Read the whole PR at Digitalproducer.com.

Digital Producer reviews RE:Vision Effects Video Gogh.
Creative-3D reviews ZBrush 1.23B.

VR4MAX release 1.2, the latest version of the real-time, interactive virtual reality environment to view, check and distribute 3ds max 4 models is out now featuring: VR4MAX Navigator (the FREE player version of VR4MAX), VR4MAX Extreme bringing VR4MAX to Unix and new product names for the Windows based products. Read on for more information on features.   [ more... ]

LightWork Design have announced LightWorks Sketch, a non-photorealistic renderer that has the ability to create impressionistic and stylised design renderings. A wide selection of sketch style shaders is available within LightWorks Sketch, ranging from pencil sketches to watercolour paintings. LightWorks Sketch supports output of EPix files for use in the Piranesi application from Informatix Software International. Veteran Max users may recall that LightWork Design has previously developed a radiosity plugin for Max called RadioRay.

REALVIZ MatchMover 2, a software for quickly and accurately tracking 3D camera data and object motion from videos and film sequences for seamlessly integrating 3D objects into your footage is being offered at a promotional price of $999, valid through January 1st, 2002.

Panasonic is shipping the TH-37PWD4UZ professional plasma display, which provides support for VGA, SVGA, XGA, SXGA and UXGA resolution computer graphics and DTV/HDTV signals in 480p/i, 575p, 720p, 1035i, 1080/60i, 1080/50i, and 1080/24p/24sf. The TH-37PWD4UZ is available at a list price of $5,995.

Discreet has created a website where customers and companies can post job offers to find freelance users for their projects. Freelance users can also post their profiles and the type of assignment they're looking for as well. Discreet-Talent is (at least currently) an initiative for Europe, Middle East and Africa only.

Advanced Rendering Technology (ART) is shipping Pure 3D, a PCI card that renders images up to 16 times faster than software-based ray tracing implementations. Pure 3D features an integrated plugin interface for 3dsmax, 3D Studio VIZ and Maya and has a retail price of $3699. More information available at Art-render.com.

Jahshaka, currently in alpha, is an open-source effects, compositing and editing system available on Linux, Irix and Windows.
Features include a 3d world with X/Y/Z control, integrated 2d compositor, and an OpenGL based 3d paint environment.

Squirrely Productions has updated their Scene Explorer plugin to version 1.1. Scene Explorer consolidates various max functionality into one window and simplifies and speeds-up day to day workflow. New features include:
- Un/hide, un/freeze, open/close, collapse/expand multiple nodes at once.
- Un/hide, un/freeze, open/close, collapse/expand entire hierarchy at once.
- Properties option in general tab to always automatically jump to last selected node
More information and demo version available at Squirrely's website.

Motion Media will be holding an OPEN HOUSE, December 12th from 2PM - 10PM in Santa Monica (California), showcasing many new products including the Brazil Rendering System, Discreet Edit 6.5, Combustion 2.0, and more...

The XSI 2.0 LA event will be on Thursday, December 13, 2001 at 7pm (registration at 6:30 pm) in Santa Monica, CA. Other XSI events will take place in Chicago, Montreal and Munich. Read the details at Softimage.com.

3DCorum reviews Blur Studio's L-system 1.0 procedural object plugin.
Digital Producer reviews Lightwave 7.

The Animadrid Festival will take place in Madrid, Spain from December 10 through Dec. 15, featuring animation screenings, seminars and prizes for the winners of the short film animation contest (first price is 9000 Euros). Discreet and CICE (Discreet Training Center) are sponsoring the festival; Daniel Martínez Lara, José Antonio Navarrete and Manolo Gómez (Dygra Films) will be among the lecturers of the seminars. For detailed information and schedules and to register online visit CICE's website.

Think Secret has an article stating that Max could be ported to the Mac.

Take a look at some images generated with Matt Fairclough's Terragen for the Advanced Terragen Contest.

