Siggraph 2003 Turns Out Big for Apple Computer and the Future Looks Even Better

Although Apple doesn't have a traditional booth at the Siggraph show this week, the Macintosh OS X platform has made quite a splash in the 3D community with a number of exciting announcements. Actually, the announcements started to trickle out of the 3D developer community late last week in anticipation of the computer graphics show.

Apple this year is showing off Shake 3, the latest version of the award-winning visual effects and compositing application the company acquired last year. We spoke to Apple's Richard Kerris, Sr. Director of Worldwide Developer Relations, about Apple's participation at Siggraph. "Apple is there for its developers, first and foremost," said Richard Kerris. While Apple is focusing on developers it also has a training center for Shake 3 at the show (booth no. 1601) so that people can come up and take a course.

Kerris said the Siggraph community has had an enthusiastic response to the latest version of Shake 3 on the Mac OS X platform. "At the Shake User Event last night a number of developers and users spoke enthusiastically about their experiences on Mac OS X", said Kerris.

Mac OS X The Platform of the Future for 3D

From many quarters of the professional 3D community developers are coming to realize that the Mac OS X platform on the new G5 architecture represents the future of 3D. Back in June at Apple's worldwide developer's conference (WWDC) a new firm, Luxology, made a stunning presentation showing just how superior the Power Mac G5 platform is for running computationally intensive 3D applications when compared to 32-bit Intel-based computers. And the news of the G5's stunning power gets even better.

Just prior to the Siggraph show the developer Kaydara, announced that they have selected Mac OS X as their only Unix-based platform for MOTIONBUILDER 5 and the future of the product. "Based on feedback from customers and our industry projections, we do not believe the 3D market warrants the development and support of two different Unix-based platforms," said Michel Besner, president of Kaydara. "Mac OS X is a much more powerful and reliable solution for graphic artists and 3D professionals. With the release of the new Power Mac G5, we believe Mac OS X is the platform of the future, which is why we have decided to concentrate our Unix development efforts solely for this market." Kaydara is a market leader in the development of real-time 3D animation software solutions for the entertainment industry.

Richard Kerris said developers like Kaydara and Luxology are not the only companies coming to realize that the Mac OS X platform on G5 hardware offers a superior environment for the next generation of their products. Asked why developers are realizing OS X's strengths over Linux and other Unix operating systems, Richard Kerris remarked: "It's important to know why developers are attracted to Linux and Mac OS X. Developers and their customers have a deep heritage of custom Unix development, and Linux was attractive to them because it offered them a similar environment, just like Mac OS X does." Kerris explained that in the highend studios and production houses there are almost always custom development -- making their 3D pipelines highly modular and tuned to their particular strengths. "But developers are finding that Mac OS X offers them a superior environment to move their legacy Unix code and tools over to," said Kerris. "Being a Unix-based environment Mac OS X offers them what they really need and it gives them a lot more."

When we questioned high profile defections off Sun and SGI to Linux on Intel 32-bit systems -- by large studios like DreamWorks -- Kerris noted that it is important to realize who is making the announcement. "It's the platform provider making the announcement," said Kerris. Usually this involves a "very large deal where a studio has attained a superb discount" on a lot of equipment "in exchange" for a highly motivational marketing story. But Kerris insisted that -- while those deals may sound impressive and motivational -- where developers and 3D artists are really looking these days is at the Mac OS X platform.

Big Studios Need Big Power

Since the introduction of the 64-bit G5 Power Macs, Kerris noted that many of the major and independent film studios have come to Apple hoping to get their hands on the G5 as quickly as possible. Kerris said that studios and their developers have already come to Apple seeking out solutions for visual effects problems that 32-bit computers couldn't handle. There is a realization in the industry that the 64-bit capability of the G5 Power Macs is going to offer studios the type of power that used to only come at the expense of very costly Sun and SGI Unix workstations.

Kerris noted that what is really giving the Power Mac G5 a huge advantage goes beyond the floating point power of the G5...it really concerns Apple's innovative motherboard architecture. "This is where developers are really impressed", said Kerris. The Power Mac G5 has a 1 Ghz dedicated bus offering huge bandwidth in and out of each processor.

One such company duly impressed with the awesome power of the G5 is mega-hit film studio, Pixar. Richard Kerris said Pixar announced at the Siggraph show that PR RenderMan on Mac OS X will be released as a beta in September and will have a final ship date later in the year.

Developers and the Future

Asked what kind of resources developers have at their disposal to prepare products for the Power Mac G5, Kerris said Apple has a G5 lab facility where folks can bring their code and learn how to use Apple's new Xcode and other optimization products to make their applications run as quickly as possible on the new G5. Additionally, Apple has developers on the road helping customers optimize their applications for the G5. And in the near future the Cupertino-based G5 optimization lab will have European and Asian equivalents.

Beyond the new developer and customer interests -- and the new tools and support Apple is providing to the community -- even more performance progress is taking shape behind the scenes with the new IBM and Apple partnership. "IBM is working with Apple on further optimizations of the GCC compiler," said Kerris. This work, said Kerris, will add further speed increases to applications over time and "developers who take advantage of these tools will see huge advantages."

With over 90 Macs on the show floor, a dedicated and popular Shake 3 classroom, and numerous exciting announcements from developers and film studios, this year's Siggraph show is turning into the Mac's comeback event of the year! ---- ANTHONY FRAUSTO, Editor

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