App

Inherits Group

Inherited by: GuiApp

Synopsis

The App object represents one instance of a project. See detailed description…

Functions

Detailed Description

An App object is created automatically every times a new project is opened. For each instance of Natron opened, there’s a new instance of App. You never create an App object by yourself, instead you can access them with variables that Natron pre-declared for you: The first instance will be named app1, the second app2,etc… See this section for an explanation of auto-declared variables.

When in background mode, (interpreter or render mode) there will always ever be a single App instance, so Natron will make the following assignment before running any other script:

app = app1

So you don’t have to bother on which instance you’re in. For Group Python plug-ins exported from Natron, they have a function with the following signature:

def createInstance(app,group):

So you don’t have to bother again on which App instance your script is run. You should only ever need to refer to the app1, app2… variables when using the Script Editor.

Finally, you can always access the App object of any instance by calling the following function when your script is for command line (background mode):

natron.getInstance(index)

Or the following function when you want to use GUI functionalities:

natron.getGuiInstance(index)

Warning

Note that in both cases, index is a 0-based number. So to retrieve app1 you would need to call the function with index = 0.

Creating nodes

The App object is responsible for creating new nodes. To create a node, you need to specify which plug-in you want to instantiate and optionally specify which major version should your node instantiate if the plug-in has multiple versions. For instance we could create a new Reader node this way:

reader = app.createNode("fr.inria.openfx.ReadOIIO")

You can also specify the group into which the node should be created, None being the project’s top level:

group = app.createNode("fr.inria.built-in.Group")
reader = app.createNode("fr.inria.openfx.ReadOIIO", -1, group)

For convenience, small wrapper functions have been made to directly create a Reader or Writer given a filename:

reader = app.createReader("/Users/me/Pictures/mySequence###.exr")
writer = app.createWriter("/Users/me/Pictures/myVideo.mov")

In case 2 plug-ins can decode/encode the same format, e.g. ReadPSD and ReadOIIO can both read .psd files, internally Natron picks the “best” OpenFX plug-in to decode/encode the image sequence/video according to the settings in the Preferences of Natron. If however you need a specific decoder/encoder to decode/encode the file format, you can use the getSettings() function with the exact plug-in ID.

In Natron you can call the following function to get a sequence with all plug-in IDs currently available:

natron.getPluginIDs()

You can also get a sub-set of those plug-ins with the getPluginIDs(filter) which returns only plug-in IDs containing the given filter (compared without case sensitivity).

Accessing the settings of Natron

To modify the parameters in the Preferences of Natron, you can call the getSettings() function to get an object containing all the parameters of the preferences.

Accessing the project settings

You can get a specific parameter of the project settings with the getProjectParam(name) function.

Member functions description

NatronEngine.App.addProjectLayer(layer)
Parameters:layer – ImageLayer

Appends a new project-wide layer. It will be available to all layer menus of all nodes. Each layer menu must be refreshed individually with either a right click on the menu or by changing nodes connections to get access to the new layer. Layer names are unique: even if you add duplicates to the layers list, only the first one in the list with that name will be available in the menus.

NatronEngine.App.addFormat(formatSpec)
Parameters:formatSpec – str

Attempts to add a new format to the project’s formats list. The formatSpec parameter must follow this spec: First the name of the format, without any spaces and without any non Python compliant characters; followed by a space and then the size of the format, in the form width*x*height; followed by a space and then the pixel aspect ratio of the format. For instance:

HD 1920x1080 1

Wrongly formatted format will be omitted and a warning will be printed in the ScriptEditor.

NatronEngine.App.createNode(pluginID[, majorVersion=-1[, group=None] [, properties=None]])
Parameters:
  • pluginID – str
  • majorVersion – int
  • group – Group
  • properties – Dict
Return type:

Effect

Creates a new node instantiating the plug-in specified with the given pluginID at the given majorVersion. If majorVersion is -1, the highest version of the plug-in will be instantiated. The optional group parameter can be used to specify into which group the node should be created, None meaning the project’s top level.

In Natron you can call the following function to get a sequence with all plug-in IDs currently available:

natron.getPluginIDs()

The optional parameter properties is a dictionary containing properties that may modify the creation of the node, such as hiding the node GUI, disabling auto-connection in the NodeGraph, etc…

The properties are values of type Bool, Int, Float or String and are mapped against a unique key identifying them.

Most properties have a default value and don’t need to be specified, except the pluginID property.

Below is a list of all the properties available that are recognized by Natron. If you specify an unknown property, Natron will print a warning in the Script Editor.

