Category: Visual Effects

Ben Stiller, Jack Black and Robert Downey Jr. lead an ensemble cast in DreamWorks Pictures' TROPIC THUNDER, an action comedy about a group of self-absorbed actors who set out to make the biggest war film ever. After ballooning costs (and the out of control egos of the pampered cast) threaten to shut down the movie, the frustrated director refuses to stop shooting, leading his cast deep into the jungles of Southeast Asia for "increased realism," where they inadvertently encounter real bad guys.

Reflecting Thursday's announcement that the release date of HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE has moved to July 2009, IMAX Corporation, confirmed it is already exploring alternative titles for this year's holiday season and is "confident" it will secure a solid film for the IMAX theatre network.

The company will announce a replacement film as soon as possible.

Disney announced it has moved their next animated feature, BOLT, up a week, to November 21 to fill the vacancy.

Swedish vfx house Filmgate has expanded business by adding a range of digital intermediate (DI) services for the post production of films. ASSIMILATE's SCRATCH Digital Process Solution is at the core of Filmgate's new digital pipeline.

TWILIGHT, the first film in Summit Ent.'s thriller romance franchise, has moved up its North American release date to Friday, November 21, 2008. The film, which was previously planned to be released on December 12, 2008, is taking advantage of HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE moving to next summer.

The new release date for TWILIGHT allows the studio to both bring the film to the written-series' enormous fan base sooner, and to present the film in more theaters prior to the holiday movie-going season where traditionally screen time for any popular film is limited.

Warner Bros. Pictures has moved back the release date of HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE to summer 2009. The sixth installment of the HARRY POTTER franchise will now open day-and-date domestically and in the major international markets on July 17, 2009.

Three-time Emmy winner Christopher Lloyd has joined the cast of Sci Fi Channel's upcoming four-hour fantasy/adventure miniseries MIRABILIS (working title). Lloyd will play Tesselink, a venerable senior elf and accomplished master of bloodsteel sorcery who aids his granddaughter Perfidia (Natassia Malthe) and a band of knights in their quest for the crucible that may save Mirabilis. He is best known for his roles as Emmett "Doc" Brown in the BACK TO THE FUTURE trilogy and as Reverend Jim Ignatowski on television's TAXI.

MGM Pictures will be releasing the suspense film, VALKYRIE (vfx by Lidar Services, Sony Pictures Imageworks and The Third Floor), from director Bryan Singer, on Friday, December 26, 2008.

"We saw and tested the movie," said Clark Woods, President of MGM Distribution. "And we believe a strong movie deserves a strong playdate."

mental images' rendering software, mental ray 3.7, is now integrated as part of the recently announced Autodesk Maya 2009 software digital content creation package.

The release of Maya 2009 will mark the first availability of mental ray 3.7, which will subsequently be integrated by other key mental images customers.

Duiker Research Corp., creator of the Color Symmetry plug-in suite, announced Color Symmetry 2.0. Version 2.0 encompasses new capabilities that make it possible to create and emulate production looks, accurately view color and correctly exchange color data across a variety of film- and emerging all-digital production pipelines in motion pictures, television, commercials and games.

Nevercenter has released version 2.1 of its popular 3D modeling application Silo, which is now available at www.nevercenter.com in two different versions. Silo Core is a new, lighter version of Silo which will be available for $99 and is solely focused on modeling tools. Silo Professional is the equivalent of previous full versions of Silo, including high quality displacement painting, advanced UV layout, and high end modeling tools on top of Silo's robust core toolset.

Touch feedback technology developer Immersion Corporation today announced four new products and services for the motion capture (mocap) and animation industries. Attendees of SIGGRAPH 2008 will see the new offerings in booth 1422 at the Los Angeles Convention Center, August 12-14, 2008.

Demand for better graphics performance and programmability within the professional notebook market continues to increase as animators, designers and engineers work with larger 3D models, datasets and images.