“You know, a lot of people in our industry spend time making a lot of useless technology,” says Margot. “And then there’s this.”
Here’s more info about the exoskeleton. [Via Matthew Richmond]
Category Archives: 3D
Valve Source Filmmaker
They’re just giving away this new storytelling tool?? From the site:
The Source Filmmaker (SFM) is the movie-making tool built and used by us here at Valve to make movies inside the Source game engine. Because the SFM uses the same assets as the game, anything that exists in the game can be used in the movie, and vice versa. By utilizing the hardware rendering power of a modern gaming PC, the SFM allows storytellers to work in a what-you-see-is-what-you-get environment so they can iterate in the context of what it will feel like for the final audience.
These are the days of miracles & wonder.
(T)ether: A spatially-aware system for animation & annotation
Hey, it’s the return of my (not at all) beloved Nintendo Power Glove!
Cynical take: “Oh, you were bitching that UIs requiring you to lift your hands & touch a screen would make you tired? Wait’ll you have to hold up an iPad in one hand just so you can re-create Lawnmower Man! You’ll be built like Jeff Fahey in no time, tuffy!”
Actual take: Cool!
Check out the project site for more info.
[Via Dave Simons]
"Photoshop Dimensions" magazine now available
Very cool: free*, and right from the Photoshop 3D team:
Photoshop Dimensions is the magazine of 3D in Adobe® Photoshop®. Whether you are new to 3D in Photoshop or an old hand, Photoshop Dimensions will show you new and exciting ways to add another dimension to your work. Photoshop Dimensions is written by leading authorities and experts who truly understand Photoshop’s powerful 3D features.
In this free issue of Photoshop Dimensions, we look at the many changes made to Photoshop’s 3D tools in CS 6 that will speed-up your workflow and expand your capabilities.
Grab it for iPad from the App Store. Amazon (Kindle), B&N (Nook) and PDF versions are also available; check out the site for links.
*Update: The first version is free, and the second costs $4.99.
New 3D reflections, draggable shadows in Photoshop CS6
Check out this concise demo from PM Zorana Gee:
Video: Spherikal
A trippy "Shining"
Topi Kauppinen creates a really uncanny effect, turning 2D stills from The Shining into 3D:
He explains the process on Vimeo:
“The overlapping parts must be photoshopped [*Cough* — Adobe brand cops] so that in the end everything comes together without any seams or texture repetition. The Content Aware Fill feature found in Photoshop CS5 is a godsend for this type of work.”
[Via]
New videos cover 3D in CS6
Photoshop team member Daniel Presedo has posted a series of short videos meant to make you productive quickly using Photoshop CS6’s totally revamped 3D tools. Photoshop PM Zorana Gee writes:
I’m really excited about the overhaul of the 3D features in Photoshop CS6 beta (Extended). The main focus we have is with performance (both interactivity as well as performance) and usability. You’ll notice that we added some great additions like live, re-editable 3D type; easy extrude operations; a single tool (the Move Tool) to adjust the position of all the elements in your scene; and many other great additions. Designers wanting to integrate 3D objects into their composites or create simple 3D geometries from type, paths, etc. will find that 3D in Photoshop is really powerful and fun to use.
Please let us know if you have specific tutorials you’d like to see and myself as well as some folks from the team will be happy to start sharing them.
Demo: Lighting Effects in CS6
For years, at the start of every Photoshop cycle, some version of the following conversation repeated itself:
“People really love Lighting Effects, but we haven’t touched it in *years*.”
“Yeah, there’s so much cool stuff we could do there! This should really be a major investment.”
“Ah, but we can’t this time… Could we at least just make the dang preview window bigger?”
“Well, that code was written on punch cards during the Nixon Administration, and the effect should really just work on canvas (no preview window at all), so really we should rewrite everything, but…”
…and so on.
At last, though, the team has had time to deliver something that’s worth the wait. Check out the goodness in action:
A sneak of Photoshop.next's new 3D chops
It’s about usability (think “3D for the rest of us”) and performance:
See how After Effects & Premiere were used to make "Hugo"
This year’s Oscar winner for Best Visual Effects used the Creative Suite on set:
VFX: Inception Park
As Colossal puts it, “This is almost too good for words. A wonderfully clever video directed by Fernando Livschitz of Black Sheep Films, in which hovering roller coasters fly through the streets of Buenos Aires, completely untethered to tracks.”
