Image Data Flows Downstream

In the Workspace panel and Timeline, a branch is the top-level item in the hierarchy tree view. Image data flows to the top of each branch. In the Workspace panel example, a Footage operator flows to a Color Corrector operator, which flows to a Paint operator.

You can see the same flow of image data in the Schematic view example. Follow the arrows from node to node until you reach the end of the branch.

In either case, the direction where the image data starts is upstream, and the direction where the image data ends is downstream.

In the Schematic view example, the Paint operator is the one farthest downstream in the Paint branch. For the composite, the Background[#####] and Hero.[###] Footage operators are the farthest upstream (since there are two streams).

You can move operators freely—and all operations are non-destructive. Therefore, if you change the settings of a Brightness filter or Paint operator on a layer, your changes automatically ripple to the operators added later in the flow.