Chaos Group Customer Success Story :: Method Studio

 

 

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Chaos Group gives us another customer spotlight. This time its Method and their work on Halo:Reach"Deliver Hope" .

If you missed it click the link above.

With the coming of the E3 Expo in June. We  went back in awe of the visually stunning work from BLUR and interview with Kevin Margo CG Supervisor at Blur Studio.

"V-Ray is a supremely brilliant rendering engine with mind bending approaches to visualizing 3 dimensional form that encourages philosophic ontological discussions about the nature and observation of reality itself."

We at Motion Media can't wait to see what  BLUR is working on for this year's E3 Expo!

BLUR STUDIO has been creating award-winning visual effects, animation and design, applying its creative skills across various mediums. We produce 3D character animation, motion design and visual effects for feature films and television, game cinematics & trailers, large format films, location-based entertainment, commercials and integrated media. Located in Venice, California, we combine the passion and excitement from our directors, animators, designers, concept artists, and writers with our clients into a collaborative creative approach that results in compelling visuals and storytelling.

Order your V-Ray for 3ds Max or Maya at our online shop!

 

Pixologic announces ZBrush 4 Trial version!

Pixologic is pleased to announce the availability of a ZBrush 4 Trial version for both Win and Mac!

The ZBrush 4 Trial grants you access to all of ZBrush 4's powerful features (including all plugins) for 30 days. For your convenience, these days can be spread out however you like over a total of 45 days. Use them at your leisure or consecutively!

In order to get the most benefit from the ZBrush 4 Trial, download the

*Getting Started with ZBrush" guide!

This interactive PDF covers ZBrush's key features in every area from sculpting to painting and finally rendering your work. The informative text is supplemented by links to other tutorials and even videos, helping to demonstrate and reinforce what you've learned.

There's never been a better way to get to know ZBrush!

Click Here for the "Getting Started with ZBrush" guide.

Click Here to Start Your ZBrush 4 Trial Today!

To Purchase Zbrush 4 click Here!

Autodesk® Maya® 2011 Feature Videos

mental ray 2011 Announced!

More details to follow as I get them - but I can tell you this:

3ds max 2011, maya 2011, and softimage 2011 will all be compatible with the same version of mental ray!  Finally!
In addtion, mental ray standalone will now be licenses PER MACHINE, and not per cpu.  For all of you have are curretly using mental ray, this means you effectively just doubled your licenses! (in the case of using it in 2 proc machines)

mental ray does not have an upgrade path - you must be on subscription in order to get the newest release, contact Motion Media to find out details, cost etc.

Autodesk Smoke: Conforming Timelines from Adobe Premiere Pro

Grant Kay put up an excellent video showing the workflow from Adobe Premiere to Smoke on his blog located at The Area.  You can go to his blog to see other videos about smoke here.

Below is an excerpt:

Adobe Premiere Pro has a variety of options for exporting media and metadata such as EDLs, AAFs and XMLs. But which one would you use with Autodesk Smoke?

While EDLs will give you an edit with tape-names and timecode, using an AAFs will give you all that plus the ability to link to the same media you’ve already been working with in Premiere.

Check out this video for the workflow!



It is very simple and easy to export an AAF and conform it in Autodesk Smoke.

Please check the on-line Wiki database to see what is supported when conforming an Adobe Premiere Pro AAF in Autodesk Smoke. To my knowledge you should be able to look at the Avid AAF Conforming notes on the Autodesk Wiki that will tell you which features are supported when conforming from AAF.

And just so you’ll have them all in one place, here are links to my previous blogs showing conform in Smoke from Final Cut Pro 7 and Avid Media Composer. Remember, no matter what application you’re using to edit, if it exports an EDL, XML or AAF, you can conform it in Smoke.

Coming very soon… A new videos series giving a high level overview of Smoke for Final Cut Pro 7 editors presented by myself and Final Cut Pro Editor, Rick Young (www.macvideo.tv)

Thanks for all the feedback and comments. Please keep them coming in.

Please take care where ever you are!

Signing off
Grant

AJA Software update supporting Adobe CS5.5 Now Available!

AJA is pleased to announce software and driver updates for the KONA(3G) and Io Express supporting Adobe CS5.5 both windows and Mac.

