C4D on iPad

Naturally built for the iPad’s touch user interface, Cinema 4D for iPad delivers core 3D modeling and design capabilities in a streamlined, mobile-first interface.

Key Takeaways

• Cinema 4D for iPad will enable creatives to take their 3D and animation skills on the go, whenever inspiration strikes
• Cinema 4D for iPad is designed to complement the desktop versions and will be a mobile, touch-centric version with its own capabilities and functions
• Cinema 4D for iPad is due in late 2026

Moreover, the iPad version of Cinema 4D is meant to complement the classic desktop version of Cinema 4D, so artists can explore ideas on the go, when traveling, or whenever they have a creative moment, and bring that work back into the desktop version.

Maxon is slated to release Cinema 4D for iPad, a touch-optimized version of the award-winning 3D content creation software.

Now the iPad version of Cinema 4D will be tailored for mobile workflows and will not be a carbon copy of the desktop versions of the application. It will also support cross-platform workflows, dovetailing with both Mac and Windows versions of Cinema 4D.

Additionally, Cinema 4D for iPad will support Redshift rendering capabilities, and Sculpts from ZBrush for iPad will also open directly on Cinema 4D for iPad.

Availability

Maxon has only said the release and availability are late 2026. Readers interested can join the official beta program here.

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Steve Forde

Forde comes to Maxon with a long history of connection to the company. Earlier in his career, he founded two startups, including Gridiron Software, where Forde oversaw the development of plugins for Adobe After Effects, which led to his first deep connections to Maxon.

Steve Forde comes to Maxon with deep roots at Adobe and veteran software startup experience.

During his career, he held senior leadership roles at Adobe and Amazon, where he led product, engineering, and design teams for large-scale platforms such as Adobe After Effects and Amazon Prime Video.

“What drew me to Maxon was the convergence of people, technology, and a fundamental shift in how creative content is made,” said Steve Forde, Chief Product Officer at Maxon. “The proliferation of games, advertising, and social media is driving 3D from niche skillset to mainstream job requirement. With the right combination of product innovation and intelligent workflows, it can become accessible to an even broader audience. Maxon is uniquely positioned to lead that transformation, not just by building powerful tools, but by delivering experiences that scale with creators as their needs evolve. I didn’t want to sit on the sidelines while it happens.”

Industry Shifts

This new appointment comes at a time when the industries Maxon serves are undergoing skill democratization, and 3D skills are becoming increasingly mandatory across standard roles, including architecture, graphics, advertising, and film and television creatives. Specialists will continue to exist, but companies like Maxon are increasingly targeting their technologies to support broader access to 3D skillsets.

MORE: Maxon aims to bring Hollywood-level rendering to AEC

Forde’s appointment will reinforce Maxon’s promise to strengthen its leadership team while advancing its product offering to address the evolving needs of creators in the markets it serves.

“Steve brings a deep understanding of both where Maxon comes from and where the market is heading,” said David McGavran, CEO of Maxon. “His ability to connect long-term vision with practical execution makes him an ideal partner as we continue to grow. This appointment strengthens our leadership team and positions Maxon to lead the industry through the next phase of creative evolution.”

The Future

Forde’s mandate going forward will be to guide software and technology developments that integrate emerging technologies into Maxon’s products in ways that respect artistic craft and amplify human creativity. He will focus on removing friction in workflows and expanding the possibilities of creative 3D artists so that they spend less time navigating complexities in workflows and tools.

Maxon will continue to invest deeply in product innovation and deepen its connection to the artist communities it serves. To learn more about Maxon, visit here.

Architosh Commentary and Analysis:

Steve Forde had a prominent 10-year career at Adobe and was a key figure in the strategic alliance between Adobe and Maxon in 2013 when Cinema 4D Lite was directly integrated into After Effects. His career at Adobe began with After Effects, becoming principal product manager in 2013, group manager in 2014, and finally general manager of emerging products in 2017. Like Maxon’s CEO, David McGavran, Forde spent many years leading large teams centered on After Effects and Adobe’s motion graphics and video tools. 

This appointment further strengthens Maxon’s leadership with former key leaders from US-based Adobe. The two companies began with a single tool bridge into a deep, cross-platform ecosystem and has grown to include native engine integrations, specialized plugins and strategic product bundles. Adobe’s acquisition of Substance resulted in the recognition that a powerful bundle between the two companies is Maxon One + Adobe Substance 3D, which provides a complete 3D design and texturing pipeline in a single subscription. That was initially released as a limited-time bundle. 

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Vantage 3

Chaos Vantage 3 is the first major update in more than two years. AEC visualization professionals will now be able to drop their projects into real-world locations, as well as leverage the USD file format.

“Vantage has always been about giving artists and designers an immediate, photoreal view of their work, whether they’re creating buildings, products, or entire worlds,” said Allan Poore, chief product officer, Chaos. “With Vantage 3, we’ve taken that even further for AEC users by introducing USD and MaterialX support, adding new tools to explore designs in a real-world context, refining materials and lighting with greater control, all while keeping the creative process fast, fluid, and inspiring.”

An example rendering from Chaos Vantage 3, highlighting the fog capabilities, among others, in this latest version.

Vantage 3 can now make use of Gaussian splats that are part of their V-Ray scene files. Gaussian splats have been discussed on Architosh before. The technology captures real-world 3D scene data (often captured by a drone) and enables it to populate a 3D scene, typically as context for a proposed building 3D rendering. With the addition of fog, smoke, and light rays, 3D imagery gets even more lifelike. And the addition of the Night Sky system delivers astronomically accurate stars, moon phases, and even the Milky Way for stunning nighttime renders.

MORE: AU: Chaos Unveiled Big AI News at Autodesk University

Vantage also boasts the Chaos AI Material Generator, directly available inside the Chaos Cosmos browser. This comes with a new material editor, giving AE users more control over the look of materials and scenes down to the smallest detail. Cosmos also comes with thousands of ready-to-use assets, while support for the USD file format unlocks the entire KitBash3D library of 20,000-plus production-ready assets.

Other features include:

• Camera Tracking — Translate real-world camera moves directly into Vantage to create natural cinematic shots without manual keyframing.

• Extended Texture Support — Apply mapping sources across all sub-maps, adjust texture variation with probability controls, and define front/back surface looks.

• New Render Mode — Switch cameras, resolutions, and define sequences in a streamlined, non-blocking interface.

• Offset Animation — Position animated V-Ray scenes freely in the scene with persistent spatial geometry, making it simple to build animated fields, crowds, and motion.

• Scatter Clustering — Generate natural cluster variations with noise calculations while color map mode and layer paint modes remain accurately rendered.

• Selection Mask (View Mode) — Instantly generate black and white masks of selected objects for compositing.

To support the broadest set of pipelines, Chaos Vantage 3 now supports USD and MaterialX, bolstering its ability to share or exchange assets across varied pipelines. Both AEC and VFX artists can integrate Vantage 3 into existing workflows for high-quality playblasts, previz, and final-quality rendering, even if they are not using V-Ray.

