What’s New in Mudbox 2012

Autodesk Mudbox 2012 continues to advance itself and in this year’s release the design software giant added support for 64-bit Linux in addition to Windows and Mac OS X 10.6.x support. In this update Autodesk touched on all three major areas of Mudbox (sculpting, painting and posing) adding useful improvements, but in general the largest updates are concentrated in the area of 3D painting and posing.

Before we get into those we’ll briefly touch on some general improvements. Version 2011 added 64-bit support for Mac and now as we mentioned we have the same for Linux. A big new improvement in this update is the ability to create and edit stencils. You can bring in images to use for stencils directly from the Mac clipboard.

Autodesk also has introduced new single-step “round-trip” workflows for other related Autodesk software, such as: Autodesk Maya, Autodesk 3ds Max and Autodesk Softimage. Imagining a scene origin from your DCC software of choice, you can export to Mudbox to add painting or sculpting effects and detail and then merge back to your digital content creation (DCC) software. That improves work flows for those working with Autodesk DCC suites. There is a new Send To option in the File menu.

Another useful and related new feature is the new Maya-like “Hot Menus” introduced in Mudbox 2012. Clicking the spacebar quickly creates a “heads-up” hot menu system. For whose who do not use such menu systems it may take getting use to. (see image 01).

01 - Autodesk Mudbox 2012 features new "heads-up" Maya-like hot menu system.

Some significant minor changes include the ability to use tools like Grab and Pinch to manipulate stencils to more closely conform to the shape of your model. There are new selection tools with region and lasso modes. This gives you more control over how you control your model. (see image 02).

02 - Mudbox 2012 features expanded selection tools with new lasso and region modes.

There are two new Grab brush options–Grab Silhouette and Follow Path–that allow you to create innovative new shapes. And this release vastly improves on texture data sets.

next page: Painting Improvements

Used in both entertainment, media and technical engineering fields, the Autodesk DEC products include the following products for Mac-based design and creative professionals: Autodesk Maya 2012, Autodesk Mudbox 2012, Autodesk Flame 2012, and Autodesk Smoke 2012.

The 2012 products enable iterative workflows and help users manage complexity and provide new creative tools. Autodesk products have been used in the creation of popular movies like “Black Swan” and chart-topping video games such as “Medal of Honor.”

Marc Petit, senior vice president of Autodesk Media & Entertainment, said that “Movie, video and game and television audiences are demanding more sophisticated content, which is causing production complexity to outpace budgets.”

New 2012 Digital Entertainment Creation Products include:

• Autodesk 3ds Max 2012 — windows
• Autodesk Maya 2012 – mac and windows
• Autodesk Softimage 2012 — windows
• Autodesk Mudbox 2012 — mac and windows
• Autodesk MotionBuilder 2012 — windows

Finishing products include Autodesk Flame and Smoke 2012 which are aimed at both the Windows and Mac video editing world. Game middleware products include Autodesk HumanIK 2012 and Autodesk Kynapse 2012.

To learn more visit www.autodesk.com

To read our review of Autodesk Mudbox 2011 go here.

Autodesk acquired Skymatter Inc. in the summer of 2007 and have taken over development since then, releasing versions in 2009, 2010 and now 2011 (released earlier this year).

The What of Mudbox

Mudbox is a digital sculpting 3D software program with several different uses. In the visual-effects (VFX) industry Mudbox’s primary value is in creating high-resolution digital sculptures of creatures, characters and terrain. It is also a capable 3D painting tool and a tool for the creation of displacement and normal maps. 3D artists from hobbyist to studio professionals and animators can tap Autodesk Mudbox’s power and ease of use for rapid 3d sculpting.

What is powerful and useful about Mudbox is it utilizes 3D meshes and supports Catmull-Clark subdivision of mesh polys. One can work swiftly with a low-poly count mesh even after creating several surface subdivisions. The program blends into Autodesk’s arsenal of 3D applications nicely borrowing interface design coloring and features and works particularly well with Autodesk Maya in addition to Adobe Photoshop.

An Introduction

Mudbox 2011 features an updated user-interface that primarily changes in that it utilizes the same color scheme as Maya and Autodesk-related software packages. The Mudbox 2011 UI features a simple tabbed structure, a large primary 3d view window wrapped by layer, object and properties control palettes and tool and material trays at the bottom. (see image 01 below) The program has a very nice HUD (head’s up display) implementation within the primary 3d view window delivering key contextual messaging.

01 - Autodesk Mudbox 2011 has a very clean interface, relates well aesthetically to other Autodesk Media and Entertainment division software packages, such as Maya and Max.

When you open up Mudbox 2011 you are presented with a Welcome window overlaying the UI. (see image 01 above) The primary benefit of this window is to choose a template mesh. Mudbox speeds up character and object 3d modeling creation by providing templates such as a human head (bust), a bull, a human body, a cube or ball, et cetera. Also within this window are a series of video tutorials and quick start guides.

