Computer Graphics World articles from April 2001

Computer Graphics World archives from April 2001

Mind Expanding Graphics.
April 1, 2001... After reading from one of the Harry Potter novels with my grade-school-age daughter recently, I casually mused, "Won't it be great when the movie comes out, and we can see what everything looks like?" "NO, THAT WILL RUIN IT!" she blurted....

LETTERS.(Letter to the Editor)
April 1, 2001... Modern Uses for Ancient Machines I was intrigued by your description of the ancient computer called the Antikythera mechanism in the article "Grecian Gears" on pg. 58 of the February 2001 issue. I'd seen an earlier television program on...

Anark Upgrades Web Design.(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... Adding broadcast-quality video to Web sites is easy if you only want the video to play back in a little window. If you decide to add 3D elements and post-production video effects and make everything interactive, though, Web site design can turn...

New Surface Suite from ICEM.(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... ICEM Technologies, a subsidiary of solid and surface modeler maker PTC, has released ICEM 2001, the latest version of its suite of styling and surfacing tools that integrates with the company's Pro/Engineer software. ICEM 2001 includes updates...

High-Test Amorphium.(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... Electric Image has announced an update to Amorphium, its real-time 3D sculpting and painting program. Amorphium Pro 1.1 (our second product this month newly designed to appeal to the "professional" market) adds modeling, animation, and...

Best Lightscape Performers.
April 1, 2001... This month, we list the five workstation and graphics card combinations that most recently received the best scores for the Lightscape (Light-04) subset of the SPECviewperf 6.1.2 benchmarks. The Lightscape viewset, which consists of...

Group Works toward 3D Web Standard.(Industry Trend or Event)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... In an effort to streamline 3D Web development, the Web3D Consortium, a non-profit group comprising corporations and educational institutions, has announced the Rich Media 3D (RM3D) initiative, aimed at developing an open standard for Web and...

In Brief.(Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... Plastics simulation software vendor Moldflow Corp. (Wayland, MA) has agreed to acquire Branden Technologies (Wilsonville, OR), a developer of hardware and software systems for the plastics and die casting industries.... Gamecom (Arlington, TX),...

Poser Aimed at Pros.(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... Poser, Curious Labs' versatile and easy-to-use program for modeling and animating 3D figures, has always been popular with hobbyists. Now Curious Labs has released a set of tools and enhancements that work with Poser to create greater character...

Affordable Animation from Sun.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... Sun Microsystems has introduced a sub-$1000 64-bit Unix workstation based on its 500MHz UltraSPARC IIe processor. The entry-level Sun Blade 100 runs on the Solaris operating system and is aimed at users in film, broadcast, and game development,...

Virtual Teacher.(Technology Information)
April 1, 2001... An animated agent helps students grasp complex tasks Some teachers consistently go the extra mile to make sure their students fully comprehend what they're being taught. STEVE is one of them. An autonomous, animated agent within a simulated...

Bright Lights, Big Picture.(Company Business and Marketing)
April 1, 2001... Unique lighting and optics help a new display technology shine The future of the big screen never looked so bright. Visualization researchers at the San Diego Supercomputer Center, in collaboration with the JVC Digital Image Technology...

From Human to Humanoid.(Company Business and Marketing)
April 1, 2001... Physics-based simulations move robots toward more lifelike motion The general perception of robotic movement as slow, choppy, and mechanical may soon fall by the wayside as researchers specializing in the digital re-creation of human motion...

Animation Industry Barrels Along.(Industry Trend or Event)
April 1, 2001... Web and game development are coming on strong, but film and television applications continue to dominate Though the computer animation industry seems to change unceasingly, one constant has been its relentlessly strong growth. The latest...

Medieval Magic.(Technology Information)
April 1, 2001... PDI USES 3D GRAPHICS TO CREATE FAIRY-TALE HAVOC IN SHREX, A FEATURE-LENGTH ANIMATION Once upon a time, in a land not so far away, 275 people were given a daunting task: They had to transform zeros and ones into a rich landscape filled with...