Pricing and Availability

Chaos Vantage 3 is available now, with monthly, annual, and three-year licenses available. For more information, including feature demos and trial downloads, please visit chaos.com

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Red Giant Update

The latest software release boasts some powerful features that are sure to impress. The new Universe bokeh tools render quickly and create stunning blurs, depth of field, and transitions. The Light Ball core projection has been updated to include Real Lens Flares and obscuration, which was a highly requested feature. The color management integration for Magic Bullet Looks has been completely reimagined, providing a seamless experience. The software now also supports Maxon Cloud Capsule in Trapcode. And finally, the new Tracker-Only mode for Spot Clone Tracker is a game-changer, providing even more precise tracking.

January’s Red Giant software update boasts new enhanced Unreal Engine integration and much more.

This release equips editors, filmmakers, compositors, and content creators of all types with new, next-level image enhancement features and tools that will further augment their options in a wide range of creative applications.

Release in Detail

Universe offers editors and compositors an essential toolkit of effects and transitions, and now it’s even easier to add dream bokeh to any shot. 

• New Bokeh plugin allows artists to quickly create beautiful bokeh and mimic camera focus without the need for a complex camera lens setup. A variety of shapes, and other customizations, make it possible to simulate depth of field while maintaining control over the area of focus, focus length, and adding custom blur maps and depth maps. 

• Bokeh Transition, a variant of the Bokeh plugin, helps artists seamlessly transition between two clips using a dazzling de-focus effect.  

• Enhancements to Universe’s underlying framework offer non-linear editors and compositors real-time experience with Maxon products. Both new plugins plus uni.Blur are built on the new performance framework, which will be expanded to other Universe products in future releases. 

Magic Bullet updates include a more user-friendly color management experience and updates to Unreal Engine integration. 

• New, simplified Magic Bullet Looks color management makes it possible for artists to achieve their goals much more quickly. 

• Enhanced support for Unreal Engine (UE) integration allows users to make the most of Looks with the latest version of UE. 

VFX Real Lens Flares now features obscuration and a Light Ball core projection option.

• Obscuration is as groundbreaking as Real Lens Flares itself. Watch as the flare and reflections change shape and beautifully morph as the light goes behind complex shapes — just like in a real lens!

• Art direct the sun and bring streetlights to life with the new Light Ball core projection option, which gives flares a physical presence in a scene. 

VFX Spot Clone Tracker helps artists turbocharge their tracking game with a new Tracker Only feature. 

• Particularly helpful to After Effects users, the Tracker Only feature allows artists to hide all non-tracking-related parameters, exposing only the necessary controls. Handle multiple tracks on one clip while also kicking out nulls with the new Create Null and Clear Track buttons. 

• Shape Roundness is a new single slider that determines the roundness of tracking, cloning shapes. Get more versatility from Spot Clone Tracker, and quickly clone shapes that fit into hard-to-reach places. 

Trapcode updates include optimized multi-frame rendering across multiple threads, new cloud service support, and new sprites. 

• Particular is now optimized for multithreaded, multi-frame rendering. 

• A new asset browser refresh enables Maxon to provide assets through the cloud to all Trapcode asset browsers except Form. Artists can now find the perfect sprite, model, curve, or gradient in the ever-expanding Maxon Cloud Capsule Service. 

• Highlighting Trapcode’s new cloud service support, Maxon has added two new sprite categories for emojis and pixel art. 

To learn more about Red Giant software and Maxon, go here.

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Maya is popular across creative industries, from film and television to architecture and design. As such, the SPECapc for Maya 2024 benchmark is a useful industry tool to help creative professionals optimize their computer system selections as part of their workforces and digital pipelines.

SPECapc for Maya 2024

Unlike other SPEC-based benchmarks (see, Xpresso, “How SPEC/GWPG Benchmarks Exist to Help Users Optimize Workstation Selection,” August 2022, in Special Feature), the “apc” versions require the benchmark user to actually have the software that is being used in the benchmark. With this latest 2024 release, users of Autodesk Maya 2024 can test their computer system’s performance running the software and compare that to other systems.

SPEC has released the new SPECapc for Maya 2024 benchmark. (image of their website).

“We are pleased to deliver this timely update to the SPECapc for Maya 2024 benchmark, allowing users to measure the performance of existing and new computing systems when running the latest version of Maya,” said Jessica Heerboth, Chair of the SPEC Application Performance Characterization Committee. “With the inclusion of the SPEC Workload Development Kit, enterprising users can gain greater insight into the performance of the workloads that matter most to them.”

43 Tests

There are 43 total tests in the new benchmark using 11 different models and animations. There are eight separate graphics tests in various modes and five different CPU tests. The graphics-oriented tests use six different Maya view settings — Shaded, Shaded SSAO, wireframe on shading, wireframe on shaded SSAO, textured, and textured SSAO. Various tests measure both animation and 3D model rotation performance. Five CPU tests within the benchmark perform CPU ray tracing and evaluation caching in various modes.

In addition to updating the benchmark for Maya 2024, the SPEC Application Performance Characterization Committee added the SPECapc for Maya 2024 WDK, a framework allowing users to run their own GPU-specific workloads using the same measurement and output techniques.

Available Immediately

The SPECapc for Maya 2024 benchmark is available as a free application for everyone except vendors of computers and related products and services. For those users, membership in the SPEC Graphics and Workstation Performance Group (SPEC GWPG) includes a vendor license for all SPEC GWPG benchmarks. Current SPEC GWPG members include:

• AMD
• Dell
• HP (Hewlett Packard)
• Intel
• Lenovo
• Nvidia

Non-member computer product and service vendors can purchase the benchmark for USD 2,500.

About SPEC

SPEC is a non-profit organization that establishes, maintains and endorses standardized benchmarks and tools to evaluate performance for the newest generation of computing systems. Its membership comprises more than 120 leading computer hardware and software vendors, educational institutions, research organizations, and government agencies worldwide.

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Capsules

Capsules is Maxon’s collection of tailor-made assets, specifically designed to enhance the realism of artists’ projects. Hence the latest additions to Capsules include a collection of Redshift materials created by visualization experts Fuchs & Vogel. It also includes a new set of Laubwerk plants.

Updates to Maxon One. Redshift Capsules materials demonstration. Image: Maxon.

Redshift now has twenty-six new glass materials. These are ideal for architectural visualization, motion graphics, and product shots. These new materials also include a collection of condensation materials that make it easy to add rain on windows or moisture droplets on cans of cold drinks.

In addition to basic “perfect” glass, Maxon has included a collection of smoked, distorted, dirty and smudged variations perfect for visualizing downtown lofts or creating VFX shots. Half of these materials are available to customers with active Cinema 4D subscriptions while the other half are an exclusive benefit for Maxon One subscribers.

In addition, Maxon releases the second pack of Laubwerk plants, featuring fifty-one high-quality plant models perfect for architectural visualization, visual effects shots and illustration. Designers can also add a natural touch to any scene by scattering lifelike Birch, Pine, and Willow trees, Rosemary plants. These offer a variety of ages, seasons, and shape variants to make renders appear more realistic.

Forger

The latest update to Forger comes with a very useful new set of tools.