[Via ]
New 3D mapping tech for iPad, Android tablets
Looks creamy smooth. Here’s a bit more info.
How warring rabbits led to 3D in Photoshop
Lagomorphs, man–lagomorphs.
Mind-blowing 3D projection
What the… what??
It was all shot in single takes, recorded in real time:
In the past, projection mapping worked only from a single, static view point, and thus was very limited. By attaching the PlayStation Move to the camera, we can track projections to screens in real time, enhancing the effect of spatial deformation and false perspective on the projections and allowing viewers to look round (virtual) corners, bend walls, create a hole in the wall, or remove the walls altogether to reveal vast expanses of virtual worlds.
Check out the fascinating making-of piece:
[Via Felix Baum]
A 3D planetary animation made in Photoshop Extended
Every time I think I know the limits of what one can do with Photoshop…
Creator Panos Efstathiadis shows how it’s done in this tutorial.
Demo: Microsoft's 3D "Holodesk"
This project leverages a Kinect sensor to let you manipulate 3D virtual objects with your hands:
[Via]
Amazing 3D map technology
These are the days of miracles & wonder:
The technology is said to have been purchased by Apple. Check out 9to5 Mac for more details.
[Via]
Amazing tech for turning video into 3D
I will never get over how lucky I am to work with people like this:
In this video, Sylvain Paris will show you a sneak peak of a potential feature for editing videos, including the ability to create 3D fly-throughs of 2D videos and change focus and depth of field.
The first digital 3D-rendered film, c1972
Check out this groundbreaking work from Ed Catmull (later of Pixar fame) and the story behind it:
[Via]
Video: Tactile 3D technology
RePro3D, writes Engadget, combines “a glasses-free 3D display with an infrared tactile interface, they are able to create a holographic model that responds when ‘touched.’ The next step for the team is to provide feedback via a wearable device, adding the sensation of touch.” Check it out:
Video: 3D text projection the hard way
Backwards, specifically:
[Via Steve Guilhamet]
Here’s another example or artist Stephen Doyle creating a similar piece:
[Via]
New 64-bit Flash Player accelerates 3D
A new prerelease version of Flash Player 11 is available for testing on Adobe Labs. Key features include faster 3D gaming performance, as demonstrated by toolmakers Unity (whose gaming dev tools will target Flash Player).
HTML5, Flash, 3D meetings in SF this week
Quick note to Web developers in San Francisco: Tonight there’s meeting of GamesJS (focusing on using HTML5 & JavaScript for game development), and tomorrow there’s a San Flashcisco meeting covering the Molehill 3D work in Flash Player 11. See Doug Winnie’s blog for details.
New free 3D sculpting app for iPad
Autodesk’s latest offering looks pretty nifty:
CG Channel writes,
The app, which is currently available for free, offers basic sculpting and detailing tools. The geometry can be textured by importing images or capturing them with the iPad 2 camera and ‘stencilling’ them onto its surface.
123D Sculpt offers 17 base models. Five further packs of four are available from the App Store for $0.99 each.
[Via Jerry Harris]
Sneak peek: After Effects 3D GPU tech
Fast, direct, highly interactive object extrusion? Yes please.
[Via] Update: Steve Forde addresses some NVIDIA-related concerns via the comments.
VW's Augmented Reality
Check out this tool for visualizing & playing with a Golf Cabriolet:
That’s nice and all, but I’m so advanced that for the last 11 years I’ve been able to just look out the window to see the same dusty Golf materialize in front of me. (It’s okay to be jealous. 😉 #120hpRealUltimatePower)
Solar-powered 3D printing with sand
If you thought yesterday’s 3D printing example was even remotely cool, you must see the “Solar Sinter,” below. The clip unfolds slowly, offering that deserty “my brain’s cooking in my skull” sense of time, but it’s worth the wait.
“By using the sun’s rays instead of a laser,” writes creator Markus Kayser, “and sand instead of resins, I had the basis of an entirely new solar-powered machine and production process for making glass objects that taps into the abundant supplies of sun and sand to be found in the deserts of the world.”
