Offers speed increases up to 10x faster than USB 2.0, according to press release. First consumer applications expected to be available in 2010. Read the whole PR (PDF) at USB.org for more.

Science Daily has the news.

Scanline VFX brings Roland Emmerich's "2012" Teaser to life. Water abounds. Check it out!

A hobby that could easily find its place in Argentine writer Julio Cortázar's list of "strange occupations": take a look at some examples of creative computer case design.

HDRI-locations has been updated with new locations, some of them are in low light around sunset/dusk/dawn which are particularly good for black cars. Also updated the examples section with some more renderings. But maybe most important, there is now a free sample available so people can try it out and play around. Visit HDRI-locations.com.

(Updated November 11, 2008) Josef Wienerroither has optimized and tweaked the Max scenes from the tests in order to balance them with the XSI setup, and did complete benchmark sessions before and after. Max fares much better than the results published at Jon Peddie's website, and in a few cases outperforms XSI. Check out the details at Josef Wienerroither's website.
Josef Wienerroither, a reader from Austria, sent us feedback criticizing the tests done by Jon Peddie Research for comparing XSI's performance with Max's and Maya's (see our recent news item). He downloaded the scene files and says they do not ensure a fair comparison because they are set up in a way that seems to favor XSI's performance. After making his own tests with the scene files his conclusion is that "this looks really not like a Benchmark to count on." Read on for more detailed information on the tests he made.   [ more... ]

The latest release of the fluid plugin for Max includes a new node Object called GluBaker that allows playing Glu3D previously calculated caches without loading a main Glu3D node in scene. It has user controls like offset and scale that allows adjusting time to scene needs. It reads mesh surface cache from a calculated Glu3D scene; it can also re-calculate meshes from a selected cache directory. Download a demo version of Glu3D to test it and check out a tutorial on the subject at 3DAliens.com.

Melbourne-based Eness, a company dedicated to creating more intuitive and humane ways of interacting with technology, have developed a way of playing Pong on a common whiteboard. For more fun inventions such as the Zen robot, Floppy Disk ceramic tiles or Ping-pong bat stand check out their website.

"Softimage recently commisioned Jon Peddie Research to conduct a series of tests on XSI, Maya and Max." The result: Windows Vista performs much worse than XP. Also, XSI usually outperforms Maya and Max in the tests presented. Find out more at 3DSpeedMachine.com.

George Maestri reviews Mudbox 2009 for VFXWorld.com: "... a great package for anyone who needs to create highly detailed models for 3D."

With Vue 7 xStream, all Vue tools are now fully integrated in the host application, providing direct access to 3D environment creation technologies. Vue 7 xStream users can create complete natural 3D environments directly inside their favorite 3D software, using standard application tools and manipulators. New features in Vue 7 xStream and Infinite include: extended compatibility with Mental Ray – integrated and satellites (xStream), EcoSystem 3 technology (dynamic population, EcoSystem painting from any angle), Spectral 2 cloud technology with realistic volumetric 3D clouds and cloud layers, new Radiosity engine optimized for indoor and infinite scenery, Water Editor: water animation from still lakes to stormy ocean waves, up to 4 times faster GI rendering, improved SolidGrowth 4 plant technology with high definition species for “hero” plants, collada file format import, over 160 editable SolidGrowth plant species, etc. Check out a Vue 7 demo video along with a Vue 7 xStream-3DS Max presentation at E-onSoftware.com.

The trailer for the latest short film distributed by Platige Image has been made available. The "Chick" was directed by Michal Socha. Also of note, take a look at the trailer for "Teaching Infinity", directed and created by Kuba Jabłoński and Bartek Kik. Both films will have their premiere in the US this coming Saturday November 8 at the 20th Polish Film Festival in Chicago.

Spiral Graphics has announced the immediate availability of Genetica 3.0, the latest version of its popular seamless texture, animation, and HDRI environment map editor. The new version includes more than a thousand royalty-free presets. A demo is available for download from SpiralGraphics.biz. Read on for more.   [ more... ]

New features in OnOne Software's image scaling Photoshop plugin include texture presets, a new gallery wrap function, batch processing, tiling for smaller printers and support for Photoshop CS4. Genuine Fractals 6 is scheduled for release in November. Read the whole PR for more.

Yes, you have read right. Autodesk is set to acquire substantially all the assets of Softimage (that includes Max plugin Character Animation Toolkit). Reactions at 3D forums have been very negative, if they represented a 3D stock market, one could say that today it has crashed. Here's a random sample: "the worst industry news ever", "a sad day for 3D", "short of a death in the family", "So now there's officially absolutely no competition anymore?", "Run Pixologic Run!", "One Company To Rule Them All", "Autodesk's country based licensing system is a joke", "For sale: 1 seat of xsi advanced version 6.5", "one more reason to move to Blender", "It is so bad, that I can't describe it". According to the posts, Max, Maya and XSI users are worried about a potential lack of innovation in future versions of their 3D software, the possibility of rising prices, Autodesk's licensing policies (which are far more restrictive than Softimage's), and the impossibility of being able to choose among major 3D software companies. Responses have been very emotional, as usually happens with releases and acquisitions of 3D software, but these latest ones have had a particularly negative tone, and whether the arguments will prove to be justified or not in the future, this symptom in itself does raise an eyebrow. One thing can be safely said, in the long run competition is better for everyone (yes, even Autodesk itself), and for the time being, among Autodesk's 3D software, only Mudbox seems to be forced to keep competing due to ZBrush's continued development. A few links related to the acquisition: press release at Autodesk.com, comments at Ken Pimentel's blog, reactions at Softimage's forums, CGTalk, Blenderartists.org, Leonard Teo's take on the subject. Read on for a sample of comments from the Softimage forums.   [ more... ]