• Lighting toolset. This includes Area and IES lights, which enable designers to place sources of light with great accuracy. Area and IES Lights also complement the existing types of lights.
• Set Flow. This is a useful tool for rounding out harsh bevels by adjusting the curvature on a selection of edges based on surrounding geometry.
• Fit Circle tool allows designers to model rounded details easily. Simply select a group of polygons and use interactive handles to adjust the size of the circle. Thanks to the flatten option, the surface can be averaged at the same time.
• Sketch Sculpt brush. This allows designers to create new shapes easily.
• Action Point camera navigation makes it more intuitive to rotate your camera around the area of interest.
• Sweep and Lathe tools add new modeling capabilities to Forget. The Sweep tool can create pipes or horns. Designers can also use the Lathe tool to create complex profiles.

Forger also offers complete hierarchy support, making it easy to organize your creations, group elements, and manipulate groups together.

Redshift

One of the most significant updates for Maxon is the a new Jitter Node for Redshift 3.5.17. This can accordingly apply a variation in color across a large number of objects with the same material texture. This is particularly useful for for creating foliage, rocks, or a fruit of varying degrees of ripeness. In the same way, authentic colors can be applied to a collection of battered old tools, as shown below.

Updates to Maxon One. A box of battered old tools – a Redshift Jitter example render. Image: Maxon.

The new Jitter Node is currently available for a variety of visual effects software. This includes 3ds, Cinema 4D, Houdini, Katana, Max, Maya, and ZBrush. Redshift additionally allows for easier randomization of materials. It also improves performance when using Redshift in CPU mode.

The new MatCap Shader Node designers quickly to create simple stylized materials by mapping an image onto a mesh relative to the render camera. This lays the foundation for non-photo-real materials in Redshift.

Redshift CPU rendering performance now scales better with additional CPU cores or even multiple CPUs in one system. Consequently, this results in faster render times for users of Redshift CPU. Similarly, Texture Memory Optimizations provide overall performance improvements when handling textures in Redshift.

Trapcode

Maxon has paid particular attention to ease of work flow in its latest release of Trapcode particle simulations and 3D effects.

The new built-in Bounce Ground Plane serves as an additional bounce surface with its own height and rotation controls. It allows VFX and motion graphics artists to easily set up an infinite bounce plane. The new Bounce Ground Plane comes with several pre-designed setups and allows you to create and save your own Bounce presets.

Child systems can now inherit the Particle Type, Size, and Opacity values from their parent system at the time of their creation. Consequently, this expands the creative possibilities of parent-child setups. It also allows designers to create stunning effects with each child particle exactly matching the attributes of its parent particle.

Trapcode additionally features three new gradient interpolation models in addition to the existing RGB model. This allows for a wider array of creative choices and possibilities for crafting captivating transitions.

A new Curve Mirror Mode enables designers to create perfectly symmetrical curves. Simply click “Mirror” in the menu and perfectly mirrored curves will appear along the horizontal axis.

Maxon is trying to offer a more consistent user experience across various systems and software packages. Consequently, Particular Designer now calls the After Effects color picker instead of the operating system’s default color picker.

Availability

To enjoy all these new features, Maxon One users are encouraged to update immediately through the Maxon App. This requires either

• Microsoft Windows 10 or 11,
• Apple macOS 10.14, 10.15, 11.x, 12.x or 13.x, or
• A GNU/Linux x86_64 OS with glibc 2.17 or later, and systemd support.

The app is available here. Please note app download requires users to sign in.

About Maxon

Based in Bad Homburg, Germany, Maxon creates powerful yet easy-to-use software for content creators working in 2D and 3D design, motion graphics, visual effects, and visualization. Maxon’s innovative product portfolio helps artists supercharge their creative workflows. Maxon is part of the Nemetschek Group.

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ZBrush Summit

The summit will take place at the Gnomon School of Visual Effects, located conveniently in Los Angeles, adjacent to Hollywood. The event will feature several key components:

• Artist Insights: Attendees will have access to exclusive presentations by renowned digital artists and industry leaders from around the world. These presentations will delve into detailed procedures and industry-specific applications of ZBrush, and live Q&A sessions will provide a rare opportunity for interaction and feedback from favorite artists. This unique experience aims to empower artists and enhance their sculpting skills and knowledge.
• Live ZBrush Sculpt-off: The summit will host the world’s most prestigious digital sculpting competition, the Live ZBrush Sculpt-Off. This competition brings together top digital sculptors with diverse backgrounds and international expertise. Participants will compete in front of a live and streaming audience, creating masterpieces aligned with a given prompt within a specific time limit. This event showcases the power of ZBrush as sculptors demonstrate their speed and creativity, vying for the championship title.
• Creative Lifestyle: The Creative Lifestyle segment at the ZBrush Summit offers attendees a chance to witness the creative process in action and gain insights into the tools and techniques used by leading digital artists. Workshops covering various topics, including concept art, character design, and 3D printing, will be conducted. Attendees will have the opportunity to interact with industry luminaries, ask questions, and immerse themselves in an environment that fosters creativity and encourages artists to push their artistic boundaries.

Registration for the ZBrush Summit is now open on zbrushsummit.com. Whether attending in person or virtually, this event promises to be the ultimate experience for digital sculpting and art enthusiasts.

You can register for the event here. 

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Not a hair out of place

The research papers that NVIDIA will present at SIGGRAPH 2023 describe the latest generative AI and neural graphics. These include NVIDIA’s collaborations with over a dozen universities in Europe, Israel, and the United States.

NVIDIA presentation for SIGGRAPH 2023 showing how AI can be used to make dynamic objects such as hair move realistically (Image NVIDIA.)

Once a 3D character is generated, artists can layer in realistic details such as hair. This is normally a complex, computationally expensive challenge for animators. Humans have an average of 100,000 hairs on their heads. Each hair reacts dynamically to an individual’s motion and the surrounding environment.

Traditionally, creators have used physics formulas to calculate hair movement, simplifying or approximating its motion based on the resources available. That is why virtual characters in a big-budget film sport much more detailed heads of hair than real-time video game avatars.

This paper showcases a method that can simulate tens of thousands of hairs in high resolution and in real-time using neural physics. This is an AI technique that teaches a neural network to predict how an object would move in the real world.

• To see a video showing how neural physics enables such realistic simulations, please click here.

Optimized for modern GPUs (graphics processor units)

The team’s novel approach for accurate simulation of full-scale hair is specifically optimized for modern GPUs. It offers significant performance improvements compared to state-of-the-art, CPU-based solvers. Consequently, it reduces simulation times from multiple days to a few hours. It also improves the quality of hair simulations possible in real-time. This technique finally enables both accurate and interactive physically-based hair grooming.

The SIGGRAPH 2023 papers include generative AI models that turn text into personalized images. These include:

• Neural physics models that use AI to simulate complex 3D elements with astonishing realism.
• Neural rendering models that unlock new capabilities for generating real-time, AI-powered visual details.
• AI tools that transform still images into 3D objects.

Customized text-to-image models

Generative AI models that transform text into images are powerful tools for creating concept art or storyboards for films, video games, and 3D virtual worlds. Text-to-image AI tools can turn a prompt such as “children’s toys” into almost infinite visuals that a creator can use for inspiration.

However, some artists may have a specific subject in mind. For example, a creative director for a toy brand could be planning an ad campaign around a new teddy bear and needs to visualize the toy in different situations, such as a teddy bear’s tea party.

To enable this level of specificity in the output of a generative AI model, researchers from Tel Aviv University and NVIDIA have two SIGGRAPH 2023 papers. These projects will enable users to provide image examples from which the generative AI model can learn.

