The 2026 edition of Sapphire refines Boris FX’s long-standing effects suite with new filmic textures, advanced transitions and workflow improvements. The focus: creative control with physical authenticity. Let’s go throug the new tools!
FilmBurn: The analogue heartbeat
The new S_FilmBurn effect reconstructs the look of “over”non-traditionally”-exposed film using high-resolution scans of damaged celluloid. Instead of overlaying stock footage, the plugin generates procedural flashes, flares, and edge burns entirely within Sapphire.
Artists can combine multiple light bursts, tune flicker frequency, and shape each flash’s hue and softness. Additional modules replicate scratches, dust, grain, hairs, leader markings and sprocket edges. Each component is independently keyframeable and blendable via combine modes such as Add or Overlay.
Presets like Silver Halide or Sepia Sulfide emulate specific chemical film responses, while the FilmBurn Transition version extends the look into motion edits, replacing hard cuts with organic light wipes. The effect is available across all major Sapphire hosts.
MochaWhip: Motion with precision
MochaWhip Transition fuses Mocha’s AI-based masking with Sapphire’s Whiplash engine to deliver tracked, subject-aware whip edits. Foreground and background motion can be driven separately, allowing smooth hand-offs between clips. The transition suits fast-cut sequences and stylised energy transitions, integrating directly into the host without pre-compositing. And, you know, Mochas excellent Mask ML.
Pro Lens Flares: Eight new optical models
Sapphire 2026 adds eight handcrafted flares based on real cinematic lenses. The collection includes strong anamorphic streaks, diffused bloom effects and chromatic internal reflections. Each preset maintains physically-plausible flare fall-off and spectral behaviour, designed for both realism and stylised grading work. Use those as a ready preset, or change them to your needs.
Grunge Stamps: Real-world texture capture
The S_Grunge module expands with new scanned materials: oil paint, chalk, ink, sponge and other tactile surfaces. These high-resolution “stamps” supply a physical texture base for titles, motion graphics and surface distress work.
Effect Builder: Easier visual logic
The Effect Builder receives one of its most practical updates yet. Parameter links, the connections driving relationships between nodes, are now visually displayed. Lines appear between linked parameters, colour-coded to indicate driver and driven nodes. Hovering reveals contextual data about what controls what. This seemingly minor change significantly improves readability for complex, multi-node setups.
The Builder also consolidates preset browsing across all Sapphire effects. Users can search, tag and favourite looks globally, or isolate only those marked “new” for the 2026 release. Presets can be edited or rebuilt from scratch, then shared seamlessly between hosts. Parameters exposed in one application remain intact in another, enabling consistent pipelines across Avid, Adobe and Resolve environments. Combined with the new visible linking, this cross-host portability makes custom effect design more transparent and maintainable.
Builder presets and advanced nodes
New “Advanced Presets” demonstrate complex node combinations, using FilmBurn, DuoTone, and Hue-Saturation stacks as modular examples. Each preset exposes only the most relevant host parameters, reducing clutter for editors while maintaining full Builder control.
The improved Builder enables rapid prototyping: layer nodes, link parameters, and adjust controls visible to the host, then export the preset for facility-wide use.
Workflow considerations
The new film-scanned effects and multi-layer composites may increase GPU load. Tests should confirm playback and render speed on specific hosts. For predictable results in colour-managed pipelines (ACES/OCIO), users should verify how FilmBurn and Grunge interact with graded footage.
Availabilty and Pricing
Sapphire 2026 supports Adobe After Effects, Adobe Premiere Pro, Avid Media Composer and everything compatible with OFX-Plugin-Connections. The update runs on both macOS and Windows, with native support for Apple Silicon and modern NVIDIA/AMD GPUs.
Licensing remains subscription-based OR perpetual. As of publication, a new annual licence for Sapphire (Multi-Host) starts at 125€ per Moth, going down to 40€ a month anually, and perpetual licences from 2720. Existing users with subscriptions obviously receive the 2026 update at no additional cost. A free, fully functional trial of Sapphire 2026 is available via borisfx.com/free-trial.
