Sony Investment

The investment in Epic from Sony firms up a close existing relationship between the two companies and will reinforce their shared mission to advance state-of-the-art advanced gaming entertainment technology. Sony is the maker of the Sony Playstation, one of the leading gaming console machines and a competitor to Nintendo and Microsoft.

“Epic’s powerful technology in areas such as graphics places them at the forefront of game engine development with Unreal Engine and other innovations. There’s no better example of this than the revolutionary entertainment experience, Fortnite. Through our investment, we will explore opportunities for further collaboration with Epic to delight and bring value to consumers and the industry at large, not only in games but also across the rapidly evolving digital entertainment landscape,” said Kenichiro Yoshida, Chairman, President, and CEO, Sony Corporation.

Rise of the Tomb Raider the 20 Year Celebration Launch is one of the newest Sony computer games.

“Sony and Epic have both built businesses at the intersection of creativity and technology, and we share a vision of real-time 3D social experiences leading to a convergence of gaming, film, and music. Together we strive to build an even more open and accessible digital ecosystem for all consumers and content creators alike,” said Tim Sweeney, Founder, and CEO of Epic.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

Sony got its big start in the world of computer games with the original PlayStation and the game Crash Bandicoot. The PlayStation is now at version 5 in its hardware evolution. Another big game franchise has been Laura Croft. That game is entering its 20th-year celebration with “Rise of the Tomb Raider: 20 Year Celebration.” Earlier this year (May) we looked at Epic’s news of Unreal Engine 5 preview running on PlayStation 5 in an early build of “Lumen in the Land of Nanite.”

There is a lot to look forward to on the pro apps side with Unreal Engine 5, it’s advances in dynamic global illumination being a chief one.  The Land of Nanite demo shows that off very convincingly. With such a large infusion of funds from Sony, we can imagine Epic advancing Unreal Engine further and faster, which is critical given the strength of its main competitor in Unity. With these two gaming giants—already very sizeable companies—able to take on these kinds of partnership investments, one has to begin wondering how smaller discreet rendering software companies will compete and defend themselves in the pro apps market. 

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What’s Key in Unreal Engine 4.25

The Unreal Engine has become a driving force in the professional markets, particularly for both AEC and product and industrial design.

Epic Games releases new Unreal Engine 4.25, offering powerful new features for both next-generation game consoles and professional AEC applications alike.

Version 4.25 offers production-ready ray tracing features, as well as support for Niagara Mesh Emitters on both CPU and GPU, plus new support for Anisotropy shading model and big improvements to the Clear Coat shading model. There is also an added Clear Coat BRDR material support to the Path Tracer when generating ground truth comparisons. This will be a significant boost to rendering quality useful for the professional market tools utilizing Unreal Engine 4.25.

Additionally, there are shading model improvements such as a new physically-based Thin Transparency shading model; it adds native support for true tinted translucent materials with physically accurate properties, allowing artists to simulation materials like tinted car windows in a single render pass.

AEC Pro Features

While improvements to rendering like the Ray Tracing features mentioned above are useful to AEC professionals, exclusive professional features like the new LiDAR Point Cloud support means that AEC pro apps based on the Unreal Engine are now capable of ingesting laser-device generated point clouds common in architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) markets.

An example of LiDAR point cloud data visualized in the new Unreal Engine 4.25.

The LiDAR support means UE 4.25 can import, visualize, edit, and interact with point clouds from laser scanning equipment. This update will empower archViz specialists, manufacturers, set designers, builders and more to aggregate and use huge data sets captured from real-world contexts. (see, Architosh, “Talking to 2019 Autodesk Innovator of the Year—Amr Raafat of Windover Construction,” 10 May 2020)

Next-Gen Game Platforms

The big news with version 4.25 is the next-gen game console support in Sony PlayStation 5 and Microsoft Xbox Series X. This support solidifies Unreal Engine as a robust foundation for game developers with scalability across platforms, including mobile, consoles, and PC. In addition, Unreal Engine’s Niagara visual effects system, battle-tested on Fortnite, is now moving from Beta to production-ready in this release.

Unreal Engine 4.25 delivers initial support for Sony’s PlayStation 5 and Microsoft’s Xbox Series X as first-class platforms, and throughout the year we will be updating the 4.25-Plus branch with optimizations, fixes, and certification requirements to support developers launching on the next generation of consoles. Features include platform-specific functionality, such as new audio advancements, initial support for online subsystems, and early support for TRC and XR certification requirements.

Niagara VFX and Chaos physics as battle-tested in Fortnite find their way into Unreal Engine 4.25.

Also supported is Unreal Engine’s Chaos physics and destruction system, now in active use on shipping seasons of Fortnite. Chaos now supports destruction, static mesh dynamics with collisions, cloth, hair, rigid-body skeletal control for items such as ponytails and scene queries. As a native physics system, Chaos’ code is easily extended and optimized specifically for Unreal Engine for the most powerful real-time performance.

These are just some of the major features but others include improved HoloLens 2 support, immersive, realistic audio improvements, and more.

Read the full list of features here.

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For readers not aware, Unity is the creator of one of the world’s leading real-time 3D development platforms, first known in the gaming industry but now becoming prolific in the professional markets like AEC.

Unity 2019.3—What’s New

Unity 2019.3 Tech Stream is now available to download from the Unity Store. It includes a production-ready version of the High Definition Render Pipeline (HDRP), which brings to high-end consoles and PCs beautiful new graphics capabilities.

A screen capture of The Heretic, a short film created with Unity 2019.3

This version of Unity also brings a new user interface, both revamped for faster performance and new icons; it is leaner and more optimized from the Editor’s experience, says Unity.

“With the release of Unity 2019.3, we are continuing our focus of giving all creators the power they need to have a more optimized, stable, and pleasant, creative experience, ” said Brett Bibby, Vice President of Engineering, Unity Technologies. “Unity 2019.3 includes more than 260 improvements and new features focused on giving you the confidence that what you’re making right now will look and perform beautifully – whether you’re targeting the technologies of today or the platforms of tomorrow.”

Highlight New Features

• HDRP Now Production Ready – The power of control that developers need to unleash beautiful high fidelity graphics on high-end consoles and PCs is now available for all. Also available today is the full-length version of The Heretic, which is created using HDRP and off-the-shelf Unity technology. This real-time feature includes CG humans and demonstrates what’s possible right now on Unity

• Universal Render Pipeline Production Ready Since Unity 2019.1- Formerly known as the Lightweight Render Pipeline, the Universal Render Pipeline delivers beautiful graphics, scalability, and performance for the broadest array of platforms, including 2D, 3D, and AR/VR projects. New integrated Post Processing brings improved performance, and the increased light limit gives creators the power to exercise more creative freedom

• Massive Evolution in 2D – A new suite of 2D tools, a dedicated 2D renderer, and features makes high-end creation more accessible by bringing new and improved production-ready workflows to teams of all sizes. A new sample project that showcases this evolution, Lost Crypt, is now available to download

• Visual Effect Graph Now Production Ready – Create stunning, reusable, high-fidelity visual effects; now integrated with Shader Graph for faster creation of custom looks

• Real-Time Ray Tracing Enters Preview – Built on top of HDRP, Unity’s real-time ray tracing realistically simulates how light behaves and interacts with physical materials, bringing global illumination and other effects to all types of projects, from photo-realistic to stylized

You can read about further updates in 2019.3 and future 2020 planned updates here.

You can watch the complete film short below: The Heretic.

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The new game engine pushes the boundaries of photorealism and cinematic quality for real-time experiences. A prominent new feature is real-time ray tracing based rendering, which will help 3D artists improve build times by up to 165 percent and streamline workflows across both game design and enterprise workflows.

New in Unreal Engine 4.22

Real-Time ray tracing (early access) is a major new feature. Selectively ray trace just the passes that benefit from it, to achieve subtle, accurate effects that contribute to the realism of your scene, like true reflections and refractions, soft area shadows, and ambient occlusion–at blazingly fast speeds. Watch the 90-second “Troll” short film to view unprecedented cinematic-quality lighting using UE 4.22 ray tracing features.

