NVIDIA GELATO PRO GPU-POWERED RENDERING SOFTWARE NOW FREELY AVAILABLE Final Version Now Available to the 3D Design, Animation, and Postproduction Communities SANTA CLARA, CA—May 29, 2008—NVIDIA Corporation, the world leader in visual computing technologies, today announced NVIDIA® Gelato® Pro 2.2 rendering software, the Company’s advanced GPU-accelerated rendering software for professionals, is available as a no-cost download at www.nvidia.com/gelatozone. Well suited for rendering of 3D digital content and design, Gelato Pro software now replaces the basic version of Gelato software, which was previously available directly from NVIDIA. “NVIDIA Gelato Pro 2.2 software is extremely powerful GPU-accelerated rendering software and we are excited to support the creative community by making it freely available,” said Dominick Spina, senior product manager, Digital Film Group, NVIDIA. “Now all artists and designers with NVIDIA Quadro graphics cards can enhance their production pipelines with Gelato Pro—without a licensing fee.” Gelato Pro 2.2 will be the final version of NVIDIA Gelato rendering software. Moving forward, the NVIDIA Gelato and mental images rendering teams will focus on the development of mental ray software, reinforcing NVIDIA’s investment and commitment to advanced accelerated rendering. Gelato software is a GPU-accelerated, final-frame renderer for the creation of high-quality computer-generated images using NVIDIA Quadro® graphics cards. Originally developed to render film and broadcast visual effects and animation, Gelato software can be used with 3D software applications that require advanced rendering such as game development, CAD, industrial design, and architecture. Basic capabilities of the Gelato renderer include sub-pixel antialiasing; true displacement; high-quality motion blur; depth of field; support for NURBS, subdivision surfaces, and particles; raytracing features, including global illumination effects and ambient occlusion; and fully programmable shading. Frantic Films’ Amaretto plug-in also provides advanced rendering functionality with Autodesk’s 3ds Max software, complementing the Mango plug-in for rendering with Autodesk’s Maya software. Features of Gelato Pro 2.2 software, which until now required payment of a license fee to access, include the Sorbetto™ interactive relighting engine, network parallel rendering, multi-threading, 64-bit support, and DSO shadeops. Gelato Pro also supports Joe Alter’s Shave and a Haircut software for computer-generated hair and fur effects and includes support for Autodesk Maya 8.5 and 3ds Max 9.0, offering improved stereo rendering, fog lights, and significant performance improvements. NVIDIA Gelato Pro 2.2 software supports Windows XP and Linux operating systems and runs on any NVIDIA Quadro graphics solution. Gelato is available for download at www.nvidia.com/gelatozone. As a freely downloadable product, NVIDIA will no longer be developing or supporting the Gelato software products.

by Philip Nemec

A new beta version of 2.2 has been posted with improvements like Maya 2008 support.

Available on the Gelato download page.

NVIDIA had a huge presence at NASSCOM 2007 in India this week as Digital Film Group Marketing Director Laura Dohrmann and Senior Product Manager Dominick Spina took center stage to discuss the flourishing animation and gaming community in Mumbai. NVIDIA continues to take the lead in the Bollywood community, delivering professional hardware and software solutions that are ideal for 3D content creation. 

Dohrmann and Spina joined a wealth of talent from around the globe, discussing the cutting-edge technology and processes that are currently improving the animation and game development community. Speakers included Franck Malmin of Def2Shoot, who focused on the importance of asset management in the creative pipeline, and Marlon Marlon Montgomery of Mind the Gap Inc. who emphasized the importance of a fluid pipeline--from profitability to flexibility.

Animation Xpress, a leading magazine focusing on the animation community in India covered the event from top-to-bottom. Read the full story at at the Animation Xpress web site.

http://www.nvidia.com/object/gz_plush_life.html

by Kelly Dove

The Indian film market, popularly known as “Bollywood,” is booming, but Indian filmmaking, until quite recently, has been slow to adapt to computer-generated visual effects (VFX) and animation. As Bollywood moves toward an era of slick visual effects, Indian VFX and animation studios are honing their skills and building their portfolios by taking on work from Hollywood as well as for indigenous films and commercials.

Resident Evil: Extinction, a Sony/Screen Gems film, is the third in a series of films based on the popular Resident Evil games. Not only does the film deliver an outstanding movie going experience, but it elevates the role Indian studios are playing in delivering world-class visual effects. Resident Evil: Extinction is a sci-fi/horror film directed by veteran Russell Mulcahy and stars Milla Jovovich (Zoolander, The Fifth Element). In the movie, Jovovich and her co-stars battle it out with zombies and killer crows against the post-apocalyptic landscape of a ruined Las Vegas.