All properties type have been wrapped to Natron types:

  • A boolean property is represented by the BoolNodeCreationProperty class
  • An int property is represented by the IntNodeCreationProperty class
  • A float property is represented by the FloatNodeCreationProperty class
  • A string property is represented by the StringNodeCreationProperty class

Here is an example on how to pass properties to the createNode function:

app.createNode("net.sf.cimg.CImgBlur", -1, app, dict([ ("CreateNodeArgsPropSettingsOpened", NatronEngine.BoolNodeCreationProperty(True)), ("CreateNodeArgsPropNodeInitialParamValues", NatronEngine.StringNodeCreationProperty("size")) ,("CreateNodeArgsPropParamValue_size",NatronEngine.FloatNodeCreationProperty([2.3,5.1])) ]))

  • Name: CreateNodeArgsPropPluginID

    Dimension: 1

    Type: string

    Default: None

    Description: Indicates the ID of the plug-in to create. This property is mandatory. It is set automatically by passing the pluginID to the createNode function

  • Name: CreateNodeArgsPropPluginVersion

    Dimension: 2

    Type: int

    Default: -1,-1

    Description: Indicates the version of the plug-in to create. With the value (-1,-1) Natron will load the highest possible version available for that plug-in.

  • Name: CreateNodeArgsPropNodeInitialPosition

    Dimension: 2

    Type: float

    Default: None

    Description: Indicates the initial position of the node in the nodegraph. By default Natron will position the node according to the state of the interface (current selection, position of the viewport, etc…)

  • Name: CreateNodeArgsPropNodeInitialName

    Dimension: 1

    Type: string

    Default: None

    Description: Indicates the initial script-name of the node By default Natron will name the node according to the plug-in label and will add a digit afterwards dependending on the current number of instances of that plug-in.

  • Name: CreateNodeArgsPropNodeInitialParamValues

    Dimension: N

    Type: string

    Default: None

    Description: Contains a sequence of parameter script-names for which a default value is specified by a property. Each default value must be specified by a property whose name is in the form CreateNodeArgsPropParamValue_PARAMETERNAME where PARAMETERNAME must be replaced by the script-name of the parameter. The property must have the same type as the data-type of the parameter (e.g. int for IntParam, float for FloatParam, bool for BooleanParam, String for StringParam).

  • Name: CreateNodeArgsPropOutOfProject

    Dimension: 1

    Type: bool

    Default: False

    Description: When True the node will not be part of the project. The node can be used for internal used, e.g. in a Python script but will not appear to the user. It will also not be saved in the project.

  • Name: CreateNodeArgsPropNoNodeGUI

    Dimension: 1

    Type: bool

    Default: False

    Description: * If True, the node will not have any GUI created. The property CreateNodeArgsPropOutOfProject set to True implies this.

  • Name: CreateNodeArgsPropSettingsOpened

    Dimension: 1

    Type: bool

    Default: False

    Description: * If True, the node settings panel will not be opened by default when created. If the property CreateNodeArgsPropNoNodeGUI is set to true or CreateNodeArgsPropOutOfProject is set to true, this property has no effet.

  • Name: CreateNodeArgsPropAutoConnect

    Dimension: 1

    Type: bool

    Default: False

    Description: * If True, Natron will try to automatically connect the node to others depending on the user selection. If the property CreateNodeArgsPropNoNodeGUI is set to true or CreateNodeArgsPropOutOfProject is set to true, this property has no effet.

  • Name: CreateNodeArgsPropAddUndoRedoCommand

    Dimension: 1

    Type: bool

    Default: False

    Description: Natron will push a undo/redo command to the stack when creating this node. If the property CreateNodeArgsPropNoNodeGUI is set to true or CreateNodeArgsPropOutOfProject is set to true, this property has no effect.

  • Name: CreateNodeArgsPropSilent

    Dimension: 1

    Type: bool

    Default: True

    Description: When set to True, Natron will not show any information, error, warning, question or file dialog when creating the node.

NatronEngine.App.createReader(filename[, group=None] [, properties=None])
Parameters:
  • filename – str
  • group – Group
Return type:

Effect

Creates a reader to decode the given filename. The optional group parameter can be used to specify into which group the node should be created, None meaning the project’s top level.

In case 2 plug-ins can decode the same format, e.g. ReadPSD and ReadOIIO can both read .psd files, internally Natron picks the “best” OpenFX plug-in to decode the image sequence/video according to the settings in the Preferences of Natron. If however you need a specific decoder to decode the file format, you can use the getSettings() function with the exact plug-in ID.