Simultaneous multi-user editing (early access) is another big new feature. Collaborative editing allows multiple developers to simultaneously make and view changes to the same Unreal Engine project, facilitating effective collaboration that eliminates bottlenecks and inspires creativity.

01 – Epic has released Unreal Engine 4.22—major new update to the powerful game development engine that is now be utilized across diverse enterprise industries.

Unreal Engine 4.22 also supports faster mesh drawing, utilizing a more aggressive caching of drawing information for static scene elements, and automatic instancing to merge draw calls where possible.

Unreal has licensed Molecular Matters’ Live++, and integrated it as a new Live Coding feature (Experimental). UE 4.22 also optimizes UnrealBuildTool and UnrealHeaderTool, drastically reducing build times and resulting in up to 3x faster iterations when making C++ code changes.

And there is also enhanced sound design. Among the new tools for creative sound design are TimeSynth (Early Access) for sample-accurate audio clip management; a spectral analyzer for Submixes; layered sound concurrency for better control of how many sounds will play simultaneously; and spectral analysis baking.

Virtual Production Features also include:

• New Composure UI: With a new UI in Unreal’s built-in compositing tool Composure, users can achieve real-time compositing capabilities directly within Unreal Editor – ideal for on-set visualization.
  —
• Sequence Take Recorder: Enables users to record animations from motion capture linked to characters in the scene, and from Live Link data, for future playback, enabling faster iteration and review of previous takes.
  —
• OpenColorIO (OCIO) color profiles: Unreal Engine now supports the Open Color IO framework for managing multiple color spaces across a film, TV series, or animated project.
  —
• Hardware-accelerated video decoding (Experimental): On Windows platforms, UE 4.22 can use the GPU to speed up the processing of H.264 video streams to reduce the strain on the CPU when playing back video streams, resulting in smoother video and allowing the use of higher resolution movie files and more simultaneous input feeds.
  —
• New Media I/O Formats: UE 4.22 ships with new features for professional video I/O input formats and devices, including 4K UHD inputs for both AJA and Blackmagic; support for both 8bit and 10bit inputs; single-link, dual-link, and quad-link; AJA Kona 5 devices; HDMI 2.0 input; and UHD at high frame rates (up to 60fps).
  —
• nDisplay improvements (Experimental): Several new features make the nDisplay multi-display rendering system more flexible, handling new kinds of hardware configurations and inputs. See the Childish Gambino case study to see nDisplay in action.

Animation sharing is also newly improved. This new plugin reduces the overall amount of animation work required for a crowd of actors. It is based upon the Master-Pose Component system, while adding blending and additive Animation States. The Animation states are buckets for which animation instances are evaluated. The resulting poses are then transferred to all child components part of the bucket.

And there is a new Microsoft Holelens Remote Streaming Support. UE 4.22 supports streaming to HoleLens, with full support coming to HoloLens 2 coming in May 2019. Read more here: https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/blog/epic-games-announces-unreal-engine-support-for-microsoft-hololens-2

Google Stadia support is also now available. Unreal Engine supports Google’s new game streaming platform, Stadia. With Unreal’s cross-platform capabilities, developers can access Stadia features through familiar interfaces for consistent workflows across any device. Read more here: https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/blog/unreal-engine-support-for-google-stadia-now-available

For a full feature list and additional details, visit: https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/blog/unreal-engine-4-22-released

About Unreal Engine

Epic Games’ Unreal Engine technology brings high-quality games to PC, console, mobile, AR and VR platforms. Creators also use Unreal for photorealistic visualization, interactive product design, film, virtual production, mixed reality TV broadcast and animated entertainment. Follow @UnrealEngine and download Unreal for free at unrealengine.com.

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The Unity keynote will take place at 5 pm PTD at 846 Mission Street in San Francissco and will be broadcast live. With Unity at the center of the gaming ecosystem, the Keynote kicks off a full week of technology reveals and programming at the Unity Booth (Booth S249, S127, and S227 in the Moscone Center), Unity Central (30 3rd Street) and online on the Unity GDC Hub.

01 – Big events are planned in addition to the keynote at GDC, including the largest booth in Unity’s history!

Performance by Default will be on full display, demonstrating how developers can achieve benefits from multi-threaded performance for build targets of all ranges, all without the heavy programming headache. Invitations to the keynote will be sent out in the coming weeks, says Unity. Space will be limited but the company will also be hosting viewing parties in its own offices in San Francissco, Bellevue and Montreal.

Unity Brings Largest Booth in Its History

The company plans to have the biggest booth ever at GDC 2019—12,000 square feet—with a theater packed with developer talks, an Answer Bar where attendees can speak to Unity experts and partners, and hands-on areas with the latest technologies.

Several sessions will be streamed; for a full slate of programming please check the Unity GDC Hub.

Unity will also be represented across several sessions at the show:

• Assisted Artistry: Applying Deep Learning to Games Content Creation (Natasha Tatarchuk, Vice President of Graphics)

• Evolving Mixed Reality: Designing on the Real World (Jono Forbes, Senior Software Engineer)

• Mental Models and Systems for Spatial Computing (Timoni West, Director of XR Research)

• Everyone Watching This is Fired (Mike Acton, Principal Engineer)

• Math for Game Developers: Inside Neural Networks (Michael Buttner, Principal Research Engineer)

• Super Powering Technical Artists Using Deep Learning (Cesar Romero, Principal Machine Learning Engineer)

• From the Trenches: Moving the Diversity Needle in Community Management (Deborah Oyeyinka, Social Media and Community Manager)

Unity Central Welcomes All Visitors, No Badge Needed

With GDC taking place in Unity’s backyard, the company is once again opening its doors to all members of the game development community. All visitors are welcome at Unity Central (30 3rd Street) where they can get access to Unity’s technology and the people who build them, all without the need of a badge. Additionally, Unity is providing quiet places to have conversations, comfortable seating, places to charge and other amenities such as food and beverage. Happy Hours will also be hosted at this location by invitation.

Unity Developer Day

Unity Developer Day takes place at the Moscone West (Room 3022) and is a full day of customized sessions for badge holders. Topics are technical and will range from beginner to advanced, including deep dives into the Unity 2019 Roadmap and Project Tiny, Unity’s runtime and Editor mode designed to build games and experiences that can load instantly. Attendance is first come, first served.

Unity at the Center of the Game Development Ecosystem

Unity powers more than 50% of all new mobile games, and reaches more than 3 billion devices worldwide. This is only possible because of Unity’s role of partnering with industry leaders such as Apple, Google, NVIDIA, Sony Playstation, Microsoft Xbox, Nintendo Switch, Oculus Rift, and Autodesk to optimize the Unity platform for each of these platforms and workflows.

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Allegorithmic’s customers include some of the biggest names in design, including BMW, Ikea, Louis Vuitton, Gensler, and Foster + Partners.

A Future World of Mixed Realities—Why Adobe Acquired Allegorithmic

Adobe has acquired Allegorithmic’s Substance 3D design tools so they can add them to Adobe’s Creative Cloud tools, industry-leading imaging, video and motion graphics tools that empower creatives in the video game industry, VFX artists working in film, broadcast, architecture, marketing, and product design.

Adobe is well aware that in the near future we will live in a world where the real and the virtual blend into mixed reality immersive experiences. As brands look to compete and differentiate themselves, compelling interactive experiences enabled by 3D content, VR and AR will become more critical to the successes of these companies.

01 – Adobe has acquired Allegorithmic and plans for 3D initiatives are in full bloom.

“We are seeing an increasing appetite from customers to leverage 3D technology across media, entertainment, retail, and marketing to design and deliver fully immersive experiences,” said Scott Belsky, chief product officer, and executive vice president, Creative Cloud, Adobe. “Creative Cloud is the ‘creativity platform’ for all and Substance products are a natural complement to existing Creative Cloud apps that are used in the creation of immersive content, including Photoshop, Dimension, After Effects and Project Aero.”

