News

Autodesk Introduces Smoke 2010, Flint 2010 and Lustre 2009 Extension (19/5/2009)

Latest Visual Effects Systems Help Boost Efficiency and Promote Creative Freedom on Film and TV Projects

Autodesk, Inc. (NASDAQ: ADSK) has announced the 2010 releases of Autodesk Smoke and Autodesk Flint software for editorial finishing and visual effects. The company also unveiled the 2009 Extension 1 releases of Autodesk Lustre and Autodesk Incinerator colour grading software. In addition, the company launched Autodesk Flare software, a creative companion to the 2010 releases of Autodesk Flame and Autodesk Inferno visual effects systems (announced separately). The new releases are being showcased on the Autodesk stand SL2120 at the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) Show in Las Vegas, which runs from 20-23 April 2009.

"Autodesk strives to provide integrated solutions that help our customers meet today's artistic and business challenges," said Stig Gruman, Digital Entertainment Group vice president, Autodesk Media & Entertainment. "We are focused on promoting creative freedom for projects large and small and our new systems releases feature creative 3D tools, improved interoperability and expanded format support, including RED, across multiple platforms."

Autodesk tools have been used on some of this year's highest profile entertainment projects, including the TV shows NCIS, Bones, Prison Break, Smallville and Dexter as well as blockbuster movies such as Milk, Frost/Nixon, Changeling, Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa and The Day the Earth Stood Still. The software was also used to help shape the Super Bowl commercials Pepsi Pass and Refresh, General Electric Scarecrow and Pedigree Crazy Pets.

New Feature Highlights in Smoke 2010 and Flint 2010
Quotes from beta testers:
* "Smoke continues to make my jobs easier with each release." Mark Sullivan, VFX Artist, 3008
* "The increased integration between Flame and Smoke is huge." Jake Parker, Visual FX Supervisor, Fischer Edit

Autodesk Smoke is a nonlinear, timeline-based system for editorial finishing and visual effects in short- and long-form post-production and broadcast design. With an extensive set of editorial and finishing features, Smoke provides intuitive, powerful and high-speed tools to editors as well as finishing and effects artists.

Autodesk Flint is a cost-effective system for designing complex visual effects and motion graphics in a real-time environment for post-production and broadcast design. It is used primarily for promotions, stations ID packages, commercials and brand graphics. Smoke and Flint 2010 feature highlights are:
* New 3D creative tools: 3D displacement, UV Mapping and enhanced 3D Text
* Modular Keyer with easier-to-use presets
* Extended support for professional digital-media formats: REDCODE RAW, multichannel OpenEXR and Avid DNxHD with Apple QuickTime for expanded media conform capabilities
* Faster and more flexible file-based conform capabilities with a powerful new search engine with definable search criteria; configurable import settings to control metadata mapping; and relink rules to more easily match media to the original source
* Support for Advanced Pulldown removal from clips with Advanced, Standard and PAL Pulldown with automatic pulldown detection
* Extended floating point processing support in Batch

New Feature Highlights in Lustre/Incinerator 2009 Extension 1
Quote from beta tester:
* "I love the Diamond Keyer in Lustre. It opens up a new way of working for me. Nothing is impossible." Ivar Beer, Head of Digital Post Production, CinePostproduction GmbH

Autodesk Lustre is a high-performance graphical processing unit (GPU) - accelerated digital intermediate colour grading solution for film and television projects. Autodesk Incinerator is the real-time accelerator within Lustre that enables interactive grading sessions, ultra high-speed clustering and intelligent system management. Top benefits are:
* New colour isolation capabilities based on the Autodesk Diamond Keyer, featuring pre-filtering options, enhanced post-Key filters, quick colour presets and control panel implementation
* 3D lookup table (LUT) support on input and colour matte view to make it easier to perform complex colour transformations
* Expanded format support for REDCODE RAW and Avid DNxHD with Apple QuickTime
* 16 audio tracks I/O via embedded SDI signal as well as project-based audio file format setting for capture
* Improved interoperability between Lustre and Flame, Inferno and Smoke

Product Availability
* The 2010 releases of Flame, Flare, Flint, Inferno and Smoke will be available later this month.
* Autodesk Lustre 2009 Extension 1 and Autodesk Incinerator 2009 Extension 1 are anticipated to be available to Autodesk Subscription customers on 22 April 2009.

www.autodesk.com  

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