Compositors, DFusion, Combustion...

[alexoctagon]

Hi

I've seen the deal for DFX + LW8, but although a great deal, I'm not sure about DF. I tried both Combustion and DF demos but found Combustion great to use and DF terrible - what do you all think?

Cheers, Alex

[Lightwolf]

The opposite :)
I've used combustion 1.0 extensively, and checked out 2.x, as well as DF 3.12 extensively. I'll get the DF 4.0 upgrade soon.
The main difference imho: combustion is nice for a couple of layers, if you need the 3D comp space, the tracker is decent as well as the colour correction and the g-masks rock. It is however dog slow.
DF is much faster, has a better workflow (imho again), and is great for very complex comps that I wouldn't attempt in combustion (or AE for that matter). Text+ is a great tool (it saved my a** so many times...), and it is rock solid.

just my 2 cents...
Cheers,
Mike

[alexoctagon]

When you say Combusion 2 is 'dog slow' Lightwolf, which aspect do you mean? Generating the previews, or the final render?

[Lightwolf]

Expecially the final renders. Once it chews up your RAM for its cache, it slows to a crawl. I found DF to be much faster rendering (that is on DF 3.12, I thnk DF 4.0 is a tad slower as well...).
I'm also faster in DF than in combustion becuase I find the interface handling to be faster (not in the comp itself, but finding and selecting tools...).
Cheers,
Mike