Busy director John Woo has signed on to direct Paramount feature adaptation of Tom Clancy's RAINBOW SIX, reports VARIETY. The long in-development pic was originally brought to Paramount by Artists Management Group's Michael Ovitz in 1999. Michael Shiffer, Bill Wisher, Art Monterastelli, Frank Capello and John Enbom have all taken cracks at the script over the years. The story follows former CIA agent John Clark, who leaves the agency to set up an U.K.-based multinational organization that fights terrorism.

THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW, which just claimed the best second place showing ever at the box office over the Memorial Day weekend ($85.8M), has whipped up quite a vfx storm, and Henry Turner explores all of the digital challenges in bringing on the next Ice Age.

The Visual Effects Society (VES) unveiled a stellar lineup for VES 2004, its sixth annual Festival of Visual Effects, June 18-20 in San Rafael, California. The three-day event features presentations and panels headed by visual effects supervisors and their teams with a focus on how vfx enhance the storytelling process.

Speaker Schedule:

June 18, 2004
9:30AM - 11:30AM
"Film Visual Effects Techniques in Games"

Alias and Motion Computing agreed to include the full version of Alias SketchBook Pro on all Motion M1400 Tablet PCs configured with the Motion Pak software package sold worldwide. The bundle combines Motion Computing's cutting-edge Tablet PCs with Alias SketchBook Pro's best-in-class digital pen-based sketching and annotation software.

On the eve of the industry transition to PCI Express, ATI Technologies announced a complete line-up of FireGL workstation graphics accelerators with full native support for this new bus architecture. The newly branded Visualization series will offer four new graphics accelerators: the high-end FireGL V7100, mid-range FireGL V5100 and, redefining the entry-level segment, the FireGL V3200 and the FireGL V3100.

Southwest Arts, Film & Television Conference
Dallas Texas, USA
June 4-6, 2004

The new Southwest Arts, Film & Television conference is offering a special section for HD production and has panels and exhibitors of interest to film & video professionals engaged in producing television programming for cable and broadcast, commercials for local and national audiences, feature films, corporate video production, documentaries, animation and special effects, infomercials and music videos. The conference runs June 4-6, 2004, at the Dallas Convention Center in Dallas.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences mailed entry forms on June 1, 2004 for the 2004 Scientific and Technical Awards to more than 850 companies and individuals, including past winners, within the sci-tech community both in the United States and abroad. All entry applications must be submitted to the Academy no later than Friday, July 30, 2004.

The litigation that disrupted the relationship between Marvel Enterprises and Sony Pictures is now over. Both companies announced they have "amicably resolved their pending court disputes." In 2003, Marvel sued SPIDER-MAN partner for $50 million, claiming the film studio was trying to label SPIDER-MAN a Sony property and leaving Marvel alienated from merchandising its own character. As part of the agreement, details were not released.

Discreet announced that its 3ds max professional animation, modeling and rendering application and flame visual effects system were used to create seamless CGI for Fox's THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW, which opens May 28.

The cataclysmic events depicted in Fox's THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW, opening May 28, came alive with the help of previs provided by Crack Creative and visual computing technology leader NVIDIA.