[Via]
Video: A 3D printer creates working tools
…and in color, no less! Fascinating.
[Via John Eakin]
64-bit Flash Player 11 accelerates 3D, more
You can download a beta version of the new Flash Player 11 from Adobe Labs. Highlights include:
- Stage3D APIs — A new set of low-level, GPU-accelerated 3D APIs enable advanced 3D experiences and improved 2D performance across devices.
- 64-bit support — Support for 64-bit operating systems and browsers on Linux, Mac OS, and Windows.
- G.711 audio compression for telephony — Integrate voice/telephony into business apps using G.711 codec.
- H.264/AVC SW Encoding — Encode higher quality video locally using H.264 video.
- Socket Progress Events — Build advanced file sharing apps like FTP clients that send large amounts of data.
- HD surround sound — Deliver full HD videos with 7.1 channel surround sound directly to AIR powered TVs.
More features are listed here, and you can check out Flash Player PM Thibault Imbert’s post for more background & detail on the features.
Paper animations of 3D lettering & more
Bianca Chang animates by cutting sheet after sheet of paper and precisely stacking them.
[Via]
Video: A clever use of 3D + text in Photoshop
Now *this* you don’t see every day: Check out Scott Valentine’s quick use of a 3D preset in Photoshop Extended to create a novel text effect:
Dutch stamps add augmented reality
Popping 3D architectural data out of a postage stamp? Crafty, to say the least:
Check out the project site for more info. [Via]
Trimensional: 3D Scanner for iPhone
Nifty, even if I’m not sure how & why it would be practical:
[Via Mike Orr]
Video: 3D video projection remaps a room
Craft Dutch projector wizards Mr. Beam have “created a unique physical 3D video mapping experience by turning a white living room into a spacious 360° projection area. This technique allowed us to take control of all colors, patterns and textures of the furniture, wallpapers and carpet. All done with 2 projectors.” Check it out:
[Via] Update: Adobe researcher Dan Goldman points out similar projects done 30 years ago (see “Displacements”).
Learn Photoshop 3D this Thursday in SF
If you’re free Thursday evening in San Francisco,
Come check out Zorana Gee, Photoshop Product Manager and author of “3D in Photoshop: The Ultimate Guide for Creative Professionals”, talk about 3D workflows. This is a must-see presentation!
She’ll demonstrate an overview of the 3D capabilities in the latest Photoshop by targeting workflows, such as compositing a 3D object into a photo and how to create a 3D logo/text using Adobe Repoussé.
As part of this presentation, we’d like you to send us questions that can be addressed by Zorana. Please post them on the wall related to this meeting in Meetup.
Update: In response to a question from Rich MacDonald via comments, you can check out similar demos from Zorana via PSDTuts.
Interesting 3D Photo app
I can’t readily pronounce it “endlessly useful,” but 3D Photo‘s ability to map a live camera feed onto 3D shapes is rather cool:
[Via]
It can be hard to take tablet hardware, which is largely designed for low-power media consumption & gaming, and make it perform well for general-purpose imaging operations. Lately I’ve taken to joking that, “Well, my year-old iPad can run a beautiful 3D pinball game fullscreen at 30+ FPS, so maybe we should let people draw with friggin’ 3D pinballs, because apparently those can be made to go fast.” Look for Adobe Avian AngerPaint™, coming soon to an app store near you!
Crazy 360-degree dodgeball video
Photographer Ryan Jackson strapped together four cheap GoPro video cameras into an interesting Frankenstein, shooting a cool 360-degree panoramic video. “The short version of this story is that I shot with four GoPros, extracted still images from video, stitched the stills together into panoramas then recombined them back into video. For the much more detailed and nerdy answer, read on.” [Via Manu S. Anand]
New OpenEXR plug-in for Photoshop CS5
Photoshop PM Zorana Gee writes,
People who work in the 3D and film industries and who use the OpenEXR format in Photoshop CS5 will be happy to know that we now offer a plugin which preserves files’ alpha channel on import/export. Out the box, Photoshop bakes the alpha into the layer transparency. Users who are happy with this behavior don’t need to do anything. Others who find that they need to preserve the alpha channel should simply install this plugin to override the default behavior.