Três D1 Computação Gráfica is a great resource for Portuguese speakers with lots of information, tutorials and tips on 3ds max.

3D-worXX reviews World Builder 3.1 landscape creation and animation software.

Mixing procedural textures
Box modeling the shape of a car
Hand Tutorial
World Builder - 3ds max communication tutorial

Areté Entertainment released Digital GameWare, a physics-driven middleware solution for game developers that enables simulation and rendering of ocean environment FX at real-time frame rates.
Read the whole PR at Digitalproducer.com.

Max Ink Cafe has finished the cinematics for Dragon Rage, a game for the Sony PS2 using Discreet's 3ds max and Character Studio and some Digimation plugins: Shag Hair, Stitch, and Bones Pro. Read the article at Digitalproducer.com.

Exluna has posted a newsletter on its website with some details on their plans regarding ports to Maya and OS X, an image contest and the scheduled release for Max's integration plugin.

Juan Antonio Amblés has updated his Lightmesh plugin that lets users turn any object into a lightsource. In the new version all parameters of Lightmesh are now animatable. Juan Antonio is also asking people to send him wishes for future plugins.

Max 3D has posted some details on the current developments of the Brazil renderer. Also of note, another 0.2.26 build of Brazil has been posted so that those with timelock failures can refresh their license. This will reset the timelock so Brazil r/s will continue to work for another 60 days.

Plugin3d.com, the commercial products division of Cubicspace Studios have updated their site with more information on Thunder 3D, and a downloadable demo version of the sound creation plugin.

Discreet is shipping cleaner 5.1, an industry-standard tool for importing, authoring, encoding and delivering streaming video for the web. Discreet cleaner 5.1 is available for sale and as a free download to update all current cleaner 5 customers at Discreet.com.   [ more... ]

PolySelections v1.2 by Grant Adam - Lets you select polys by the number of verts that compose them.
ImportNendo v0.1.2 by Jack Palevich - Imports geometry from Nendo .ndo files.
CharRigger v1.07 by Michael Comet - Auto generates a character rig for animation based on given pointHelpers. Version 1.07 adds a new feature to automatically mirror the ptHelpers (you can now setup helpers on just one side, and then mirror them to other *with the proper names*).
MyLayer v2.1 by Stefan Rademakers - Advanced display organize / layer manager tool.   [ more... ]

3DVF is holding an animation contest with many prizes.

Darwin is a set of special parametric primitives designed to help artists create new and unique life inside of 3ds max 4 quickly and efficiently. With over 600MB of component mesh parts and real-life maps to work with, you can create a new lifeform in just a few minutes. All the body parts contain pre-skinned skeletons (MAX bones) for animation. More information and sample images at Digimation.com.

Maxhelp.com has just released a CD of 10 low-poly man models for 3ds max 4, complete with Bones and Skin, ready to animate.   [ more... ]

3DMaxer.dk interviews the greatly talented 3D-artist Willi Hammes - currently working at Eurocom Ltd.

“V-Ray public beta program starts on Dec 01,2001. Stick around to learn more.
For more information on V-Rays visit: http://www.chaoticdimension.com/products/info/?ID=7”

Creative-3D reviews Darkling Simulations' DarkTree Textures 2 procedural texture creation plugin: "From a finite set of components and parameters you can create endless varieties of great-looking textures--it's magic!".

Auran, creator of the Auran Jet game engine, has announced that its upcoming model railroad simulation game Trainz, will include a 3dsmax plug-in exporter. The exporter will let users add custom 3D models to the game. There is no word on whether gMax will be supported. Full Story.

"Autodesk VIZ 4 (formerly 3D Studio VIZ) introduces the next generation of global illumination rendering technology for more intuitive, real-world lighting and richer, more realistic images and animations." Has Lightscape finally been integrated into Viz?

Read the articles, forecasts and comments at CNet, Digital Producer, Digit Magazine Online, GameSpot and Gamasutra (registration required).

