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Looking at the few sneak peaks we have seen of Video Copilot’s new lens flare plugin, Optical Flares, it is already looking like it could be massive competition for the leading Lens Flare generator, Knoll Light Factory. Yeah, KLF has been around for ages, but time is showing, and although it is very popular among its users, its got a steep price and an ancient looking interface.



If you already have Knoll Light Factory, and use it often, well you are probably going to want to stick with it because, well… you shelled out almost $400 for it, and you might as well get your money worth.  For newcomers to the lens flare market, they might be looking to grab a copy of Optical Flares, for one… its less than half the price of KLF.  Not only that, but the aesthetics of interface, control and learning curve are always a big factor as well.  From what I have seen of Optical Flares, the built-in 3D capabilities and the beautiful interface are enough to sell me on the product.  A lot of what KLF has can be rigged to work just like Optical Flares, but it takes a lot of expressions, time, and workarounds.  Andrew showed us how you can use their Track Lights option to track the lens flares to 3d lights in your composition, which is one of those things with KLF that you would need to rig a workaround.  But that, among I am sure many other things such as using AE’s lights for things like scale, brightness, intensity, and position, are going to make it a nice contender for KLF to compete with.