There are three primary functional areas in Mudbox: sculpting, painting and posing. In this release, the biggest new changes are in the introduction of a posing toolset and 3D painting.

As a general introduction, a model is chosen from a template form. This can be a humanoid, an animal, or basic form like a cube or sphere (as shown below, see image 02). When modeling you use the sculpt tools to create a basic sculpt stroke. This will produce either a positive addition or negative subtraction to the model’s mesh body. With each stroke of the sculpt tool, vertices on the mesh are affected. There are simple controls for the size and strength of the stroke using keyboard shortcuts with the tool. Another key aspect of sculpting is the degree of subdivision to the mesh itself. Mudbox 2011 allows for continued degrees of subdivision of the mesh, thereby increasing or decreasing the subtly of each tools’ deformations on the model.

02 - With various sculpting tools one can modify basic elements and increase subdivision levels.

03 - Mudbox features non-destructive sculpting layers and you can blend sculpt layers together.

When you sculpt in Mudbox you do so on “sculpt layers.” (see image 03) Mudbox calculates the differences between vertices after a stroke tool and records that difference (delta) on the layer. Deltas for all other layers are added up to arrive at the final shape of a model. Sculpt layers in Mudbox 2011 do not need to be in any stacking order because sculpt layers combine in an additive manner.

As you can see in the image above (see image 03), sculpt layers have opacity. Increasing the opacity amplifies the sculpting on that layer, while reducing it decreases the amplification.

04 - You can sculpt in Mudbox 2011 using stencils.

Mudbox already had stencil and stamp modeling in the previous version. With stencils Mudbox utilizes images to apply interesting sculpted details to the model. It does so by corresponding black pixels and white pixels differently to the affect of the tool. White values allow the tool to pass through and affect the model while black values don’t. In the image above the spiky hair on the human head was created using a stencil affect in the modeling. (see image 04).

Two Entertainment Suites

There are two entertainment suites to choose from. One suite is the Autodesk Maya Entertainment Creation Suite 2010. This consists of Autodesk Maya 2010, MotionBuilder 2010 and Mudbox 2010. 

The second suite is the Autodesk 3ds Max Entertainment Creation Suite 2010. This suite consists of Autodesk 3ds Max, Motionbuilder 2010 and Mudbox 2010. In both suites only a portion of the software is Mac native compatible, so officially Autodesk does not list Mac OS X or Linux as supported for these suites although some products within the suites are officially supported on both Linux and Mac OS X. 

Again, our advice for readers to Autodesk is to complain about this. For instance, MotionBuilder in older versions is native on Mac OS X. Perhaps they should allow the older version to round out the native Mac support in the Maya suite since all products would then be fully supported on the Mac. Mac-based Autodesk users will likely feel cheated that they cannot save up to 35 percent on bundled suites such as these.

Mudbox 2009 for Mac gives artists that create 3D digital artwork the freedom of clay and paint. It is as if you are working with physical media, with a top-notch user interface that complies with many of the Mac OS X UI standards. Mudbox 2009 for Mac contains the same creative toolset as the Windows release, offering artists equal parity between platforms. 

The organic brush-based modeler can work with ultra-high 3D poly models, enabling artists on the Mac to work with very large assets. Earlier in the year Autodesk spoke to Architosh about Mudbox at Macworld Expo San Francisco (see: “Autodesk Talks to Architosh about the Mac”, Jan 25, 2009) where we got a good look at where Autodesk was going with Mac software. 

Autodesk Meeting: Autodesk Mudbox 2009 Mac.

To learn more about Autodesk Mudbox 2009 for Mac or to download a free trial go here.

Autodesk Mudbox 2009 for Mac

In our Autodesk press briefing we spoke with Rob Hoffmann, Senior Product Marketing Manager, 3D, Autodesk Media & Entertainment. If that name sounds familiar to you readers it should, we last spoke with Rob about Maya on the Mac when he was with Alias. 

Before we talk about Mudbox 2009 in some detail let’s explain some of its history. Rob stated that Mudbox was originally a Weta Digital in-house tool created for the Lord of the Rings films. The New Zealand digital visual effects company is well known for some other in-house proprietary software, perhaps the best known of which is MASSIVE. 

Mudbox then went out of house to a company (Skymatter) that was subsequently acquired by Autodesk. Autodesk unveiled Mudbox 2009 at SIGGRAPH in the summer of 2008. During SIGGRAPH only the Windows versions were announced but Mac development was underway. 

Autodesk Mudbox 2009 - Native on the Mac.

As can be seen above Autodesk Mudbox 2009 is a real native Mac OS X application. The product was demoed for us on the Mac (see lower photos) and looks and runs fantastic. 

