Crummy Camera Lens Blur CS6

[Guest]

The Camera Lens Blur effect that came with AE CS 5.5 and CS 6 doesn't look nearly as good as the old Lens Blur effect that came with CS 5; it's pretty much unusable for my purposes. Foreground elements that should be sharp render sharp, but with a blurry halo around them. The old Camera Lens blur does not exhibit this behavior, nor the Frischluft Depth of Field plugin.

Here's an image showing the depth map and how the three plugins render it:

CameraLensBlur.png

The images are composited from 16-bit PNGs rendered out of Cinema 4D. There's a nasty halo visible around the foreground particle in the upper left in the CS6 Camera Lens Blur version. I saved the old Lens Blur effect as a preset out of a CS5 project and am, fortunately, still able to use that approach in CS6 since the "improved" version of the plugin looks pretty crummy (I skipped AE CS5.5). As a test I installed the demo of Frishluft's Lenscare plugins, and after inverting the depth buffer in the plugin I got a good result.

The "new" Camera Lens Blur is acting like the Compound Blur effect. Foreground elements appear sharp but with a blurry halo since the entire "background" is being blurred, creating a blurred ghost of the foreground element. The old Lens Blur effect was very slow, but it did work.

Anyone know how to make this new "improved" Camera Lens Blur look like the other plugins?  I've posted a zipped file with the image and depth map in a small AE CS6 project here if anyone here would care to check my settings.  Maybe I'm missing somthing.

CameraBlurs folder.zip

Thank you.

Shawn Marshall

Marshall Arts Motion Graphics

[reel2riehl]

I was able to import the blur effect from CS5 into the plugins folder for CS6. I took away the current pluging for "lens blur" and this worked. store your CS6 plugin somewhere else for use in the future. However when I open After Effects both "camera lens blur" and "lens blur" show up in my effects panel. Not sure why they are both there, but they both work!

-seth

[puppetnonsense]

AAAAnnnnnnnd still unresolved. Look, I know there must be a ton to do at Adobe, but how could such an egregious mistake make it through quality control? Is there literally no one that tests new effects when they are implemented? I somehow doubt it, which leads me to believe that this was a known issue when the new effect was added. I could be wrong, but either way, for something as essential as using a depth map for DOF effects, this is unacceptable, especially for a software that touts itself as being a professional level compositing application. 

I have filled a bug report, but if its honestly been this long, what chances are there that this will be resolved anytime soon? It's sure not going to help me finish the project I'm working on currently.

It seems like every other day I need to buy this plugin or that plugin to get the functionality I need from AE. I left Nuke due to the high cost, but now I'm beginning to understand that you get what you pay for.

To the poor individuals who have to read all of our complaints, I thank you. I know you aren't responsible.

[Tim Kurkoski]

Hi puppetnonsense,

We are looking at making improvements to the Camera Lens Blur effect for a near-term release. Right now I can't promise that this will definitely happen, or when such a release would be available. I can say that the work is high on our priorities list.

When we introduced Camera Lens Blur in After Effects CS5.5, it solved many issues with performance compared to the old Lens Blur effect, as well as adding new capabilities. It also introduced this problem with overlapping depths. We have investigated this and understand the problem; the solution requires a complex re-working of the algorithm that Camera Lens Blur currently uses. The amount of time it will take to engineer this, and the fact that the existing results are good for cases where overlapping depths do not occur, have been contributing factors towards us not yet choosing to make this change.

Now that the issue is higher on our priority list, there's a good chance the work will get done soon.

Please do continue filing bugs for issues that you see in After Effects. We read all of them and the data we get helps us to prioritize improvements to After Effects.

[staus_me]

So now we're in AE CC 2014 and I see absolutely no difference to this essential feature!

How come this is not more important? I literally use this effect on every single project where I import 3D sequences and there are no such cases where "overlapping depths do not occur". The one reason I want to use this tool is because I have overlapping depths from a depth map. If there wasn't any overlap I wouldn't need this tool. I could simply use another simpler blur effect and mask the desired area and I'd be ok with it. With depth maps that's not possible, though, so a tool like this is essential!!

Either fix it or remove it. This tools' been sitting in the effects box for generations without fulfilling its purpose

[emomobile]

Amen! Even in CS5 it was never as good as Frischluft's Lens Blur. C'mon Adobe, step it up.

[puppetnonsense]

Has this moved forward yet or been dealt with, do you know?

Thanks!

[Seb.James]

Nope, it still looks awful.

Adobe, any chance on when we can get this updated?! Sooner rather than later please!

[Hit The Roof]

It's been now more than 2 years now that Shawn referred to you this "bug". Thing that I doubt to be a bug. However, after 2 years now, and being on CC 2014.2, this is still ugly when using a depth map. The bokeh is nice, I give you that. But you clearly can't use it with a Dmap. I know it's pretty useless to tell you things that you already know, either make a bug report. It's clear now that it won't get any update.

