u/NewAntelopes

I've just uploaded 0.21.6 to steam; Amongst a few other fixes and improvements, this build includes a startup window that allows first timers to choose the initial interface and setup:

https://preview.redd.it/8hsusxb7ws0h1.png?width=700&format=png&auto=webp&s=2d6f4ead3341e70516cdf7a1f2ffc4b13cf20dc5

Choose the blue pill and you get a small, default composition full of interesting, blendable particle effects, milkdrop masks, etc etc to play with, no effort.

https://preview.redd.it/toz8bouiws0h1.png?width=798&format=png&auto=webp&s=12519c82d28970ede4e3e40bef90e32f1bf00f3f

You can also get to the demo composition using the menu option Composition -> Open -> DemoBlends.comp.
There's a lot of joy in that lil comp.. have a go at blending the alphas and params - on a midi controller ideally, but you can do it all with mouse too. I have wasted many a minute discovering interesting and delicate combos on this little grid.

I lost 35 minutes to Milk Blur + Milkaleido Mult + Dual MilkMask

Finally got round to writing these up:

v0.21

• Midi Mapping Editor ; (Select 'Elemental' menu bar -> Edit Midi). Includes import/export options, details on this post
• Added better support for multiple midi devices. Active midi devices are shown on the preferences panel.
• Added F9 - Debug texture view, which shows the various renderTargets being created during the output pipeline (useful for debugging mask and filter outputs etc)
• Improved the display of folder names in the preset browser
• Various default filter additions/improvements:
  • Added 'Absolute' flag to rotation component (Rotation then is set directly by the component, rather than being additional to whatever the current rotation is). Same for the offset component
  • Added greyscale flag to the brightness contrast filter so we don't need to have a separate greyscale filter. Added game the BrightnessContrast filter an AlphaMod prop
  • Added invert and 'Ignore source alpha' to the default ChromaKey filter (for various reasons)
  • Default pixellate filter treats a 0 pixel-size as the same as 1 (rather than just drawing nothing, which is strictly correct but pointless)
  • Added cutoff and threshold options to the default mask filter
• Added tooltips to the milk playlist view to show the full paths of the presets in the playlist
• Added a default set of 'Starter Pack' milkdrop presets to the steam builds. This is basically a lightly filtered version of the publicly available, Isoceles 'cream of the crop' collection ( https://www.patreon.com/posts/pack-nestdrop-91682111 ).. but with a focus on fewer subfolders and removing some of the cases which can be done through particles or filters in elemental. Sure most folk will have their own preset folder arrangements already, but this is really handy for beginners wanting to jump straight in and helps allow more interesting default compositions to be distributed that reference known .milk paths
• UX: Collapse all components button on the element header bar
• UX: file select dialog on video component shows correct current folder if there's a video already in place
• UX: Make the BrightnessContrast AdjustCol filter default when adding a new Source Filter
• Improved ui display of ELEUI_INT shader/filter props
• Added (mappable) 'prev instance' button on channels. Fixed behaviours when using the next/prev instance buttons so that it loops back to the start of the list as needed
• Added (dev) menu option for regenerating UIDs (hopefully won't be needed if nothings broken..)
• Every time a new instance is activated, older instances that are still in their fadeout transition phase speed up the fade out transition (to help reduce the amount of lingering instances when moving rapidly between em)
• (Full vers) Whole bunch of optimisations, fixes and improvements for the video player (so it can properly handle varying playback speeds without just throwing its toys out of the pram)
• BUGFIXES for:
  • the milk preset browser missing one file from every folder
  • certain milkdrop presets leaving the renderer in an invalid state and hence subsequent SourceFilters not always working
  • deletion of milk component not cleaning up properly (possible crash)
  • using f11 to set display back to the preview window not saving that in settings
  • the initial shader parameters for the default source filter not being shown when the component is first added.
  • transition time weirdness when rapidly switching between instances in a channel
  • for crash if selecting 'next instance' on a channel with no instances

v0.21.5

• Added support for different value mapping modes
• Added 'open data folder' option to the main menu bar
• UX: property values without a range will default to having a midi mapping range of -1 to 1
• added extra info on the midi mapping editor window, (including the device the mapping is associated with), made the textbox editing work and tidied the UI
• Added placeholder REST api structure and preferences option to activate the http server port (more to follow)
• Added some new filters (bulge, mirror/radial mirror) and added a few extra parameters to others. Changed BrightnessContrast to AdjustCol, which does a lil more (UI needs sortin).
• Added midi mapping editor options to map to the content instances, the bpm +/- buttons and the prev/next column buttons
• Sorted all the channel view stuff out so we can have any number of instances in a channel (well, within limits), and the view deals with appropriately. Buttons to scroll through the channels and center the view on the specified active instance (etc)
• Added Menu option to merge compositions (combine the currently loaded one with another previously saved one) and shuffle compositions (randomly mix up the position of instances within channels - cheap way of getting some new combinations and variety to a composition)
• Added multiply blend mode
• Added concepts of Editor mode and Performance mode, which can be selected from dropdown in the midbar. 'Performance mode' will turn off most of the editor display, leaving just the channel view and channel controls panel active. (Turning off some of the editor UI can save a few milliseconds on the frametime, and just makes it easier to keep your windows tidy).
• (Full vers) Videos now display their current playback progress etc
• BUGFIXES for:
  • non-selectable textboxes in midi mapping editor
  • Q and W keys causing the rename text input dialog to exit weirdly
  • the midi mapping selection not being reset when finishing edit
  • channels using subtractive modes making particle emitters outputting to a source channel not do anything
  • a newly added instance showing as selected in the channel view but not appearing in the effect stack
  • a bunch of leaky memory issues (and started looking at some of the more gnarly bits left to do with async initialisation and memory consumption)

Also wanted to give a brief update on the broader dev roadmap.. in general that I'm way behind on what i wanted to have got done by now, as 100% expected 😄 ... Realities of maintaining a decent work/life/hobby balance means the hobby has to stay in a low gear for a while, so Im now expecting to take quite a bit longer to get to the point that i feel comfortable calling it a 'release version'. Gonna keep just working on things until im there, and will keep posting progress here. If anyone happens to be exceedingly desperate to get early access to the full version (in-built video, more channels & instances, no watermark) DM me, otherwise.. its later/soon.