Autodesk Underscores Support for Education by Sponsoring Pioneering Student Award to Short Film “LOOM”

SAN RAFAEL, Calif. — (BUSINESS WIRE) — February 2, 2011 — As part of its ongoing educational commitment and support for future artists, filmmakers, animators and designers, Autodesk, Inc. (NASDAQ: ADSK) again sponsored the Visual Effects Society’s (VES) award for “Outstanding Visual Effects in a Student Project”.

This year’s winning entry is “LOOM” created by Jan Bitzer, Ilija Brunck, Csaba Letay, Fabian Pross and Regina Welker of Film Akademie in Stuttgart, Germany, using Autodesk Softimage software, their self-proclaimed “weapon of choice.” With breathtaking photo-real computer graphics (CG), the filmmakers weave a tale of a moth stuck in a tangled web facing an impending spider attack.

“For LOOM, we made heavy use of ICE [the Softimage Interactive Creative Environment] to create spider webs, hair systems and deformers. We’re honored that the VES picked our film,” said co-director Ilija Brunck. “It’s simply awesome,” added co-director Jan Bitzer.

“Each year the quality and creativity of the work we see in the student category is amazing. The nominees this year displayed incredible talent for creating cartoon character-style CG, beautiful life-like photo-real renderings and seamless meshes of live-action with CG environments,” said Jeffrey A Okun, chair, VES. “’LOOM’ is a beautiful work of art that truly impressed our hundreds of judges from around the world.”

“The student entries in the VES awards continue to raise the bar every year. The astounding level of sophistication of the entries continues to make Autodesk proud to support this award, recognizing the filmmakers, visual effects artists and animators of tomorrow. We will definitely be following the careers of these very talented young filmmakers in the years to come,” said Stig Gruman, vice president, Autodesk Digital Entertainment.

This year, the VES received entries from around the world with the final selected nominees coming from accredited schools in New Zealand, Germany and France. While not a requirement for submission, all of the four nominees used Autodesk 3D animation software to create their short films.

Nominees included “Time for Change,” a short film featuring whimsical characters living behind the doors of a town square cuckoo clock and “Das Tub,” a farcical submarine encounter that takes place in a bath; both entries were created by Rupert Ashton, Priyan Jayamaha, Junying Xu and Kristen Dale Pretorious, students from the Media Design School in Auckland, New Zealand using Autodesk Maya software. “Nuisible(s)” by Erick Hupin, Baptiste Ode, Phillippe Puech and Pierre Nahoum of the Artfx School in France also used Maya to combine live action and CG to create a story about a bug-sized civilization meeting its match in a shiny black vacuum cleaner.

About the VES

The Visual Effects Society is a professional, honorary group, dedicated to advancing the arts, sciences and applications of visual effects and to upholding the highest uniform standards and procedures for the visual effects profession. The VES is the entertainment industry’s only official organization representing the extended community of visual effects practitioners including supervisors, artists, producers, technology developers, educators and studio executives. For more about the VES, visit www.visualeffectssociety.com.

Autodesk Education Initiatives

Autodesk supports students and educators by providing design software, innovative programs and other resources designed to inspire the next generation of professionals. By supporting educators to advance design education and science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) skills, Autodesk is helping prepare students for future academic and career success. Autodesk supports schools and institutions of higher learning worldwide through substantial discounts, subscriptions, grant programs, training, curriculum development and community resources. For more information about Autodesk education programs and solutions, visit Autodesk education.

About Autodesk

Autodesk, Inc., is a leader in 3D design, engineering and entertainment software. Customers across the manufacturing, architecture, building, construction, and media and entertainment industries -- including the last 15 Academy Award winners for Best Visual Effects -- use Autodesk software to design, visualize and simulate their ideas. Since its introduction of AutoCAD software in 1982, Autodesk continues to develop the broadest portfolio of state-of-the-art software for global markets. For additional information about Autodesk, visit www.autodesk.com.

Autodesk, AutoCAD, Maya and Softimage are registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc., and/or its subsidiaries and/or affiliates in the USA and/or other countries. Academy Award is a registered trademark of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.. All other brand names, product names or trademarks belong to their respective holders. Autodesk reserves the right to alter product and services offerings, and specifications and pricing at any time without notice, and is not responsible for typographical or graphical errors that may appear in this document.