Cavalry vs Natron

Cavalry is 2D animation software for macOS and Windows, with tools for motion graphics and character rigging. Its listed capabilities include procedural rigs, data-driven sequences, node-based compositing, keying, and simulation tools, alongside a hybrid render engine and real-time viewport. Users can connect a spreadsheet to animate data at scale. Export formats include APNG, GIF, JPEG, Lottie, MP4, PNG, QuickTime, SVG, sprite sheets, WebM, and WebP. Individuals can download and use Cavalry for free without stated usage restrictions or payment; no paid individual price is given. Organizations can arrange team access with SSO through Canva Enterprise or Canva Education. A Canva account is required to use the software, which is brought to users by Canva. Cavalry is not available on mobile devices. Learning materials include getting-started guidance, feature and tips content, tutorials, and community resources, with documentation and a support link also available. Refunding a legacy subscription removes Pro feature access in Cavalry 2.6.1 and earlier.

Natron is a free, open-source application for visual-effects compositing in digital post-production. It runs on Linux, macOS, and Windows and uses a node-based workflow to build, group, and save custom tools and presets. Its interface includes more than 100 nodes, with listed tools for chroma keying, matte refinement, rotoscoping, rotopaint, tracking, and stabilization. Natron supports OpenFX and community-made plugins, as well as OpenImageIO, OpenColorIO, and 32-bit floating-point linear color processing. Python scripting includes expressions, user-defined parameters, scripts, callbacks, and GUI extensions. Rendering options include headless command-line work and integration with render farms for distributed rendering. Natron has no 3D workspace, though it can be used with Blender and supports CHAN camera-tracking files. Listed minimum requirements are 3 GB RAM, 5 GB free disk space, a 1280×1024 display, and OpenGL 2.0 for hardware-accelerated GPU rendering. The project lists version 2.5.0, released November 25, 2022.