From Electronics Arts to Blade Runner 2049

Allegorithmic is based in France—as discussed in this feature report here—and is a rapidly growing company with clear leadership in the 3D material and texture authoring tools space. Top creative brands like Electronic Arts, Ubisoft, BMW, Ikea, and other previously mentioned are all users of their software. Substance Designer has been used in the making of award-winning films like Blade Runner 2049, Tomb Raider and more.

“Allegorithmic and Adobe share the same passion for bringing inspiring technologies to creators,” said Sebastien Deguy, CEO and founder, Allegorithmic. “We are excited to join the team, bring together the strength of Allegorithmic’s industry-leading tools with the Creative Cloud platform and transform the way businesses create powerful, interactive content and experiences.”

02 – Allegorithmic’s Substance Designer 2 when we first starting learning about this exciting company.

Adobe’s strong track record of successfully integrating acquisitions will help further accelerate Allegorithmic’s product roadmap and go-to-market and extend its reach among enterprise, SMB, and individual customers. Allegorithmic CEO and founder, Sebastien Deguy will take a leadership role in Adobe’s broader 3D and immersive design efforts as vice president, 3D and Immersive, reporting into Scott Belsky.

Allegorithmic tools are already offered as a subscription service to individuals and enterprise customers, and in the future Adobe will focus on expanding the availability of Allegorithmic tools via subscription. Later this year, Adobe will announce an update on new offerings that will bring the full power of Allegorithmic technology and Adobe Creative Cloud together.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

Allegorithmic’s CEO Will Lead Adobe’s 3D Initiatives

As part of the terms of this acquisition, it looks like Allegorithmic’s CEO and founder, Sébastien Deguy, will lead Adobe’s 3D initiatives and to “take them to the next level,” as Deguy writes on this blog post titled “My Peter Jackson Moment.”

The question is “What Are Adobe’s 3D Initiatives?”

Adobe is a company that has strangely long ignored truly deep diving into the 3D software market. Is this a sign that has changed? Deguy’s blog post suggests that Adobe may finally be growing its third dimension. To be honest the California software giant has spent plenty of time investing 3D in the past and today has initiatives and partnerships. Some partnerships have long suggested (or hinted at) possible acquisition targets. 

MORE: Getting Real with 3D Materials—How Allegorithmic’s Technology Is Leading

One such longstanding partnership has been with Strata. Strata’s 3D tools pivoted years ago towards the packaging design market, addressing marketing and retail experiences, both areas customers today utilize Adobe’s tools for. Another interesting longstanding partnership has been with Maxon and its award-winning 3D tool, Cinema 4D.

The latter would be a more difficult acquisition target as Cinema 4D technology is a core technology among Nemetschek Group products and Maxon itself is a Nemetschek subsidiary. Adobe, of course, could go after the Foundry Group, a rather large independent software house with a plethora of industry-leading 3D software solutions targeting the same markets mentioned in Adobe reasons for acquiring Allegorithmic. 

An interesting tidbit is that Dr. Sébastien Deguy notes that Adobe had been an investor for two years prior to this moment. He also writes, “We want to invent the next camera obscura for 3D artists and immersive experience builders.” That is a bold statement. 

To learn more read Adobe’s blog post here. 

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Unreal Engine 4.21

The new update improves on the proven tools that developers already love, adding further optimizations for mobile platforms like Apple iOS and Google Android—up to 60 percent speed increases when cooking content, and more power and flexibility in the industry-leading Niagara effects toolset for real-time VFX.

New Autodesk Revit Support

A key new part of this update is the new support for Autodesk Revit, the popular BIM (building information modeling) platform for the AEC industry. For users in enterprise spaces like architecture, manufacturing, product design, and other areas of professional visualization, Unreal Studio 4.21 offers an enhanced Datasmith workflow with new Revit support, plus enhancements to material translation for Autodesk 3ds Max.

01 – Epic’s new Unreal Engine 4.21 update has dozens of new powerful features for developers, including new support for Autodesk Revit for enterprise customers.

Key new features in Unreal Engine 4.21 include (in brief):

• Replication Graph — new production-ready Replication Graph plugin, makes it possible to customize network replication as part of building large-scale multiplayer games.
• Niagara Enhancements — New Nintendo Switch support added, plus substantial VFX improvements.
• Sequencer Improvements — Sequencer can a now record incoming video feeds to disk as OpenEXRframes and create a track in Sequencer, with the normal ability to edit and scrub the track.
• Pixel Streaming (early access) — New Pixel Streaming features enable authors to create interactive experiences such as product configurators or training apps, host them on a cloud-based GPU or local server, and stream them to remote devices via a web browser without the need for additional software or porting.
• Mobile Optimizations — With the help of Samsung, Unreal Engine 4.21 includes all of the Vulkan engineering and optimization work that was done to help ship Fortnite on the Samsung Galaxy Note 9 and is 100 percent feature compatible with OpenGL ES 3.1
• Much Faster Cook Times — 60 percent speed improvement in the cooking process.
• Gauntlet Automation Framework — another early access technology that enables developers to automate the process of deploying builds to devices, running one or more clients and/or servers.
• Animation System Optimization and Improvements
• Blackmagic Video Card Support — Unreal Engine 4.21 adds support for Blackmagic video I/O cards for those working in film and broadcast.
• Improved Media I/O
• Windows Mixed Reality — Unreal Engine 4.21 now natively supports Windows Mixed Reality (WMR) platform and headsets.
• Magic Leap Improvements — the new engine (4.21) supports all the features needed to develop complete applications on Magic Leap’s Lumin-based devices — rendering, controller support, gesture recognition, audio input/output, media and more.
• Oculus Avatars — The Oculus Avatar SDK includes an Unreal package to assist developers in implementing first-person hand presence for the Rift and Touch controllers.
• Datasmith for Revit (Unreal Studio) — Unreal Studio’s Datasmith workflow toolkit for streamlining the transfer of CAD data into the Unreal Engine now includes support for the popular BIM platform Autodesk Revit. This includes support for materials, metadata, hierarchy, geometric instancing, lights, and cameras. There is also new DWG and Alias Wire file types supported, so designers can natively import 3D DWG and Alias data.
• Multi-User Viewer Project Template (Unreal Studio) — A new project template for Unreal Studio 4.21 enables multiple users to connect in a real-time environment via desktop or VR, facilitating interactive, collaborative design reviews across any work site.
• Accelerated Automatic and Jacketing and Defeaturing (Unreal Studio) — Jacketing automatically identifies meshes and polygons that have a high probability of being hidden from view and lets users hide, remove, or move them to another layer; this command is also available via Python so that Unreal Studio users can integrate this step into automated preparation workflows.

This is a long list of major updated features, making Unreal Engine 4.21 dramatically better than previous versions with extensive capabilities for new types of devices support and workflows.

For a full list and additional details, please visit: https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/blog/unreal-engine-4-21-released

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The latest and fastest real-time rendering engine in Unreal gains numerous new features to help 3D artists and creative professionals do more amazing work. There are hundreds of optimizations, says Epic, especially for iOS, Android, and Nintendo.

01 – Unreal Engine 4.20 contains hundreds of optimizations across leading mobile gaming platforms and features for enterprise applications like CAD and 3D pro tools.

For the enterprise space—where the AEC and manufacturing markets exists—Unreal Studio 4.20 includes the upgrades to the UE4 Datasmith plugin suite, with SketchUp support, which makes it easier for CAD data to get into Unreal Engine.

