Real Glow
  • SystemSystem
    imageReal Glow

    Real Glow is a glow aura generator which works on rules of optically correct light falloff as opposed to an unrealistic simple linear blur as AE's internal glow and other glow plug-ins use.

    https://aescripts.com/real-glow/


  • Alex DinninAlex Dinnin
    There is no doubting this is a very nice glow plugin.

    Is it a $34.99 / $49.99 glow plugin ?

    I don't expect it for free ??  but is this price a bit steep ???
  • Stephen van VuurenStephen van Vuuren
    Agreed, since Red Giant Universe free version includes a glows, it's hard to figure out the pricing on just a glow as nice as this one appears.
  • Jonathan CrosbyJonathan Crosby
    Alex and Stephen, thanks for your comments. The value of any item is as always in the mind of the customer.  Perhaps Real Glow doesn't offer enough value to you for the price, and that's understandable.  There are plenty of glow plug-ins for AE, no doubt, but none of them have the photorealistic behavior of Real Glow. All others, Sapphire, Red Giant, AE internal, all use a simple box or gaussian blur to create the glow.  A gaussian blur is not enough to emulate realistic light behavior. Real Glow uses inverse square falloff math to mimic real world light sources.  Perhaps this level of precision is not always needed for all projects, but when you do need it, Real Glow will really make a difference.  

    Having worked as a visual effects compositor for years, I have always had to resort to hacky methods, precomps, and adjustment layers to create this inverse square result. To me, as a VFX compositor, the price of Real Glow is absolutely worth it to not have to use those methods anymore. It saves lots of time and project management headaches. Real Glow's toolset provides everything I need for making realistic shots, because that is the exact reason we made it. For ourselves. We released it to the public so that others may find it a valuable tool in their workflows as well.
  • Stephen GreenStephen Green
    Hi,

    Nice to see this - a couple of questions.

    I use Frischluft's glow quite a bit, and I find the threshold/soften function useful just for getting a bit of bloom on highlights - any chance of something similar being built into your glow?

    Also, not sure if it's a possibility of implementing some kind of GPU acceleration?

    Thanks,

    Steve
  • Jonathan CrosbyJonathan Crosby
    Hi,

    Nice to see this - a couple of questions.

    I use Frischluft's glow quite a bit, and I find the threshold/soften function useful just for getting a bit of bloom on highlights - any chance of something similar being built into your glow?

    Also, not sure if it's a possibility of implementing some kind of GPU acceleration?

    Thanks,

    Steve
    Steve,

    Thank you for for the questions!

    1. Threshold is indeed one of the things on the whiteboard for future updates to Real Glow :)
    2. I am planning on beginning work on bringing all of the jaetools plugins up to speed with GPU acceleration in the future. (including Real Glow)

    - Jonathan
  • Orrin ZuckerOrrin Zucker
    Thanks Jonathan - this is much better than the native ae glow. Nice job!
  • Alex DinninAlex Dinnin
    Hi Jonathan,

       Thanks so much for the reply.. I completely understand what you are saying and I really do appreciate what everyone is doing on the site.. 

    My scripting / coding skills are non existent.. so anything above a basic expression is lost on me..

    As I said.. it really is a good plugin.. I just think in todays current market it is a little over priced.. However you know how much work went into it and what you think it is worth.. if it was $20.00 I would have bought it without thinking..

    However at $35.00/$50.00 I'm going to wait till I can bill it against a job.

    keep up the good work..

    Alex
  • thomas smallthomas small
    I was thinking the same thing Alex. I don't use AE enough to justify this, but at $20 I would probably buy it anyways... OR... really the reason I came to comment on here was to see if it worked in Premiere. In that case I would be happy to pay the full price - are there any plans to make it Premiere Pro compatible? I find myself doing more and more simple effecting inside PP instead of linking to AE just to save time.
    Thanks!
    Tom
  • Bryan WoodsBryan Woods
    You had me at "inverse square fall-off".  I'm in the same boat as you.  I can get something like this out of Nuke whenever I want, but I'm not always at a studio with nuke, so this is a god-send.  I bought it without thinking twice.  

    Anyone complaining about the price isn't working as a professional.  Using this plugin just once on a project would pay for its self.

    REAAAALLLLLY love the "repeat edge-pixels" checkbox.
  • David EastmanDavid Eastman
    Thank you so much for creating this.  After years of frustration with other glow solutions, I can't begin to tell you how thrilled I am with Real Glow.  This plugin looks the way I always expected other glows to look, but they never did.  Gorgeous results at the push of a button... this is worth every penny!
  • Jonathan CrosbyJonathan Crosby
    Tom,
    Thank you for the suggestion on Premiere.  While it is not currently supported in Premiere Pro at this time I will definitely be looking at what it would take to potentially update it to be in a future release!

