This year’s flame user gathering at IBC is getting kicked up a notch thanks to the folks at url(http://www.avp.nl/, hecticelectric) in Amsterdam. They were thinking about organizing this years flame user-meeting and to motivate people they decided to give away free food! So a flame-user BBQ it is…and fxguide is more than happy to help spread the word. Click below to read the invitation to the event and how to register.

The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Title Design & Special Visual Effects Peer Group will host a “Bake-Off” for the first time. This will be a combination voting event and nominee reception to showcase the final Emmy nominees for the categories of Outstanding Special Visual Effects for a Miniseries, Movie or Special, Outstanding Special Visual Effects for a Series, and Outstanding Main Title Design.

You’re in London. Your clients are in New York. And you’re finding more and more that you need to get a full res version of your work to them as quickly as possible. London-based Sohonet has targeted the the media and film industries by providing tools and a network that can carry massive files, quickly and at very low cost. In this week’s fxpodcast, Mike Seymour gets the details from Dave Scammel, Managing Director for Sohonet.

MovieEditor is running a Linux Conference at Siggraph on the 3rd of August. Most of the major studios use Linux, including DreamWorks with more than 1,500 Linux desktops and 3,500 Linux servers. The MovieEditor Conference is an all-day event on computer-based filmmaking in downtown Los Angeles. Studio technology chiefs and other experts discuss ongoing work using Linux in feature animation and visual effects.

Massive software is well known for its epic shots in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, but with the release of Massive 2.0 – we asked just how practical is it to use Massive in a ‘normal’ TV Ad spot? In this week’s podcast we talk to A52’s 3D team leader Craig Xray Halperin, about what it took for A52 to go from not even having the software to creating 10,000 agents celebrating two Clydesdale horse teams meeting in St.Louis on the 4th of July.

We test drive the wondertouch Motion plugins and ask the question – will this help unlock some of the potential of Motion? Why isnt Motion more widely used? Are the Wondertouch plugins worth it? And we ask Wondertouch President Alan Lorence how he came up with the new emitters?

In this weeks fxpodcast, we sit down with Marc Petit, Vice President Product Development and Operations. During the interview we discuss NAB, Toxik, the state of the current systems software, his thoughts about Apple’s recent move to Intel, and more.

Known for their work in such films as Flight of the Phoenix and Constantine, Mr & Mrs Smith represents the 17th feature film project for Furious FX. In our first fxPodcast, Mike Seymour chatted with Scott Dougherty and David Lingenfelser about the company’s work on the job. Check out some before and after frames while you listen to the interview. (update: fxPodcast is now live)

We’re excited to announce that DVDs of fxguide LIVE’03 and LIVE’04 are now available for purchase. They can be ordered by clicking here. Each year is two-disc DVD recording of the 3-hour fxguide LIVE seminars done in Las Vegas at NAB, complete with example setups. fxguide LIVE’05 DVDs from this year are currently in production and are planning to be released mid-summer.

What will the Apple Intel deal likely mean for VFX artists? Is this a significant move towards a new work environment or does the type of CPU chip in the Mac not really matter either way these days? – After all Apple is much more of a software company than ever before in its history? We spoke to numerous insiders on and off the record to gather up a take on what this may mean over the next 24 months and beyond, many sources had strong opinions but were ne

The Sunday before NAB started with two fxguide sessions — one for smoke and the other for flame. Immediately after the flame session, the “first” Autodesk User Group Meeting took place and showcased what has been under development for the last year at discreet. In this article, we’ll take a look at what was shown regarding the effects products….

Perhaps the hit of NAB – the Apple booth was packed with people keen to see the new Professional tools launched at the show. We review the releases and talk to Author Damien Allen about Motion 2.

With the release today of Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy (it releases in the USA on Friday), Jeff Heusser spoke to Adam McInnes. McInnes is one of the VFX supervisors for Cinesite Europe, which did nearly 100% of the digital visual effects in the film.

Photoshop CS2 has been announced as part of the new CS2 Suite. We will be roadtesting it fully in coming weeks, but were keen to have a first look at the HDR 32bit capabilities.

In this week’s fxpodcast we speak to John Montgomery about one of the most complex and difficult shots for this year’s Super Bowl. In a detailed account he explains the tips and tricks – and inside gossip – of how a major effects shot in an award winning Super Bowl spot is done. “When the agency art director showed me the concept I knew that John was the guy we needed,” says multiple Clio-award-winning editor Terry Kaney, “and his ability to use sensitivi

Toxik was relaunched to the effects community today. Last seen at NAB 2002 and called Strata and Mezzo. So what happened ??? Where the heck did it go, and how does today’s version compare with the one we saw in 2002?

With a twinge of sadness, we’re reporting that the Discreet name is now history. As such there will be no separate company ‘Discreet’ – only Autodesk Media and Entertainment division. We sat down with some employees of the company formerly known as discreet and asked what impact this would have on customers and why the change? We also have some fun and visually take a look back at the evolution of a company image from on that exuded creativity and a shared

fxguide is pleased to offer high level Shake training in two upcoming seminars in Sydney, Australia.
Shake for Flame Artists, and Compositing for 3D Animators. The seminars are for experienced VFX and 3D artists, covering advanced keying, floating point workflow, multi-pass 3D and live action integration, strategies for complex effects using Shake, and more.

Tropfest is the world’s largest film festival, with 130,000 people attending to watch 16 finalists in one of the world’s most popular short film festivals. The rules are simple. First, it must be contain this years signature item (this year an umbrella). Second, it must be less than 7 mins. Finally, the film must premiere at Tropfest and cannot have been shown previously anywhere.

The 2004 Visual Effects Oscar was presented as part of the live Oscar broadcast tonight.
Updated.

A nite of fun at the 3rd annual Visual Effects Society awards at the Hollywood Palladium.
Eli Jarra – a winner last year and a nominee this year, walks us through the night, from the limo to the last award.

Digital Vision announced today that it has agreed to acquire Nucoda Ltd. who is a leading supplier of advanced digital media solutions for film and video, including systems that support the digital intermediate process in the 2K and 4K domains. In exclusive discussions with fxguide, Digital Vision’s President and COO Robert Ekstrom states “the final talks on the acquisition has been intense and quick”, we asked him about what this means to the future of D