New Features — Unreal Engine 4.20

• New Proxy LOD System: Handle sprawling worlds with ease via UE4’s production-ready Proxy LOD system for the easy reduction of rendering cost due to poly count, draw calls and material complexity. Proxy LOD yields huge gains when developing for mobile and console platforms.
• Smoother Mobile Experience: Well over 100 mobile optimizations developed firsthand for Fortnite come to all 4.20 users, marking a major shift for easy “shippability” and seamless gameplay optimization across platforms. Major enhancements include improved Android debugging, mobile Landscape improvements, RHI thread on Android and occlusion queries on mobile.
• Better for Switch: Epic has significantly improved Nintendo Switch development by releasing tons of performance and memory improvements built for Fortnite on Nintendo Switch to 4.20 users as well.
• Niagara VFX (early access): Unreal Engine’s new programmable VFX editor, Niagara, is now available in early access and will help developers take their VFX to the next level. This new suite of tools is built from the ground up to give artists unprecedented control over particle simulation, rendering and performance, for more sophisticated visuals. This tool will eventually replace the Unreal Cascade particle editor. Watch this GDC talk to learn more.
• Cinematic Depth of Field: Unreal Engine 4.20 delivers tools for achieving depth of field at true cinematic quality in any scene. This brand new implementation replaces the Circle DOF method. It’s faster, cleaner and provides a cinematic appearance through the use of a procedural bokeh simulation. Cinematic DOF also supports alpha channel, dynamic resolution stability, and has multiple settings for scaling up or down on console platforms based on project requirements. This feature debuted at the Game Developers Conference as part of the Star Wars “Reflections” demo by Epic, ILMxLAB, and NVIDIA.
• Digital Humans Improvements: In-engine tools now include dual lobe specular/double Beckman specular models, backscatter transmission in lights, boundary bleed color subsurface scattering, iris normal slot for eyes, and screen space irradiance to build the most cutting-edge digital humans in games and beyond. All users now have access to the same tools used on Epic’s “Siren” and “Digital Andy Serkis” demos shown at this year’s Game Developers Conference. Check out the updated Photorealistic Human sample, which has been updated to include the static bust from “Meet Mike,” revealed at SIGGRAPH 2017.
• Proven, Exclusive Cross-Platform Capabilities: Developers only have to create their game once when building with Unreal Engine. Use the same content and gameplay across any device to deliver experiences anywhere players want to enjoy them.
• Live Record & Replay: First shown at this year’s Game Developers Conference, all developers now have access to code from Epic’s Fortnite Replay system. Content creators can easily use footage of recorded gameplay sessions to create incredible replay videos.
• Sequencer Cinematic Updates: Creating real-time cinematic content has never been easier with Sequencer. New features include frame accuracy, media tracking, curve editor/evaluation, anim instance control, and Final Cut Pro 7 XML import/export.
• Shotgun Integration: Shotgun, one of the industry’s leading production management and asset tracking solutions, is now supported in 4.20. This will streamline workflows for Shotgun users in game development who are leveraging Unreal’s real-time performance. Shotgun users can assign tasks to specific assets within Unreal Engine, making the latest content and associated data easily available for review.
• Improved Support for Live Broadcast: UE 4.20 now offers greater support for users leveraging the engine in broadcast, from virtual sets to virtual production to eSports. UE 4.20 includes support for AJA Video Systems’ KONA 4 and Corvid 44 video cards with a plugin for HD/SDI video and audio input and output, enabling seamless integration of AR and CG graphics in live broadcast transmissions.
• Mixed Reality Capture Support (early access): Users with virtual production workflows now have mixed reality capture support that includes video input, calibration, and in-game compositing. Supported webcams and HDMI capture devices enable users to pull real world green screened video into the engine, and supported tracking devices can match your camera location to the in-game camera for more dynamic shots.
• Robust AR Support: Unreal Engine 4.20 ships with native support for ARKit 2, which includes features for creating shared, collaborative AR experiences. Also included is the latest support for Magic Leap One, Google ARCore 1.2 support. Be sure to check out the new FaceAR sample project that is now available with this release.

In addition, key improvements to Unreal Studio 4.20 include:

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Unite Austin 2017 Conference Demo

The streamlined process for asset sharing and in-game iteration due to this new FBX integration with Unity has been demoed at Unity’s confab event in Austin this week.

“Autodesk is very interested in making media and entertainment artists’ work as seamless as possible, and the workflow between 3D art tools and engines is a big part of that effort. 3ds Max and Maya users often utilize Unity technology, so we want to provide the best possible connection between these tools,” said Marc Stevens, vice president of Entertainment, Autodesk.

Unity 2017.2 Launches in October

The release of Unity 2017.2 launches in October and promises to empower artists and designers with improved workflows and faster roundtripping. In particular, it will be the first official Unity and Autodesk collaboration.

01 – Autodesk and Unity have collaborated around FBX technology streamlining 3D artists workflows between Maya and Unity, for example.

New in the release will be new and improved FBX import/export capabilities, including support for Autodesk’s interactive physically based shader, and custom properties.

Unity 2017.2 itself contains other important improvements, like updates to design tools like Timeline and Cinemachine, the latter in particular helps artists create cinematic content. There is also new support for Apple’s ARKit augmented reality SDK technology and support for Vuforia and Microsoft Mixed Reality, plus ARCore. So AR technologies are big in this release.

02 – A block was first created in Unity. Then a button takes the block into Maya. Transformed to a spaceship…

03 – transformed to a spaceship the a single-button takes the new spaceship back to Unity.

“Unity developers turn to Autodesk for the deepest 3D modeling and animation toolsets available,” said André Gauthier, Studio Lead at Unity. “Together we are improving FBX interoperability to increase productivity and give creators a better workflow in their asset pipelines so they can unleash their creativity.”

About Unity

Unity Technologies likes to remind the world about how it wants to democratize development, solve hard problems and enable success. Unity is the world’s most popular game engine and powers more than 50 percent of all new mobile games and two-thirds of all VR/AR experiences. Interactive content made with Unity reaches 3 billion devices worldwide.

To watch the keynote that took place this week see video below.

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The company says that Unity exists to democratize development, solve hard problems and enable success—for its developers and their end-users. Unity is adopted by millions and powers more than 50 percent of all mobile games and nearly 75 percent of all AR and VR content. Interactive content made by Unity reaches nearly 3 billion devices worldwide.

New Unity 2017.1

“Unity 2017.1 is a one-stop creation powerhouse that will allow teams of artists and designers to unlock their full creativity. With incredibly open choreography tools like Timeline, smart procedural cameras in Cinemachine which follow your direction, and a built-in world-class colour grading suite plus the ability to edit and output all from within, we’re unleashing a content creation game changer that will improve collaboration across the board,” said Adam Myhill, Head of Cinematics, Unity. “Working in an environment with so much power and flexibility doesn’t just save a huge amount of time, it allows you to experiment, iterate and collaborate in ways which are the key ingredients of so many great things.”

01 – A screenshot of the Cinemachine feature in Unity 2017.1

Unity 2017.1 contains over 100 new features and improvements that will help developers with increasing collaboration, improving runtime performance and graphics quality and more. Key items include:

• Timeline and Cinemachine — New world-class artist tools Timeline and Cinemachine empower artists to create cinematic content and gameplay sequences without the need for coding. Timeline allows artists to easily blend and tweak animations within Unity, allowing for freedom to experiment and refine their creations. Cinemachine optimizes the artist workflow and gives room for experimentation by eliminating hours of hand animation, camera programming, and revision by using smart cameras for shot composition in cinematic sequences and gameplay. Engineers can also easily integrate sequences created with Timeline through the powerful scripting API and extend Timeline with the Playable API to create custom track types. Everyone will benefit from these new creative tools as it gives them access to artist tools that are intuitive, powerful and easy to use.
• Data-driven Live-Ops that tailors content to your audience — Unity 2017.1 gives users the power to take action on insights using a suite of Live-Ops analytics tools. Remote Settings is a powerful new feature that gives users the ability to make changes to their games in real-time, all without deploying a new version. Underpinning this is Standard Events which gives teams a window into how players are using their creations so they can make adjustments that will optimize enjoyment. Teams can also further maximize their success with Unity 2017.1’s built-in revenue generation solutions, bringing more opportunities to creators to optimize the performance of their content.
• Robust ecosystem that accelerates time-to-market — Unity’s robust and ever-growing ecosystem accelerates time-to-market and decreases production costs through the Unity Asset Store, a massive catalog of free and paid off-the-shelf content created by the community, for the community. The Asset Store’s all-new redesign is rolling out this summer and is home to art, models, scripts, sound effects, editor extensions, productivity tools, and more — anything an individual creator or team might need to make development easier and get their project to the finish line faster. Custom work and additional collaborators can be sourced through Unity Connect, the professional network and talent marketplace for all Unity Creators.

