Digital Video has released Toonz 5.0 Harlequin, which steps into paperless animation by integrating vector drawings in its traditional workflow based on raster drawings. This new environment allows to manage drawings, images and animation levels the way one prefers, preserving their nature throughout the workflow, with no unwanted conversion from raster to vector, or vice versa.
Three of the seven films competing in the visual effects industry Bake-off on Jan. 25 at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences used Houdini from Side Effects Software. They include CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY, HARRY POTTER AND THE GOBLET OF FIRE and THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE. The Bake-off involves a 15-minute presentation to the Visual Effects Award Nominating committee, which will then create the final nomination list for the Visual Effects Oscar awarded each year by the academy.
Leading visual effects developer The Foundry kicks off 2006 with the release of Furnace 3 for Shake, including brand new image processing plug-ins designed to significantly enhance workflow and productivity for Shake artists.
Furnace, available for Linux and OSX, is already a popular suite of image processing tools, designed to tackle every day compositing tasks, and the new release delivers Shake artists with an additional 10 plug-ins, many of which automate time-consuming processes in the creation of digital visual effects.
Adobe Systems Inc. has begun shipping Adobe After Effects 7.0 software. Professionals can streamline their workflows to produce compelling content for any media with the new features packed in Adobe After Effects 7.0, including a re-designed, unified user interface, accelerated high-fidelity OpenGL 2.0 support and the most comprehensive Flash Video (FLV) export capabilities. Adobe After Effects 7.0 is available as a stand-alone product or as part of the newly launched Adobe Production Studio.
Adobe Systems Inc. has launched Adobe Production Studio, an extension of the Adobe Creative Suite family of products. One of the most complete post-production software solutions available, Adobe Production Studio combines full new versions of Adobe's world class video and graphics applicationsAdobe After Effects 7.0, Adobe Premiere Pro 2.0, Adobe Audition 2.0, Adobe Encore 2.0 and the latest versions of Adobe Photoshop CS2 and Adobe Illustrator CS2with time-saving innovations such as Adobe Dynamic Link that deliver a highly efficient workflow experience.
Barbara Robertson flies to Genzano, Italy, for the I Castelli Animati festival and says bravo to what she found there.
Ballistic Publishing is now offering PAINTER, showcasing a collection of the world's finest digital artwork created with the natural media painting program, Corel Painter. PAINTER exhibits 209 works by 135 artists across diverse categories such as Portraits, Concept Art, Fantasy, Editorial Illustration and Abstract art. PAINTER is presented in a high quality volume consisting of 192 pages and is available in a leather-bound Special Edition and Soft Cover.
Apple is offering ATI's award-winning Radeon X1600 for the iMac, introducing an impressive consumer platform with state of the art discrete graphics. With increased efficiency and power, the Radeon X1600 enables users to get the most out of not only the extensive feature set of the iMac, but to leverage all the capabilities of the Mac OS X Tiger, including Core Image and ATI's Avivo technology to deliver superior display quality.
AJA Video, a leading manufacturer of professional video interface and conversion solutions, announced KONA 3, the new top-of-the-line HD/SD video capture card. Offering 40% more processing power than the industry-leading KONA 2, the new KONA 3 is the ultimate uncompressed capture card for SD, HD and Dual Link 4:4:4:4 HD for PCI Express Apple G5 Power Macs and Apple Final Cut Pro. The new card will ship worldwide on Jan. 30.
Vicon has installed a 44-camera Vicon MX40 system for facial, hand and full-body capture to leading game company Square Enix Co. Ltd.
Square Enix acquired the system to take advantage of the immediate performance gains of Vicon MX when recording actors for cinematic sequences and in-game play, and to support higher camera counts and complexity for motion capture on next-gen titles.
Square Enix has created such popular game franchises as FINAL FANTASY and DRAGON QUEST, and has been an experienced motion capture user for many years.
Apple introduced the new iMac featuring Mac OS X running on the new Intel Core Duo processor, delivering performance that is up to twice that of its predecessor. The widely praised iMac design now features dual-core processors, a built-in iSight video camera for video conferencing out-of-the-box, and the breakthrough media experience of Front Row with the Apple Remote for a simple, intuitive and powerful way for consumers to enjoy their content from across the room.
BOXX Technologies launched APEXX 4, a top-of-the-line personal workstation specifically engineered to maximize the productivity of the VFX professional.