Seattle hologram
I have no context for this, but boy it’s neat:
Related (?): Crayola is now selling 3D sidewalk chalk–no kidding. [Via Jesse Diamond & John Dowdell]
Trimensional: 3-D Object Scanning for iPhone
Fascinating:
Here’s more info. [Via] As more and more devices can capture and display 3D data, I think it’ll become clearer why we’ve invested in giving Photoshop a 3D infrastructure.
Feedback, please: 3D in Photoshop
The Photoshop team is running a quick survey on 3D tools & applications. It would be great to get your take on the state of the tools & what their future should hold. Thanks.
[Previously: “Photoshop 3D is not about 3D.”]
Video: Body Dysmorphia, Xbox edition
I’ve been a fan of Robert Hodgin’s visual experiments for many years, and now he’s creating some intriguing work by hacking a Microsoft Kinect:
See also his Dueling Kinects demo. (And I’m probably alone in this, but these weird characters are giving me flashbacks of the bad guy in RoboCop 2.) [Via]
(rt) Typography: Font detection, crazy bikes, & more
- Yes, there is a sort of “Shazam for fonts” (letting you snap pics to ID typefaces): WhatTheFont for iPhone.
- “Write a Bike“: Crazy typographical cycles. [Via Mira Albert-Bullis]
- Ian Curtis is spinning in his grave: “Joy Division Divorce Attorneys.”
- “If you touch…” Oh my. A topical, TSA-themed cross-stitch.
- When this is someday done in HTML5, it’ll be considered the best, most revolutionary thing ever. [Update: I probably should have added a jokey wink emoticon to convey my tone on this one. So, “;-)!” I’ll shortly post a very long list of big, significant things Adobe is doing to support the advancement of HTML5, so no one need stress.]
Flash Player's adding hardware-accelerated 3D
“Flash will innovate or die,” I wrote earlier this year. “I’m betting on innovation,” and that’s paying off.
Flash Player is used to deliver something like 70% of all online games, and its 3D chops about to grow much more powerful. At MAX the team announced “Molehill,” a new set of low-level, GPU-accelerated 3D APIs that work across screens (desktops, phones, TVs, etc.). Here’s a sample demo:
Flash Player PM Thibault Imbert shares more info & demos here:
And for a deeper dive, check out this presentation from engineering manager Kevin Goldsmith.
New Photoshop 3D book, iPad app
Photoshop 3D PM Zorana Gee & lead engineer Pete Falco, working with expert digital artists, have created new new book 3D in Photoshop, together with a free interactive version for iPad. Zorana writes,
Check out the only book of it’s kind that breaks down everything you need to know about working with 3D in Photoshop. Not only is it written directly by the Photoshop 3D Team themselves but also Photoshop masters, like Bert Monroy, have contributed useful and inspiring tutorials that will benefit any designer wanting to learn 3D.
Further, the team has put together a companion iPad app that takes the first chapter of the book (basic 3D concepts) and added interactive animations to each page to help illustrate the concepts. Scrolling across will read as the first chapter of the book plus interactivity and scrolling down will introduce 15 unique tutorials (only found in the iPad app) that show you how to create all the animations directly in Photoshop CS5 Extended.
Video: Creating a 3D logo using Photoshop CS5
I meet a large number of people who are intrigued by the features in Photoshop CS5 Extended, but who are unsure about how to dive in and make something useful. Photoshop PM Zorana Gee endeavors to break that logjam with a simple, focused tutorial:
See the PSDTuts site for downloadable source files & the second part of the video.
Augmented reality meets Better Photoshop Techniques
Philip Andrews and the folks at Better Photoshop Techniques* have used Flash & 3D to create an augmented reality component for their latest issue:
Neat.
* Presumably not colloquially known as “BP Techniques” these days.
Video: Iron Baby!
If this doesn’t make you grin, I don’t know what would:
Apparent fatherhood/VFX rockstar Patrick Boivin makes my cheap-n’-cheerful parental Photoshoppery seem so anemic, but I love the work nonetheless. [Via Jim Geduldick]
Script facilitates Photoshop-Maya integration
3D artist/Ars Technica writer Dave Girard has created a “Go Photoshop” script that sends selected meshes from Maya to Photoshop CS4 or CS5 for texturing. If that’s up your alley, check out this quick demo: