Files
effectcraft/docs/effects-parity.md
T
vangel76andClaude Opus 5.5 515cc3d5f7 Levels: channel controls before RGB, "Off for 32 bpc Color" unclipped in 32 bpc, as After Effects
After Effects 2026 in a 32 bpc project, Levels (Individual Controls) with RGB
(0.1, 0.9, gamma 1.5, 0.05, 0.95), Red Gamma 0.8, Green Input White 0.8 and
Blue Output Black 0.2 on grey steps 0..255 (case 904 E07): every step matches
"each channel's controls, then the RGB controls" with nothing clipped
(values below Input Black end below Output Black, above Input White above
Output White). EffectCraft ran RGB first and clipped "Off for 32 bpc Color"
(it could not see the bit depth): up to 27/255 off on 95 % of the grid; now
0 grid points off, max 1/255, CPU and GPU.

EffectEnv gains float_depth (the renderer sets it for 32 bpc projects), so
"Off for 32 bpc Color" clips in 8 / 16 bpc projects as before. Unclipped
values below 0 take the gamma mirrored through 0. Plain Levels keeps its
order (its channel controls were not measured); its clipping follows the same
rule. EffectCraft's own projects default to 8 bpc and are unchanged.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-10-19 16:14:42 +02:00

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Effects parity

Last reviewed: 2026-10-12 · Last updated: 2026-10-12 · Change: minor (effect colour labels; earlier change: parameter count and closed issue references re-audited against upstream/main 470ea7a3 and the generated effects.md) · Target: Adobe After Effects 2026

Effects are the deepest single area of After Effects. This page separates the four questions that a single "306 of 306" hides: does each effect exist, does it run fast, does it look like After Effects', and does the preset library exist. The per-effect catalogue is the generated effects.md; the overall numbers are in target-app-parity.md.

Summary

Question Value Kind
Effects present 306 registered, 3,017 parameters; all of After Effects' effects by name (298 at the M9.11 count) plus Obsolete and our own Measured: registry, effects.md. After Effects 26.5's Plug-ins/Effects holds 306 .plugin bundles in 231 entries (one bundle can hold several effects, so this is a cross-check, not a match)
Parameter names, order, popups, units, defaults aligned in M9.12 Agent-checked against After Effects' documentation, not against a live dump
On the GPU 280 (92%) Measured: registry flags; GPU vs CPU agreement tested per effect
32-bit float, no clamping 306 Measured: registry flags
Rendered output matches After Effects unmeasured Only Tint is checked against After Effects renders (four solids, within 1/255). effectcraft_effects::fidelity::compare_frames exists for the corpus (fidelity/README.md); simulation effects are pinned by golden hashes of our own output (M13.27)
Animation presets 54 original presets (8 text-animator, 23 Transitions, 23 Backgrounds) against After Effects' 621 .ffx presets Measured: crates/engine/presets/text_animators.json, crates/engine/presets/transitions.json, crates/engine/presets/backgrounds.json; the After Effects Presets folder
26.x additions Curl Noise (26.3) present (#463 open); effect colour labels (26.5) present in Effect Controls only, not in the Timeline; the rebuilt Effect Controls (26.5) missing Release notes

Breadth ≈ 85% (presets weigh in; the effects themselves are ≈ 100%). Ready ≈ 40%: until a corpus compares renders, each effect is assumed to differ somewhere, and users keep confirming it.

