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Qube! Supports Digital Media Education Programs

PipelineFX's Qube! render farm management system has gained continued market momentum, as seven universities from the U.S., China, the U.K. and Canada have adopted Qube! for render farm management for their digital media and animation education programs.

Rutgers University in New Jersey has selected Qube! in support of the fastest-growing section of their Art/Art History Program, the new discipline of computer graphics and computer animation. "We chose Qube! as a render farm application because it provides the tools needed for animation for our students, and Qube! has made setting that up a snap," said Dennis Moffett, systems programmer/administrator for the Camden Graduate School Dept. of Fine Arts in Camden, New Jersey. Rutgers-Camden offers a diverse curriculum designed to provide students with a strong liberal arts background as well as extensive knowledge in specialized fields.

The University of North Carolina Wilmington Department of Computer Science has selected Qube! to manage rendering for their new Digital Arts lab. "We are building our first dedicated render farm which will be used for 3D graphics, animation and special effects," said Dr. Eric Patterson. "The students and faculty are really excited about accelerating creative and technical development, and the students are so glad to have the chance to go straight from their workstations to a system that will be working on the time-consuming rendering for them. This will help expand the scope and quality of their work and give them more of the flavor of a real production environment."

Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, California, has adopted Qube! for render farm management. The LMU|School of Film and Television offers a Bachelor of Arts degree in Animation. Lab resources include comprehensive, up to the minute computer hardware and software, including AfterEffects, Maya, Shake, Toonz and 3ds Max, running on both Mac and PC platforms.

Southern Adventist University School of Visual Art and Design in Collegedale, Tennessee, chose Qube! to support three tracks in students' pursuit of a B.S. in Animation; Character Animation, Commercial Animation and Technical Animation. The Technical Animation degree is a double major in Animation and Computer Science.

Nanjing Finance and Economics University in Nanjing, China, has purchased Qube! for their growing animation curriculum. "There is a lot of interest in 3D animation and graphics education in China today," said Ivan Lee of Jadason Technology Ltd., an experienced reseller of Qube! software as well as Autodesk animation products throughout China and Hong Kong. "China's animation market is growing quickly and top Universities like Nanjing are leading the way in digital media education, providing the best tools for their students."

The University of Teesside in Tees Valley, U.K., adopted Qube! in support of their B.A. (Hons) Creative Visualization, Computer Animation, Digital Character Animation and Digital Visual Effects programs. Applications used include SOFTIMAGE|XSI, Autodesk Maya, 3ds Max and Combustion.

Algonquin College School of Media+Design in Ontario, Canada, recently selected Qube! to provide a commercial-grade render farm management system for their animation students. "Qube! allows us to run an all MAC OSX render farm environment but still use both OSX and Windows clients," said Brad St. Jean, Media and Design Technologist. "Cross-platform functionality was important for us since we teach a wide variety of production tools in our three-year animation program."

"We are seeing tremendous growth in digital media and animation programs in the educational marketplace," said Troy Brooks, ceo of PipelineFX. "Qube! dramatically accelerates the students creative process by aggregating cross-platform computing resources and efficiently managing them for rendering. Also by centralizing rendering, the students' workstations are freed up to be more available to more students."

PipelineFX (www.pipelinefx.com), with headquarters in Honolulu, Hawaii, was founded in 2002. Qube! is used by world-class studios, including South Park Studios, Electronic Arts, Buena Vista Games, DKP, Reel FX, Guava Graphics, and Radical Ent. Qube! is used by schools around the world, including the School of Visual Arts in N.Y., Carleton School of Architecture, Full Sail in Florida, the University of Advancing Technology, Pratt Institute and the University of Hawaii-Academy for Creative Media.

Bill Desowitz's picture

Bill Desowitz, former editor of VFXWorld, is currently the Crafts Editor of IndieWire.

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