MAXON has released a new version of their 3D software CINEMA 4D and is available immediately for purchase or upgrade. The release a slate of new features in addition to a revamped and simpler product lineup. One of the big changes is built-in support for linear workflow and color profiles throughout the application, which really helps the app fit in to a broader workflow, especially for high-end compositing and effects.

Building upon this are support for real world measurements as well as entry of IES data for lights and photometric intensities. Python scripting has been further enhanced, providing full integration which makes creating scripts and plugins much more effective. In addition, there are new character tools, deformers, a new render queue, and more. For more details, click through for the full press release or visit the MAXON web site.

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This week’s Red Centre podcast we have in the Red Room the Director of the new hit film TAKERS : John Luessenhop. We discuss shooting with Genesis as well as a general, open and frank discussion about the directorial decisions he made making this film and rehearsing and working with the actors.We also discuss Red drives, EVIL cameras & Gear this week from Deadly Cine

Visit the red centre page for direct downloads and RSS feed links. To be notified automatically and have the episodes downloaded in iTunes, subscribe via this link.

This afternoon in Los Angeles the Creative Arts Emmy Awards were held at the Nokia Theatre L.A. Live. We’ve got the winners in the visual effects related categories after the read more. Congratulations to all those nominated and to those taking home statues tonight.

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The Scientific and Technical Awards Committee of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has released the list of those under consideration for Sci-tech awards. Names like ILM, Rhythm & Hues, Digital Domain, Dreamworks, PipelineFX, Pixar, SPI, Disney, Rising Sun Research are included… full press release follows.

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The Visual Effects Society reports that Sande Scoredos, who served as Executive Director of Training and Artist Development At Sony Pictures Imageworks for the past 12-plus years passed away Saturday morning after a prolonged illness.

More information as well as details about services can be found after the jump…

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David S. Cohen reports in an article today in Variety that Montreal’s Fake Studio (part of Camera e-Motion Group) has left a handful of VFX artists unpaid since April for work done on the film Piranha 3D. The article discusses the familiar nature to the Meteor story, mentions the Visual Effects business as a Ponzi scheme and talks of the lack of a union for artists. David ends his piece with this paragraph:

“The show must go on” has been the showbiz mantra, and the movie biz has counted on artists taking that to heart. But the patience and goodwill of vfx artists aren’t infinite. Whether the solution is market-based (i.e., artists negotiating ruthlessly and walking off immediately if a payment is missed) or a union, it’s becoming clear that the status quo will not hold. Something has to give.

Read the whole article at Variety.

This year’s This year’s Conference on Visual Media and Production is taking place in London on November 17th and 18th. The event provides an outlet for production and post personnel to discuss the latest technology and research impacting the field. If you like geeking out about the tech side of things with research impacting the field and actual production techniques, this conference is for you.

There is an early-bird discount of £100 off the registration fee if you sign up before the 17th of October.

This year’s confirmed speakers include:

• Dan Piponi of ILM’s R&D group
• Mike Romney, ZOIC studios in Los Angeles
• James G.H. Knight, motion capture project manager on Avatar
• Wolfgang Lempp, a founder and director of FilmLight Ltd
• Marcus Gross, Director of Disney Research Zurich
• David Spilsbury, Head of Commercials Technology at MPC
• Bruno Nicoletti, CTO at The Foundry
• John Fletcher of the BBC

Visit the CVMP website for more details.

Blackmagic Design has announced their support for RED Rocket in both Mac and Linux configurations. Stereo .R3D playback will be supported with dual Rockets. In both MAC and Lunix installation is aimed to be plug and play.

If you do not have Rockets installed, r3d clips are decoded and debayered as per user configurable settings on a project or clip basis.

These new features and more including stereoscopic grading and monitoring are in the V7.0 release which is now in beta.

Resolve should run on both Apple Laptops and Towers ( – although only the 17″ laptops due to menus), and at the moment the Red Rocket cards are only really used in Tower systems. Most potential users are also expected to buy control surfaces but several third party control surfaces are planned to be supported.

We will have a full product review of Resolve in both an on set and production configuration as soon as the product is released, which should be soon.

This week Jason and Mike are joined in the Red Room by Doug Purver to discuss is cool Running Spot.

Also the guys geek out on SLR sensors and the way Canon builds .CR2 RAW files for the Canon 5D and 7D.

Visit the red centre page for direct downloads and RSS feed links. To be notified automatically and have the episodes downloaded in iTunes, subscribe via this link.
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The Foundry have announced two new plugins for Adobe After Effects CS5, a 3D camera tracker based upon the tracking technology from Nuke, and an extremely fast version of their Kronos plugin. It’s a good sign to see some of the Foundry’s research and technology make it’s way to the affordable desktop platform.

The Kronos AE plugin is the first offering to be accelerated by The Foundry’s new ‘Blink’ technology. Blink runs on CPUs and supported NVidia CUDA GPUs allowing the extraction of peak performance from hardware. For the hardcore tech details about ‘Blink’, listen to our excellent fxpodcast with Bruno Nicoletti, co-founder of the Foundry.

Prices for Camera Tracker start at 170GBP/250USD and Kronos runs 70GBP/100USD. Floating licenses are also available at slightly higher prices. For the full press release, click on through….
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