Alias/Wavefront has announced Maya Paint Effects. Paint Effects is a tool
for the instantaneous creation and animation of organic and painterly
effects. Completely integrated inside of Maya, Paint Effects comes with a
myriad of editable pressure-sensitive preset brushes including: Effects
Brushes which can create complete environments with trees, grass, and
flowers, characters with realistic hair, eyebrows and beards, and special
effects such as lightning, clouds, rain, fire, fireworks, starfields and
sparks; and Natural Media Brushes which includes traditional painterly
brushes. Paint Effects, available this fall, will be a standard feature of
Maya 2.5 software in both Maya Complete and Maya Unlimited for Microsoft
Windows NT and Silicon Graphics IRIX workstations. Alias|Wavefront has also
announced Maya Builder. Maya Builder, a subset of Maya Complete, has been
optimized to address the specific needs of level designers and programmers
in the game and interactive title development community. Maya Builder
includes the polygonal modeling and texturing tools that are also included
in Maya Complete, Artisan features, MEL scripting and the full Maya API.
Priced at US$2,995, Maya Builder is a cost-effective solution for games and
interactive title developers looking to standardize on Maya technology
throughout their games production pipeline. Maya Builder will be available
for Microsoft Windows NT or IRIX as part of the release of Maya 2.5 this
fall. Maya Builder has a SRP of US$2,995. Maya Complete 2.5, Maya Unlimited
2.5 and Maya Builder 2.5 are scheduled to ship in the fall of 1999. Maya
Complete 2.5 has a SRP of US$7,500 and includes modeling, rendering,
animation, dynamics, and Maya Artisan.