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Monday, May 12, 2008

Morph-O-Matic v2 *



+ Di-O-Matic, a leading developer of character animation software, is proud to release today the new edition of the award-winning Morph-O-Matic. The Morph-O-Matic, is industry standard morphing extension for 3ds max, has been designed from the ground up as a tool to assist modellers, animators and technical directors in creating complex morph setups and animations. Morph-O-Matic provides many benefits over the build-in morpher of 3ds max. More importantly, no matter how complex the model or how numerous the targets, Morph-O-Matic will provide you with instant results every time.
Now, Morph-O-Matic also provides you with the ability to create pose presets, allowing you to easily re-use a combination of morph targets. In addition to fully supporting the latest versions of 3ds max (2008 and 2009) in both 32 bit and 64 bit, Morph-O-Matic newest version sports many new features including:
· Faster morphing calculation speed
· Enhanced user interface for animators
· Ability to use modifier stack result as morph target
· Auto Reload Target per channel
· Improved .mom file features
· Additional MaxScript commands
· Correction of malfunctions from the previous version
· Much more
“The key benefit of using Morph-O-Matic is that it is a huge increase in productivity for both animators and character setup artists. I really recommend Morph-O-Matic as THE tool for studio animating with morph targets in 3ds max.” revealed Luis San Juan from Nexus Production. “On the animation side: the increase of speed, been able to play facial animations in real time and having a floating window for each character simultaneously allowing you to animate a few characters at the same time make live much easier. The new pose system saves a lot of time in reusing poses too.” He continues: “On the character setup side: it’s like having all the small options you always wanted to have in morpher, the ability to keep the targets in the modifier, the negative target, independent limits for each morph." To learn more about Morph-O-Matic or to download a trial version visit: www.di-o-matic.com

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Friday, April 11, 2008

Face Robot 1.9 - Realistic 3D Facial Animation


+ Softimage Co., a subsidiary of Avid Technology, Inc., today announced the availability of its 3D character facial animation technology, SOFTIMAGE® Face Robot® 1.9. SOFTIMAGE Face Robot enables professional 3D artists to create realistic human character facial animations quickly and easily, eliminating complex technical rigging steps. SOFTIMAGE Face Robot 1.9 is a complete technology that can scale to meet the needs of facilities varying in size and scope of project or game title.
SOFTIMAGE Face Robot 1.9 introduces a new Autodesk® Maya® exporter that facilitates moving completed facial rigs and animation data from Face Robot into Maya. The interoperative workflow enhances pipeline export and custom data exchange, allowing artists to integrate facial rigs created in Face Robot into pipelines built on SOFTIMAGEXSI® software, Autodesk Maya software, or between any other professional 3D animation software packages. SOFTIMAGE Face Robot 1.9 introduces a new export system for Autodesk Maya software that allows artists to create a shape-based version of Face Robot deformers, and move it directly into Maya. For more information, please visit - Click here

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Friday, April 04, 2008

MakeHuman 0.9.1 *


+ MakeHuman 0.9.1 stand-alone is now available for free download. MakeHuman © which started life as a Blender(c) python script, is now completely free, innovative and professional stan-alone software for the modelling of 3-Dimensional characters. The features that make this software unique are the new Tetra-parametric GUI © components and the Natural Pose System ©, for advanced muscular simulation.Using MakeHuman a photorealistic character can be modeled in less than 2 minutes; MakeHuman is released under an Open Source Licence, and is available for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. MakeHuman features Professional and photorealistic rendering on the basis of the Renderman standard and supports exports of the scenes in rib format and uses some Renderman compatible shaders. MH0.9.1 also exports in collada or obj format. Export in collada format allows a skeleton structure perfectly adapted to character to be obtained automatically.