Examples of generative AI models personalizing text-to-image output based on user-provided images. (Image: NVIDIA.)

One of their papers describes a technique that needs a single example image to customize its output, accelerating the personalization process from minutes to roughly 11 seconds on a single NVIDIA A100 Tensor Core GPU. This is more than sixty times faster than previous personalization methods.

Their second SIGGRAPH 2023 paper introduces a highly compact model called Perfusion. This takes a handful of concept images to allow users to combine multiple personalized elements. For example, it can meld a 3D image, such as a specific teddy bear and a selected teapot, into a single AI-generated 3D image, as demonstrated above.

Neural rendering offers film-quality detail to real-time graphics

After an environment is filled with animated 3D objects and characters, real-time rendering simulates the physics of light reflecting through the virtual scene. Recent NVIDIA research shows how AI models for textures, materials, and volumes can deliver film-quality, photorealistic visuals in real-time for video games and digital twins.

NVIDIA invented programmable shading over two decades ago. This enables developers to customize the graphics pipeline. In these latest neural rendering inventions, researchers extend programmable shading code with AI models. These run deep inside NVIDIA’s real-time graphics pipelines.

Neural texture compression

In another SIGGRAPH 2023 paper, NVIDIA will present neural texture compression. Neural texture compression can substantially increase the realism of 3D scenes.  The image below demonstrates how neural-compressed textures (right) capture sharper detail than previous formats, where the text remains blurry (center). Neural texture compression (right) provides up to sixteen times more texture detail than previous texture formats. Moreover, it does so without using additional GPU memory.

Three-pane image showing a page of text, a zoomed-in version with blurred text, and an equally zoomed-in version with clear text. (Image: NVIDIA.)

A related paper announced last year is now available in early access as NeuralVDB. This AI-enabled data compression technique decreases the memory needed to represent volumetric data up to one hundred times. These effects can create clouds, fire, smoke, and water.

Sharing research

NVIDIA researchers regularly share their ideas with developers on GitHub. This includes the NVIDIA Omniverse platform for building and operating metaverse applications and NVIDIA Picasso. This is a recently announced foundry for custom generative AI models for visual design. Years of NVIDIA graphics research helped bring film-style rendering to games. These include the recently-released Cyberpunk 2077 Ray Tracing: Overdrive Mode game.

In conclusion

The cutting-edge AI research NVIDIA will present at SIGGRAPH 2023 should be of great interest to both developers and enterprises. The content of these papers will help engineers generate synthetic data to populate virtual worlds for robotics and autonomous vehicle training. They will also help creatives in art, architecture, graphic design, game development, and film.

• To learn more about SIGGRAPH 2023, please click here.
• More information regarding NVIDIA’s cutting-edge AI papers is accessible from here.

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Cinema 4D

Maxon Cinema 4D is professional quality 3D modeling, animation, rendering, and simulation software.

Maxon wins 2023 NAB Award. CEO, David McGavran. (Image Maxon.)

With this in mind, many industry experts consider Cinema 4D one of the best tools for professionals in the animation, film, game, and visual effects industries. Maxon CEO, David McGavran explains:

Cinema 4D offers powerful features and an easily accessible and intuitive user interface. Consequently, it makes creating complex 3D projects relatively easy. The software includes a vast library of pre-built objects, materials, and lighting setups that speed up workflows and enhance creativity.

It also supports multiple file formats and integration with other professional software packages. As a result, Cinema 4D is an excellent tool for any professional in the film or animation industry creating high-quality 3D content.

NAB awards

A panel of industry experts selected NAB Show Product of the Year Award Winners, in fifteen categories. After which, they announced the winners in a live awards ceremony at NAB Show on 18 April 2023. In order to be eligible for an award, nominated products must come from companies exhibiting at the 2023 NAB Show, and deliverable within the 2023 calendar year.

“During our centennial year, NAB continues to recognize the products that are transforming how content is being created, connected and capitalized throughout the broadcast, media and entertainment industry,” said NAB’s Chief Customer Success Officer Eric Trabb.

He continued, “Congratulations to Maxon for winning the 2023 NAB Show Product of the Year Award in recognition of Cinema 4D 2023, a product that has demonstrated its ability to help storytellers face the challenges of the present and future by revolutionizing a critical stage of the content lifecycle.”

Maxon One

Maxon develops professional quality software for editors, filmmakers, motion designers and visual effects artists. Moreover, Cinema 4D is part of the the Maxon One package. The latest update from Maxon saw impressive modeling and simulation updates, as well as optimized workflows in Cinema 4D 2023.

Maxon One provides an intuitive way to install and update users’ favorite Maxon applications. At the same time, it also manages Maxon software licenses. Moreover, users can download a 14-day trial of the entire Maxon One package directly from within the Maxon App. Consequently, this allows users to test all the new features from the entire Maxon product range.

• More information about the Maxon app.
• Maxon is part of the Nemetschek Group.

About NAB

The National Association of Broadcasters is an advocacy association for America’s broadcasters. NAB advances radio and television interests in legislative, regulatory, and public affairs. NAB also enables broadcasters to best serve their communities, strengthen their businesses and seize new opportunities in the digital age. It does so via advocacy, education, and innovation. Please click here for more information.

About the NAB Show

This year’s NAB Show took place 15-19 April 2023, in Las Vegas, whilst celebrating its centennial year. Consequently it has become the ultimate marketplace for next-generation technology. As a result, the NAB Show is where audiovisual experts from around the world meet to get inspiration and share ideas. Please click here for more information.

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Lumion – Ray Tracing

Back in October 2022, Lumion announced that ray tracing would be added to Lumion. This was a massive undertaking and took the company some time.

Ray tracing comes to Lumion 2023. Picture shows how sunlight would cast shadows in a room. (Image: Lumion.)

It meant developers needed to rebuild its render engine virtually from scratch. In fact, over the past six months, Lumion’s development team has almost doubled in size. Consequently, Lumion 2023 is quite unlike any previous version of this software.

By entirely redesigning its rendering engine to incorporate ray tracing alongside rasterization, Lumion offers a design platform that creates accurate photorealistic imagery very quickly indeed.

Rasterization versus Ray Tracing

Lumion 2023’s hybrid rendering engine combines rasterization and ray tracing. However, unlike rasterization, ray tracing technology calculates how light behaves in the real world. With the ray tracing switched on, a render will automatically feature more realistic indirect lighting, non-screen space reflections, and contact shadows. The new ray tracing effect in Lumion also lets designers control the number of samples and bounces, giving users greater control over the final result.

Reflections

Reflections now work automatically whenever the ray tracing effect is enabled. With ray tracing, curved surfaces now show accurate reflections, removing the need for reflection planes. In the first implementation, the ray tracing effect will not support reflections of glass or water materials.

Soft shadows created by point or omnidirectional lights now look natural. Simply switch the ray tracing effect on and adjust the light intensity to watch the softness of your shadows change automatically. Area and line lights can instantly turn an interior scene into a convincing render, complete with lifelike shadows.

Emissive surfaces

Emissive surfaces now emit light and cast shadows just as they would in reality when ray tracing is enabled. With the new ray tracing effect enabled, the interaction between light and each surface results in astonishingly realistic textures. Users can also import their own textures or combine different bitmaps to create the desired effect.

