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

fxguide returns to NAB in Las Vegas this year on Sunday, April 17th, thanks to popular demand and the generous support of Discreet and SGI. For the first time at NAB there will be both a flint/flame/inferno and a fire/smoke fxguide live session. The seminars will cover the recently released effects 6/9 and editing 6.5 versions, sharing tips and tricks to help you get the most out of the software. Find out more about the event which one artist says “

Seven films went to the Bake-off last week. Today the three films nominated for the 2004 Visual Effects Oscar were announced…

The Visual Effects Society (VES) announced their nominees this week for their awards honoring oustanding visual effects in 19 categories of film, television, commercials, music videos and games. On January 22nd, VES will hold their “Big Reveal” — an oustanding event where VES members and the general public can hear about the work first-hand from the artists….

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced the seven films being considered for Achievement in Visual Effects for the 77th Academy Awards.

UPDATED:1/6/05

Since 1994, if a post house wanted to install the fastest most powerful finishing room it meant a discreet Onyx. After ten years, sgi is discontinuing the Oynx line meaning the end of Inferno and Fire as we know them on Onyx.

“My first job in the post production industry was as render wrangler on Farscape series 1 in 1998-99. New to 3D and VFX compositing it was very exciting to be involved. Series 1 proved to be a huge success, the quality of the FX shots helped Australia gain respect in the industry on the world stage. Five years later having some shots in the final mini series return to us was a great thrill, we wanted to do as much as we could to go out with a bang and do

China is an amazing country – with massive potential and an extremely determined visual effects community. Last month Fxguide was Live in Shangahi, for 3 days of compositing lecturing and training with the help and sponsorship of ChinaDV, which is China’s leading visual effects community internet company. We spoke to some of the talented artists in Shanghai and explored a community facing massive cracked software issues. Of course it is not only the visua

After our recent article about Max-T, we received quite a few questions and comments from readers. We passed the questions on to Mike Hughes, V.P. Business Development at Max-T, who took a moment to respond. In this evolving world of shared storage in the post production environment, comparisons between various solutions can quickly become complex. Mike Seymour takes a closer look in this Q&A session…..

Photoshop has made major gains in reproducing brushes, and it is the cornerstone of most digi-matte departments. Does Painter still have role to play? Is Painter just a weekend app, or can it reposition itself?

Corel has moved to make Painter a more professionally focused tool for concept art, matte paintings and illustration work, in so doing they are moving away from the “Santa Fe” casual artist. Fxguide took version IX for a road test and spoke to

“It was clear from the look on their faces – that they weren’t joking… we knew we had a global problem, that’s when we hit the panic button”. Just three hours after a major support call from Paris, plus eight and a half years after an MIT graduate in Boston decided to generate a unique ID for any frame in any discreet system using a 28 bit number, Bill Roberts (Director of Product Management – Systems) realized that Discreet had a serious problem. Ever

Discreet has identified an issue that affects ALL users of inferno,flame, flint, fire, smoke, backdraft, and frost that MUST be addressed BEFORE OCT 2ND or your system WILL NOT FUNCTION!



Updated Again: Oct 1st