excellent, yes. I think there are a few differences between Resolve's Fusion and Fusion standalone, but I don't think there is much difference. The free one is hamstrung, but even that is still excellent. I edit the KZbin videos in Resolve and use Fairlight in it to edit my podcast.

[@kevinbillington9773]

@@GENVFX Thanks for the reply 👍🏻👍🏻

[@xanzuls]

@@GENVFX I don't think the free version of Fusion is hamstrung, it just doesn't have some of the advanced nodes and the 3D camera tracker which neither Natron has. But it still has more features than Natron in total.

[@kevinbillington9773]

@@xanzuls thanks for the clear response.

[@xanzuls]

@@kevinbillington9773 Give both a shot and see which one works the best for you.

[@gravitomagneticpower]

Is Natron still in developement? The last release is from november 2022 and it is 2023 march already... I wish this software would become kind of free compositors choice like blender in 3d community. But it is very buggy yet and some nodes need more developement (greenscreen keying, post process motionblur is missing etc...)

[@GENVFX]

I feel the same way. It is still being updated, but it's a but intermittent.

[@dongiovanni1993]

So, what of this exactly cannot be done in the blender's embedded compositor?

[@GENVFX]

A separate compositor like Natron has access to many extra options, for example, open source effects OFX that can provide lots of stuff that Blender does not have.

[@cihatfg]

nice

[@ganapathym3664]

What lacks in blender that we should go for natron

[@GENVFX]

Oh it's not about what is lacking in Blender, it's about what you can do with you rendered images once youre in Natron. Compositing if often quicker than re rendering, so lighting changes or color fixes can be done faster than returning to the scene file

[@ganapathym3664]

@@GENVFX Thank you for the reply.

[@rano12321]

proper vfx compositing.