Fixed occasional issue where on app startup, no rendering device was selected, thus resulting in nothing being rendering
Fixed intermittent crash that happened when rendering video animations
Fixed Animation Sequencer UI for MacOS Big Sur, where selection locators did not redraw themselves.
XPC Fractal Render Service ------------------------ (Part of Sequencer In-App Purchase option)
XPC Fractal render service is used for Sequencer video rendering to workaround rendering memory leak.
The render service restarts itself periodically to reclaim leaked memory.
There is a Local / XPC switch on the video rendering dialog box which controls if the app itself renders the video frames or if the XPC fractal render service does.
Big Improvement for Intel GPU users: ===================
You can now use the Mega 2D and 3D variation sets, which include all the hundreds of variation types found in the app.
This change is available for Metal GPU rendering, but not OpenCL GPU rendering.
In prior app versions, Intel GPU users were unable to use these huge variation sets.
AMD and Apple Silicon GPUs have always been compatible with these huge variation sets.
GPU rendering is unlocked with a Gold Subscription.
Free base app has maximum image size limitation of 1024 x 768 pixel area.
If you purchase the optional Silver or Gold Subscription, you can create fractal images of unlimited size.
To avoid purchasing a subscription, please consider purchasing the Fractal Architect 5 app instead of this app.
Big Enhancement: Progressive rendering now supports multi-layered fractals
Fixed Progressive rendering control window's buttons not updating appearance on Big Sur
Fixed Animation Segment editor's Video Preview not working properly
Fixed Animation Segment editor's appearance on Big Sur
Native support for both Intel and Apple Silicon Macs
Bug Fixes
Fixed context menu item: "Make High Quality Video" on Fractal Keyframes window - it is now subscription aware
Crackle and Truchet variation types now work properly on Native CPU, OpenCL, and Metal render engines
App memory consumption while rendering 1000's of separate video frames is now stable.
The XPC render service workaround is now obsolete and might be removed in a future update.
This is the final update ensuring the app's compatibility with MacOS Catalina.
For users with the Gold Subscription, the Video Render's XPC render option now works with MacOS Catalina.
This option is important at it keeps the app's memory usage down for long video renders.
The XPC render option can only render movies to the user's Movie and Pictures folders.
Renders to other locations will fail on MacOS Catalina due to changes in app sandboxing.
This restriction does not apply on both earlier versions of MacOS and for Local in-app video renders on MacOS Catalina.
Improvements to Video Rendering interface
Metal on Mac OS Catalina is available for GPU rendering.
Metal GPU rendering on AMD GPU devices is not recommended as the rendered images frequently appear different than they should.
OpenCL GPU rendering on AMD GPU devices is recommended instead.
Metal GPU rendering on Intel GPUs does not have this problem.
Fixed bug in version 5.3.1 that caused crash when opening the Animation Sequencer
Fixed video rendering bug that appeared in later Mojave release versions
Transform Editor Enhancement -------------------------------------------------------
In the past, the 3D fractal tetrahedron editor expected you to hold the Option key down while dragging the mouse
to adjust the 3D axis about which the fractal's transform would be rotated or scaled.
Most people missed this Option key usage and were not able to use the tetrahedron editor effectivelty.
The Transform Editor now has 3 modes for 3D fractals: 2D Triangle faces, 3D Tetrahedron, and 3D Axis Adjust mode.
The Axis Adjust mode lets you rotate the 3D axis by simply dragging with the mouse.
You can also rotate the 3D Camera using the standard rotation trackpad gesture.
This new mode should be easier for users who previously did not know about holding the Option key down to rotate the Camera axis.
Transform Editor now can be either Metal or OpenGL backed. --------------------------
App now supports either Metal or OpenGL backed Transform editor graphics.
For Metal capable Macs, the Metal platform is used.
OpenGL is used by older Macs that are not Metal compatible.
Bug Fixes ---------------------------
Crucial bug fix for large memory leak that affected the Native CPU render engine.Celebrating full Mojave support plus beautiful Dark mode.
New ---------------------------------------------------------------------
Use Preferences > Preview > App Appearance to set optional app appearance override.
This allows you to use Dark mode appearance even when the System setting is Light mode.
You can choose to always use the System Appearance, always use Light mode, or always use Dark mode.
Bug Fixes --------------------------------------------
Fixed critical bug that crashed app if you tried to use Metal rendering.
Fixed some bugs with Sequencer video rendering that happens only on Mojave.
Metal Dark Mode support throughout - many tweaks
Bug Fix for Sequencer graphics on Mojave
Mojave Dark Mode improvements for Transform editor
Refactored app to reduce usage of OpenGL and fix some memory leaks
Major variation type fixes affecting: waffle, xtrb, MobiusN, hexcrop, post_hexcrop, pre_hexcrop
More Mojave compatibility improvements.
Fixed continuous rendering for Mojave.
Added Mojave Dark Mode support
Workaround for critical Mac OS bug affecting OpenCL CPU devices that was preventing app from working
This is a huge update with 2 new render engines.
Fixed occasional haloing bug with CPU Renders
New "Wide" variation set support for CPU and some AMD GPU devices
New: Mega 2D wide variation set with 281 variation types
New: Mega 3D wide variation set with 373 variation types
New: XPC Render Service render engine for long video frame renders - requires GPU subscription
New: Native CPU render engine that will eventually replace the OpenCL CPU render engine
Bug fix: upgrade/downgrade/crossgrade subscriptions now works properly.
Fix for crash when Gold subscription lapsed and GPU device was being used.
Preview window can now show alignment grid
Bug Fixes for Sequencer
Updated HTML links in Help menu
Updated GPU Compatibility report for Mac OS High Sierra 10.13.4
Corrected Subscription Free Trial duration shown in app's Store page