For a full list of changes, please visit the blog post on the Unity website.

Unity 2017.1 subscription plans are available with enhanced features and services to support customers’ individual needs: Unity Pro represents the top of the line in professional-grade tools while Unity Plus offers serious creators who intend to publish additional tools and services to help them be successful. Custom-tailored enterprise solutions are also available for teams of 21 or more. For hobbyists and aspiring creators, Unity Personal provides all the core features they need to get started for free.

Architosh Insights

As the AR and VR industries heat up over the next year, in particular, and as Apple ventures into robust support of both of these technology domains, it will be interesting to see what kind of affect Apple, with its extremely popular iPhone product line, puts on the game engine companies going forward. Unity has a very strong position in mobile games, a place where Apple’s iPhone dominates.

The Key Takeaways

• At the GRAPHISOFT North American User Conference earlier in the year, I attended a session focused on utilizing Unity for bridging the gap between ARCHICAD and VR head-gear. Unity’s platform is extremely popular at this current time with VR and AR content producers but it will be interesting to see what happens with its competitors in the domain of professional tools and if Unity can maintain its dominant position with respect to this particular type of workflow., 

• Game engines in general are infiltrating the pro creative apps market, not just in the AEC software markets but other pro app markets as well. As we can see in the new Twinmotion 2018, which incorporates the rival Unreal game engine, game engines like Unity solve problems and simplify delivery of solutions that would otherwise take much longer for individual developers to produce.. 

• Unity 2017.1 is also the first fully subscription-based product. Moving to a fully subscription-based licensing model has its ups and downs, as Autodesk knows all too well. 

SaveSave

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Xenko the Game Engine

Xenko was created and refined by a group of international developers working under the oversight of the Japanese studio known to game creators for its industry-standard middleware, and to gaming fans for development of the 3DS Bravely Default RPG series for Square Enix Co., Ltd. While the engine is accessible to users of all skill levels, it is created by developers for developers.

Key Takeaway

An experienced gaming middleware software company has written a new gaming engine over the past two years and aims to compete with Unity and Unreal Engines. 

“The decision to move from middleware to a full game engine was actually a fairly easy one for us,” said Terada Takehiko, CEO of Silicon Studio. “We were in a position to address some of the complaints developers have about the other commercial game engines on the market, and from there we began to see what developers of the future will need to be successful, including VR and mobile support.”

01 – The new game engine Xenko comes from Japan and aims to compete with Unity and Unreal Engine.

Xenko is the only commercial engine that supports the latest C#. Along with a development streamlining scene editor, a built-in prefab system and scene streaming system that allows developers to store reuse, and review designs, the engine will launch with a complete set of tools, including a full asset pipeline, PBR material editor, script editor, particle editor, and more.

Future Proofing for Virtual Reality

Future proofing the engine for VR, Xenko also offers an intuitive user interface, an advanced rendering set, full support for Vulkan, Forward+ rendering support, global illumination, and a built-in 3D audio support system. Along with its appeal to developers working on all mediums, Silicon Studio expects Xenko to be the future reference and go-to game engine for VR development.

“I ported the game from Unity engine over a year ago because I find Xenko’s API and software architecture to be far superior,” said Mark Aherne, creator of the upcoming game “Universe of Nothing.” “The added benefits of the engine being written entirely in C#, and having access to the source code, just make it a complete winner for me.”

Xenko will be on display at GDC in the Silicon Studio booth, #624, and at the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) Pavilion in the Moscone Convention Center West Hall Lobby. To schedule an appointment to see the engine and speak with Silicon Studio’s Xenko team, please contact Pierre Rahier.

Availability

Xenko will be available to download directly from the Xenko website, as well as through authorized resellers in April 2017. .NET platforms are supported today with Apple iOS, Android, and Linux support via  Xamarin. Apple macOS and Sony Playstation 4 support coming soon.

About Silicon Studio

Silicon Studio is a Japan-based game engine and middleware company providing quality rendering, optical effects, and post-effects solutions for game development. Silicon Studio also publishes games across mobile, PC and consoles, and develops first party games, and non-gaming applications for third parties.

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“The Unity 5 cycle culminating in 5.6 represents great progress in our key focus areas: graphics, performance, stability, efficiency and platform growth. I’m really proud of what our engineering teams delivered,” said John Riccitiello, CEO, Unity Technologies. “Features like Physically Based Rendering, Global Illumination, and Codeless IAP are just a few of the advancements that have helped make Unity 5, and the community it powers, so successful.”

Key new features in Unity 5.6

Progressive Lightmapper speeds up iteration and testing of lighting scenarios and reduces baking times.

01 – Navigation Mesh system adds AI and pathfinding to more easily control character navigation through giant game worlds. Image: Unity Technologies. All rights reserved.

New Video Player supports smooth 4K playback to provide immersive video and enable the creation of 360 video experiences.

02 – Native support for Vulkan graphics API provides better performance across Windows, Tizen, and Android platforms, while consuming less device power. Image: Unity Technologies. All rights reserved.

TextMesh Pro provides improved control of text formatting and layout through Advanced Text Rendering and is now available for free to users of 5.3+, with native Unity integration coming in Unity 2017.

Global distribution and discovery

At the GDC, two Unity partners announced new opportunities for Unity creators seeking global distribution and discovery:

• Xiaomi, one of the top handset manufacturers and Android app stores in China, is now offering Western developers direct access to the Chinese market; interested developers can learn more in the new Xiaomi-Unity Developer Portal.
• Facebook announced Facebook Gameroom Premium support, inviting developers of premium games—like The Eyes of Ara and Skyhill—to bring their content to the PC gaming platform’s growing portfolio. For developers using Unity IAP to implement payments, the company also announced that Facebook payment support will be available in Unity 5.6.

Unity 2017

Unity introduced Unity 2017, the next generation of Unity that will get new features and improvements across graphics, performance, stability, efficiency and platforms as well as a new dedicated focus area: artists and designers. To improve team productivity and collaboration for non-programmers, Unity 2017 will bring the start of a series of features designed specifically for artists and designers across disciplines, from technical artists to lighting artists, animators and more. Beta signups will be available in April. For more information go to www.unity3d.com.

About Unity Technologies

Unity Technologies is the creator of a flexible and high-performance end-to-end development platform used to create rich interactive 2D, 3D, VR and AR experiences. Unity’s powerful graphics engine and full-featured editor serve as the foundation to develop beautiful games or apps and easily bring them to multiple platforms: mobile devices, home entertainment systems, personal computers, and embedded systems. Unity also offers solutions and services for creating games, boosting productivity, and connecting with audiences including Unity Ads, Unity Analytics, Unity Asset Store, Unity Cloud Build, Unity Collaborate, Unity Connect and Unity Certification. Unity Technologies serves millions of registered developers including large publishers, indie studios, students and hobbyists around the globe. For more information, visit www.unity3d.com and to see the latest games and experiences created in Unity, go to madewith.unity.com.

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The industry consortium behind OpenGL and WebGL, among many others, is continuing its strong commitments to creating a community for collaboration of open standards that are used extensively throughout the industry. The group works strongly in support of developing technologies that work across competing platforms, enabling software developers to reach more audiences and markets from their core code bases.