    Thanks to everyone else for your kind words and it makes us excited that you are all loving the new plug.  Please come back sometime and show us what you used it on!
  • Michael ScanlanMichael Scanlan

    This plug-in does what it promises. So I'm happy.

    I look at the “price” as an investment. Would rather spend a bit more and know that the plug in will continue to developed and that the creator is interested in feedback like “bloom on the highlight.”


  • Stephen GreenStephen Green
    Steve,
    Thank you for for the questions!

    1. Threshold is indeed one of the things on the whiteboard for future updates to Real Glow :)
    2. I am planning on beginning work on bringing all of the jaetools plugins up to speed with GPU acceleration in the future. (including Real Glow)
    - Jonathan

    ___________________

    Thanks Jonathan, look forward to it!

  • Marc RühlMarc Rühl
    It's really a strange contingency, I searched the last few days for exactly this: a glow plugin with a realistic falloff. I tried around 5 or 6 plugins, with no luck and stumbled about Authority FX plugin, which wasn't sold anymore. I even checked AEscripts twice. And shortly before I gave up you released this plugin. I didn't tried it 5 minutes before buying it.
    It could need a bit more settings, like threshold but if you prepare a glow matte before you get instantly great results.
    Thank you A LOT
  • thomas smallthomas small
    Excellent!!  I'd pick it up in a heartbeat if you can get it working with Premiere. Thanks so much, I'll follow the progress.
    All the best,
    Tom

  • Dan SollisDan Sollis
    Just bought and installed it -  and already used it on two projects. It's freakin' great!  Dead easy to get great results with - looks really natural.
    One small request/suggestion I'd make  - it'd be useful to have an option to clip white levels when working in 32bitPP.  AE is pretty lousy at handling float and linear space (since most users are still doing everything in 8 bit or 16 bit mode) but since I'm dumb enough to try and use it for film and TV work in Linear Space (working from LogC footage) I keep having problems with AE overwrapping high floating point values (making dark spots appear in the brightest points)
  • Jonathan CrosbyJonathan Crosby
    Just bought and installed it -  and already used it on two projects. It's freakin' great!  Dead easy to get great results with - looks really natural.
    One small request/suggestion I'd make  - it'd be useful to have an option to clip white levels when working in 32bitPP.  AE is pretty lousy at handling float and linear space (since most users are still doing everything in 8 bit or 16 bit mode) but since I'm dumb enough to try and use it for film and TV work in Linear Space (working from LogC footage) I keep having problems with AE overwrapping high floating point values (making dark spots appear in the brightest points)


    Dan, glad to hear you have already found it useful. That's great.  We did design Real Glow to work in 32bit float as well. The most likely reason you are getting black spots, is because by default Real Glow's glow mode is set to "Screen".  Simply drop that menu down and select "Add" instead of "Screen." That should fix the dark spots. If you look at the bottom of the PDF documentation under trouble shooting, we cover this very thing.  Thanks for using Real Glow, and if you can, let us know what you've used it on! :)
  • Truls BerlinTruls Berlin
    Hi, great plugin! Finally a sweet glow for a sweet deal!

    One thing I was hoping for was to have individual controls for each channels like in Sapphire Glow, see screenshot.
    I´m holding my fingers crossed for that in a future release.

    Thanks,

    Truls

    image
  • Miika TurunenMiika Turunen
    I bought this to composite flames with different layers. If I put this on a Ajudstment Layer... everything either explodes with the glow or with low values nothing I'm looking for happens. Normal glow makes the flames blend well. The only way to use this is to put this on a single layer, but putting this only on a flame layer wont blend this with the surrounding object (real glow).
  • Jonathan CrosbyJonathan Crosby
    Hi, Miika.  Real Glow was designed to be put on pre-made elements which you want to glow. Putting it on an Adjustment layer over everything will indeed glow everthing.  You can pre-comp the element you want to glow and add an Adjustment layer over that if you wish.
  • Terry FernándezTerry Fernández
    I myself would like to make an observation about the performance of the plugin, I often work on a 32bpc workflow and I have notice some significant performance drops when I need to glow a large portion of the image. If you can make it work faster It would be really awesome.

    BTW The idea from Truls Berlin about the individual controls is excellent!
  • Yuya TakedaYuya Takeda
    I just tried the demo of realglow. It is absolutely fantastic visually and yes it does beat the default and free glow effects floating around out there. I'm a motion graphics designer and while it's mentioned here already, I thought I'd add weight to the request for threshold and threshold smoothness parameters with the realglow plugin. I really utilize those parameters, it does make life easier, and it would satisfy a reasonable purchase.