Mudbox 2009 is a digital sculpting program, which includes a toolset that the company describes as having “tools for extreme detailing of digital characters and objects.” Rob Hoffmann said its strength is in its extremely dense tessellation capabilities. 

Autodesk Mudbox 2009.

Mudbox strength lies in its intuitive user-interface combining sophisticated and powerful tools for creating the most highly detailed 3D models imaginable. Optimized for performance Mudbox 2009 can maintain great model interactivity while working on very high-resolution meshes, including those with tens of millions of polygons across the entire mesh. 

Mudbox 2009 includes rendering technologies that leverage the power of the OpenGL application programming interface (API) on today’s powerful graphics cards. The software offers an accurate, on-target environment for real-time evaluation as the digital model is manipulated by the artist, greatly improving interactivity for directors and client presentations. 

Autodesk Mudbox 2009 - Use of Stencils.

Dan Platt, modeler at Disney Animation Studios, said, “Time is money. An Autodesk Mudbox session begins with its artist-friendly, intuitive interface. This is sculpting at the speed of thought with the greatest of fidelity. In a business where new ideas with impossible deadlines are commonplace, Mudbox never lets me down.”

Autodesk Meeting: Autodesk Mudbox 2009 Mac.

The image above and below were snapped on an iPhone during our Autodesk press briefing, the day before the Macworld Expo keynote. Mudbox 2009 Mac was running very smoothly on a Mac Pro workstation machine. 

Autodesk Meeting: Autodesk Mudbox 2009 Mac.

As you can see from the images the interface is fairly clean and straight-forward. Texturing painting starts with a more basic shape and through a series of manipulative 3D brushes an artist can alter the model further into increasing degrees of resolution. 

Autodesk Mudbox 2009 for Mac will be available, like the other new Mac products announced by Autodesk, within 60-90 days from Macworld Expo. Architosh will be sure to post news on their eventual availability. 

To learn more now please visit the Autodesk Mudbox 2009 webpage here.

“We’re thrilled that Autodesk is expanding its Mac 2D and 3D software offerings for our creative professionals.” said Ron Okamoto, Apple’s vice president of Worldwide Developer Relations.

Available Mac Products

While some products were previously announced for the Mac today Autodesk is unveiling Mac OS X support for Autodesk Mudbox 2009, Autodesk Toxik 2009, and Autodesk ImageModeler 2009 for the first time. Additional Mac products coming from Autodesk’s Media & Entertainment software division include Autodesk Maya 2009 and Autodesk Stitcher 2009. 

Outside of the M&E division Autodesk makes a few other native Mac OS X products, most notably Autodesk SketchBook Pro (a product formerly belonging to Alias) and Autodesk MotionBuilder 2008 (edit. note: the 2008 version is one version behind but available for Mac users to purchase, future versions for the Mac are in the works). 

Autodesk makes a big splash at Macworld SF 2009 - Introduces Five New Native Mac OS X Applications

“Given the growing adoption of Mac OS X and the production requirements of the Mac community, we’re excited to offer these premiere creative tools to Mac artists,” said Stig Gruman, Digital Entertainment Group vice president of Autodesk Media & Entertainment. “Autodesk’s product offerings will empower artistic vision and provide Mac users with the tools to bring their creative ideas to life.” 

As noted in this story yesterday, Autodesk’s announcements for Mac OS X signal a surging trend in Mac adoption and demand for Mac products from the world’s largest software developer of design software. With this major announcement, Autodesk is clearly signaling that it intends to fully meet that demand from its growing customers who prefer to work on Apple’s UNIX-based Mac OS X operating system. And this is a very exciting thing.

Bunkspeed (booth 311) will be showcasing its revolutionary CGI applications at SIGGRAPH in Los Angeles from August 12-14, 2008. Throughout the show Bunkspeed will be demonstrating its “CGI Made Simple” with HyperShot and will also have HyperShot on 70 workstations at the SIGGRAPH Studio, an on-site computer lab. Architosh will be covering more Bunkspeed at SIGGRAPH news during our show coverage.

Autodesk’s New App

Autodesk has released a new 3D digital sculpting and texture painting tool calledMudbox. The Windows-only tool allows powerful 3D painting and texturing to high-poly models, using organic brush-based 3D technology. Learn more here.

e-on Software and SIGGRAPH

The e-on Software folks will be at SIGGRAPH in a week showing the new Vue 7 Professional Solutions. The Oregon-based developer will be in booth #1129. Vue is the leading solution for natural 3D environmental creations and works seamlessly with leading 3D software packages. To learn more go here.

OpenCL Apple Article at Washington Post

Peter Cohen of Macworld fame has written a good summary piece on OpenCL and Apple coming up in Snow Leopard, the next iteration of Apple’s industry-leading operating system.