Khronos at GDC 2017: Announcements

Vulkan

The group has announced that Vulkan adoption grows. There are also new Vulkan graphics API features. In just its first year the Vulkan API has gained high fidelity among gaming. Vulkan is supported in leading game engines like Unity and Unreal. Vulkan drivers are also shipping from all the major GPU manufacturers, for both desktop and mobile.

01 – The Khronos Group participants include the biggest names in the computer industry—including Apple, ARM, AMD, Nvidia, Imagination and more. (image: courtesy Khronos Group. All rights reserved)

At GDC Khronos announced the release of new Vulkan extensions for cross-platform access to Virtual Reality and multi-GPU functionality.

OpenXR™

The Khronos Virtual Reality Initiative announced in December is making rapid progress in designing an open standard for portable Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality apps and devices. At GDC 2017, Khronos releases the official name of the standard: OpenXR. The group is made up of a who’s-who of VR industry leaders working together to combat industry fragmentation in these markets. Any interested companies are invited to join Khronos to get involved and help steer the VR industry. Read more at: https://www.khronos.org/blog/the-openxr-working-group-is-here.

New Portability Standard

Khronos has announced a call for participation in a new Exploratory Group to create a native 3D Portability API to enable developers to write rendering code that can run efficiently on Vulkan, DX12 and Metal-based systems. This API could also be a solid foundation for the next generation WebGL that can bind to this portable API for use with JavaScript and WebAssembly. Interested companies are welcome to join Khronos for a voice and a vote in this initiative. Find out how to get involved at: khronos.org/3dportability.

WebGL 2.0 News

Already supported by production browsers from Google and Mozilla, the WebGL 2.0 standard is final and now ready for developers to create the next wave of 3D web applications and engines. WebGL 2.0 exposes OpenGL ES 3.0-class functionality, bringing desktop-OpenGL capabilities to web developers everywhere. Additionally, Khronos has now started work on the next generation of WebGL to bring the power of the new generation of explicit 3D APIs to the Web. More information on WebGL 2.0 is available at https://www.khronos.org/blog/webgl-2.0-arrives.

Final Call for Feedback on glTF™ 2.0

Khronos has released a developer preview version of glTF 2.0 that brings significant enhancements over glTF 1.0. For example, glTF 2.0 introduces physically-based rendering (PBR) for portable, high-quality materials – making glTF independent of the underlying 3D API. Khronos is seeking input and feedback from the industry via GitHub to help finalize glTF 2.0 in the next few weeks. Khronos has also this week released a request for quotations on a funded project to bring glTF 2.0 export capability to the open-source Blender 3D Authoring Tool. Find out how to share feedback and get more details here: https://www.khronos.org/blog/call-for-feedback-on-gltf-2.0.

More at GDC 2017 f0r Khronos Group

In addition to API updates, The Khronos Group is hosting educational sessions and networking events this week including a full-day developer conference and booth talks from various members. Below is a high-level look at Khronos talks and events taking place at GDC.

• Khronos GDC Booth – Visit the Khronos booth for hourly presentations on Khronos APIs as well as opportunities to talk with Khronos members and standards experts. Booth 2419, South Hall.
• Khronos discusses OpenXR at VRDC 2017: Monday and Tuesday, February 27 to 28 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., visit the Khronos table #TT06 in room 135 North Hall to talk to VR experts working on OpenXR and share feedback on this recently-announced initiative.
• Khronos 3D Graphics Developer Day Sessions on Vulkan, OpenXR, WebGL, glTF and more: On Tuesday, February 28 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., room 3022 in West Hall, Khronos will host one-hour educational sessions for developers.
• Khronos Meetup: To discuss WebGL, WebVR, glTF, mobile 3D and network with Khronos members and developers, join the group on Thursday, March 2 from 6:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. at Galvanize, San Francisco.
• Official GDC Sessions related to Khronos standards: Khronos members and developers will present on topics from Vulkan Lessons Learned to the Future of VR.

The full schedule of events is available at: https://www.khronos.org/news/events/gdc-2017.

About The Khronos Group

The Khronos Group is an industry consortium creating open standards to enable the authoring and acceleration of parallel computing, graphics, vision and neural nets on a wide variety of platforms and devices. Khronos standards include Vulkan®, OpenGL®, OpenGL® ES, OpenGL® SC, WebGL™, SPIR-V™, OpenCL™, SYCL™, OpenVX™, NNEF™, COLLADA™, OpenXR™ and glTF™. Khronos members are enabled to contribute to the development of Khronos specifications, are empowered to vote at various stages before public deployment, and are able to accelerate the delivery of their cutting-edge accelerated platforms and applications through early access to specification drafts and conformance tests.

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An Industry First

The first of its kind on the technology learning platform, “Swords and Shovels” offers game developers the hands-on opportunity to play a game they can then learn to recreate in its entirety through a series of courses available on Pluralsight.

Mapped as sequential training through the Game Environment Modeling learning path, the courses provide game developers with the most direct route to increased proficiency in gaming environments, character modeling and gameplay elements using leading software tools including Maya, Unity, Photoshop, ZBrush and more.

01 – Pluralsight is offering an industry-first, a free game paired with learning materials to teach inspiring game developers how to code computer games.

“As technology becomes more complex, the art of creating games will become increasingly interdisciplinary,” said Andy Rahden, VP of creative, design and engineering at Pluralsight. “By embracing hands-on, interactive mediums like “Swords and Shovels” and the Game Environment Modeling learning path, we are helping game developers understand the full inner-workings of a game, see where every little piece fits and interacts within the pipeline and master the skills they need to be successful.”

MORE: Software Training—How Pluralsight Is Taking Aim at AEC and Manufacturing

“Swords and Shovels” is a top-down dungeon crawler — a game where characters navigate a labyrinthine environment, battle monsters, and loot treasure. The game and accompanying courseware was designed and authored by Josh Kinney, curriculum manager at Pluralsight, in collaboration with game development industry veterans Jean Simonet, Jonah Lobe, Dan Cox, Michael Baker and Alex Jerjomin, known for their work on “Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim,” “Fallout 4,” “Fable Legends,” “Splinter Cell Blacklist” and “Below.”

Creating Games Is Both In-Demand but Challenging

“Learning how to create games is one of the most difficult and demanding challenges in tech right now,” said Jean Simonet, a former AAA developer for “Skyrim,” “Fallout” and “Oblivion” and lead developer for the project. “Due to the complexity of modern games, many developers are forced to specialize their craft, limiting their experience and exposure to the various elements of video game creation. With ‘Swords and Shovels’ and the learning experience through Pluralsight, game developers can get a taste of the entire game-creation process and then select the learning focus that really appeals to them.”

See “Swords and Shovels” at 2017 Game Developers Conference

“Swords and Shovels” is available for immediate download on Pluralsight.com/gamedev and will also be available to play at Pluralsight’s Game Developers Conference (GDC) booth #244 in San Francisco on March 1-3, 2017.

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New Github for Open Source Code

“Following the lead of Vulkan, the OpenGL ES working group is excited to open our conformance tests to the public, increasing transparency and encouraging direct involvement from the development community to help improve test quality,” says Tobias Hector, chair of the OpenGL ES working group and leading software design engineer at Imagination Technologies Ltd.

Khronos will continue to invest significantly in the evolution of conformance tests for its family of 3D APIs, and in parallel will use GitHub to drive community input and engagement. Implementers of Vulkan, OpenGL and OpenGL ES that wish to use the API name and trademark, and enjoy the benefits of the Khronos IP framework, may become Adopters. Adopters gain access to formal conformance test suite packages, are enabled to submit the results from running the conformance tests to the Khronos Adopters website for working group review, and for their implementations to subsequently become officially conformant. Along these lines, the OpenGL ES working group has released a new conformance package based on the open source repository, and Adopters are encouraged to submit against this new version 3.2.2 of the tests.