    Thanks for the super awesome plugin. I'm keeping my eyes open for any updates.
  • Chris CunninghamChris Cunningham
    Absolutely amazing plugin. :)

    Here's a quick video I made using the plugin:

  • Emile GregoireEmile Gregoire
    We think that there is an issue with Real Glow in our render farm. Is it possible that the "license for 1 user" may not be working properly in a network environment? We have trouble reproducing it, as the pink X only appears once in a while (even though the license is activated on every machine in the render farm).

    Thank you, have a nice day!
  • Jonathan CrosbyJonathan Crosby
    We think that there is an issue with Real Glow in our render farm. Is it possible that the "license for 1 user" may not be working properly in a network environment? We have trouble reproducing it, as the pink X only appears once in a while (even though the license is activated on every machine in the render farm).
    Thank you, have a nice day!
    Emile,

    I was wondering if you could open a support ticket on this site.  Once a ticket is opened we can start working towards a solution for you though the website ticketing system.

    Thanks,
    - Jonathan
  • Dan SollisDan Sollis
    I really love this plugin. It's particularly great for creating 80's style neon optical glows, like this test I did:

  • Jeremy MilfordJeremy Milford
    This is by far the best glow plugin for After Effects I have found. I wish they would bundle this with AE. Great work.
  • Andrew EmburyAndrew Embury
    Still lovin' it!

    Any plans to speed it up?
  • ivan robles mendozaivan robles mendoza

    I am also experiencing problems with a red pink x, it disappears when I switch to 16bit or 32bit, so for rendering will be ok... hopefully. but since I don't want to work the whole time on 16bit but in 8bit. I would really appreciate if someone has some advice to resolve this issue.

    thanks

  • Jonathan CrosbyJonathan Crosby
    ivan robles mendoza said:

    I am also experiencing problems with a red pink x, it disappears when I switch to 16bit or 32bit, so for rendering will be ok... hopefully. but since I don't want to work the whole time on 16bit but in 8bit. I would really appreciate if someone has some advice to resolve this issue.

    thanks


    Ivan,

    Please make sure to delete your disk cache as well as sometimes the watermark can get cached.

    Thanks,
    Jonathan
  • Andreas MoosburgAndreas Moosburg
    Hi Jonathan,

    first of all, I would like to thank you for that incredible cool plugin. Good Job.

    Unfortunately I am experiencing problems with the pink X in my render farm.
    How do I solve this?

    Best regards
    Andreas
  • Lloyd AlvarezLloyd Alvarez
    Andreas Moosburg said:
    Hi Jonathan,

    first of all, I would like to thank you for that incredible cool plugin. Good Job.

    Unfortunately I am experiencing problems with the pink X in my render farm.
    How do I solve this?

    Best regards
    Andreas
    That is because every machine needs to be licensed. We offer render-only licenses which are special order. Please send your quote/order request  to this email address to order them.
  • Kira PoliakovaKira Poliakova

  • Max SternkopfMax Sternkopf 
    When will there be a version for CC 2017?
  • Navarro ParkerNavarro Parker
    Two years since its initial release and not a single update in that time. Is this product dead/abandoned?
  • Jonathan CrosbyJonathan Crosby
    Max Sternkopf said:
    When will there be a version for CC 2017?
    Real Glow is CC 2017 compatible already :)
  • Jonathan CrosbyJonathan Crosby
    Navarro Parker said:
    Two years since its initial release and not a single update in that time. Is this product dead/abandoned?
    Definitely not dead or abandoned, it is just very stable and hasn't required any updates or bug fixes to date. :)
  • Michael SzalapskiMichael Szalapski
    Jonathan Crosby said:
    Navarro Parker said:
    Two years since its initial release and not a single update in that time. Is this product dead/abandoned?
    Definitely not dead or abandoned, it is just very stable and hasn't required any updates or bug fixes to date. :)

    I think I would disagree with you. No need for bug fixes, sure, but there are a number of very useful-sounding feature requests in these comments. Even comments from you that you were planning to add things like Threshold and GPU-acceleration in a future version.  

    Threshold and Threshold Smoothness parameters would be quite useful, options to change the glow per channel would be wonderful, and GPU-acceleration would be superb.

    The fact that two years ago you said you were planning some updates and nothing has happened since then makes Navarro's question a very valid one. Saying you're planning to continue work but then nothing for years does make this seem abandoned.

    I'm on the edge of purchasing and adding any one of those features I mentioned would push me over the edge. :)

  • Miika TurunenMiika Turunen
    Does not work with the latest AE CC2017.1
  • Jonathan CrosbyJonathan Crosby
    Miika Turunen said:
    Does not work with the latest AE CC2017.1
    Miika,

    Would it be possible for you to file a ticket through the aescripts ticketing system so that we can get more information about the issues that you are experiencing as well as having a better means of communicating with you about those issues?

