Category Archives: computers

toonboom launches flipboom lite for ipad

Toonboom, makers of the long-standing animation software ToonBoom Studio, has released Flipboom Lite, a simple app that will let you create simple flipbook style animations on the iPad. It really is a lot of fun… although I do find myself reverting back to creating dinosaurs killing UFO’s that are eventually all killed by a large [...]
Also posted in animation | Leave a comment

control your applications with a touch, ipad keypad pro

Keypad Pro for the iPad is a wireless remote with buttons sliders, dials and panns that will control any application on the Mac or Windows. I haven’t tried it yet, but I am eager to see how it will work with all the junk that I use, Maya, After Effects, etc. Looks promising! Check out the [...]
Posted in computers | Leave a comment

webcam piano

Memo Akten shows off his latest, the Web Cam Piano. A short teaser for a new installation and ongoing project: Webcam Piano 2.0. All the music you hear is being created in realtime based on analysis of live camera input and gestural motion tracking, smarter and sexier than before. Written in C++ with openFrameworks. msavisuals.com/webcam_piano_2 [...]
Also posted in animation | Leave a comment

fermi: nvidia introduces its new gpus

NVIDIA introduced at Siggraph 2010 its new GPUs based on the latest Fermi architecture and seriously the specs on the Quadro 4000, 5000, and 6000 look insane, and from what the buzz has been by early users points by all accounts that to be true. Vfx World Magazine has a great article covering not only [...]
Also posted in 3D | Leave a comment

fxguidetv from siggraph 2010

FxguideTV with episode one of likely many from the Siggraph 2010 show, in this episode an interview with Master Zap about iRay and Mental Mill, Mental Images new interactive photorealistic rendering technology and Shader creation application respectively. Also, an interview with nVidia about the Quadro 4000, Quadro 5000, and Quardo 6000 Fermi cards and Cuda GPU processing. [...]
Also posted in 3D | Leave a comment

artie, new personal render farm

RenderStream, makers of high performance 3D workstations and Render Servers, have recently introduced Artie, a turnkey solution for small to mid-sized production facilities and studios. Artie is a 6U enclosure with a single PCoIP workstation, 2X RenderStream Ridiculous Speed 4 render farm and a switch shown here. 4U, 6U, 12U and 24U enclosures available depending on [...]
Also posted in 3D | Leave a comment

programmable motion effects

From the Computer Graphics Laboratory ETH Zurich, J. Schmid, R. Sumner, H. Bowles, M. Gross submit a WhitePaper for Programmable Motion Effects for various styles of speed lines, multiple stroboscopic images, temporal offsetting, and photorealistic and stylized blurring on both simple and production examples. “abstract: Although animation is one of the most compelling aspects of [...]
Also posted in 3D | Leave a comment

drag and drop render queue for os x

I recently got an email from Greg D suggesting a post on the lab experiments Andrew Andoru has been working on – Thanks Greg, what a great idea! If you remember Andrew had some droplets that would render from After Effects, Nuke and Maya easily – basically doing a terminal render with some automation and [...]
Also posted in after effects, maya | Leave a comment

interactive on-surface signal deformation

Tobias Ritschel, Thorsten Thormählen, Carsten Dachsbacher, Jan Kautz and Hans-Peter Seidel present an interactive system for the artistic control of visual phenomena visible on surfaces. The method allows the user to intuitively reposition shadows, caustics, and indirect illumination using a simple click-and-drag user interface working directly on surfaces. In contrast to previous approaches, the positions [...]
Also posted in 3D | Leave a comment

frankencamera platform for computational photography

I have been wondering why there is no such thing really as an open source camera where the camera would be able to do all kids of wonderful things while taking a picture, or after taking a picture. This thought process stemmed from my attempt to find a “lomo” style digital camera, when all i [...]
Also posted in filmmaking | Leave a comment