Madrid-based Next Limit has released the FlowTracer fluid shader, a volumetric plugin that creates realistic fluid surfaces with a metaball based engine. FlowTracer works with a RealFlow or RealWave particle .bin sequence or any particle emitter from your 3D package. Right now it's available for Cinema 4D, but a 3ds max version will be out soon.

New pictures at Raphael Benedet's 3D Artists gallery. Check' em out! One of the featured artists, Johannes Schlörb, is a German CG artist and contributor at 3dmax.de. Visit his website to see some more great images and animations.

Find the answer at Jeremy Engleman's online studio. Many new pictures created with 3ds max posted at his website.

Exluna today announced Entropy 3.1, an upgrade to Exluna's new rendering system which will be available in January. The release will include a number of improvements such as direct 3ds max and 3D Studio VIZ integration. Entropy 3.1 also introduces new features such as depth of field and HDRI image-based lighting, as well as performance enhancements to significantly improve rendering speed, motion blur, and sub-pixel (true) displacement.
Read the whole press release at Exluna.com.

Motion Media is working on a new CG film titled "Machine Phase". The movie is set in an era soon after augmentation, the process of integrating molecular machinery into humans. A trailer (with some very impressive visuals) is available for download and a gallery of still images and more details on the plot can be found at the movie's website.
(Note: some images contain nudity.)

This is unconfirmed but it comes from a very reliable source: new seat sales of 3ds max 3.1 and upgrades from 3ds max 1 and 2 to 3ds max 4 to be discontinued December 31, 2001.

JetSetWally is a new interactive 3D online gaming experience that teleports your browser into a game-console quality type environment. Produced for your enjoyment by Heavy3D.com using Discreet's 3dsmax 4.2, and Virtools Dev. 2.0 - Come and Play episode one on www.JetSetWally.com.   [ more... ]

Digimation has posted a list of plugins it has on discount for its 9th anniversary until December 21.

Realviz announced MatchMover 2 Professional. The latest version of the 3D tracking software features automatic tracking, calibration, track cleanup, and support for matte sequences for tracking specific objects. MatchMover allows users to start tracking automatically, and if necessary, transition to manual mode with no interruption of workflow. MatchMover 2 Professional will be available worldwide in January 10, 2002 at a list price of $4999.   [ more... ]

Tomek Baginski has updated the website for the upcoming short film "The Cathedral". This non-commercial animated film is based on a story written by Polish author Jacek Dukaj. You can find the new images (many of them rendered with Brazil) on the site's gallery as well as the 'trashcan' section. Don't miss this one, there are some truly amazing images on this site!
The trailer for the short film will be released later this month.

Digit Magazine reviews Softimage 3D's latest release.
XSI 2.0 also reviewed at Computer Creative.

This is unconfirmed, but signals abound: "On November 14 a service pack for 3ds max 4.2 users will be available for download from Discreet.com. This free update includes enhancements that will ensure quality, workflow, performance and stability. Some of these enhancements include:
· Greatly enhanced TCB controller animation and workflow
· Morpher has been modified so that deleted Morpher targets still have racks in Trackview
· Raytrace Reflections now support Face Mapping
· Performance increases on the Pentium 4 using this update range from 5 to 30 percent, depending on the types of 3ds max operations used
· Increased rendering performance for faster raytracing and blurring"

Deep Paint 3D 2.0, Right Hemisphere's 3D texture painting program and the next version of Texture Weapons (now called Deep UV) are scheduled to be released Q1 2002. Right Hemisphere has also put up some information on upcoming products including Deep Persona, a new software for creating humanoid characters and Deep Mesh, a set of tools for healing and optimizing meshes.

Courtesy of Forum3D we present you with a sample of works of artists from Poland who've used 3ds max to create their images and animated shorts:
"Night Shift" animation - by Maciej Jackiewicz.
"AVES" animation - by Tomasz Strzalkowski.
Trailer "IT" animation - by Zbigniew Lenard.
Image Gallery by Aleksander Golowacz - a compilation of images by a very imaginative artist.
(Warning: The themes of the Night Shift and IT animations are quite gloomy and may not be suitable to all viewers.)

