When I switched over to the Mac platform, I had no idea how popular the Apple Final Cut Pro editing software was with third party plug-in designers. Just when I thought that I had reviewed all of the available FCP plug-ins, I ran across several more plug-in providers.

I tested them using DvcProHD footage on my MacPro dual quad core 3Ghz machine with an AJA card interface, connected to a Seagate SAS RAID via an Atto SAS controller card, while viewed on a TvLogic 17-inch HD monitor.

Today I'll be telling you about the Continuum Complete and the Final Effects Complete 5 packages from Boris FX. Before I start, let me just convey that these plug-ins rock and they will take your images to new levels.

Since there are close to 300 plug-ins in these two packages, I'll give you an overview and my impressions. You can go to their website, and download a demo version and tutorials, if you want to try them out.

Continuum Complete

Boris Continuum Complete is a set of more than 180 FXPlug filters, transitions and generators for the Final Cut Pro interface. BCC offers a wide range of effects and delivers everything from basic everyday utility and convenience to very nice special effects.

With more than 1500 presets, I discovered I could find something that worked very quickly and then modify it so that it worked perfectly. Highlights include precise keying and advanced matte filter tools. Each filter includes integrated online help. I found high-end postproduction tasks simplified by wire removal, light wrap, as well as plug-ins for dust and scratches.

Optical flow creates key-framable motion effects and super smooth slow motion. There is also a wide variety of effects, such as Blurs, Glows, Light Rays, Wave Distortions, Particle Wipes, and 3-D shapes that you can be creative with.
The plug-ins for film effects help match up your video and film clips, and there are even auto-animating Wipe Transitions; it's a handy box of tools.

Let me go over a few of the cooler plug-ins:

BCC UpRez is designed to help you with the resizing of image clips while minimizing the data loss usually associated with media transforms within Final Cut Pro. This provides a final result that cannot be achieved by Final Cut Pro scaling and standard post-processing methods; cleaner is better.
The BCC Pan and zoom filter was designed to automate the work of documentary-style pan and zoom effects where a large still image file is moved along the x and y axis (pan), and scaled up or down (zoom) in a composite that adds animation to a still image. This filter also includes an on-screen heads-up display so that you watch what you are doing.

You can run this filter in full automatic, semi automatic, or full manual animation modes. It's easy to use, and generates smooth animation and a sharp image from less than perfect stills.

You can use the BCC Matchmove filter in Final Cut Pro to lock the movement of one image clip to another image clip through the built-in motion tracking function. One of the great advantages of using this filter to composite within Final Cut Pro is that it includes full DVE functions -- such as tumble, spin and rotate, along with interesting lighting and light wrap compositing features -- normally found only in full compositing applications. Imagine taking a pan shot and a still shot and being able to composite the two images together using the motion from the pan shot to move the still shot; very high-end.
The BCC LED filter makes an image, clip, or text element (with alpha) appear as though it was constructed out of an array of blinking or solid LED lights. Turn your footage into the look of the large display screens that you see at your sports stadium.

The BCC Turbulence filter generates auto-animated gel like distortion fields in an image clip based on input from the built-in noise map and turbulence controls. This filter includes 36 preset effect settings that make it easy to get impressive image bending results.

The BCC Noise Map 2 filter is primarily used to generate auto-animated image clips that can be used as backdrops, or as a mask track input for other image clips. The dozens of presets included with this filter make using the filter in Final Cut Pro a point and click operation, even for very complex animations.

The BCC Color Choker filter posterizes and blurs colors in an image clip for creative and artistic results. The media clip colors that the filter is applied to can be changed, remapped individually through the many filter parameters, or changed together as an RGB group. One use of this filter would be to selectively change the color of the clouds in a shot.
As you can see BCC has a large number of useful tools for altering your images in beautiful ways. Now, on to the other Boris package: Final Effects Complete.