What can Lumion 2023 be used for?

Lumion 2023 can be put to many uses. These include 3D design, building and landscape architecture, education, interior design, and urban planning. It can produce realistic light and shadows, high-quality textures, and has an extensive asset library.

Lumion 2023 also significantly reduces the time and effort required to create compelling, high-quality visualizations of the design. Designers can control the composition of their visualizations by rendering directly in your preferred aspect ratio and easily create animations with new camera presets. Users can also choose to import a camera path from an external program to create more complex animations.

Improved build mode

The brand-new Transform feature makes moving and aligning one’s models very straightforward. Designers can arrange assets exactly as necessary. Designers can also align objects to the walls, floors, and furniture more easily with the new-and-improved AutoSnap feature. It is also very easy to position and angle the virtual camera can too.

Improved materials

Lumion 2023 now has an improved glass material. This allows designers to fine-tune every last detail of their project’s windows and other glass surfaces. Users can also add custom textures such as frostiness. However, the new glass material is currently not fully compatible with ray tracing version 0.9.

Expanded material library

Lumion 2023 comes with 98 new materials that you can use to add realism to your buildings’ surfaces or landscape designs, including asphalt, brick, concrete, grass, metal, plaster, soil, stone, and wood.

The raster workflow in Lumion 2023’s enables designers to control subsurface scattering. Consequently, this gives objects a translucent effect, allowing light partially to penetrate the object and subtly scatter. It can also alter the tint of the scattered light by assigning a color to the material map.

Additionally, users can use the Clearcoat property available in Lumion Pro to add a layer of colorless, resin-like finish to surfaces for a more realistic appearance. Meantime, a new search function in the material library makes finding the materials much quicker and easier.

Future development

Lumion plans to extend its ray tracing effects. These will be available through the new software updater included in Lumion 2023. This will enable more frequent feature and content releases.

Compatibility

Lumion 2023 also automatically recognizes the materials assigned in your CAD software and applies them to your scene’s surfaces. When importing a 3D model, Lumion 2023 now recognizes and applies a corresponding material from the library to these surfaces. Consequently, Lumion 2023 is compatible with a wide range of industry-standard design and graphics tools, including:

• 3D Studio Max
• Autodesk Autocad
• Autodesk FormIt Pro
• Autodesk Revit
• BricsCAD
• Graphisoft ArchiCAD
• Nemetschek Allplan
• Nemetschek Vectorworks
• Rhinoceros
• Trimble SketchUp

Availability and Pricing

Existing Lumion users with an active subscription license can upgrade to Lumion 2023, straight from their accounts, at no additional cost. Lumion 2023 is available as a 1-year or 3-year subscription both for Standard and Pro editions. Customers with a perpetual Lumion license can now take advantage of promotional pricing when upgrading to Lumion 2023.

• Users may purchase these licenses from here.
• Lumion 2023 Pro is also available as a free 14-day trial. Please click here.
• It is also available free for students and educational faculties. For more information, please here.
• To learn more about how ray tracing works and its current limitations, please study the Lumion 2023 release notes here.

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Bifront and USD

In its announcement dated 12 December 2022, Autodesk outlines its feature-rich Bifrost for Maya update. This includes a number of improvements for more streamlined and flexible workflows. In particular, it includes the debut of Autodesk’s open-source Bifrost-USD integration.

Bifrost-USD in Maya screenshot.

It was developed to drive open industry standards and to help creative facilities produce content more efficiently. The Bifrost update also introduces a host of simulation, scattering, and USD workflow enhancements for Autodesk’s node-based visual programming system.

Bifrost Senior Product Manager, Jonah Friedman explains:

Key features of recent updates:

• Bifrost-USD is open-sourced.
• Bifrost geometry, property transfer, and pipeline improvements.
• Enhanced UI (user interface) editing.
• Low-overhead evaluation.
• Redesigned backdrops and sticky notes.
• Streamlined simulation diagnostics and scopes.
• Upgraded MPM (material point method) simulation.

Bifrost-USD open sourced

Bifrost-USD is now available as an open-source USD within Maya or as a standalone project on GitHub. The Bifrost-USD project includes wrapped USD types. Bifrost-USD also includes:

• Ability to monitor USD low-level operations.
• Translation tables to handle integration with the host software.
• Compounds that expose Bifrost-USD functionality to users.
• Custom USD tools and builds to improve pipeline flexibility and scalability.

Bifrost geometry, property transfer, and pipeline improvements

To simplify creating complex geometry algorithms from scratch, new property transfer helps teams streamline the use of custom properties. It also creates a first bath of procedural geometry compounds in the process. This includes basic compounds, such as delete and filter points, faces, and strands. It also includes separate mesh, detach faces, and add points. Additionally, Bifrost’s Alembic implementation features improve performance with indexed properties, including UVs and face vertex normals, to better preserve user data. Bifrost data can also be turned into a Maya mesh with a single mouse- click.

Enhanced UI editing

Artists can add widgets such as sliders, color pickers, and a new combo box without requiring any coding.

Low-overhead evaluation

Processing overheads have been reduced to improve system performance. This includes arrays of input data that increased the speed of running a graph by 30-fold.

Redesigned backdrops and sticky notes

A complete overhaul of backdrops introduces more functional and aesthetic annotations. Backdrops enable teams to outline, identify, and separate notable areas in graphs. Meanwhile, sticky notes are ideal for annotating comments and instructions for more efficient communication between teams.

Streamlined simulation diagnostics and scopes

To streamline physics simulations, the recent unified set of diagnostic tools has been added to MPM and Aero. This allows artists to visualize velocities and temperatures and to explore the solver’s internal state to understand the physics behind the effects.

Upgraded MPM simulation

The introduction of new collider stickiness makes it easier and more intuitive for artists to create a snowball impact with the desired amount of snow left clinging to the wall. Additionally, new per-particle activation supports complex disintegration effects. It also offers location-based activation for efficient footstep simulations in large environments.

Availability

Bifrost is available either with a standalone Maya subscription or with the Autodesk Media & Entertainment Collection.

More information

• For further information concerning Bifrost-USD, please see the official Bifrost release notes.
• Additional details on the evolution of Bifrost are available from What’s New in Maya.
• Free tutorials are available on Youtube at the Maya Learning Channel.
• You can find the open-source Bifrost-USD project, complete with source code, on GitHub.
• And discover more about Pixar’s USD format by clicking here.

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BOXX is one of the first workstation manufacturers to ship equipment with the new processors.

APEXX S4

“The new APEXX S4 dramatically accelerates demanding 3D workflows,” said Bill Leasure, BOXX VP of Sales and Marketing. “The addition of 13th Gen Intel® Core™ processors to this multi-GPU workstation will enable architects, engineers, animators, VFX artists, video editors, and other creative professionals to create and render faster and more efficiently than ever before.”

BOXX Technologies APEXX S4 comes in a rack-model version.

The APEXX S4 is a desktop side tower system that can be mounted in a rack as well for various purposes. It will deliver optimal performance on both CPU and GPU tasks in leading applications like Autodesk 3ds Max, Maya, and AutoCAD, as well as other non-Autodesk tools like SolidWorks, Cinema 4D, Adobe Creative Cloud and many other professional applications.

