London Film Academy offers film VFX course

Digit Online reports that the London Film Academy is offering a 16 week film VFX course that will include coverage of Vue. For more details see the "London Film Academy offers film VFX course" on the Digit web site.

The BBC take a look Inside ILM

This one is a little tangential from the usual Vue focus but I thought these reports on the BBC were worth covering as it shows us what ILM are running Vue on...

The power behind LucasFilm magic

Inside Industrial Light and Magic

3D World Magazine Review of Vue 6 Infinite

Vue 6 Infinite is reviewed in the latest issue of 3D World Magazine (June 2007). They gave it 9 out of 10 for Range of Features, 10 out of 10 for Value for Money and 9 out of 10 overall.

Digit Review of Vue 6 Infinite

Digit Magazine has a review of Vue 6 Infinite available on their web site. They gave it a rating of 4 out of 5 stars. There is a sidebar of xStream as well. You can read the review at the Digit web site.

Vue External Renderer Tutorial

Peggy Walters has posted a new four page tutorial on using Vue's external renderer.

Moving Mountains Tutorial

3D World Magazine has a tutorial in issue the June 2007 issue on building terrains in Vue 6. The step by step tutorial includes details on working with procedural terrains, EcoSystems, spectral cloud layers and Digital Elevation Maps (DEM).

Tip: Render Times

This tip comes from Frédéric Louguet (aka Render Fred) and draws on his experience running the RANCH renderfarm.

Here is something I have added to the RANCH Renderfarm User Guide (as we had seen this problem with several customers), but I think it might be helpful to everyone. The purpose of this tip is to detect scenes which require incredibly long render times... before it is too late.

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Before sending us a still image to render, ALWAYS do the following test: render your scene on your system with all the final parameters, but in 16 pixels wide (for landscape images) or 16 pixels high (for portrait images). For example if your image has a 4:3 ratio, render it in 16 x 12 pixels, Render to Screen mode.

It seems like a joke, but really it is not. For a "normal" scene, even in ultra mode, the render time should be very fast (a few seconds to a minute for complex scenes). Note: count only the render time, not the preparation time which will be the same, even in high resolution.

BUT IF THE RENDER TIME IS > 1 MINUTE, YOU ARE IN TROUBLE!
(on a Core 2 Duo @ 2 GHz for instance)

It means it could take a VERY long time on the farm in high resolution and that it would cost you a lot of money. Typical symptom for these “nightmare scenes” : Vue quickly displays 100%, but the "finished!" message appears only after several minutes.

Vue 6 Revealed - Reviewed

Vue 6 Revealed is a straightforward introduction to the most recent version of Vue. Its approach is to provide step-by-step guides to using the tools. There are chapters carefully covering all the features that have been in Vue going back to before the first version I used (Vue 3) including terrains, lighting, materials, atmospheres and solid growth plants. Many new features in Vue 6 are also covered in a clear and concise way including hypertextures, ecosystem painting, metaclouds, spectral atmospheres and ventilators.

It doesn’t cover everything: advanced features such as python scripting and the function editor are barely mentioned if they appear at all. It also focuses heavily on technique avoiding less concrete tasks that wouldn’t fit the step-by-step approach such as composition, lighting design, realistic texture creation etc. You’ll need to pick up other books to learn how to put the art into your pictures – this is very much a guide on how to use the tools not how to create a landscape. However if it were it would be at least twice as thick and far more expensive.

If you’re looking for an introduction to using Vue or an alternative to the manual this is really worth considering.

Skin Vue 6.2

SkinVue 6.2 is now available:

• Added automatic Male Genitals support for DAZ and Poser characters
• Fixed bug in Terai Yuki II swapper (Poser Character Plugin)
• Added support for ApolloMaximus (DAZ Character Plugin)
• Added Face Room material support (Poser Character Plugin)
• Added automatic material preview refresh following a swap

This release requires Vue 6 Infinite/Xtreme (Build 290396 or later)

SkinVue 6 For Mac

SkinVue 6 for PC

Modelling Roads on Terrains Tutorial

A new free video tutorial on how to create roads on a terrain from Chipp Walters is now available: Modelling Roads on Terrains

Vue 6 Personal Learning Edition

e-on have launched a free PLE (Personal Learning Edition) version of Vue 6 Infinite, and Vue 6 xStream. The PLE is a fully working version of Vue 6. You can save your work, export and render without size limit. Unlike previous demo versions of Vue it never expires.

There are a few restrictions on what the PLE can do:

• For personal, non-commercial use only
• You cannot exchange files with other users
• Renders are watermarked and carry a logo after 30 days before then you can render at up to 800x600 without a watermark

You need to sign up for an account at e-on's web site. Once you have you can download the PLE from your account page.

Vue 6 Update Beta 6.05

A new beta update for Vue 6 (6.05 Build 290396) is available from the e-on's web site. Including improvements to Poser memory issues, radiosity, animation editing and other bug fixes.

Registered users can get the update from the update section at e-on's web site.

Terrain Matcher

impworks is giving away a new python script for Vue 6 Infinite to create flat areas on terrains under objects. For more information see: New Vue Python Script: Terrain Matcher.

Tip: Resume Render

Resume Render allows you to stop a long render, save it, leave Vue, come back, load the scene again and start the render where it had reached rendering before. To use resume render you must have resume render info switched on. It isn't available for Open GL and Preview renders. To turn it on go to the Render Menu and turn Generate Resume Render Info on

Imagine FX Vue 6 Review

Issue 17 of Imagine FX includes a review of the Vue 6 line and gives it an overall 4 out of 5.

RANCH renderfarm News

The second newsletter from RANCH renderfarm has just been sent out and includes news of updates to the farm, a new user guide, the extension of the introductory offer beyond the original time limit and the option to pay by subscription.

More details at www.ranchcomputing.com

Mac User Review of Vue 6 Infinite

Mac User has a review of Vue 6 Infinite on their site. They raise a few issues but overal a positive review with a rating of 4 out of 5.