By category (from effects.md)

Category Effects On the GPU Known differences or bugs
3D Channel 8 8 Cryptomatte selection can't be set in the UI and the GPU path is slow (#473; quoted names with commas fixed); multi-layer EXR decode shared (#474 open: f16 storage and cache sizing remain)
Audio 13 0 CPU by design (applied in the mixdown)
Blur & Sharpen 16 15 Gaussian Blur interaction and output to be measured first (fidelity/ae-2026-acceptance.md)
Channel 13 13 —
Color Correction 40 40 Tint, Tritone and Black & White (sliders and Tint) match After Effects 2026 renders (Rec. 601 luminance); Levels (Individual Controls) matches After Effects 2026 in 32 bpc (channel controls before RGB, "Off for 32 bpc Color" unclipped; plain Levels' channel order not measured); Tint has Swap Colors (#963); ACES 2.0 / OCIO 2.5 (26.5); Apply Color LUT (#514) and 32-bpc blending (#494) are closed
Distort 39 35 Liquify has no viewer brush; #303 (Mesh Warp drag) and #534 (CC Power Pin Unstretch) are closed
Expression Controls 9 9 —
Generate 26 25 Fractal on the CPU (needs f64); #526 (Reset) and #536 (Write-on marks) are closed
Immersive Video 12 12 —
Keying 12 12 Key Cleaner approximated; #533 (wire-removal Frame Offset) is closed
Matte 6 4 Mocha shape reads our documented JSON, not Mocha's format
Noise & Grain 13 12 Curl Noise (#463); Match Grain on the CPU
Obsolete 9 9 —
Paint 1 0 Tablet pressure not read (hardware-parity.md)
Perspective 10 9 Chromatic Aberrations pan/tilt crash (#580)
Simulation 18 18 Particle Playground lacks Particle Exploder, text particles, ephemeral mapper; CC Particle World camera fixed (#397)
Stylize 25 25 Motion Tile output size (#369)
Text 2 2 —
Time 8 8 #535 (Pixel Motion Blur, Vector Detail) is closed
Transition 17 17 —
Utility 9 7 —

Third-party bundles in After Effects (Cineware, Mocha AE) are out of scope; Keylight is implemented under a generic name ("Key Light").

Estimate

≈ 70–130 h: a fidelity corpus case per effect at default and one non-default setting, compared with After Effects renders, and the fixes they turn up (40–80 h, most of it parallel, but every reference render needs After Effects on the owner's Mac); an original preset library covering After Effects' preset categories (Behaviors, Shapes, Synthetics, Text, Image effects remain; Backgrounds and Transitions exist) 15–35 h; the open effect bugs 10–20 h. Moving Fractal and the analysis effects to the GPU is performance, not parity.

Revision history

Date Change Summary
2026-10-19 minor Tritone uses Rec. 601 luminance, measured against After Effects 2026 renders of a red solid and a grey ramp (CPU and GPU)
2026-10-19 minor Black & White's Tint keeps the gray's luminosity (Color blend), measured against After Effects 2026 renders (CPU and GPU)
2026-10-19 minor Levels: "Off for 32 bpc Color" no longer clips in 32 bpc projects, unclipped values extrapolate below Output Black; Levels (Individual Controls) applies the channel controls before the RGB ones, measured against After Effects 2026 (CPU and GPU)
2026-10-18 minor Tint uses Rec. 601 luminance weights, measured against After Effects 2026 renders of red, green, blue and grey solids (CPU and GPU)
2026-10-18 minor Exposure converts to linear light with a pure 2.2 power curve, as measured in After Effects (Offset 0.0005 / 0.002 / 0.02 / 0.1 on black: 8 / 15 / 43 / 90), not the piecewise sRGB curve
2026-10-18 minor Exposure converts to linear light with a pure 2.2 power curve, as measured in After Effects (Offset 0.0005 / 0.002 / 0.02 / 0.1 on black: 8 / 15 / 43 / 90), not the piecewise sRGB curve; its sliders take After Effects' ranges (Exposure −100..100, slider −4..4; Offset −2..2, slider −0.5..0.5; Gamma Correction 0.1..10)
2026-10-12 minor Parameters 3,014 to 3,017 (effects.md); #303, #514, #526, #533–#536 marked closed instead of pending
2026-10-12 minor Effect colour labels (26.5) added in Effect Controls
2026-10-12 minor Tint's Swap Colors button and agent-drivable command (#963); undo/redo, instance targeting, animated layer-time edits and invalid-input tests
2026-10-10 major First effects parity checklist