01 – Vulkan(tm) is the latest graphics and compute combined future API for GPUs across all devices and is open sourced from the Khronos Group.

“Developers can now directly fix conformance bugs in place and contribute tests to make sure all vendors follow the OpenGL spec as closely as possible,” said Piers Daniell, chair of the OpenGL working group and principal engineer at NVIDIA. “A joint repository with OpenGL ES and Vulkan is an added bonus, as all three APIs can benefit from contributions to common code.”

Industry Support

“DMP has been a Khronos contributor for many years and developed GPU products as an adopter of the OpenGL ES API,” said Eisaku Ohbuchi, managing director and general manager of development at DMP. “We very much welcome this announcement, which will support the further dissemination and market expansion of Khronos APIs.”

“By growing support for Khronos’ open development of conformance tests, the Android ecosystem will be able to converge on a common set of automated tests for 3D rendering across the industry,” says Pyry Haulos, Khronos Vulkan conformance test lead and senior software engineer at Google.

“The members of the Mesa project are excited by this development. With public access to the test suite and the ability to contribute new tests, all OpenGL and Vulkan implementations will benefit. The quality and consistency of both open source and proprietary drivers will be better than ever,” said Brian Paul, a founding contributor to the Mesa open-source OpenGL implementation.

“Complete and accurate conformance tests are critical to interoperability and portability of applications and tools across platforms,” said Robert Simpson, director, technical standards, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. “We believe open development of conformance tests for OpenGL and Vulkan is allowing the community to be more involved and responsive in the standards development process, reducing the time needed to bring new technologies to market at a higher quality.”

“The widespread adoption of the Khronos API standards has helped VeriSilicon to scale our GPU solutions to thousands of system integrators who have created more than a billion Vivante GPU powered devices in automotive, aviation, IoT and consumer products across the globe,” said Weijin Dai, chief strategy officer at VeriSilicon, Inc. “Placing these conformance tests in the public domain will empower the diverse user base VeriSilicon serves, and will further strengthen these Khronos APIs with community contributions and add value to these vital standards.”

About The Khronos Group

The Khronos Group is an industry consortium creating open standards to enable the authoring and acceleration of parallel computing, graphics, vision and neural nets on a wide variety of platforms and devices. Khronos standards include Vulkan®, OpenGL®, OpenGL® ES, OpenGL® SC, WebGL™, SPIR-V™, OpenCL™, SYCL™, OpenVX™, NNEF™, COLLADA™, and glTF™. Khronos members are enabled to contribute to the development of Khronos specifications, are empowered to vote at various stages before public deployment, and are able to accelerate the delivery of their cutting-edge accelerated platforms and applications through early access to specification drafts and conformance tests.

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However, for the 2 out of 3 people who do have a brand in mind, those brands are not necessarily the brands the technology savvy are thinking of. (see image 01)

Virtual Reality Awareness Is Way Up Heading Into 2017

For example, we have written on Architosh about two of the key leaders, Oculus Rift and the HTC Vive, several times, as these two VR platforms have dominated a presence in software booths at AEC industry shows. Yet, the HTC Vive, in particular, is the device that Americans are least familiar with. (see image 01) So clearly there is a disconnect of sorts between professional audiences and more general audiences regarding VR.

01 – Even the sector defining Oculus Rift device pales in awareness recognition compared to the Samsung Gear brand. And the technically highly regarded Vive is dead last.

Regardless, the ReportLinker study clearly indicates awareness of virtual reality technology and the VR headsets are up substantially compared to just one quarter ago. Moreover, Americans say they have a positive outlook and attitude towards VR, indicating growing appreciation for what virtual reality has to offer.

Here are some of the survey study’s findings:

• 83% of Americans say they have a positive attitude toward VR, up from 72% in the prior quarter.
• An extra 20% were able to try VR headsets due to marketing efforts and availability of VR headsets in stores before Christmas.
• 31% say they are familiar with the technology, nearly doubling that percentage from the prior quarter.
• Millennials were early adopters but now older generations have overtaken them and have a more positive attitude toward immersive reality: 84% vs 68%.
• Samsung Gear VR rose the most in brand awareness, with 58% percent mentioning that brand when naming a device they have heard of.

The ReportLinker study clearly shows surging awareness of virtual reality (VR) technology and headsets (see image 02 below). VR marketing was quite strong on television in the United States during the holiday months. Facebook was also making announcements about Oculus Rift last fall.

02 – As we can see from the chart, of those familiar with VR less than 1 and 3 are very familiar with it and can explain it to a friend. Image: ReportLinker.

As the market opens up Samsung leads the way (58% awareness) with Oculus (31%) Rift, Google Cardboard (32%), and HTC Vive (13%) rounding out core leaders. (image 01). However, Americans were also aware of Sony’s Morpheus (24%) but that company only grew 3% in awareness compared to the prior quarter. All of the other brands grew tremendously in brand and device awareness from quarter to quarter. Google Cardboard, in particular, grew the fastest.

MORE: Samsung Gear and HTC Vive Lead VR Survey But Magic Leap?

This leads me to a final point. If the more consumer-oriented VR brands (eg: Samsung, Google, Sony) dominate, what might that do for longer term success for the VR devices that have strong professional industry aspirations like HTC Vive?

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Unit 5.5—What’s New in Highlights

A big new focus area in Unity 5.5 is support for new platforms. And perhaps the biggest new platform supported in Unity 5.5 is Microsoft HoloLens. Holographic emulation is right inside the Unity Editor in version 5.5, enabling developers in all markets the ability to prototype, debug, and iterate on design directly inside the Unity Editor without needing to build and deploy to an actual Hololens device for testing.

The Particle System and Line Renderer components in Unity have been improved in version 5.5, bringing better tools to artists. The Animation Window has workflow improvements and is massively faster.

A new Splash screen tool means developers can introduce their brands at the start of games with just a few clicks. Let’s look at some other features in more detail.

Performance

For faster performance Unity 5.5 supports the latest physics engine PhysX 3.3.3. There is a new CPU Usage Profiler timeline view as well. That will help developers tune performance.

01 – A Look Dev view inside the new Unity 5.5 release.

GPU instancing is now supported for the leading mobile platforms in Android and Apple iOS (with Metal). For Android it works using OpenGL ES 3.0 or newer and for iOS it works using Apple’s Metal API.

Linear Color Space rendering, which allows you to work in linear color space versus traditional gamma color space, is now available in Apple’s iOS and tvOS platforms via Apple Metal graphics API, and with Android with OpenGL ES 3.0.

There are numerous other performance and API related improvements.

Open Beta Features

Unity 5.5 also introduces Unity Collaborate to everyone (open beta) as a simple way for entire teams to save and sync their Unity projects.

There is also an experimental tool called Look Dev to help ensure parity of materials throughout physically-based projects.  Look Dev is an HDR (high dynamic range) image-based lighting tool that allows you to check and compare assets through a viewer to ensure they are correctly authored for various lighting.

Summary

There are dozens and dozens of discreet improvements to Unity 5.5. One item that will please quite a few developers is the added support for Visual Studio Code on macOS and Windows. This open-source external script editor is considered one of the best in the field and is popular. Selecting Visual Studio Code from within Unity 5.5 will then enable automatic push out to editing scripts in Unity 5.5 inside this chosen external text editor.

To learn more visit here. 

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Here’s What’s New

Vue 2016 includes many new features, including important new export functions and the ability to work with any non-natively integrated renderer, such as RenderMan. The key details are:

• Integration Improvements — export almost any asset, including full scenes and EcoSystem populations.
• xStream Convert tool — new tool enables you to render scenes with any renderer, such as Pixar RenderMan, Arnold, Octane, VrayRT, et cetera.
• Hybrid GPU/CPU Rendering — new support for hybrid GPU/CPU Interactive Path Tracer enabling GPU rendering integration.
• Heightfield Terrains — New Terrain Modeling technology is more flexible and more capable.
• Multiple Global EcoSystem Layers — these can be saved as EcoPainter Brushes.
• PlantFactory Variations — easily and quickly add more realism to your scenes and improve productivity at the same time.
• Fully customizable workspace and HiDPI display support
• Many smaller improvements

The Vue product line has been used in hundreds of feature films such as “Minions,” “Jupiter Ascending,” “The Avengers,” “Avatar,” “How to Train your Dragon,” “Kung Fun Panda,”; triple-A games such as “StarCraft Legacy of the Void” and “Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3,” and many other TV shows and commercials. Vue gained a worldwide reputation for its advanced technologies for the creation of Digital Nature.

