Final Effects Complete includes the formerly-named Studio Effects, Next Effects and ICE FX and will continue to be offered with BorisFX providing maintenance, support and future development.

Final Effects was one of the first filter sets for Adobe After Effects and has has a chequered ownership history from the original Cycore developers, to finally end up at Media 100. However in the meantime, the original owners had rights revert to them and the 8-bit versions of the plug-ins are bundled with Adobe After Effects 6.5 (for After Effects only). Cycore have released updated, After Effects-only versions that work at 16 bit, but the Final Effects Complete set is needed to work in other hosts. However it has languished as non-core at Media 100/Optibase.

The really good news is that Boris plans to modify the copy protection to match the scheme used with Boris Continuum Complete instead of the much maligned licensing scheme used by Media 100.

Although the overall market for Final Effects Complete is smaller than it would be without the compeition in the After Effects arena from Cycore, it is good to see the plug-ins back with a company that cares about plug-ins and is capable of keeping the code up-to-date. This would be a particularly good development if the code can be updated to work reliably in Final Cut Pro and Motion. (Although FEC’s core particle generators are less needed in Motion than in Final Cut Pro.) There are also plug-ins from the ICE era that have not been reproduced or replaced.

Final Effects Complete is one of the more expensive plug-in sets at US$795 MSRP or $1295 in combination with Boris Continuum Complete. Existing registered Boris Contininuum Complete owners can purchase Final Effects Complete for US$299 until August 30th, 2005. Similarly existing Final Effects Complete users can purchase Boris Continuum Complete for US$595. Trial versions of all Boris solutions can be downloaded at www.borisfx.com.

As part of their ongoing communication, Apple have added a new workflow guide in Frequently Asked Question form in a downloadable pdf.

The download is linked from the Final Cut Pro "Edit Everything" page.

The guide is fairly basic but will answer novice questions about HDV and working with it in Final Cut Pro compared to some other applications.

Until the end of July Wave Arts is offering a US$50 discount on purchases of their plug-ins for June and July. The sale includes Track Plug – an all in one 10 band EQ, compressor and gate channel strip; MasterVerb, MultiDynamics and FinalPlug – a peak limiter/loudness maximizer.

The plug-ins are available for all native formats on Mac (Audio Units, VST, MAS and RTAS) and Windows (VST, DX and RTAS).

If you purchased in June, before the reduction was announced, you can get a US$50 refund by emailing infor@wavearts.com with your order number.

Can’t reset the Match EQ template spectrum

When using Match EQ in an audio project file with a chosen template spectrum for the Match EQ spectrum and select a new audio file you can’t hear playback of the new file, even though the waveform appears to change.

The solution is to remove the Match EQ plug-in from the project and then reinsert it.

Non-looping Apple Loops preview gets cut off

If you have a playback region in the Timeline of a multitrack Soundtrack Pro project and preview a non-looping Apple Loop, the loop may get cut off after playing a second or two. This does not affect looping Apple Loops.

Diane Diplazza’s Dinc Fonts (a.k.a. Girls who wear glasses) are offering a set of nine free fonts from now through until July first based on the swinging London era of Beatles, Mary Quant, Jeannie Shrimpton and the Kinks. If you remember the era, or need to recreate the feel these nine fonts will help.

The new fonts are: Top Of The Pops, Fab, Liverpool, Jeannie Shrimpton, Too Cool, High Numbers, Waterloo, Swingin’ London, and Mary Quant.

Check out the main site for some very cool retro fonts and clip art and fonts.

With 1.1 release, Buena software have added two new plug-ins to their Depth Cue set of 3D effect plug-ins for realistic depth effects in Adobe After Effects. Each effect works on a 3D layer and changes based on the location of the layer, lights, and cameras in 3D space.

The two new effects are:

• Camera Mapper to map 2D footage onto 3D layers to create 3D scenes from it;
• Flipside maps one layer onto the back of another layer without causing any occlusion problems or creating a gap between the 2 layers.

The new plug-ins join 3D Composite, Depth, Falloff Lighting, Fog and Rack focus to complete Depth Cue. Depth Cue is US$169 from Buena Software for Mac OS X and Windows. It requires Adobe After Effects 6 or later. The update is free for registered users and a free demonstration version is available. A one-day serial number is available off the site.