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Monday, March 24, 2008

CG Academy releases two new 3ds Max Training DVDs



+ CG Academy releases two new 3d Studio Max Training DVDs named "Animation Fundamentals 1 : The Core Principles" and "HLSL Shader Creation 2: Light & Shading Models" for 3ds max users.
Animation Fundamentals 1: The Core Principles
Its by award winning and production proven characte animator, Simon Thistlethwaite. This DVD forms part one of a two part series that will introduce you to the fundamentals of animation in 3dsmax. In this first DVD, Simon, our instructor, will focus on the core principles of animation. He will teach you about such topics as timing and spacing, mass and weight, overlapping action, anticipation, follow-through and much more. This DVD sets the foundation for this series, and in DVD2 our focus will move on to character animation principles and skills necessary to bring a fully believable animated character to life.
HLSL Shader Creation 2: Light & Shading Models
HLSL Shader Creation 2 is written by Ben Cloward. Ben is a pipeline TD at Bioware games, probably one of the best known PC gaming brands there is. In this second DVD in our HLSL Shader Creation series, Ben Cloward explores how you can create the main building blocks of a lighting and shading system in HLSL. He shows how you can build shaders to represent the Ambient, Diffuse and Specular components of surface shading. How to enhance your Ambient shading by using a combination of convolved HDRI environment maps and baked Ambient Occlusion. Ben also shows you how to create Point, Directional and Spot light sources. And we wrap up with a practical exploration of some of today’s standard surface shading models, including Phong, Blinn, Cook/Torrence and Oren/Nayar.

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Monday, January 14, 2008

Advanced Character Rigging (Book)


+ Award-winning 3D animator TJ Galda has kicked off his new series of books on Character Rigging with an advanced book outlining how to create muscles and tendons using computer graphics software such as Autodesk's Maya. The book is designed to make the techniques as accessible as possible, so that even beginners can create and animate lifelike muscles for their animated characters. TJ Galda has worked as character technical director and studio technical supervisor on films like Fantastic Four, Shark Tale, Over the Hedge, and the upcoming Passengers, Passchendaele and Kung Fu Panda. He has also served at Electronic Arts Canada, during which he oversaw all art production on over 25 games at a time. Recently, Mr. Galda received the worldwide Autodesk Maya Master Award. In writing the book, Mr. Galda drew on his work in character animation, as well as his experience as an animation instructor, mentor, and lecturer.
In this book, you will learn how to create musculature for your characters that simulates sliding skin and flesh, while maintaining speed for animation. You will learn several tricks to create your own muscles, tendons, and more that do not require simulation and baking time. Starting from examining your forearm and hand, TJ Galda will go in depth on the usage and explanation of weight painting to maximize your efficiency. From there, we will progress into advanced rigging techniques including rigging with muscles, allowing for squash and stretch, writing custom expressions to account for various predictable anatomical phenomena and a variety of other advanced topics. These techniques have been utilized in several feature films and are based on a solid understanding of anatomy and Maya® software. You will also learn alternatives to dynamic musculature solutions and leave with a variety of options. His website can be found at www.tjgalda.com, and his book can be found at www.stores.lulu.com/tjgalda.

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Sunday, September 02, 2007

AndyRig v1.4 For Maya



+ A new version of John Doublestein's AndyRig is available for free download. AndyRig is an free generic character animation rig made for SCAD students and Alias Maya - created with JTDRiggingTools. AndyRig can be used for both female and male character setups. The Version 1.4 is now compatible with Maya 8.5 and Skin Shader with specular maps is now compatible with Maya software rendering. If you like, you may also download JTDRiggingTools, an free modular Biped auto-rigging suite designed for students, which Features: Elbow/knee pinning, IK/FK matching, dynamic parenting, stretchy and bendable limbs, stable forearm twisting and more.

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Monday, August 06, 2007

Life Forms Studio™ 4.0


+ Life Forms Studio™ 4.0 is a premier 3D software package dedicated to character animation. Life Forms by Credo Interactive makes character motion editing and creation a simple, intuitive process. Credo Interactive boast that; Life Forms 4.0 software is by far the most powerful character-animation package in it's price-range. Create your own animations based on default models or edit motion capture or keframed character animations from almost any source. With Life Forms Studio, you're not limited to one application - benefit from the smooth integration into your favorite 3D packages. Read / write HTR, BVA, BVH, LWS, DXF, ACC (Acclaim), 3DS, LFA (Life Forms) file formats. New Plugins allow LFA files to be read into Maya and 3D Studio Max. Life Forms 4.0 ships with the PowerMoves 2 CD packed with more than 750 ready-to-use motions including over 150 motion capture files. Some of the Life Forms Studio 4 features include:
- Interactive web-based Animation Viewer
- New optimized default modelsBatch file converter
- Enhanced joint-map editor
- Superior motion capture editing tools
- Integration with Maya, 3DS Max, Lightwave, Poser and more!!