01 – E-on Software releases Vue 2016 Professional Product line, including PlantFactory 2016.

Olivier Pron, supervising art director and head of art department, Method Studios, said, “VUE and PlantFactory are helping us be more creative and productive across the entire workflow for our productions, regardless the tools we currently use.”

VUE 2016 professional products come in two product lines: Vue 2016 xStream and Vue 2016 Infinite. To learn more about the new more about Vue 2016 go here.

Vue 2016 professional products also include the essential PlantFactory engine which is a key piece of software also updated in this release.

PlantFactory 2016—What’s New

PlantFactory is a 3D vegetation modeling, animation and rendering software used by the CG, VFX, architecture and gaming communities and may be little known to some Architosh readers. However, it is a key engine inside the Vue product line.

Key new features in version 2016 include:

• Growth Simulation — you can now generate geometry using a biologically inspired growth simulation.
• PlantFactory Variations — this feature generates “variations” in an easy fashion and improves overall realism to scenes and saves in productivity time as variation production is automated.
• Customized LOD — the user can truly customize Level of Detail (LOD).

“PlantFactory is a must have for any vfx pipeline — not only as an ideal companion to VUE, but also as a strong ally in any general environment production scenario,” said Peter Baustaedter, VFX art director and environment artist.

Availability

Vue xStream and Infinite 2016 are immediately available in English for 64 bit versions of Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 10, and on Mac OSX 10.6+ (Mac Intel only).

Vue xStream 2016 is natively compatible with a wide list of renderers, from 3ds Max to Cinema 4D and LightWave. With the new Conversion tool scenes can be rendered with any non-natively supported renderer.

PlantFactory Producer, Studio, Designer, Artist and Exporter 2016 are immediately available in English for 64 bit versions of Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 10, and on Mac OSX 10.6+ (Mac Intel only).

The VUE 2016 and PlantFactory 2016 Personal Learning Editions are scheduled for release in the coming month to date. The VUE 2016 Product line for 3D Artists (VUE Pioneer, Esprit, Studio and Complete 2016) are scheduled for release in Q4 2016.

To learn more visit here. 

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SynthEyes 1608 Updates

SynthEyes 1608 includes new features to better handle 360-degree film footage and geometry hierarchy tracking. New illumination tracking helps match light to difficult shots where light sources are introduced and are sudden in scenes and then vanish or stay around, like in explosions or scenes lit by strobes. This new feature records the illumination on individual trackers over the course of a shot.

Key features in SynthEyes 1608 include improvements with FBX file format interoperability. With FBX import you can use the File > Import > Filmbox Scene Import for a scene with cameras, meshes, nulls, and entire rigs. You can also select just to import the mesh with FBX as the file type. FBX export includes the entire deforming rigs.

01 – Andersson Technologies LLC has updated SynthEyes to version 1608 with many new features, including VR, FBX improvements and illumination tracking features.

Other key features include:

• Animated illumination measurement for trackers (including planar trackers) with storage on trackers, meshes, and lights to assist handling shots with rapidly varying lighting. New “Set Illumination from Trackers” script. Export via FBX or export “illumination data as plain text” script. See “Light Tracking” in the manual.
• New Number Zone and glitch-fixing features in the Graph Editor.
• SynthEyes now saves and restores non-scene settings and window placements (for single- and multiple-monitor configurations). Views adjust better to changing windows sizes. New related preferences. See “Preserving Placements and Settings” in the manual.
• New GeoH “Make Selected the Root” and “Split Bone” scripts.
• 360VR: The perspective view now displays directly on a spherical screen, instead of the linear one. So no need to run the 360VR sphere generation script for this reason (still good for export).
• 360VR stabilization export and plugin for After Effects, so stabilization can be applied within After Effects with no SynthEyes render. (Separate download from Customer-Only area)
• New Save Map Sequence script to save animated distortion/stabilization maps, for use in downstream compositing apps, notably export of 360VR stabilization.
• Demo version can now run the 360VR scripts for testing.
• Around 100 other changes.

For more information about SynthEyes software you can visit them here.

Pricing and Availability

SynthEyes 1608 is available now for Mac OS X, Linux and Windows. New licences cost from $299 to $699, depending on whether you buy the Intro or Pro edition of the software, and for which platforms.

The post Mac 3D News: Andersson Technologies updates SynthEyes 1608 appeared first on Architosh.

Bringing MDL to the Industry

An exclusive feature, Material Definition Language (MDL) authoring allows designers to create and share consistent 3D materials across teams without conversion. The new technology builds upon last year’s integration of NVIDIA’s DesignWorks, which introduced MDL and Iray to the popular texturing engine.

“Combining MDL authoring with Substances opens the door to a universe of materials that were impossible to create before,” said Sébastien Deguy, founder and CEO of Allegorithmic. “With unlimited possibilities, artists and designers can now make materials they have only dreamed of, while achieving remarkable consistency in how these materials look and feel across supporting 3D applications.”

Creating Custom MDL Textures Without Coding

With Substance Designer 5.5, users can make an MDL material from scratch, without coding, using a non-destructive workflow. With this ability, designers can now create tweakable, multi-layered, homogenous materials with volume, with or without the use of Substances. Whether used for car designs featuring high-gloss paint or intricate skin effects that require realistic transparencies, MDL authoring ensures that materials created in Substance Designer are easy to customize and shareable. As libraries are developed, materials can be shared with any MDL-ready software program, helping artists make key decisions much earlier in the design process.

01 – Allegorithmic is growing thanks its Substance product line. The latest Substance Designers 5.5 adds support for MDL authoring.

“Substance Designer has the deep, robust set of features we are looking for when we are trying to achieve awesome custom paint, and paint effects,” said Matthew Gueller, senior surface designer at Harley Davidson. “I don’t think we can do better without using real paint.”

“Substance Designer is the first application to provide an end-to-end MDL workflow, enabling its user base to take their materials to a wide variety of applications for physically-based rendering,” says Phillip Miller, senior director of product management, Advanced Rendering for NVIDIA. “The combination of Substance Designer’s intuitive workflow and MDL’s flexibility is amazingly powerful and should prove to be an invaluable tool for anyone using an MDL-compliant renderer such as Iray, mental ray and soon V-Ray.”

Several features have also been developed for the film and games industries including support for Linux, the ability to import custom camera views in the .fbx format and new UI improvements. More additions are expected in the coming months.

For a free 30-day trial of Substance Designer 5.5, click here.

Pricing and Availability

Substance Designer 5.5 is available today for Linux, Mac OS and Windows, and is free for current license holders and Substance Live subscribers. For new users, indie licenses are priced at $149, while Pro licenses are available for $590. Licenses can be purchased directly through the Allegorithmic website or an authorized retailer.

Architosh Analysis

Allegorithmic continues to rise in the gaming and visual effects world. It competes on many levels with other 3D painting tools such as Mari, Mudbox and BodyPaint 3D, among others. The big thing that is driving the rise of Allegorithmic, beyond its own innovations, is the rise in interest in physically based renderers and the rise in real-time renderers, and sometimes both and sometimes with the use of game engines outside the gaming industry.

For AEC visualization professionals, essentially all the Substance products are of value. Substance B2M in particular enables users to make any material photography tile seamlessly. And a very good reason to use Substance Designer or Substance Painter is to add those real-to-life imperfections to renders.

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