AJA Windows KONA and Io Express version 5.5

KONA and Io Express version 5.5 for the Windows adds support for Adobe Premiere CS5.5, After Effects CS5.5 and Adobe Photoshop CS5.1, with significantly improved performance for the Adobe Mercury Engine in Premiere Pro CS5.5.

AJA Mac Plug-ins for Adobe for KONA and Io Express version 9.0.1

AJA Mac Plug-ins for Adobe version 9.0.1 for KONA and Io Express are now available, adding support for Adobe Premiere Pro CS5.5, Adobe After Effects CS5.5 and Adobe Photoshop CS5.1, with significantly improved performance for the Adobe Mercury Engine in Premiere Pro CS5.5.

You can find the new AJA Mac and Windows software, plug-ins, and release notes at:
http://www.aja.com/support/index.php

Matrox Releases New features for MXO2 Devices

New features  announced at NAB are included in releases 5.5 for PC and 2.2.3 for Mac which are now available for the Matrox MXO2 Family and CompressHD. Highlights of the new releases include support for Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 Production Premium, capture support for Adobe Flash Media Live Encoder, and presets for new H.264 encoding parameters in Adobe Media Encoder.

More detailed information and Download for the new Matrox software release can be found on the Matrox support section.
Download release 5.5 for PC and 2.2.3 for Mac

Introducing Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 Product Family

Russell Brady on the Adobe blog gives us an informative post on the highlights of  the Creative Suite 5.5 release.

Adobe has announced a significant update to Creative Suite, with the unveiling of our first mid-cycle release: Creative Suite 5.5.  This is part of a new release strategy, where we’re moving out our milestone releases (such as CS3, CS4, CS5) to a two-year cycle. Mid-cycle releases will keep designers and developers ahead of technology changes, such as the mobile communications revolution (tablets!) that is radically altering how content is consumed and created.

Matrox MXO2 Mini for Avid Media Composer 5.5 Now Available

Avid's support of Matrox MXO2 Mini was the talk of NAB and IBC 2010, giving Media Composer and NewsCutter users a very inexpensive HD monitoring solution. We are now pleased to inform you that Matrox drivers for the latest Avid releases are available for you to download.

Matrox Mtx.utils 5.1 (PC) provides support for using the software-only versions of Avid Media Composer 5.5.1 and NewsCutter 9.5.1 with Matrox MXO2 Mini and Matrox MXO2 Mini with MAX hardware. Avid has qualified this release for video and audio monitoring.

Release 2.2 ( Mac) provides support for using the software-only version of Avid Media Composer 5.5.1 with Matrox MXO2 Mini and Matrox MXO2 Mini with MAX hardware. Avid has qualified this release for video and audio monitoring. Avid has also qualified this release for accelerated H.264 encoding directly from Media Composer using Matrox MXO2 Mini with MAX.

Matrox MXO2 Mini with the built-in MAX H.264 encoding accelerator option lets you deliver H.264 files for the web, iPad, iPhone, and other mobile devices, directly from Media Composer and your Mac Pro or MacBook Pro, at speeds up to five times faster than software alone, without sacrificing quality. Matrox MAX even lets you deliver directly from Media Composer up to three times faster than if you used Sorenson Squeeze to encode the files. read more

For information about MXO2 Mini hardware support with Avid editing software, including the supported video formats, see the Avid Knowledge Base topic Matrox MXO2 Mini FAQ (366347).

Purchase the Matrox MXO2 Mini at the Motion Media Online Shop.

Adobe® Premiere Pro® CS5 now offers GPU acceleration on laptops

Adobe Premiere Pro CS5, version 5.0.3 is an update available worldwide on December 7, 2010.  This update to Adobe Premiere Pro CS5 adds support for two new NVIDIA cards: the Quadro 4000 (Mac) and the Quadro 5000M (Windows). The addition of these new cards extends the power of the Mercury Playback Engine’s GPU acceleration to users working on laptops as well as workstations.

The 5.0.3 update also includes performance enhancements to further improve the experience of switching between Adobe Premiere Pro CS5 and other applications, as well as other user interface, stability, and performance enhancements that make the Adobe Premiere Pro CS5 editing workflow even more efficient and robust. For a full list of enhancements, check out Adobe Premiere Pro team’s blog post that highlights the 5.0.3 update

Advanced Planar Tracking and Roto in mocha Seminar

Motion Media and Imagineer Systems have teamed up to bring you an advanced Planar Tracking and Roto seminar live at Motion Media in Santa Monica.