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Monday, July 16, 2007

Digital-Tutors Announces New Animation and Rigging Training for Maya Artists



+ Digital-Tutors, an Autodesk® Authorized Publisher and leading provider in video-based training, today announced the availability of 'Rigging Quadrupeds in Maya' and 'Animating Quadrupeds in Maya'- the latest releases in a growing library of interactive training for emerging digital artists using Maya, the award-winning 3D modeling, animation, effects and rendering solution. 'Rigging Quadrupeds in Maya' provides 6 hours of project-based training and guides artists through Rigging techniques and the principles of building solution-based rigs, and animator-friendly controls for more efficient animating. 'Animating Quadrupeds in Maya' teaches artists time-saving animation techniques, the mechanics of quadrupeds, and principles for creating convincing quadruped animations with 3 hours of project-based training - An ideal learning solution for new and experienced animators and riggers.
Rigging Quadrupeds in Maya
Highlights from 'Rigging Quadrupeds in Maya' include: constructing effective hierarchies, developing broken hierarchy systems, building rigs from reference skeletons, building an FK spline system, incorporating MEL for speed, custom shelves for tools, Characters Sets, Sub-Character Sets, set driven keys, IK solvers for proper limb functionality, constraints, advanced hip control, painting weights, Connection Editor, reverse lock systems, muscle deformation with influence objects, corrective shapes for mesh deformations, and additional lessons developed for artists learning rigging.
Animating Quadrupeds in Maya
Highlights from 'Animating Quadrupeds in Maya' include: referencing footage and images, mechanics of quadruped animation, quadruped anatomy for animators, ghosting, Character Sets, adding follow-through, translating cycles forward, proper timing and spacing using rhythm, achieving believable weight, optimizing with Show Buffer Curves, Graph Editor, animating arcs, in-betweening, editing tangents, modifying tangents, animating in sections for efficiency, and additional lessons developed to teach artists a multitude of animation techniques.
For more information about Rigging Quadrupeds in Maya - click here
For more information about Animating Quadrupeds in Maya - click here

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Monday, May 21, 2007

Advanced Skeleton 2.0 For Maya



+ Another very handy tool for character Rigging, developed by Animation Studios Australia, and its now made totally free. AdvancedSkeleton Pro is a collection of Autodesk's Maya tools for doing character setup. Creating a Skeleton Setup for characters that works well, is a cumbersome job that includes: animation constraints, expressions and driven keys as well as fitting of the skeleton joints to the character. AdvancedSkeleton was designed to do most of this, so you can get your character setup done much faster. AdvancedSkeleton creates a complex motion system called AdvancedSkeleton from a simple joint chain called FitSkeleton. You can download the latest free version of AdvancedSkeleton from Highend3d.com.
Download Adv. Skeleton

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Friday, April 06, 2007

Automatic Rigging For Softimage XSI



+ 3dQuakers has released new Automatic Rigging DVD for Softimage XSI. The Automatic Rigging DVD is a continuation of the topics covered in the Scripting 101 DVD. It builds on concepts acquired in Scripting 101 to script out the creation of an advanced film quality rig using both VBscript and Jscript. Automatic Rigging starts off by creating functions that will be used to automate the process of building the RiggingPRO rig, with advanced features such as automatic twisting, stretching, an animation control panel and much more.. The finished addon is supplied for free with this DVD.
For more info about Automatic Rigging DVD for XSI, please click here!

