Field guide · 06

Add-ons & extra tools

Blender's pipeline is built up from add-ons, and Resolve gets a lot from plug-ins. These are the extras we actually used.

Blender add-ons

• MCP, to connect Blender to Claude for debugging and automation.
• Differential growth, for organic, procedural growth patterns.
• Lens sim, for realistic lens behaviour and distortion to match plates.
• Plus various add-ons for compositing, procedural geometry and texturing.

Expect to test a lot of add-ons and drop the ones that do not fit. They range from paid marketplace tools to open-source projects on GitHub, and you end up assembling your own pipeline from them.

DaVinci Resolve plug-ins

• Nano X greyscale and haze plug-in, for atmospheric post-processing haze (paid).
• mononodes DCTLs, a range of colour DCTLs.
• Grading presets and looks to get to a filmic result faster.

Capture, planning and review

• Cadrage, for sensor- and lens-accurate shot mock-ups.
• PhotoPills, for sun and moon tracking.
• Procreate and Procreate Dreams, for storyboards and VFX notes over plates.
• Milanote, for boards, references and planning.
• Frame.io, for review and iteration. Some shots went through more than a hundred versions, so this mattered.
• Google Drive and WhatsApp. Less glamorous, but searchable shared media and quick messaging kept a small team on the same page.

AI and motion-capture helpers

• Uisato Studio, for AI generation. See AI tools & limits.
• Wonder Dynamics, to capture a reference performance and use it to drive 3D characters, which is far quicker than keyframe animation.