Motion Media invites you to this advanced VFX training seminar presented by Imagineer Systems Product Specialist, Martin Brennand.

Martin will showing advanced techniques using mocha to solve the most difficult tracking and roto challenges found in post production. Learn how mocha's planar tracker tools work within compositing & finishing environments such as: After Effects, Nuke, and more to save time and money.

Additionally, Imagineer will be showcasing an exciting technology preview of their new product: mocha Pro.

About mocha:
mocha v2 is a stand alone tracking & roto utility designed to complement any compositing and finishing environment. mocha's planar tracker allows artists to easily track shots where point trackers fail.

As a rotoscoping station, mocha's ability to accurately track and render external mattes saves hours of manual labor for articulate matte creation. Create & render mattes with less keyframes!

mocha v2 supports export to: After Effects, Final Cut Pro, Motion, Flame, Smoke, Combustion, Avid|DS, Quantel, Shake, Digital Fusion and Nuke.

Click Here for Location, Times and to Sign Up.

Autodesk Maya 2011 Hotfix 3

Autodesk has released a third Hotfix for Maya 2011.

The download is a complete full installer.

You'll have to uninstall old version, for the new hot-fixed version

Read me and Download here.

Motion Media Check Fraud Scam

If you have received or been approached about cashing or depositing a check from Motion Media for an amount similar to $4,500 please be aware that you are most likely being scammed.  You may be part of a check fraud scam that is being investigated by the FBI, and we would like to hear from you.

DO NOT TRY TO CASH OR DEPOSIT THE CHECK or you could be liable in the case as well.

Instead, you should contact Motion Media at 310-450-4000 or via our contact page and give us all of the information you have surrounding the check that you received.

We are currently putting all of our resources into finding the person responsible for this scam and assure you that we will get to the bottom of this as soon as possible.

Thank you for understanding.

The Motion Media Team

6 New Hotfixes for 3ds Max 2009, 2010 & 2011

There is bound to be something here that you can use or that will help you, but please make sure to read each readme carefully before installing as some require special uninstall instructions, and also make sure you have the correct package for the flavor of the product you are using.

Click here for download links and hotfixes

FumeFX 2.0 for Autodesk 3ds Max is Here!!

One of the most successful plug-ins is back with a new release.

From NAB 2010: Adobe CS5 Mercury Playback and Matrox RT

NAB, something I have had a love-hate relationship with for many, many years.  This year promised to be the year of stereoscopic production, and so far it is! 

This post however is going to center around our every day production needs - and what has become one of the most anticipated software releases at this year's conference - Adobe CS5!  I have to say, thus far,  it looks fantastic!  I wanted to spend a few moments sharing some thoughts on one of the big features that many people have been waiting for: The Mercury Playback Engine, and what it really means, and what companies like Matrox are doing to work with Adobe.

If you don't already know, the Mercury playback engine is designed around technology that combines the power of the GPU, with the CPU.  In this case, an Nvidia based card with CUDA.  The demonstrations at Adobe's booth and others are all shown on top-of-the-line workstations (HPz800 and 8 or 12 core machines), with Nvidia 5800 graphics cards ($2000+) of course to put the Adobe Cs5 products in the best light possible.  Understandable, but not something many of you might have just sitting around at the moment!  I was privy to see a Mercury demo at a Matrox meeting though, when done on a quad core workstation, with an Nvidia 4800 card ($1500) to see why Matrox was still relevant.  Ok, I'm listening.

Check out the CS5 Launch Event!

Photoshop CS5 Sneak Peek - Content Aware Fill

This is a sneak peek at the new possibilities with Photoshop CS5.

Photoshop CS5 - Better edge detection and masking results in less time

Photoshop Product Manager, Bryan O’Neil Hughes, gives you a glimpse of new selection technology that offers better edge detection and masking results in less time—even with the trickiest images, like hair.

Autodesk Sketchbook Mobile

Another win for Sketchbook, Congrats Autodesk.

http://bestappever.com/awards/2009/winner/aeap