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Monday, January 29, 2007

cMuscleSystem / cSmartBlend for Maya 8.5


- Comet Digital, LLC. has released an update for cMuscleSystem and cSmartBlend for Maya 8.5. This update also includes some bug fixes for cMuscleSystem. Registered users will receive an email with more information, and should contact Comet Digital with their email, Maya version, Operating System and if possible original purchase number in order to obtain the download. In addition our DEMO version has also been updated and now includes binaries for Maya 8.0 and 8.5 including x64 bit versions.
www.cometdigital.com

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Automatron For 3ds MAX *


- Rigging is the most important part of character animation and it’s becomes much more than frustrating when a project demands animating lots of characters. As it is not always possible to use inbuilt tools of 3d animation software’s, the CG Artists writes various scripts to avoid repeating TDS jobs while rigging and among these thousands of scripts some have evolved to be very useful and widely used by CG artists. Just like recently updated Puppetshop plug-in for 3ds Max, the Automatron is a powerful new character animation tool for 3ds Max 8 and up, designed and written by Andy Murdock of 'Lots of Robots', the creator of the animated movie ‘LOR’. Automatron was made by Andy to solve many of his frustrations that he had encountered while doing character animation.
Automatron was created in and the Rig is made up of only 3ds max objects and 3dsMax controllers. That means your Automatron will be forward compatible with any copy of 3ds max 8 and up, even if you don’t have Automatron. There are no to install on net-render machines, and you can freely send your Automatron scenes to colleges and clients without the need of them having the Automatron Tool. Check it out right away.
Automartron for 3ds Max - Link*

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Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Character Rigging Tips


- If you got hang of the "Skeleton Rig" , than its time to get some Character Rigging tips from Paul Neale. Paul explains the basic process to follow and what all Considerations you have to keep in mind while setting up a Rig. Beside this brief introduction to Character Rigging, there are three handy tutorials: Multiresolution rigs - Discussion on methods and reasons for setting up character rigs with the ability to change from one resolution character to another. Triple IK Leg - Leg set up using 3 IK solvers. Arm setup - IK arm setup incorporating twist bones in the upper and lower arm. This isn't a tutorial yet but it has a down loadable file that you can deconstruct and a brief explanation of how it works.
Character Rigging - Tips

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Monday, January 22, 2007

The Skeleton Rig for 3ds Max 9



- The "Skeleton Rig" is a very easy to use Rig for 3ds Max created by Brad Noble, who have been working on/off it for last five years and recently released Version 2.2 for 3ds Max 8 and 3ds Max 9. An older version of Skeleton Rig for 3ds max 6, 7 and 8 is also available for download. This easy and handy Rig gives you great amount of control while animating the character. The rig contains full IK/FK blending on the arms and legs, finger controls with preset poses, independent hip rotation and a simple yet powerful spine setup with adjustable influences on the head and FK arms. All limbs can be bent into curves and have automatically twisting bones to greatly help deformation. FK and IK snap buttons for the arms and legs and automatic hiding and unhiding of IK and FK controls depending on the amount of IK for each limb.
Squash and stretch parameters on the head, chest, arms and legs along with adjustment for how much thickening and thinning the bones do when squashed/stretched. The rig also contains manipulators. These are not like 3ds Max’s standard manipulators, but are objects that you move instead of going to the modify panel and adjusting a slider. With the manipulators, you can pose the entire rig almost any way you wish using only the move and rotate tools.
The Skeleton Rig - Download Link

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Friday, January 05, 2007

Genemation Released GenCrowd 3D 2.0



- Genemation Ltd, a leading developer of 3D face synthesis and character modelling tools announces the availability of GenCrowd 3D 2.0. GenCrowd is a stand-alone software tool that is designed to enable both professional and amateur digital content artists to quickly and easily generate hundreds of realistic, copyright free, 3D heads. The resultant heads (3d mesh and texture), including morph targets or a 'bone rig' for animation, can be exported into industry-standard art/animation tool suites in a variety of file formats, mesh resolutions and texture sizes. Whether you want your you heads to smile or frown, GenCrowd 3D allows a variety of expressions and phonemes (morph targets) to be added to each head . Mix expressions, phonemes and traits to help produce truely unique characters. GenCrowd 3D exports in the following formats: Obj, Maya, VRML, Fbx, Xsi . All heads (excluding vrml) are exported with a bone rig and animation sequence, which cycles through sample expressions.
Download GenCrowd Trial

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Monday, November 13, 2006