Weird halo using Lens Blur depth map

[NewtV]

Is there a way to get rid of this weird halo that appears when I use Lens Blur Filter with a Depth Map?
The sharp areas should be in focus at the edges, but they show a strange halo, like if I'm using a fog lens.
Even if the Z map has a good contrast between dark an white areas, the halo appears at the edges as if the subject was out if focus.

[Andrew Yoole]

Can you post a screengrab of the effects control panel with all of the Camera Lens Blur parameters visible?

If you precompose the depth map layer and use Levels in the precomp to brighten the main body of the character to pure white, do you still get the halo?

[NewtV]

[NewtV]

This is exactly what I do. Precompose, use the Extractor filter to make ZDepth channel visible and setup Black Point and White Point to get the better contrast.

[NewtV]

I've tried many settings, but never get rid of this halo in all of my works. 

[Andrew Yoole]

Not knowing a whole lot about your job, here's some questions:

Why is your Blur Focal Distance set to 194?  If you change it to 0 what happens?

What function are Masks playing in your comp? Why are you using masks in the blur effect?

[NewtV]

As usual, when you change the number of Blur Focal Distance, it will set the focus to another area (based on grayscale tone). In this case the focus goes to the background and the character becomes out of focus. 

[NewtV]

The Blur Map is used to tell AE where you want the focus to be, in combination with Blur Focal Distance set. If I don't use a Blur Map, all image becomes out of focus and that's not what I want.

[NewtV]

Everytime I use Lens Blur, using a DOF Map (Blur Map) I get a weird halo around focused objects.  
The same files in Photoshop using Lens Blur everything works fine without that annoying halo. 
I've tried a lot of different settings in After Effects, but I can't get the same nice result I get in Photoshop. 

[NewtV]

Using 100 Blur Radius - Lens Blur in Photoshop

Using 100 Blur Radius - Lens Blur in After Effects

[NewtonArt]

Nobody seems to know much about this filter in this community... and even at Adobe. 

[NewtonArt]

Looks like AE team needs to learn some tricks with PS team

[Andrew Yoole]

I tried to reproduce your problem.  I don't have clean versions of your image so I just used Generative Fill to create a crude copy.  I used Photoshop's "Slect subject" to select the bug and create a black/white depth matte.  The results were the same in AE with Lens Camera Blur - a soft fringe around the subject when it's blurred.

However, if I then used the Depth Matte as a luma matte I was able to remove the fringe altogether, leaving a hard edge (Probably a bit too hard, you lose the sense of the blur.)

 

You could do the same if you're able to render a matte pass of your bug character without any background elements.  

But ultimately I think this is just a limitation of the plugin.

 

[NewtonArt]

I think it's more than a limitation, it's a bug that exists since CS6 version. We could say it's a limitation if no other software could achieve a decent result, but PS can do a very good result using the "same" filter.  It's strange that no one from Adobe has responded about this bug.

[NewtonArt]

Here are the files of this Bug (Beauty and ZDepth images).

[JohnColombo]

Hi @NewtV,

Thank you for reporting this issue. As noted, this is a long-standing limitation of the Camera Lens Blur effect, but one that we would like to improve. We're tracking this issue and will be investigating an improvement for a future version of After Effects.

Cheers,

- John, After Effects Engineering Team 

[NewtonArt]

Hi John. I'm glad to know it, because  Lens Blur is (or would be) a very useful filter for 3D artists. A good reference to solve the problem is the same filter in PS, that works perfectly fine. And the PS Lens Blur filter the user can click on the point where he wants to focus, this is very useful and lacks in AE as well.

[NewtonArt]

Is there any timeline for when this bug will be fixed? Lens Blur is a very important filter but it's useless as it is now.

[NewtonArt]

8 months later, this bug has not yet been fixed!!!

[NewtonArt]

8 months later after reported, this bug has not yet been fixed!!!

[marco_py]

This has been a problem for over 10 years and there still isn't a solution

[Alexander Rott]

Not sure if you've checked this plugin out, but I've used it in the past at a different agency and it worked a lot better than AE's built in filter. Specifically on not giving me that halo effect you described. Personally, I don't think Adobe will ever change this. 

https://www.frischluft.com/lenscare/index.php

[NewtV]

Thank you for your answer, but it's outrageous to have to pay $239 to replace a native plugin that should work seamlessly, especially given our existing (not cheap) monthly Adobe subscription.

[Alexander Rott]

100% agree

[marco_py]

My workaround for now is to add a fast box blur with a radius of 15 to the depth map layer, sort of softens it up.

Then in the Camera lens blur effect I change the Blur Map layer to Effects & Masks so it's applied.

[NewtV]

Didn't worked for me. In fact, the halo became stronger