- The partnership brings Multiverse Studio to the wider CG production industry offering seamless and fast data transfer of layouts and geometry between 3D applications via a unified architecture that wraps Alembic and Universal Scene Description (USD). It also powers shading network interchange via the MaterialX specification.
- Multiverse Studio solves wider industry problems such as rendering proper motion blur of varying topology meshes in Maya and Katana via 3Delight, Arnold and RenderMan.
- Each Multiverse license activates both the Katana and Maya plugins and offers Alembic & USD support.
London, UK, June 26, 2017 -- Creative software developer, Foundry, today announces an exclusive agreement with software R&D company J Cube to provide the Multiverse Studio toolset as a unified ecosystem for Katana and Maya.
As part of Foundry’s commitment to driving creativity, this new collaboration will allow artists to significantly reduce the time it takes to transport files between 3D applications – including Maya – and Katana, freeing up more time to deliver creative work.
Berj Bannayan, Partner and VFX Supervisor at Soho VFX, says: “We’ve been using Multiverse here at Soho VFX for over a year, for our Alembic pipeline that incorporates Maya, Houdini and 3Delight. It’s been transformative for us, being used in everything from “The Shallows” to “Ben Hur” and “Logan”. The integration into our existing pipeline has been straightforward and we’ve been outputting some positively giant Alembic caches that we’re now handling easily. It’s great stuff!”
Multiverse Studio customers will have access to a commercially supported set of MaterialX, Alembic and USD tools unified in all Katana and Maya versions, on all platforms. This will help make customers’ investments work better for longer, without the need to develop in-house or upgrade due to incompatible versions.
Multiverse’s innovative toolset also solves wider industry problems. It allows for fast and memory efficient I/O, provides dynamic management of hierarchies in Maya and procedural geometry rendering, facilitating accurate motion blur for varying topology simulation caches in Maya and Katana. It also offers new functionality that allows retiming of geometry caches at render time, without the need to re-export geometry caches with adjusted motion samples.
Foundry will resell Multiverse Studio for Katana and Maya as interactive and batch licenses. The pricing scheme includes the first year of maintenance for each license type and activates Maya, Katana, plus any future DCC app implementations.
Jody Madden, Chief Product and Customer Officer at Foundry, commented: “We are excited to offer artists the opportunity to add Multiverse Studio to their Katana and Maya pipelines, helping to relieve the immense pressure to deliver better, faster and cheaper work. As well as supporting Pixar’s open source project and the industry demand for USD tools, we wanted to have a commercially supported ecosystem around Katana that simplifies the creative process. Ensuring that Katana is easily integrated into more pipelines is an important contribution to the VFX and animation industries, and we’re proud to be part of this exciting collaboration.”
Paolo Berto Durante, Chief Technical Officer at J Cube Inc, commented: “Foundry has always been skilled at identifying innovative software solutions that improve the production experience and change the industry for the better. We are delighted Foundry’s attention is now focused on Multiverse, with this collaboration providing our tools to a larger audience, worldwide. We can’t wait to see what artists are going to create with it.”
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About Foundry
Foundry designs creative software technologies used to deliver award-winning visual effects and 3D content for the design, visualisation and entertainment industries. Foundry’s software advances the art and technology of visual experience in partnership with creative leaders across the globe. It enables clients like Pixar, Mercedes-Benz, ILM, Weta Digital, The Moving Picture Company and Sony Pictures Imageworks to turn incredible ideas into reality by solving complex creative challenges.
The company was founded in 1996 and is headquartered in London, with 300 staff based across offices in Silicon Valley, Los Angeles, Shanghai, Austin and the UK. Foundry consistently invests in R&D to provide more efficient ways for its clients to bring visual concepts to life.
In 2015, the London Stock Exchange named Foundry one of its “1000 Companies to Inspire Britain.” It regularly features in The Sunday Times’ Tech Track as one of Britain’s fastest-growing private technology companies, most recently in 2016 when it also won the Excellence in Service Award at the International Track 200 awards. Every single film nominated for the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects in the last five years was made using Foundry’s software.
© Foundry, its logo and product names are registered trademarks in the UK, USA and/or other countries.
About J Cube Inc
J CUBE is a software design and R&D company based in Tokyo, Japan. It was established in June 2013 to respond to the local production needs of Polygon Pictures. In just 4 years J CUBE has created open source technology, SIGGRAPH publications and introduced novel end-user products: Multiverse and Maneki. J CUBE’s Maneki revolutionized Anime production at Polygon Pictures with the BLAME! Movie. Multiverse powered complex visual effects on major Hollywood blockbusters such as Doctor Strange, Logan, Alien Covenant, Ben Hur and The Shallows. J Cube’s mission is to research the intersection of art & technology, and to develop new ideas and workflows combining, design and usability for the present and future needs of production environments.
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