NatronEngine.App.createWriter(filename[, group=None] [, properties=None])
Parameters:
  • filename – str
  • group – Group
Return type:

Effect

Creates a reader to decode the given filename. The optional group parameter can be used to specify into which group the node should be created, None meaning the project’s top level.

In case 2 plug-ins can encode the same format, e.g. WritePFM and WriteOIIO can both write .pfm files, internally Natron picks the “best” OpenFX plug-in to encode the image sequence/video according to the settings in the Preferences of Natron. If however you need a specific decoder to encode the file format, you can use the getSettings() function with the exact plug-in ID.

NatronEngine.App.getAppID()
Return type:int

Returns the zero-based ID of the App instance. app1 would have the AppID 0, app2 would have the AppID 1, and so on…

NatronEngine.App.getProjectParam(name)
Parameters:name – str
Return type:Param

Returns a project Param given its name (script-name). See this section for an explanation of script-name vs. label.

NatronEngine.App.getViewNames()
Return type:Sequence

Returns a sequence with the name of all the views in the project as setup by the user in the “Views” tab of the Project Settings.

NatronEngine.App.render(effect, firstFrame, lastFrame[, frameStep])
Parameters:
  • effect – Effect
  • firstFrame – int
  • lastFrame – int
  • frameStep – int

Starts rendering the given effect on the frame-range defined by [firstFrame,*lastFrame*]. The frameStep parameter indicates how many frames the timeline should step after rendering each frame. The value must be greater or equal to 1. The frameStep parameter is optional and if not given will default to the value of the Frame Increment parameter in the Write node.

For instance:

render(effect,1,10,2)

Would render the frames 1,3,5,7,9

This is a blocking function only in background mode. A blocking render means that this function returns only when the render finishes (from failure or success).

This function should only be used to render with a Write node or DiskCache node.

NatronEngine.App.render(tasks)
Parameters:tasks – sequence

This function takes a sequence of tuples of the form (effect,firstFrame,lastFrame[,frameStep]) The frameStep is optional in the tuple and if not set will default to the value of the Frame Increment parameter in the Write node.

This is an overloaded function. Same as render(effect,firstFrame,lastFrame,frameStep) but all tasks will be rendered concurrently.

This function is called when rendering a script in background mode with multiple writers.

This is a blocking call only in background mode.

NatronEngine.App.timelineGetLeftBound()
Return type:int

Returns the left bound of the timeline, that is, the first member of the project’s frame-range parameter

NatronEngine.App.timelineGetRightBound()
Return type:int

Returns the right bound of the timeline, that is, the second member of the project’s frame-range parameter

NatronEngine.App.timelineGetTime()
Return type:int

Get the timeline’s current time. In Natron there’s only a single internal timeline and all Viewers are synchronised on that timeline. If the user seeks a specific frames, then all Viewers will render that frame.

NatronEngine.App.writeToScriptEditor(message)
Parameters:message – str

Writes the given message to the Script Editor panel of Natron. This can be useful to inform the user of various information, warnings or errors.

NatronEngine.App.saveProject(filename)
Parameters:filename – str
Return type:bool

Saves the current project under the current project name. If the project has never been saved so far, this function e saves the project to the file indicated by the filename parameter. In GUI mode, if filename is empty, it asks the user where to save the project in GUI mode.

This function returns True if it saved successfully, False otherwise.

NatronEngine.App.saveProjectAs(filename)
Parameters:filename – str
Return type:bool

Save the project under the given filename. In GUI mode, if filename is empty, it prompts the user where to save the project.

This function returns True if it saved successfully, False otherwise.

NatronEngine.App.saveTempProject(filename)
Parameters:filename – str
Return type:bool

Saves a copy of the project to the given filename without updating project properties such as the project path, last save time etc… This function returns True if it saved successfully, False otherwise.

NatronEngine.App.loadProject(filename)
Parameters:filename – str
Return type:App

Loads the project indicated by filename. In GUI mode, this will open a new window only if the current window has modifications. In background mode this will close the current project of this App and open the project indicated by filename in it. This function returns the App object upon success, None otherwise.

NatronEngine.App.resetProject()
Return type:bool

Attempts to close the current project, without wiping the window. In GUI mode, the user is first prompted to saved his/her changes and can abort the reset, in which case this function will return False. In background mode this function always succeeds, hence always returns True. this always succeed.

NatronEngine.App.closeProject()
Return type:bool

Same as resetProject() except that the window will close in GUI mode. Also, if this is the last App alive, Natron will close.

NatronEngine.App.newProject()
Return type:App

Creates a new App. In GUI mode, this will open a new window. Upon success, the App object is returned, otherwise None is returned.