The GPU Technology Conference (GTC) took place in San Jose California from May 14th to May 17th. The conference is the brainchild of GPU giant NVidia and looks to celebrate global awareness of GPU computing and visualisation as well as the importance of the future of science and innovation.
Compositing: Creating the Illusion
Want to introduce yourself to some of the fundamental techniques of compositing? Well now you can. The lovely Simon Richardson, compositing escapee and one of our esteemed Studio Assistants here at Escape, has put together a free NUKE tutorial that will demonstrate exactly that. This short video will walk you through a basic CG rebuild inside NUKE, using Maya’s Mental Ray passes. For anyone starting out using this software, it’s a great insight into the processes behind building a shot ready for edit.
The President With A Past
Now this movie has been cropping up a lot recently. Our friends at Assimilate worked on it with their software SCRATCH, so we thought we should shed a little more light on it.
Get Involved With The Foundry
The Foundry are planning on launching a range of new online live product demos this summer, set to be a regular feature on The Foundry website. But before anything is set in stone they want to know what YOU want to hear about!
Monster success with mocha Pro V3
The mocha Pro V3 event took place last night at Framestore screening room in London. The event was a great success so a big thank you to everyone who came down.
Krazy for IKinema
IKinema has been the go to plug-in for Autodesk Maya when it comes to creature and model animation especially after their performance on smash hit films like Wrath of the Titans and X-Men: First Class. With the release of IKinema Action 2 in April there was a bit of a buzz around the newest features included in the latest version (check out my previous blog for more details!)
Visual Effects Society Global Visual Effects & Technology Expo
The Visual Effects Society (VES) are holding their annual worldwide VFX career fair this year in LA, New York, Montreal, San Francisco and London. This daylong event brings together some of the biggest names in the business and aims to inform, educate and employ the VFX community.
Making Magic With modo
San Jose University, California came up trumps at the recent Interior Design Association of Northern California (IIDA) Student Design Awards and have their 3D visualisation toolkit to thank for their success.
Autodesk and Adobe: The Start of a Beautiful Relationship
Cloud Coverage
Adobe has created Creative Cloud, a hub for creative pros to access all their Adobe software for a $49.99 monthly subscription fee. Adobe’s Creative Cloud is the newest feature to the Adobe range which allows the subscriber on the go access their Creative Suite, 20GB storage and immediate access to new software versions for a fraction of the “in the box” price.
Deal of The Decade...
Want the software that was used on The Artist, Journey 2: The Mysterious Island and Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides?
Cracking Job by MPC & mocha Pro
If you’ve been hiding under a rock for the last, let’s say 6 months to a year, then you may be unaware of the new Tim Burton movie, Dark Shadows, released this month.
Softimage Creatives: Launch Event Line-Up Released!
Great news Softimage users out there… the line-up for the launch Softimage Creatives user group meeting has been released. And for those of you who are hoping to attend, I think you’ll agree this is a programme to get excited about.
Here’s the list of speakers and topics for May 29th 2012:
Studio Assistant Workshop - Final Gather Maps Part Two
Welcome back everyone!! I hope you all had a cracking weekend. Right now we are going to pick up where we left off on Friday with FG Maps.
Free Tutorial: Sculpting Smoke for a ‘Dry Ice’ Effect
Many of you have been eagerly anticipating May’s free tutorial, and I’m delighted to announce to you all that it’s now live. So check it out here.
Studio Workshop - Final Gather Maps
Ladies and gents, welcome to another Studios Assistant blog. Today's topic: Final Gather Maps.
A Decisive Moment
“The decisive moment. It is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event as well as the precise organization of forms which gives that event its proper expression” Henri Cartier-Bresson
All The Best Things Are Made From SCRATCH...Cannes 2012
We would like to be one of the first to congratulate Assimilate for their success at the Cannes Festival 2012. Although the winning films are yet to be announced, several films on the competition's roster have been created using SCRATCH, Assimilate’s digital workflow and post-production tools. SCRATCH has been used on recent screen successes like The Artist, Thor and Underworld: Awakening as well as the films nominated at Cannes 2012.
Built by Self-Confessed Industry Nerds
With the divide between 2D and 3D becoming increasingly indistinguishable, I thought I'd share some information about an interesting alternative to Nuke’s default scanline render node and indeed much of Nuke’s current 3D shading tool set.
Head of Maya Development at The Mill
This year, Escape Studios is ten years old, and it’s a pretty big deal for us. It’s also a big deal for all of the students who we’ve trained over the years and are now dotted throughout the world of VFX. So, from now on, every week, we’re going to be launching a story from our escapee Wall of Fame which will showcase all of the escapees who have gone on to work on the biggest and boldest films, TV shows, commercials and games over the years. It’s a chance for them to step up and take a bow, albeit a virtual one.