Overclocked to 5.8 GHz

BOXX Technologies builds systems with advanced overclocking and system cooling systems, enabling BOXX Technology workstations to push chip technology beyond the limits imposed by most manufacturers. The APEXX S4 system is overclocked to 5.8 GHz and features a 24-core architecture with Intel Turbo Boost Max Technology 3.0, with 20 total CPU PCIe lanes and up to 36MB of Intel Smart Cache.

The system supports the latest DDR5 memory for RAM and Thunderbolt 4 for simple and exceptionally fast peripheral connections.

The new APEXX S4 uses the latest 13th generation Intel Core i7 and i9 processors for next-generation performance in up to 24-core configurations.

BOXX Technologies, as noted earlier, is an innovator in advanced cooling paired with overclocked systems. The APEXX S4 features liquid cooling, up to 128 GB of memory storage, a 1300-watt power supply, and support for up to four (4x) NVIDIA RTX A6000 GPUs, delivering state-of-the-art performance at the GPU level.

“APEXX S4 is the most expandable BOXX S-Class workstation ever,” said Leasure. “With the latest Intel technology and the ability to support multiple CPU tasks, GPU tasks, and complex rendering, this is a workstation creator can rely on to power the latest applications, maximize productivity, and outpace their competitors.” 

For Pricing and Shipping

For further information and pricing on the APEXX S4 workstation, contact a BOXX sales consultant in the US at 1-877-721-1790. Learn more about BOXX systems, finance options, and how to contact worldwide resellers by visiting www.boxx.com.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

BOXX Technologies is based in Austin, Texas, and has been developing and building some of the world’s top-performing workstation computers for decades. Architosh itself has a relatively newish BOXX APEXX workstation which forms the basis of our reference system for future workstation computer performance testing and reviews, as well as our reference platform for our discreet GPU card performance testing and reviews. While we have relied on both Dell and HP workstations in the past for reference systems, we have been particularly thrilled with our 2021 model BOXX APEXX workstation and the exceptional build quality (important when you are getting in and out of it often to swap out GPUs and such). 

BOXX Technologies stands apart in the US workstation market for its comprehensive knowledge of professional CAD and 3D software, and what types of systems benefit which software the best. Their guidance is invaluable to newbie workstation owners who may not understand why a high-frequency machine is better for, say, Autodesk Revit than for a high CPU-core count-based workstation. 

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Maya Creative

This more affordable and flexible version of Maya is a good option for those looking to scale capacity whilst still accessing professional quality VFX (visual effects) and 3D tools.

Screen capture showing Maya Creative in action.

For example, VFX studios are often under considerable pressure to create high-quality content, quickly. Streaming services always need new material in order to satisfy their subscribers. This new product offers artists just the creative tools they need, as they need them, on-demand.

Autodesk. SVP of Media and Entertainment, Diana Colella explains:-

Maya Creative features powerful animation, modeling, rendering, and rigging tools for film, television, and game development. This includes Maya’s full industry-standard creative toolset:

• Animation deformation.
• Camera sequencing.
• Data and scene assembly.
• High-end 3D modeling.
• Motion graphics.
• Rendering and imaging.
• UV, look-development, and texturing.

Maya Creative also includes Arnold renderer, designed to meet the demands of complex photorealistic VFX and animation workflows.

Creativity on demand

Autodesk’s goal was to introduce a cost-efficient option for freelancers, boutique facilities, or small business creative teams, who don’t need the same API access or extensibility required for larger production workflows. Maya Creative is available on both Microsoft Windows and Apple macOS. Artists can use it as it is needed for their work. It is available through Flex, Autodesk’s token-based pay-as-you-go option for daily product use.

According to one independent creator, Clifford Paul, the best thing about Autodesk’s new product is its flexibility. As a freelancer working on a wide range of different creative projects, he needs to use a wide variety of programs for his client work. Maya Creative allows him to use and pay for Maya just for the time when he actually needs to use it.

• Learn more about Maya Creative and compare its features with those of the standard Maya here.
• You can access Maya Creative using Autodesk’s Flex tokens or download a free trial here. Flex tokens cost USD 300 for 100 tokens.
  

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Pixotope XR Edition

Developed in response to the growing trend of LED volume use in virtual production and the need for hardware optimization, Pixotope’s XR Edition includes a range of tools to simplify setup and operation. It does so by reducing the technical complexities and associated resource costs of XR workflows and environments.

Pixotope XR Edition “cubes” virtual set.

With XR Edition, Pixotope is removing a major barrier to Virtual Production adoption. It is addressing the fundamental challenges that have historically made it difficult to leverage XR outside of major blockbuster productions. With its streamlined, simplified setup and purpose-built tools that address common operator difficulties, Pixotope XR Edition effectively removes the need for expensive proprietary hardware. Thus providing its users with a relatively affordable, off-the-shelf XR solution.

Key features include

• ICVFX (in-camera visual effects) color matching functionality for AR<->XR workflows.
• LED mesh import and automatic alignment for converting CAD and geometry representations of LED volumes to virtual LED projection surfaces.
• Reduced and optimized hardware usage and multi-wall support.
• System health and diagnostics monitoring for system resilience and failover.

ICVFX color matching functionality for AR<->XR Workflows

This unique color-matching tool enables users to match the colors of ICVFX quickly and easily. It also matches colors appearing through the LED volume for seamless AR/XR workflows and visual effects. This is particularly useful when AR (augmented reality) is used alongside XR (extensible reality) for set extension. It is also useful when adding virtual elements to a scene. This is because color reproduction is affected by both the camera and LED volume, making it difficult to color match accurately by eye.

LED mesh import and automatic alignment

By combining procedural geometry creation tools and tracking technology, Pixotope XR Edition provides its users with an automated method for converting CAD and geometry representations of LED volumes to virtual LED projection surfaces. These are further refined using computer vision to ensure perfect registrations for XR and AR set extension. This significantly reduces the time needed to setup and configure the system.

Reduced and optimized hardware usage and multi-wall support

When using more than one camera in an XR setup, the images on your LED volume and your AR rendering need to synchronously change perspective when switching between cameras in a single frame. With in-software switching, Pixotope XR Edition ensures this operation is accurate and trouble-free without the need for additional hardware.

With multi-wall support, Pixotope can drive several LED walls from a single workstation. This not only reduces the amount of hardware needed and therefore cost, but it also mitigates many common issues, such as output synchronization and sharing of assets over multiple machines.

System health and diagnostics monitoring for system resilience and failover

Failure is deeply undesirable in live virtual production. With Pixotope XR Edition, its clear and comprehensive health and diagnostics monitoring system enables users to address proactively any issues that might arise. Users can quickly troubleshoot problems that may occur during dung production. In the case of a system failure, the system can seamlessly fail over to a backup machine. This makes Pixotope XR edition resilient, robust, and reliable.

Pixotope Chief Revenue Officer David Dowling explains:

Pixotope XR Edition brings virtual production a step forward in sustainability efforts thanks to the ways it optimizes hardware usage. XR Edition’s multi-wall support, features one input and three outputs to render one virtual scene.

Extended Reality for Everyone

XR Edition will be available to new and existing Pixotope users from September 2022. Pixotope has also launched its Pixotope Education Program to help build out the pipeline of next-generation virtual production talent. For a complete list of Pixotape XR Edition features and capabilities, please click here.