Made for TV.(Industry Trend or Event)
April 1, 2001... DIGITAL STARS SHINE IN BROADCAST PRODUCTIONS On any given day, the streets of New York City and Hollywood are lined with actors and actresses looking for work. When a part becomes available, the rivalry is fierce, with thousands vying for a...

all about Eve.(Company Business and Marketing)
April 1, 2001... A LIFELIKE VIRTUAL `PERSONALITY' BECOMES A RISING STAR She hosts her own radio show every Saturday morning. In February she appeared on the cover and a fashion spread in the popular French women's magazine Madame Figaro. She has a modest...

JUNGLE FEVER.
April 1, 2001... WHEN THINGS GET TOO HOT FOR SHEENA STAR GENA LEE NOLIN, A DIGITAL STUNT DOUBLE SWINGS INTO ACTION At one time or another, most of us have thought of our work environment as a "jungle." For Gena Lee Nolin, that description couldn't be...

village people.
April 1, 2001... 'TOON COUNTERPARTS OF REAL ACTORS SEARCH FOR ROMANCE IN THE EAST VILLAGE WHAT WOULD YOU GET IF YOU COMBINED the action and story line of HBO's hit show Sex in the City with the look of an Andy Warhol painting.* Something that resembles...

COMPUTER AIDED DESTRUCTION.(Technology Information)
April 1, 2001... Everyone knows about CAD in construction. But can it play a role at the other end of the life cycle? The building is enormous. It is concrete. It is full of steel. It reaches many stories into the turquoise sky. All around it is a teeming...

Designing the Future.
April 1, 2001... Professional and student designers recently were challenged to envision the shape of things to come by executing a new form, functionality, and technology for everyday objects in a design contest sponsored by Alias|Wavefront and IBM. Using...

THE DIGITAL DIVIDE.(Product Information)
April 1, 2001... A train company crosses a chasm that separates two diverse worlds Bridging the gap between the traditional world and the technology-driven cyber world can be difficult even for an industry veteran. Using computer graphics, Rhythm & Hues...

FX TROOP.(Product Information)
April 1, 2001... Musician Master P addresses his `Soljas' in an animated music video Hip-hop artist Master P shows he's the master of his musical domain in a completely computer-generated video called "Soljas," in which the singer organizes his troops of...

A TIGER IN TRANSITION.(Product Information)
April 1, 2001... Animators give a cartoon icon a 3D makeover It's not often that a highly recognizable tiger changes its stripes. So when modelers and animators at Smoke & Mirrors 3D in London were asked to turn Kellogg's Tony the Tiger into a 3D...

Boujou 1.0.(Software Review)(Evaluation)
April 1, 2001... Matchmoving made easy Any digital artist who works with live-action footage has probably had to perform the nasty task of matchmoving. In theory, matchmoving is simple--in order to produce a realistic composite of 3D imagery and...

Solid Edge 9.(Software Review)(Evaluation)
April 1, 2001... New design environment and add-ons highlight latest UGS release UGS's Solid Edge Version 9 is the latest release of the company's powerful midrange mechanical modeling software. The new version builds on the program's capabilities with a...

RenderBoxx.(Hardware Review)(Evaluation)
April 1, 2001... Boxx Technologies' low-profile, high-power rendering machine Boxx Technologies has been building workstations and rendering servers for the graphics and entertainment community for a number of years. The company's RenderBoxx is its...

PRODUCTS.(Buyers Guide)
April 1, 2001... For a direct link to more product information and vendor Web sites, click on: www.onlinecenter.to/cgw SOFTWARE GRAPHICS SUITE WIN The Collage 2 platform is a graphics production suite that includes character generation, paint, 2D...

INSIGHT.
April 1, 2001... Now Showing: Asteroid 433 Eros, in Color" If NASA had its own marquee, this is how it might announce a recent visualization project by scientists in its Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC). Using more than 8 million surface observations gathered...