Some very nice images and an animation done with Brazil's cartoon shader have been posted by Rune Spaans at his website. Check 'em out!

The new release seems to be a maintainance update according to the PR, which mentions that it will tackle issues and bugs reported to Cebas.

TrU-V (patent pending) is a new form of texture mapping that allows 3D animators to apply textures to objects without the nagging artifacts associated with conventional cylindrical, spherical and planar mapping. To learn more go to Texture Tools.

Cubicspace Studios announced Thunder 3D, a "positional sound system" plugin for 3ds max and Viz that incorporates Sensaura's 3DPA technology, enabling sound to be heard in 3D from only 2 speakers or using headphones. Thunder 3D features include material occlusions, scalable doppler shift, dynamic reverb, randomisation of sounds, play and looping control, per particle sound processing, animated frequencies & volumes, air absorption and unlimited sounds. Retail price is $399, check out Thunder 3D's webpages for more info, including an animation done with the plugin.   [ more... ]

Peter Åsberg is writing an ongoing series of tutorials aimed at procedural texturing in Max. Check out his new tutorial on how to make brushed metal using procedurals. The author is taking requests for the next tutorials so email him if you have any suggestions.

Scratchpost.com has an interesting article on their November issue on the CG animated short JIGGY BUG with *lots* of behind the scenes information about the creative process told from the production and the director - David J. Sung. JIGGY BUG was done using 3ds max, Character Studio, Bones Pro and Maya. Some hi-res images from the animation can be found at Right Hemisphere's site.

Tokyo-based Integra has updated its InSight G.I. renderer with new features such as multiprocessor support (multi-threaded calculations), fuzzy reflections, RPC object support, improved antialiasing for reflected/refracted images, support of bleeding by material, object excluding from Illumination Map calculations, etc. Read the release notes and features pages for more information.

Anibyte's website has been updated with new images and animations done with 3ds max by Víctor Garrido and his team. Definitely recommended!

RE:Vision Effects has updated three of its plugins for After Effects (and other AE plugin architecture compatible software). These include ReelSmart Motion Blur, Video Gogh and ReelSmart Shade/Shape. ReelSmart Motion Blur 2.0 lets users control how far pixels are tracked and the Pro version of the software adds support for foreground and background separation using a mask. Updates are free for current users of the plugins. Read the whole PR for more information.

VFXPro has a list of CG-related events for this month. Events include the Bay Area Motion Graphics User Group meeting on Monday 5th in San Francisco, the Motion Graphics Los Angeles meeting at the American Film Institute (LA) on Nov. 6 and The London Effects & Animation Festival on Nov. 13-15 at the Olympia Hall in London, among many others. Check them out, there are some very interesting lectures and seminars available. 3D|VfX Magazine and CG Channel are also hosting a Visual Effects Production seminar in San Francisco on Nov. 10.

Sony Corporation today announced the development of the S-AIT format, a new tape-based data storage technology platform that will enable up to 500GB of native capacity to be stored on a single-reel, half-inch tape cartridge by the end of 2002. The S-AIT will feature a sustained native transfer rate of up to 30MB per second uncompressed and is expected to be available late next year at a list price of under $10,000.

Trapcode announced the release of their 3D Stroke plugin for After Effects (and other AE plugin architecture compatible software). The plugin uses the path from one or more masks to render strokes that can be rotated and moved freely in 3D space. It has a built-in camera for AE41 users, and can also use AE5's comp camera. Logo reveals in 3D are easily made using the keyframable sliders for start and end. Price is $49 until November 30, a free demo may be downloaded from Trapcode's website.

Digit Magazine reviews LightWave 7.

Digitalproducer.com has a great article on the upcoming movie based on J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. The article also mentions that Electronic Arts is currently working on a Lord of the Rings game which uses some of the models and textures created for the movie.