After our last post last year đź‘€, we ran into a few issues. After Effects has a lot of different things it does plugin-wise depending upon what type of layer you're working on, what size things are, etc. You can get a sense of that while working with it when you have to deal with comp space, layer space, raster, vector, etc. All of that has to be accounted for. Then you even have GPU vs CPU rendering, etc.
We started teasing some AE plugins 2 years ago (if not more), and ran into some snags. But we are finally back on track at @ElementSupplyCo and can't wait to finally get these out in the wild soon. pic.twitter.com/DYLHHr5MTn
So the first thing we did was ditch the idea of CPU rendering. More and more, you can render on one machine in AE because of GPU plugins and the only edge case—that was pretty rare because of the hassle—is distributed rendering where you can only use CPU for whatever reason, so we decided to just stick with GPU rendering. A lot of the effects we're cooking up can be run in parallel on the GPU much faster.
Over the last year we've built a pipeline to build our After Effects plugins that we're calling Prometheus. So we're currently going back to our earlier alpha builds and rebuilding them to get them out to our beta testers to shake out as much as we can before we get them up here.
And unlike the last time when we thought we were in a good place and then ran into issues, this time we're ready to go. In fact, Better Ramp is the first plugin out of Prometheus and many more are in beta testing. We're excited to show you what else we have cooking, including some additional surprises from Prometheus but that'll have to wait just a little bit.
Over the past few weeks, we’ve been teasing some upcoming After Effects plugins on X, and now it’s time to round them up in one place. These are still in development, so they’re not available just yet—but they’re coming soon!
Texture Color Mapper
This plugin maps textures and colors to brightness values, unlocking all kinds of visual styles. Whether you’re going for a halftone effect, posterized shading, engraving-style crosshatching, or something entirely your own, Texture Color Mapper makes it easy. Drop in a texture, let the plugin do the work, and watch your footage transform.
Not even sure how to describe what's going on here, but it's fast, unique and super adaptable to many looks, and most of all, it's not boring and predictable. #TCM (what does TCM stand for?????) pic.twitter.com/M4dkKJR5R9
Inspired by the iconic Joy Division album cover, Unknown Pleasures, this plugin breaks up depth maps and normal passes into contour lines, creating stunning topographic visuals.
Last week I shared a bit from a plugin I was working on. That was the happy accident, but this is what I was going for. We have plenty of testing still to do, but J-Division will be coming at you as soon as possible from @ElementSupplyCopic.twitter.com/5ywsiNUOIw
While developing J-Division, we accidentally stumbled onto something else—a glitchy, vaporwave-esque look that ended up being too good to ignore. So instead of tucking it away as a side effect, we’re turning it into its own plugin. This one is still unnamed, but it’s coming soon.
Sometimes mistakes can be pretty interesting. Working on some plugin development at the moment... pic.twitter.com/w7nro14rjx
If you’ve ever wanted more control over After Effects’ Roughen Edges effect, Edgelord will be your new best friend. It lets you manipulate edges using noises and textures, allowing for much more detailed and customizable distressed looks. From subtle erosion to full-blown chaos, this one dials it in.
Film grain is great—until it slows everything down. ESC Fast Grain gives you a nice, organic grain texture without the performance hit. It even runs faster than the default Noise effect while looking better.
Add Grain looks pretty decent in After Effects. But Fast Grain looks decent and is basically real-time. It'll be out soon on @ElementSupplyCo! pic.twitter.com/VWgZs6VWQO
While we’re teasing upcoming plugins, let’s not forget we’ve already dropped something useful: Super Duper. This script lets you remap any number of keyframes to a single slider control, making animation adjustments way easier. If you missed it, it’s available now.
More to Come...
These plugins are still in development, but we’ll have more to share soon. We’ve got even more interesting tools in the pipeline, and we can’t wait to show them off when they’re ready. Stay tuned—we think you’re going to like what’s next.
Welcome to the launch of Element Supply Company. If you look around, you'll find some products you might be familiar with from various people in our collective like Mikey Borup, Paul Conigliaro, and Joe Clay to name a few. But you'll also find new products available with introductory pricing.
Once the rates listed on the product pages expire, that's the price they're going to stay at. Our products are priced fairly and are always on sale, so you can grab the tools you need when you need them. You don't need to worry about missing out on a sale and you don't need to wait for some arbitrary date so you can save some coin.
Thanks for checking out our store. It means a lot to us that you're here.