    I believe that the link for filing a new ticket should be: https://aescripts.com/helpdesk/index/customer/

    Thank you!
  • Miika TurunenMiika Turunen
    Jonathan Crosby said:
    Miika Turunen said:
    Does not work with the latest AE CC2017.1
    Miika,

    Would it be possible for you to file a ticket through the aescripts ticketing system so that we can get more information about the issues that you are experiencing as well as having a better means of communicating with you about those issues?

    I believe that the link for filing a new ticket should be: https://aescripts.com/helpdesk/index/customer/

    Thank you!
    I'll get back at ya if it reoccurs. Now it seems to work, strange. Might have been some other issue causing the problem I had.
  • Micah HaunMicah Haun
    Is there a way to only get the glow instead the glow mixed with the layer source?

    I'd like to be able to apply Real Glow to CG specular passes, or use curves/levels to limit how much of the image gets the glow. Since realglow applies the glow to the layer it's on, I end up adding that back over the composition as well, which is not what I want in this case.

    The stock "Glow" effect in After Effects can do this by setting the "Composite Original" and "Glow Operation" to None. It seems like this option would be in the "Glow Mode" menu in Real Glow. The only options are "Screen" and "Add", so I assume it's just not possible with the plugin as it currently exists.
  • XDude DotComXDude DotCom
    Man! There's no doubt that your glow looks way better than AE's default. :)

    My boss bought me this plugin today and I'm really excited.

    Am I using this plugin wrong, though? Am I supposed to add it on top of the default Glow or replace it?

    I basically want to color my glow ... but the Tint option colors the ENTIRE layer, whereas I only want to tint the highlights.

    I think this could be fixed by adding a Glow Threshold slider like the built-in Glow. It would also be nice to have a "Glow Based On" dropdown if that's possible... :)

    Thank you! I'm really excited to replace AE's crappy glow with this one.
  • Jonathan CrosbyJonathan Crosby
    XDude DotCom said:

    Man! There's no doubt that your glow looks way better than AE's default. :)

    My boss bought me this plugin today and I'm really excited.

    Am I using this plugin wrong, though? Am I supposed to add it on top of the default Glow or replace it?

    I basically want to color my glow ... but the Tint option colors the ENTIRE layer, whereas I only want to tint the highlights.

    I think this could be fixed by adding a Glow Threshold slider like the built-in Glow. It would also be nice to have a "Glow Based On" dropdown if that's possible... :)

    Thank you! I'm really excited to replace AE's crappy glow with this one.

    Hi. So glad you love the plugin! We wanted a better glow too, that's why it exists. :)

    Real Glow is a replacement for the Glow, not to be used on top.

    The Glow Threshold slider is a common request, and we agree it's something that would be great.

    Thanks for your comment!
  • Bob WeberBob Weber
    The falloff is great, much better than in AE. The radius setting sometimes seems to not make a difference at all, why could that be? It is a pity that the plugin seems to be abandoned, more than two years after the new features were claimed to be "on the whiteboard", still no updates...
  • Jose londonoJose londono
    Hi !... This Plugin works with AE 2018 ?
  • Simon KipferSimon Kipfer
    Hello, Is there an Update planned to make it compatible with cc18? would be very nice as it is useless now :(
    thank you
  • Aaron SmithAaron Smith
    I was handed an AE script from someone, but I didn't have this plug-in. His script is CC2018, and "Real Glow" works for him, but will not install for me with my new purchase.

    Looking into how it's working for him, but has anyone else got a workaround?
  • Pete BurgesPete Burges
    This is a nice plugin, but unfortunately not worth the money as it lacks versatility and support. While the glow itself is much better, more realistic and vibrant than the standard glow effect, RealGlow does not have anywhere near the same level of control. There is not even a threshold function, which absolutely should be standard for any lighting effect. And unfortunately the effect itself is not even solid- if you stray from the "vanilla" settings, there is noticeable banding and dithering in the falloff. If all you want to do is add realistic glow to your (separate) lightsaber layer with one click, then this is great, but for a power user it feels like a one-trick pony.

    Not only that, but read through the comments below and you notice that the developer has not made any improvements since release and the product is effectively unsupported. At this price point, it is not good enough to claim that your product is stable and therefore needs no improvements despite multiple requests and issues posted by customers. You can pick up Trapcode plugins for $50 in sales, and they are well supported, regularly improved and work properly no matter how you tweak the settings; this is abandonware for the same price.
  • Dan SollisDan Sollis
    I might be missing something here. but is there any way to get this plugin to render the Glow only -  not composited on top of the source image? Under "Glow Mode" you only have "add" or "screen" -  it would be really useful to have a "unblended" option
Add a Comment