Wacom Technology Corp.s new Intuos3 12x19 pen tablet is specifically designed for photographers, designers, artists and engineers that use multiple large monitors or large widescreen displays such as the 30 Apple Cinema HD display. Like the recently introduced Intuos3 6x11, the Intuos3 12x19 features an active area with an aspect ratio that is a great match to the screen aspect ratio of either a widescreen display or standard displays used together. This provides optimal pen control and efficient use of the entire tablet.
Alienware is now featuring the new AMD Athlon 64 FX-60 dual-core processor on both the Aurora ALX and Aurora 7500 desktop platforms.
Autodesk is will soon be offering an exclusive new 3ds Max subscription service called Pro Booleans, which delivers expanded flexibility for the installed modeling tools in 3ds Max.
Upon the sad news of Wendy Jackson Halls passing, Animation World Network collected the thoughts of the community in tribute to her career in animation.
Rendercore Inc. has extended its promotional offer of unlimited use pricing model. Though Virtual Renderrack was only launched in December 2005, it was highly successful and generated a lot of requests from clients for the promotional offer to be extended. This promotion is available to those who purchase unlimited solution from Jan. 4-6, 2006.
Eovia Corp. announced the immediate availability of the international English and French language editions of its complete 3D solution, Carrara 5. Responding to the need for mainstream accessibility while addressing the sophisticated requirements of professionals, Eovia Carrara 5 is made available in two versions. Both Carrara 5 and the more extensive Carrara 5 Pro present a potent and compelling suite of 3D modeling, animation and rendering tools wrapped within a more enjoyable user interface.
![NewTek Releases Free Update to VT[4] Integrated Production Suite](https://www.awn.com/sites/default/files/styles/small_featured/public/image/featured/19641-newtek-releases-free-update-vt4-integrated-production-suite.jpg?itok=ik5CuhUS "NewTek Releases Free Update to VT[4] Integrated Production Suite")
![NewTek Releases Free Update to VT[4] Integrated Production Suite](https://www.awn.com/sites/default/files/styles/tiny_featured/public/image/featured/19641-newtek-releases-free-update-vt4-integrated-production-suite.jpg?itok=HpdACgew "NewTek Releases Free Update to VT[4] Integrated Production Suite")
NewTek Inc. announced the release of a free update for VT[4] owners, version 4.6. The new version of the award-winning VT[4] Integrated Production Suite includes improved 3D animation and motion graphics tools, enhanced support for multiple monitors, improvements to the NewTek codec and all computer sources, including attached DV cameras, and can be used as a downstream key (DSK). The feature and maintenance update is a free download for registered VT[4] users.
RE:Vision Effects offers Twixtor, their popular retiming solution, for SOFTIMAGE|XSI animation software.
Twixtor 4.5 raises the bar in motion estimation. Nick Brooks, Oscar and Emmy winner for visual effects, said, "Twixtor 4.5 represents a new touchstone in retiming. The difference in accuracy means that retiming artifacts are either drastically reduced or disappear on the hardest to retime footage. "
Twixtor runs as an FxTree operator within SOFTIMAGE|XSI and provides the following features:* Calculation of motion vectors at each pixel.
Valve released a 64-bit version of its Source game engine technology. The first 64-bit Valve games released will be native 64-bit versions of HALF-LIFE 2 and LOST COAST, and have been developed to take advantage of AMD Athlon 64 FX processor-based systems.
The 64-bit versions of these games are being offered to all HALF-LIFE 2 owners via Steam, Valve's online platform for delivering games and digital content directly to users around the world.
ProMAX Systems Inc. and BOXX Technologies Inc. will jointly deliver a broad range of specialized media creation products for film, video and broadcast professionals.
BOXX's, is to rapidly make new performance technologies available to creative professionals to improve the efficiency of their workflow. ProMAX delivers stability, performance and high quality support in advanced integrated video systems.
Autodesk Inc. has begun shipping Autodesk Combustion 4 software for Apple Macintosh. Combustion 4, Autodesk's desktop visual effects software consists of a powerful feature set, including vector paint, particles, effects, animation and 3D compositing. This new version for the Mac operating system streamlines the creative process for visual graphics creation by providing enhanced interoperability with third-party desktop applications, improved paint tools and workflow efficiency.
D2 Software Inc., a subsidiary of Digital Domain Inc., is now shipping v4.5 of Nuke, the high-end compositing system built by artists, for artists, was and recently used by Weta Digital on KING KONG.
Peter Plantec explores recent advances in facial animation and crowd simulation software to see how different forms of virtual acting are converging in vfx-driven works.