About Pixotope

Pixotope is at the forefront of virtual production technology. and empowering content creators with accessible solutions for boundary-pushing immersive storytelling. Pixotope features in some of the world’s most demanding live production. It offers media producers a reliable and sustainable virtual production platform upon which to build their media businesses.

Pixotope allows media creators to tell stories with the visual impact similar to high-end feature films, combined with the connected and scalable nature of online content and the immersive and social experience of video games. To learn more about Pixotope, please click here.

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RV contains professional-grade media player technology that allows visual effects (VFX) and animation artists, as well as production teams, to view high-resolution images and sequences in real-time. Filmmakers can also use RV to compare different versions of motion picture footage while they collaborate on projects.

Why open source RV?

Often software manufacturers prefer to keep their source code secret. Companies generally do not want their hard work to be used by their competitors for free. However, the open-source software model is different. An open source license for computer software allows the source code, blueprint, or design to be used, modified, or shared, albeit under certain defined terms and conditions.

Autodesk open sources RV – screen capture of RV in action.

In this instance, Autodesk is sharing the source code from its RV product with other industry leaders primarily to develop open standards. This is intended to encourage interoperability between the various software packages that designers and filmmakers use.

Unified open source toolset

It forms part of the Open Review Initiative. This is the Academy Software Foundation’s (ASWF) project to build a unified, open source toolset for playback, review, and approval of movie footage. Autodesk is a founding member of ASWF, which the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) launched in 2018 under The Linux Foundation umbrella.

The organization’s objective is to encourage the use of open source software across the motion picture industry and encourage open standards and foster better global collaboration. Animal Logic Chief Technical Officer and AWSF board member Darin Grant explains:

The entertainment industry currently has quite an active open source community. Some of these projects, such as ILM’s OpenEXR raster file format, have even been adopted widely across many other areas of computing too.

Visual effects and animation departments are continuously pushing the boundaries of visual fidelity and photo-realism. So they are often on the leading edge of developing new techniques to simulate the real world more realistically.

In recent years, the visual effects business has become increasingly distributed, with many different studios working together on the same films. Therefore, the use of open source software has become a useful way to develop open standards. These allow greater interoperability and collaboration between various studios and creatives.

About Autodesk RV

Autodesk acquired its RV technology from Tweak Software in 2015 and integrated it into its ShotGrid production management platform. This has eliminated workflow bottlenecks, enabled live collaborative review sessions, and supported teams in accelerating time to pixel during reviews. Autodesk will continue supporting RV commercially as part of its ShotGrid ecosystem.

• For details about RV, visit the ShotGrid website here.
• To learn more about Autodesk’s contributions to the open source community, please click here. And for more technical information concerning Autodesk’s various open source projects, you can find its Github page here.

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Nemetschek and its Maxon subsidiary aim to help build an open and inclusive metaverse that enables the deployment of diverse technologies, including interactive 3D graphics, AR (augmented reality), and VR (virtual reality).

Metaverse Standards Forum

Metaverse Standards Forum members include industry leaders Adobe, Alibaba, Autodesk, Epic Games, Huawei, IKEA, Meta, Microsoft NVIDIA, Qualcomm Technologies, Sony Interactive Entertainment, the World Wide Web Consortium, and around 640 other companies and organizations.

Maxon CEO David McGavran explains why Memetschek joined the Metaverse Standards Forum.

Maxon CEO David McGavran tells us:

Industry standards

Prior to joining the Metaverse Standards Forum, Nemetschek’s Maxon brand had already embraced exchange file formats and bridges to other software, such as Unreal and Substance. In particular, Cineware has long set the standard for interoperability and collaboration.

High-quality tools under the Maxon product umbrella, including Cinema 4D, Redshift, and the recently acquired ZBrush, have been established as the industry standard for motion graphics.

MORE: Maxon’s Universe 5.1—Adds M1 Mac Support

Additionally, Maxon offers support for the Graphics Language Transmission Format (.glTF) and Universal Scene Description (.USD) file formats. The new Redshift Standard Material adds industry standard-material authoring to Cinema 4D, and support for MaterialX is currently in development.

Hence Maxon already allows its customers to participate in the metaverse as it currently exists, as well as what the metaverse will eventually become in the future. This is why it was important for Nemetschek to join the Metaverse Standards Forum as a founding member.

About the Metaverse Standards Forum

Metaverse Standards Forum is open to any organization at no cost. Metaverse Standards Forum and the Metaverse Standards Forum logos are trademarks of The Khronos Group for the benefit of The Metaverse Standards Forum. Please click here to learn more.

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One of the ironies of creating photorealistic virtual worlds is that in order to make an object look more realistic, one often has to make its surface less perfect. Maxon’s new high-definition Surface Imperfections collection offers new textures, designed to bring additional photorealism to artists’ renderings by adding minor pseudorandom imperfections to the surfaces of 3D objects.

Image demonstrates how Surface Imperfections can add to an object’s photorealism

Surface imperfections or ‘grunge maps’ have long been the ‘secret sauce’ of skilled virtualization professionals. By subtly layering imperfections such as dust, fingerprints, and scratches and smudges, artists can make their renders look more natural and realistic.

A few of things one can do with these new high-definition tiled textures

• Bump maps add realistic micro-scratches, for creating subtle impurities in materials like such as paint and plastic.
• Extra detail on windows, monitors, mirrors and other reflective surfaces that require that extra glint of realism.
• Glossiness or anisotropy maps to add realistic surface imperfections to reflective surfaces such as glass, metal and plastic.
• Masks for layered materials and procedural shaders.
• Mix additional plain colors in your materials to break them up and add variation, to emulate natural surface imperfections.
• Overlay glare and lens flare to emulate dirty or smeary lenses.

The grayscale maps in Surface Imperfections collection feature a variety of naturally occurring imperfections, all scanned from real surfaces and carefully tiled so that viewers cannot see the joins.

Building complex textures such as these normally require expensive equipment and specialized techniques. It also requires significant time and skill to make these textures seamlessly tileable. Maxon has circumvented all this hassle by making its new tiled textures available free to all Cinema 4D users. And it has done so without the inconvenience of individual licensing.

The Surface Imperfections Volume 1 texture library was created by David Gruwier and has been licensed by Maxon for immediate royalty-free use by all Cinema 4D and Maxon One subscribers.

Where to get Surface Imperfections

If you already have Cinema 4d, then the Surface Imperfections collection is located in the Cinema 4D Asset Browser, in the Textures/Imperfections category, or by searching for “si-v1”. If you do not have Cinema 4D, then you can find it bundled within Maxon One.

In order to obtain Maxon One, you first need to download and install the Maxon App. The Maxon App provides an intuitive way to install and update all your favorite Maxon application, as well as manage your Maxon licenses. The Maxon App available for Apple macOS, Microsoft Windows, and for many popular GNU/Linux distributions.

• More information about the Maxon app.

About Maxon

Maxon was originally founded in 1986 in Germany by students Harald Egel, Uwe Bärtels and Harald Schneider. In 2000, it became a subsidiary of the Nemetschek Group. Today Maxon produces and develops a wide range of professional-quality software for editors, filmmakers, motion designers and visual effects artists.

