Depth Scanner — Mac download

Depth Scanner is a plugin from Blace Plugins that analyses a frame to find the parts closest to the camera, producing a depth map you can use for depth-based transitions.

It works on both video clips and still photographs. The plugin documentation lists it alongside Depth Scanner 2, giving you two approaches to depth map generation within the same toolset. Once generated, the greyscale output drives effects that respond to scene depth — think of a blur that rolls from background to foreground, or a light wrap that changes intensity based on subject distance.

Analyse just one frame instead of the whole clip

A few shortcuts in Depth Scanner are easy to overlook but speed up repetitive work.

• Drag-and-drop frame sampling. Instead of running analysis on a full clip, scrub to a representative frame and hit Analyse Current Frame. The plugin remembers your settings when you switch back to full-clip mode. Useful for long renders where you want to preview the depth map quality first.
• Copy-paste between layers. Generated depth maps sit as effects on a layer. Select the effect, press Cmd+C, select another layer, Cmd+V. Settings, matte and all. No need to re-run analysis on identical clips used across multiple comps.
• Solo view toggle. Hold Option while clicking the Show Depth checkbox to view only the depth matte temporarily — no need to toggle the layer's visibility or add a solid background. Release the key and the composite returns.
• Expression-friendly output. The depth map is a standard greyscale layer. Link it to any property via pick-whip and After Effects treats it like any other matte source. No proprietary node system to learn.

8–12 seconds for 1080p, longer for 4K

On an M-series Mac with 16 GB of RAM, a 10-second 1080p clip analyses in roughly 8–12 seconds. 4K footage takes longer — expect 20–35 seconds depending on frame complexity. The plugin leans on the GPU where possible, though Blace Plugins does not publish exact hardware acceleration specs.

Memory usage stays reasonable. A single depth map generation rarely pushes After Effects past an extra 300–500 MB of RAM. Multiple sequential analyses on long timelines can creep upward, so a restart of After Effects between heavy sessions keeps things tidy.

Stability is solid in version 1.15.6. Crashes are uncommon during normal use. The plugin handles interrupted renders gracefully — if After Effects quits unexpectedly mid-analysis, reopening the project and re-running the effect picks up without corrupting the layer stack.

Black frames or missing depth when resolution mismatches

Depth map looks flat or washed out

This happens most often with low-contrast source footage. The AI struggles when foreground and background share similar luminance values.

• Add a temporary Curves adjustment above the source layer to boost contrast before analysis. Remove it after generating the depth map — the matte references the frame data, not the adjustment layer.
• If you are working with a photograph, try the depth scanner 2 free download mac alternative approach: Depth Scanner 2 uses a different model that sometimes handles flat images better. Having both plugins installed gives you a fallback without leaving the timeline.

Flickering across frames in video

Temporal inconsistency appears when the AI interprets similar frames slightly differently. It is most visible on fine details like hair or foliage.

• Apply a mild Fast Box Blur (radius 1–2 px) to the depth map layer. This smooths the per-frame variations without destroying edge separation.
• For critical shots, generate depth maps on every 3rd or 5th frame and use After Effects' Time Remapping with frame blending to interpolate the gaps. Slower to set up, but the result holds up under scrutiny.

Plugin not appearing in the Effects menu

After installing depth scanner mac, the effect should appear under Effect > Blace Plugins > Depth Scanner. If it does not:

1. Confirm the plugin file sits in Applications/Adobe After Effects [version]/Plug-ins/ and not in a subfolder.
2. Restart After Effects completely — not just the project.
3. On Apple Silicon Macs, check that After Effects is running natively and not under Rosetta. Blace Plugins supports Apple Silicon directly.

Analysis stalls on certain frames

Rare, but it happens with extremely dark or extremely bright footage where the model cannot find enough gradient information. The workaround is to run analysis on a pre-comp with a temporary exposure correction. Once the depth map is generated, delete the correction layer and the matte remains valid.

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