vmrv2 v1.4.2 vulkan

This beta release of v1.4.2 corresponds to: 20 of September of 2025 at 09:10:34 Buenos Aires, Argentina (-0300 UTC/GMT).

It does not support NDI® on any platform.

It works on Windows 10+, Windows ARM64, Ubuntu 22.04 LTS+, Ubuntu 22.04+ ARM64, macOS 13 (amd64) and macOS M1+ (arm64).

It may contain bugs, new untested features and more.

Enjoy!

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v1.4.2 Notes

Prices after v1.4.0

• Buy mrv2 (or Vulkan vmrv2) for personal use at a cost of u$50, paid by a Paypal donation (I will use the email to verify purchase and issue a yearly license).

• Buy mrv2 (or Vulkan vmrv2) for personal use to own at a cost of u$150, paid by a Paypal donation (I will use the email to verify purchase and issue a non-expiring, node-locked license).

• Buy mrv2 (or Vulkan vmrv2) for personal use at a cost of u$250 for aarch64, paid by a Paypal donation (I will use the email to verify purchase and issue a yearly license).

• Buy mrv2 (or Vulkan vmrv2) for personal use to own at a cost of u$500 for aarch64 builds, paid by a Paypal donation (I will use the email to verify purchase and issue a non-expiring, node-locked license).

Differences between Vulkan and OpenGL

• Vulkan is a new open source API, compared to OpenGL that it might get deprecated on some platforms like macOS. It supports true HDR (High Dynamic Range), it is between 20% and 50% faster than the OpenGL version but it does not support OpenUSD.
• OpenGL's only benefit at this point is that it supports OpenUSD and runs better on older OSes like MacOS Intel or Linux's X11 desktops.

Vulkan Demo Version

The OpenGL releases at:

https://sourceforge.net/projects/mrv2/files/beta/opengl

The Vulkan releases at:

https://sourceforge.net/projects/mrv2/files/beta/vulkan

directory are versions for you to evaluate mrv2 or vmrv2 before a purchase and report bugs or performance issues. Currently, when run as demo these versions don't have:

   - Annotations
   - A/B Comparisons
   - OpenEXR Layer switching
   - NDI support
   - Allow more than 5 minutes of use.

History

mrv2 and vmrv2 are an open source professional players and review tools for vfx, animation and computer graphics for Windows, Linux and macOS. You can choose to compile from source or get binaries.

mrv2 ships now in two compiled versions:

• mrv2 with OpenGL backend (free up to version 1.4.0 - donationware afterwards)

• vmrv2 with Vulkan backend (donationware)

Difference between OpenGL and Vulkan

Vulkan is a new open source API, compared to OpenGL that it might get deprecated on some platforms like macOS. It supports true HDR (High Dynamic Range), it is about 20% to 50% faster than the OpenGL version (on Windows, macOS M1+ and it is the same speed for Linux's GNOME 48 and later) but it does not support OpenUSD.

OpenGL's main benefit at this point is that it supports OpenUSD and works better on old CPUs (macOS Intel and older Wayland compositors).

Prices for binaries

Donationware prices of binary licenses through PayPal:

I use the email information to contact you privately. I don't sell your information, as I don't have access to it, except for your email, which I use to contact you.

• u$ 50 for a node-lock license for one year.

• u$ 150 for a node-lock license to own.

• u$ 250 for a node-lock license for one year on Windows ARM64 or Linux aarch64.

• u$ 500 for a node-lock license to own on Windows ARM64 or Linux aarch64.

• The prices are cumulative. If you donate, say u$10 in 5 months, you can access the node-lock license for one year.

License works for both mrv2 and vmrv2 (you can have both installed).

ChangeLog

• Added Linux aarch64 builds, without NDI.
• Added Windows aarch64 builds, without NDI or SVT-AV1 encoder.

Notes on installation

• On macOS you install it by opening the .dmg file, and dragging the vmrv2 icon to the Applications directory. If there's already a vmrv2 version, we recommend you overwrite it. The macOS application is currently not notarized, so when you launch it you will not be able to run it as macOS will warn you that the file is not secure as it was downloaded from internet. To avoid that, you need to open the Apple Logo->Settings->Privacy and Security and go to Security and allow "Opening Anyway". Alternatively, you can do it from the Terminal, by:

  sudo xattr -rd com.apple.quarantine /Applications/vmrv2.app/

• Windows and Chrome, like macOS, also protect you from installing files from the Internet. When you first download it with Chrome it may warn you that it is not an usual archive to be downloaded. Make sure to click on the right up arrow menu to Save it anyway. You cannot open the .exe from Chrome directly. You will need to open Windows Explorer and go to the Downloads directory. You should then run it from there. Then Windows will popup a Blue box telling you Windows SmartScreen prevented the start of an unknown application and that you can place your PC at risk. Click on the More Information text and a Button that says Run anyway or similar should appear. Click on it and follow the standard instructions to any Windows installer. One note about the Windows install. When asked if you want to add vmrv2 to your PATH, it is recommended to answer No to it, as it avoids DLLs conflicts with other applications that use common libraries like FFmpeg or OpenUSD.

• On Linux, in order to install the .rpm or .deb packages requires your user to have sudo permissions.

On Debian (Ubuntu, etc) systems, you would install with:

  sudo dpkg -i vmrv2-vulkan-Linux-amd64.deb

On Fedora, you would install it with:

  sudo rpm -i vmrv2-vulkan-Linux-amd64.rpm

Once you install it, you can run mrv2 by just typing vmrv2 in the shell, as a symlink to the executable is placed in /usr/bin. The installers will also associate file extensions and install an icon for easy starting up in the Desktop icon of the user that installed it. For running vmrv2 with the icon, you need to select it and use the right mouse button to open the menu and choose Allow Launch.

If you lack sudo permissions in your organization, you should download the .tar.gz file and you can uncompress it with:

  tar -xf vmrv2-vulkan-Linux-amd64.tar.gz

That will create a folder in the directory you uncompress it from. You can then run vmrv2 by using the mrv2.sh shell script in the bin/ subdirectory.

Notes about Vulkan on Windows

In order to get HDR, you currently need to have Windows 10+ (11 is ideal) and an HDR monitor.

Notes about Vulkan on NVidia Linux

In order to get HDR, you currently need to have the KWin6 or GNOME48 compositors and an HDR monitor.

It will likely work with any NVidia RTX 3080+ or similar AMD board, but it will require you to choose and test your hardware carefully.

The preferred NVidia driver tested for best performance is nvidia-driver-570 (default on Ubuntu 25.04 with GNOME48).

Notes about Vulkan on macOS Intel

• Only up to Vulkan 1.3 is currently supported.
• HDR on macOS needs a MacBook Pro. MacBook Pro Intel will give you up to 1000 Nits of HDR depending on model.
• MacBook Pro Silicon should work with any M1 device up to HDR+.