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Silver Spoon’s new visuals have helped to modernize Iron Chef’s overall look, while preserving its familiar character and essence. The first episode of the new series premiered 15 June 2022.

Iron Chef: Quest for an Iron Legend. Marcus Samuelsson in episode 103, with XR and AR provided by Silver Spoon.

Throughout the three-week, eight-episode shooting schedule for Iron Chef, Silver Spoon provided AR & XR virtual environments, with real-time compositing via Pixotope and camera tracking via Stype. Silver Spoon’s key challenge was seamlessly to integrate AR and XR workflows during shooting. Careful pre-production planning, and collaboration among all departments proved to be the key to incorporating modern virtual production technologies successfully into the classic Iron Chef format.

Silver Spoon excels at creating technically good-quality content that is both functional and attractive. Whilst creating exciting visual content, it also ensures its technology works properly, in real-time right from the start. Consequently, Silver Spoon’s real-time studio-delivered AR and XR graphics have effectively re-imagined the popular cooking competition franchise for a new generation of viewers.

Creating culinary environments in augmented and extended reality

The competition’s unique culinary tasks take its contestants around the world and through different cuisines, with each episode featuring a Secret Ingredient. To elevate visual engagement, Silver Spoon managed the installation and operation of a large-scale LED wall. This was placed inside the ‘Secret Ingredient Chamber’, extending the physical set into a vast virtual world.

With a challenging timeline, the team prepared eight unique 3D environments in Unreal Engine, including underwater scenes, chili fields, a medieval feast, and a street food market.

Supplementing the XR environments, the team developed AR set extensions, incorporating thousands of DMX-controlled virtual lights, to expand the physical set to a larger scale.

Laura Herzing, Executive Producer at Silver Spoon, told us:

About Silver Spoon

Silver Spoon specializes in real-time virtual production. It works across industries from film, broadcast, and gaming to television, commercials and music video production. Its mission is simple: constantly innovate to expand the boundaries of real-time production.

Built on Epic Games’ Unreal Engine, Silver Spoon creates and deploys innovative real-time content and engaging visual experiences with its end-to-end virtual production platform. Silver Spoon follows best-in-class practices for content creation for real-time pipelines. With a succession of industry ‘firsts,’ behind it, Silver Spoon has become a leader in its field. To find out more, please click here.

About Unreal Engine (UE)

Unreal Engine is a 3D computer graphics game engine originally developed by Epic Games. It first appeared in a 1998 ‘shoot-em-up’ game called ‘Unreal’. Initially developed for PC first-person shooters, it has since been used in a variety of genres of games. It has also been adopted by other industries, including the film and television industry. Written in C++, the Unreal Engine is very portable, supporting a wide variety of desktop, mobile, console and virtual reality platforms.

The post Silver Spoon enhances Iron Chef revival with new AR Technology appeared first on Architosh.

Pixologic is now part of the Maxon company but will remain in Los Angeles.

Maxon product updates, key takeaways

• Cinema 4D S26 offers better integration with other Maxon tools.
• Forger now offers a selection of polygonal primitives (simple three-dimensional shapes).
• Magic Bullet Suite 16 adds new Halation and Optical Diffusion tools for Looks.
• Redshift now has CPU rendering.
• Trapcode Suite now offers M1 Mac support for all Trapcode tools.
• Universe 6 receives new creative tools.
• VFX Suite 3 introduces Real Lens Flares.
• Zbrush joins the Maxon family of high-end graphics products.

Cinema 4D S26

Maxon product updates include its Cinema4D package

Cinema 4D S26 offers better integration with other Maxon tools, unifying the entire 3D workflow. It also provides the ability to integrate Microsoft’s Visual Studio Code with Cinema 4D’s Script Manager. This loads, runs, and debugs Cinema 4D scripts from VS Code.

Forger

The latest version of Forger reveals the first stage in Maxon’s plan to provide powerful hard-surface modeling capabilities to 3D artists. Built with Cinema 4D’s polygonal foundation, Forger now offers a selection of polygonal primitives, including capsules, cubes, spheres, cylinders, planes, pyramids, tanks, and tori. These primitives can be shaped and crafted into complex creations with Forger’s set of sculpting tools, using Apple Pencil.

Magic Bullet

Maxon product updates to Magic Bullet Suite 16 add two new film and lens emulation tools for Looks, Halation, and Optical Diffusion. It also offers the first incarnation of its new Color Management system OpenColorIO.

Redshift

Redshift has added CPU rendering. This allows users to use Redshift’s powerful materials and photorealistic rendering on any modern system and a growing number of creative tools including Houdini, Maya, 3ds max, Blender, Katana, Vectorworks, and Archicad. The new Redshift Standard material is easy to use and offers a range of shading models for improved photorealism.

Redshift is also M1-native. In recent tests from LearnSketch.com one can see that the M1 Max is remarkable at Rendershift rendering, which is GPU-based.

Trapcode Suite

Maxon product updates to its Trapcode Suite 18 now offer M1 Apple Macintosh support for all Trapcode tools. Particular now has Layer Maps. Fluid Random Swirl controls are no longer disabled in the Designer. Pre-run now migrates data from older projects.

Universe

Maxon product updates to Universe 6 add new tools to enhance an artist’s workflow. Sketchify adds sketch- and cartoon-like effects to footage. ChromaTown creates chromatic streaks and blurs for warpy looks and transitions, while Box Bokeh provides square or diamond-shaped lens bokeh effects. Stretch Transition adds a stretchy crossfade between clips for a warp-like transition. Combined with over 70 new presets, Universe 6 helps artists to get impressive results quickly and intuitively.

ZBrush

Maxon acquired ZBrush in December 2021. ZBrush is a digital sculpting tool that combines 3D/2.5D modeling, texturing, and painting. It uses a proprietary “pixel” technology that stores lighting, color, material, orientation, and depth information for the points making up all objects on the screen.

Maxon CEO, David McGavran explains the rationale for Maxon product updates:

About Maxon

Maxon develops professional-quality software for editors, filmmakers, motion designers and visual effects artists. Maxon One subscribers can immediately download all product updates via the Maxon App.

The Maxon App is an all-new desktop application that provides a more intuitive way to install and update your favorite Maxon application, as well as manage your Maxon licenses. You can download a 14-day trial of the entire Maxon One package from within the Maxon App. This allows you to test all the new features from the entire Maxon product range.

• More information about the Maxon app.
• Video overview of Maxon’s latest updates.

The post Maxon’s Spring Product Updates—Details appeared first on Architosh.

Universe 5.1

A much-requested feature, the newest version of Universe was completely rebuilt to provide a more future-proof and flexible foundation, says Maxon. The Javascript code has been replaced with C++ and the new foundational updates pave the way for more creative powerful tools in the future.

Universe 5. 1 does more than add M1 chip support. There are major bug fixes for Adobe Premier and minor enhancements made to the solution as well.

Universe 5.1 from Maxon now supports M1 Macs.

These updates and features are included with the maintenance release and are available immediately with the Maxon App.

To learn more about Universe 5.1 visit here. To learn more about Maxon, a subsidiary of the Nemetschek Group, visit their home page. Maxon is the developer of industry-leader Cinema 4D, Red Giant, ZBrush, and Redshift Renderer, among other key M&E industry tools.

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