Tuesday, July 17th, 2018 Posted by Jim Thacker

Foundry ships Nuke 11.2, NukeX 11.2, Nuke Studio 11.2


Originally posted on 17 May 2018. Scroll down for news of the final release.

Foundry has posted a sneak peek of the new features due in Nuke 11.2, the next update to its line-up of compositing and editorial tools, recorded during product manager Juan Salazar’s presentation at FMX 2018.

Nuke gets improvements to the Tab menu and localisation system; NukeX gets GPU support and a new mask input for Smart Vectors; and Nuke Studio gets new options for colour coding and searching assets.

Nuke 11.2: improved Tab menu, plus further updates to file localisation
The changes in Nuke, the base edition of the compositor, are largely workflow improvements, and can be seen from 07:00 in the video above.

The Tab menu, used for adding nodes to a project, gets support for substring matching, making it possible to search for a node by typing in a few non-consecutive letters from its name.

The nodes used most frequently by an artist should also now appear higher in search results.

It should also now be easier to expose controls for Gimzos and the new Live Groups thanks to a new Edit mode that enables users to drag and drop parameters from elsewhere in the interface.

It’s easier to see the workflow in action than to read about it, which you can do from 10:15 in the video.

The file localisation system, overhauled in Nuke 11.1, gets a further update this time round, with new callbacks to enable TDs to customise the way Nuke displays the localisation status of assets.

Other changes include updates to the deep compositing API, designed to improve memory management – Foundry says they result in up to 1.5x faster processing – and to the SDKs for RED and ARRI cameras.



NukeX 11.2: GPU support and new mask input for Smart Vectors
NukeX, the extended edition of the compositor, also gets updates to the Smart Vector toolset, which enables uses to paint one frame of a shot, then have the changes propagate automatically to other frames.

The calculation of motion vectors required can now be performed on the GPU, making it possible to preview the results in real time, without the need to prerender, as shown at 14:30 in the video.

There is also a new mask input, which makes it easier to use Smart Vectors in situations where the relevant part of the frame is occluded by a moving object in other frames.

Nuke Studio 11.2: new options for colour coding and searching for assets
Nuke Studio 11.2, Foundry’s compositing, editorial and finishing software, gets new workflow features intended to make it easier to organise assets when working on large projects.

The changes, which can be seen at 02:30 in the video, include the option to colour-code assets in the project panel, sequence panel and node graph.

Colour coding can be automatic, based on file format or versioning; or done manually – for example, to flag up assets that need re-rendering.

Assets in the project bin can now be sorted manually or alphabetically; and asset search has been improved, with the option to use multiple search tokens, and to search metadata.



Updated 17 July 2018: The Nuke 11.2 product family is now officially shipping.

As well as the features listed above, the update expands the set of GPUs officially supported for use with the software to include AMD’s Radeon Pro WX 9100 and SSG and the integrated GPUs in the new iMac Pro.


Pricing and availability
Nuke 11.2, NukeX 11.2 and Nuke Studio 11.2 are available for 64-bit Windows 7 and 10, CentOS 6+ Linux, and macOS 10.12+.

Prices have risen since the Nuke 11.1 family was released, with new node-locked and floating licences now costing £3,398 ($4,528) for Nuke, £6,498 ($8,443) for NukeX and £7,598 ($9,768) for Nuke Studio.


Read an overview of the new features in the Nuke 11.2 family on the product website

Read a full list of new features in the Nuke 11.2 family in Foundry’s online release notes