For those who don’t know the tool: OpenReview lets VFX artists and supervisors inspect image sequences, compare plates with composites, examine EXR render passes and discuss changes frame by frame. It handles shot review, not editing or compositing. It covers some of the same ground as DJV and RV, but that does not establish feature parity.
The pixel has a right to remain suspicious
OpenReview runs on Python 3, PySide6/Qt 6 and an OpenGL 3.3+ viewport. A RAM ring buffer and disk prefetching prepare frames for playback and scrubbing, including multi-part EXR sequences. The project targets high-resolution material, but we have not benchmarked playback or cache behaviour. Test your 4K and larger sequences against the actual storage, hardware and colour configuration before relying on it for a screening.
OpenReview opens multi-channel EXRs, exposes individual AOVs and provides a 32-bit floating-point pixel probe with area sampling. Its checks flag NaN, infinity, negative and out-of-range values. Negative linear-light values can be legitimate, so artists still need to interpret the readout. Angled A/B wipes and an adjustable difference view expose registration shifts and compositing mismatches between a plate and a new version. Multi-layer stacks and contact sheets keep the candidates in view. The file browser can take a coffee break.
Colour, annotations and remote dailies
OpenReview combines OpenColorIO v2, ACES 1.3/2.0 workflows, ASC CDL, 3D LUTs and controls for exposure, gain, gamma and saturation. Artists can inspect shots through the project’s colour pipeline, provided they load the right configuration and display transform. Frame annotations, notes, in/out ranges, audio synchronisation, keyboard transport and PDF reports capture the review decisions. That gives ‘make it a little brighter’ at least a chance of becoming an actionable note.
OpenReview synchronises playback, scrubbing and frame annotations between machines over a direct TCP connection. The feature avoids a separate enterprise review server, but it does not automatically make OpenReview a cloud review platform. The available documentation does not establish how it distributes source media, crosses network boundaries or authenticates participants. Before remote dailies, test connectivity and make sure participants can access the shots.
What version 1.2.0 actually changes
Version 1.2.0 adds adjustable opacity and eight-direction resizing to all twelve floating HUDs. Artists can move and resize the controls without permanently covering the image. Middle-mouse and touch-drag panning now navigate the canvas across multi-source views. The metadata inspector reads EXR channel layouts, container streams, audio sample rates, pixel aspect ratios and colour-space tags. Those details can identify a problematic file before anyone starts blaming the comp.
The update also expands PDF and contact-sheet output with page orientation, margin presets, DPI scaling and multi-frame layouts. Drag feedback now appears directly in the viewport, while live metadata follows the active composite stack layer. Supervisors get a clearer view of the material and more control over the evidence they send back.
Where does it fit?
Our archive already covers DJV 3’s timeline and USD features and RV 2025’s Live Review and annotation tools. OpenReview brings EXR and pixel-level inspection, colour controls, A/B comparisons and direct session sync together in a free workstation. These applications overlap, but only a production test can establish which one handles your footage and review workflow best.
Connections to Nuke, Maya, Houdini and Blender remain on Chakravarthi’s roadmap, alongside broader Python SDK ambitions. Do not plan a pipeline around integrations that have not shipped. OpenReview is still a young, solo-developed project: check your file formats, cache behaviour, colour transforms and remote workflow before handing it tomorrow morning’s dailies.