The Future

I'm not going to lie, folks: The future of Natron is bleak. The institution that offered support for Natron up until recently cut its ties with the project, and the two main developers have had to move on to other paid jobs. There is currently nobody willing to take over the project, despite how far the previous developers have brought the code.

Sure, Natron is buggy (tip: Save often). How could it not be? With only two developers supporting a massive set of features in the last couple of years, it is surprising it works as well as it does. The point is that the groundwork is done.

Natron's crux is the thing that makes it attractive; that is, the enormous amount of things you can do with it is also what puts off would be maintainers and new developers. It is nearly guaranteed that a lot of the code is going to be cryptic and under-documented. Getting up to speed just to correct the most obvious bugs is going to require climbing a steep learning curve.

Regardless, Natron needs developers. Better yet: It needs an institution willing to adopt the project and provide a stable home for it. Otherwise, Natron will end up disappearing. So, if you or anybody you know can help, get on it now, while the last modifications are still fresh and before Natron succumbs to bit rot.

Do it for free software; do it for the kitties.

Up Ahead

Natron is complex and powerful, and one article doesn't do it justice. In a future issue, I'll show you how Natron can make your video creations much more interesting, you'll see a real-life project using some of Natron's coolest features.