One studio pushing the boundaries of VFX work on Resident Evil: Extinction is Mumbai-based Anibrain, which was founded in 2006 by Jesh Krishna Murthy, a veteran of the VFX industry who has been in involved with notable movies such as Batman Begins, Lara Croft: The Cradle of Life, and eXistenZ. Mr X Inc., a leading North American VFX studio employed the services of Anibrain for Resident Evil: Extinction and regularly uses them as an outsourcing partner for other projects. Anibrain continues to take on challenging VFX projects.

For Murthy, the key to creating a world-class, high-end animation and VFX studio in India capable of delivering visual effects with worldwide appeal was in integrating top NVIDIA Quadro professional GPUs and NVIDIA Gelato rendering software into Anibrain’s visual computing workflow.

One detailed shot from Resident Evil: Extinction that exemplifies the importance NVIDIA technology plays in the creative process is a “fly-through” of the interior of a satellite. The photorealistic animation was rendered entirely with Gelato film-quality rendering software on Quadro graphics boards.

“We have been very impressed with the real-time rendering capabilities of NVIDIA Quadro FX solutions and NVIDIA SLI™ technology is helping us create mind-blowing visuals in the real-time arena,” says Murthy. “On the high-end, feature-quality rendering side, Gelato is an invaluable tool in our arsenal. Gelato is meeting and surpassing all our rendering needs for photo-real feature film effects.”

To see more projects from Anibrain, visit www.anibrain.com

Credits:

Visual Effects: Mr. X, Toronto

VFX Supervisor:                        Dennis Berardi

Sequence Supervisor                 Aaron Weintraub

Visual Effects: Anibrain. Mumbai

Distributor: Sony/Screen Gems

Frantic Films is pushing NVIDIA Gelato software to the limits. Conrad Wiebe, part of the Frantic creative team and guest speaker at the Gelato User Group meeting at SIGGRAPH 2007, showcased some of the progressive rendering work Frantic is achieving with Gelato at the event.

The ocean surface image below was generated using Frantic Film's Flood:Surf ocean surface toolkit and rendered in Gelato using the Amaretto feature.

For more info about Frantic Films, visit the company's Web site at www.franticfilms.com.

Industry icon Barbara Robertson made the rounds at SIGGRAPH 2007 in San Diego earlier this month and blogged about her experiences on and off the show floor. Check out her blog at CGSociety -- she gives Gelato and The Plush Life animated short some attention and links back to the trailer here at Gelatozone.

Thanks Barbara!

by Kelly Dove

San Diego was the scene of another successful SIGGRAPH, as thousands descended on the San Diego Convention Center August 5-9 to see the latest in DCC goodies. NVIDIA premiered "The Plush Life," short film by Timothy Heath and unveiled the latest features in the pipeline for Gelato.

Dan Ochiva, senior contributing editor of Digital Content Producer saw the newest and upcoming features of Gelato, commenting in the magazine's show blog on the software's impressive features. Read more in his article: "Got Gelato?" at the Digital Content Producer site.

Lundo and Flint, two plush characters with a penchant for joyriding in their 1969 Buick Electra, find themselves on a unforgettable journey in the new NVIDIA Corporation (Nasdaq: NVDA) animated short film “The Plush Life,” which is set to make its debut today at SIGGRAPH 2007 in San Diego, CA (NVIDIA booth 513).

The brainchild of animator Timothy Heath of the NVIDIA Digital Film Group, “The Plush Life” is the first in a planned series of animated short films that will showcase the advanced rendering features of NVIDIA^® Gelato^® GPU-accelerated rendering software.

From concept to final renderings, The Plush Life animation evolved over a period of seven months. Modeled and animated with Autodesk Maya 3Dsoftware, the film was rendered entirely in Gelato Pro software on NVIDIA Quadro^® professional graphics boards, utilizing the program’s advanced features such as depth-of-field, motion blur, ambient occlusion, and raytraced reflections. Also incorporated into the animation is subsurface scattering, which allows materials to absorb and scatter light, depth-of-shadows for rendering of the hair, and new shader technology used to create the velvety appearance of the “Flint” character.

“The Plush Life” will give attendees a firsthand look at the advanced rendering features of Gelato software, and a glimpse of future rendering technology from NVIDIA, powered by the latest NVIDIA Quadro solutions.

by Philip Nemec

People in the Gelato team (and in many other groups at NVIDIA) are often asked by students of various ages how to get into graphics - so let me share some of the answers we give.