Sure, it’s stinkingly quick, robust and has a bunch of great features. But what’s really making Nuke shine at the moment is The Foundry’s development approach.

Since they’ve purchased it there have been a bunch of maintenance releases, each with a laundry list of bug fixes and the odd new feature. It’s being actively and lovingly maintained. Try getting bug fix releases out of Adobe (After Effects) or Apple (Shake).

Secondly, they’ve announced a development roadmap. Awesome – we know where the package is headed. Contrast this to the “we’ll let you know when it’s done and what the hell it is” mysterious project that Apple may or may not be developing to replace Shake, and you know that Nuke’s future is bright.

Not sure about Eyeon’s approach with Fusion, but i can only imagine that it’s in a similar good place.