And as someone here said, if you can't/don't wonna fix it, why can't you simply pack the old Lens Blur from CS5 as an obsolete effect ? Or let's go crazy, just buy the Frischluft (Dat name...) blur which works and pack it.

I would love, of course, to hear from you that you're on it and that a new release is coming soon... Anyway.

Just to remind you, here some pictures of what we are experiencing with your Lens Blur using a depth map.

Halo around the lens on the middle until the screw top right... and cannot be fixed by any way with the focal distance. But yes, the bokeh is really nice.

And here with the Frischluft

It simply works.

You could say then, why am I not buying it ? I'm considering it a lot now.

[WShawn]

THE number one selling point for this whole Creative Cloud thing was that the developers would no longer be subject to the tyranny of having to come up with new, attention-grabbling features every year for major, annual releases.  They could now go in and fix all of those little issues that impact workflow but aren't exciting selling points.

Yet here we are, two-and-a-half years since my original post on this issue, and still no progress.  According to Tim K. this was "higher on our priority list" almost exactly a year ago, and yet the problem exists.  Not that I've personally confirmed this since I refuse to install CC 2015, or work in anything higher than CS6 since the developers have removed the option for me to work in a dark on light interface for no apparent reason.

Maybe instead of letting broken features persist for years because only a handful of users understand how the feature should work and thus generate a sufficient number of bug reports you hire some more programmers to fix these issues.  Or just remove the feature until you get around to fixing it.  In the meantime I'm using Frischluft.

Shawn Marshall

Marshall Arts Motion Graphics

[Seb.James]

Amen to that!

Adobe, some of us work for studios who are not willing to go and buy plug-ins, so we rely on the tools that are luckily given to us (E.G creative cloud), it's not good enough when these tools don't work as they should especially when they are something as important as being able to use depth of field properly for compositing 3D shots.

[emomobile]

I'm having the same issue. I just submitted a bug report.

[Donavondb]

I'm having the same issue. This is ridiculous. Use to work so well. I'd happily take a render hit for accuracy. Just made a bug report

[Robert Glotzbach]

I'm honestly pretty shocked that after this long time the camera lens blur still does not work.

I filled in a bug report, but c'mon after such a long time?

Regards, Robert Glotzbach

[Seb.James]

Ok so I've just opened up After Effects CC 2015, and opened up a project that uses a depth pass, and an adjustment layer with the Camera Lens Blur effect applied to it, and it STILL doesn't work properly. There is still a halo around the objects that should be pin-sharp and in focus.

How has this not been fixed yet even with a new major release?!

[Szalam]

seb james wrote:

How has this not been fixed yet even with a new major release?!

I agree with your frustration on it not being fixed - I am similarly annoyed. However, CC 2015 isn't technically a major release in that it's AE version 13.5, not version 14.

Remember, to everyone in this thread, ALL of you need to file bug reports on this. The number of reports has an effect on the priority of a bug. Updated link (3/19): After Effects: Hot (1390 ideas) – Adobe video & audio apps

Even if you've filed before, this is a new release of AE and you can file a bug against this version too!

[Donavondb]

Yeah I have cloud and the cc2015 version. It's still an issue.

Been using the sapphire plugin, which is better, but still not perfect.

[Todd_Kopriva]

This fix is currently in our queue for later this year.

[SonicN2O]

What other glaring bugs in CC are there that are more important than this?

[Seb.James]

Any news on when this will be fixed? It's now later in the year, and still no fix.

[Seb.James]

HOW IS THIS STILL NOT FIXED???

Unbelievable, honestly. Just bloody fix the damn thing already.

[Seb.James]

Hi Todd,

Any sign of when this will be fixed? 3 years of waiting, many posts, multiple bug reports, and it's still not been done.

[Szalam]

Seb.James wrote:

Hi Todd,

Any sign of when this will be fixed?

Todd doesn't work for Adobe anymore.

File those feature requests, people! an official, traceable feature request is the best thing to do. Get everyone you know who uses AE to file one too. The more they get, the higher up the priority list it goes. I've filed one. Join me!

[the_dudes]

So?

[Szalam]

the_dudes  wrote

So?

Todd Kopriva doesn't work for Adobe any more.

the "Correct Answer" on this thread states that they haven't had a lot of bug reports on this, so it's not high priority. So, PLEASE file bug reports if this affects you! I have filed one, Updated link (3/19): After Effects: Hot (1390 ideas) – Adobe video & audio apps

[Guest]

Todd might not work for Adobe, but I'm fairly sure somebody still does. We shouldn't have to fill in bug reports for 5 years over a feature that we were told is in the process of getting fixed anyway... That's ridiculous.