Fusion 9: tool “External Matte Saver” not in the User or Reference Manuals ???

[Dylan Ball]

I also haven’t been able to find out any useful information on this tool. But with the node selected and going into the “Mattes” tab, I switched the drop-down from “A” to “RGBA” and then exported my matte and it exported correctly. Note that I had to manually add “.exr” to the file name so Resolve would see the image sequence.

If anybody has any more information about this tool, I’d love to read it.

Best,
Dylan

[Simon Ubsdell]

This one is a real puzzle to me.

I am on a Mac and I cannot see this among the Fusion tools and a search of the manuals returns nothing about it. Presumably it’s a PC only thing?

Simon Ubsdell
tokyo productions
hawaiki

[Dylan Ball]

Hi Simon,

I’m also on a Mac and I am able to use the tool. You get to it by right-clicking in the flow chart, going to “Add Tool,” then “Resolve Connect.” It is the only option under “Resolve Connect.”

Best,
Dylan

[Simon Ubsdell]

[Dylan Ball] “You get to it by right-clicking in the flow chart, going to “Add Tool,” then “Resolve Connect.””

Hi Dylan,

I don’t have seem to have Resolve Connect as an option and I’m on the Studio version. Where did you find it?

Simon Ubsdell
tokyo productions
hawaiki

[Dylan Ball]

Hey Simon,

I am currently using Fusion Studio 9.0.1 for macOS, but I’ve also used the tool in the Lite version. I’m not sure about the earlier versions of Fusion, but in this build, you can find the tool by following either of the below steps:

Click on the “Tools” drop-down at top of screen -> Move cursor down to “Resolve Connect” -> Select “External Matte Saver”

OR

Down in the “Flow” window, right-click in the empty space -> highlight “Add Tool” -> then highlight “Resolve Connect” -> then select “External Matte Saver”

-Dylan

[Simon Ubsdell]

[Dylan Ball] “I am currently using Fusion Studio 9.0.1 for macOS”

Thanks.

I’m on the same version, but for some odd reason I can’t see the tool in any of the usual places you mention. I even tried a complete uninstall/reinstall to try and resolve this but without success.

I’ll get onto BMD to see what they have to say about it.

Simon Ubsdell
tokyo productions
hawaiki

[Dylan Ball]

You’re welcome. That’s strange that it isn’t there. Hopefully BMD can help you out. When they do, I’d be curious to know what the issue is just in case I ever run across the same thing.

Best,
Dylan

[Simon Ubsdell]

Will certainly post my findings here when I unravel the mystery. And thanks again for your help.

Simon Ubsdell
tokyo productions
hawaiki

[Michael Mccune]

Thanks. Found the External Matte Saver tool, as you suggested, under, “Resolve Connect,” after opening the tool menu from the open Flow area (not visible with an already- highlighted or selected tool nor via the Tools menu).

And it does generate a frame sequence output. The file size, less than 100KB, does indeed indicate only an alpha channel is generated.

BUT the file format seems to have only one output, .mov.

The format selection option in the file save menu lists the usual dozens file formats. But a selection from that list seems to have no effect. Only a .mov file format is generated in the output.

AND the resulting .mov file is not recognized by Resolve, so no way to import this Fusion output file.

MediaInfo (“https://mediaarea.net/en/MediaInfo”>https://mediaarea.net/en/MediaInfo) can’t seem to pull any format info for this .mov variant.

Any thoughts?

Thanks, Mike

[Michael Mccune]

Dylan; right, changing the External Matte Saver option under Matte from “A” to “RGBA” does indeed output a usable file and one that Resolve recognizes.

But of course it is no longer just an alpha channel, at <100KB per frame, but a video frame at about 4MB per frame.

Onward and upward!

Mike