Upgrading from 1.x

Astrofox 2.0 is a ground-up rewrite with a new renderer, interface, desktop shell, export pipeline, and plugin system. It can open .afx project files — gzip-compressed 1.x files or uncompressed 2.0 files — and migrates supported elements automatically.

Open a legacy project#

Select Open project in the action rail and choose the .afx file. Astrofox inflates gzip-compressed 1.x files when needed, converts supported elements, and reports anything it removes. Save the migrated project after checking the result. The file remains an .afx project.

Element mappings#

Astrofox 1.x	Astrofox 2.0 migration
Glow	Bloom; amount becomes radius, intensity becomes strength
Bloom	strength is amount × 3; threshold is inverted (1 − threshold)
Color Halftone	scale becomes radius; angle is converted to per-channel rotation
Glitch	amount becomes strength
Geometry lighting	Light intensity, light distance, and camera zoom become key-light and camera-distance settings with lighting enabled
Distortion mode Noise	Distortion mode Simplex Noise
Pre-release Perlin Noise effect	Distortion effect using Perlin Noise mode

Elements that cannot be converted are dropped and listed after the project opens.

Project format#

Projects still use the .afx extension. Version 1.x stored gzip-compressed JSON; 2.0 writes uncompressed JSON. Open project loads either encoding. Some earlier 2.x builds also saved .json files, which still open.

Local media can require relinking after migration. Review every image, video, and audio source before exporting.

Settings and plugins#

• Astrofox 1.x application settings in app.config are not migrated. Choose your language, project settings, and preferences again.
• Astrofox 1.x plugins are not compatible with the 2.0 plugin system. Install a 2.0 version or rebuild the plugin using the authoring guide.

Review checklist#

After migration, check:

1. Canvas format, resolution, and background color
2. Scene, display, and effect order
3. Geometry camera and lighting
4. Reactor bindings and value ranges
5. Image and video sources, then reload audio with Load audio
6. Bloom, distortion, glitch, and halftone appearance
7. A short image or video test export