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Top News: the most relevant updates for post, VFX, and real-time production. Releases, acquisitions, funding, major industry moves, and deadline-relevant changes, curated for impact and practical relevance rather than volume. Fast to scan, links to sources, minimal fluff.
Maxon Autumn Release: New Colour Science, Liquids, Clouds and a Logo
Cinema 4D 2026 brings OCIO colour management, GPU simulations, UDIMs, Redshift 2026 plus Maxon’s brand-new ecosystem and logo.
Blackmagic Camera 3.0: Remote Clip Syncing and Multi-Cam Control Arrive on Smartphones
Blackmagic Camera 3.0 syncs clips between phones, adds live streaming, LUT upgrades and more, making moile multi-cam shoots less painful.
Realtime Department’s UNIQVUE: The Software Layer Behind Turnkey Corporate Studios
Hardware is nothing without brains. Realtime Department’s UNIQVUE adds the software intelligence to ARRI and Samsung’s turnkey corporate studio. Christoph Gockel explains how.
Resolve Animation: Everything moves!
Resolve Animation? Well, everything is based on keyframes. Fusion adds power (and pain), 3D feels clunky. Still: motion graphics inside an editor? Works.
ARRI Packs Virtual Production Into a Box
ARRI’s turnkey stage bundles LED wall, ALEXA 35, audio, and server into a scalable studio package with automation and colour management.
Docking Phone to Pro: Blackmagic Adds Pro Controls to Mobile with Camera App and ProDock
Blackmagic’s ProDock equips iPhone 17 Pro with HDMI, genlock, SSD ports, audio and power—making it a true production camera, not just a smartphone.
Mistika 11 Adds “The Gallery” for Colourists Who Hoard Looks
Mistika 11 adds The Gallery: unlimited presets, FX stacks, metadata control, and Apple Silicon optimisation. For colourists who like tidy chaos.
DaVinci Resolve 20.2: Ripple Discipline, ProRes RAW, and AI Fog on Demand
Resolve 20.2 ships with ProRes RAW decoding on all OS, AI-driven haze, cleaner ripple edits, immersive EXR support, and metadata flexibility.
Pixel 10 Pro unlocks true 12-bit RAW with DCG
Pixel 10 Pro quietly enables true 12-bit RAW video via DCG. Good for BCAM, photogrammetry, or set refs. But don’t expect it to replace your cinema cam.
Premiere Pro gains 90+ Film Impact effects – plug-in now built-in
Premiere Pro 25.5 folds Film Impact into the app. 90+ GPU-accelerated effects now ship natively, real-time playback, no plug-in, no red render bars.
Datacolor’s SpyderExpress: Colour Calibration on a Budget, Now with Growth Path Options
Cheapest Spyder yet does pro-level colour calibration in 90 sec—and grows with your ambitions. Budget-friendly colour accuracy, now modular.
Chaos Vantage 3.0 beta lands with USD, MaterialX and Gaussian Splats
Vantage 3.0 beta is here: USD, MaterialX and Gaussian Splats mean Chaos’ real-time GPU renderer finally speaks modern pipeline standards.
KitBash3D and Greyscalegorilla merge
KitBash3D and Greyscalegorilla merge: R&D speeds up, asset libraries grow, tools expand. Users should see no price or support changes.
Matching Your Moves: Inside Vision Age VFX
Vision Age VFX specialises in high-end matchmove and rotoanim. Workflows, QC, case studies, and technical tips from Tunisia’s camera tracking experts.
Premiere Pro on iPhone: Adobe goes pocket-sized
Adobe shrinks Premiere into your pocket: free iPhone app with pro editing, Firefly AI, and one-tap TikTok exports.
MetaHuman Meets Houdini
TL;DR: Epic’s free “MetaHuman for Houdini” brings rigged, textured MetaHumans and procedural hair grooms into Houdini, with seamless Alembic export to Unreal Engine.
Goodbye Adobe Premiere
I whispered, "Goodbye, Adobe!" as I pressed the unsubscribe button. To me it sounded very much like “Hasta la vista” but less dramatic. We had a good run, but it was time to move on.
RE:Vision Effects ups the ante with REZup V2 (and yes, it’s 4× sharper)
REZup V2 arrives with two new GPU-friendly ML models: general-purpose DNN 3 and face-focused DNN 2 and adds temporal denoising for cleaner 4× upscaling.
iClone 8.6 Update Adds New Eye Shaders, and UE5 Export Presets
Reallusion’s iClone 8.6 brings CC5 support, new digital human eye shaders, UE5 export presets, and workflow improvements for facial animation and rendering.
ProArt PA32UCDM: The OLED Display That Thinks It’s a Reference Monitor And Dresses Like an Accountant
First impression: The ASUS ProArt PA32UCDM is the Clark Kent of displays. On your desk, it could pass for a premium, but otherwise unassuming office monitor—sleek, thin, and lightweight, with none of that over-designed “gamer” bling. But underneath?
iPhones Go “Pro” with Final Cut Camera 2.0
iPhones just levelled-up: Final Cut Camera 2.0 adds ProRes RAW, genlock, open-gate, Apple Log 2, timecode and multicam workflow tools – free update arriving later in September.
Here’s Character Creator 5 — Now in Hero-Quality, MAya-Friendly, MetaHuman-Friendly, and Armed with ActorMIXER
Reallusion launches Character Creator 5 featuring HD subdivision, upgraded facial animation, ActorMIXER Pro, and integration with Maya, Marmoset, and Unreal.
Faster, wider, cleaner: KIRI Engine 4.0 drops mobile scan limits
KIRI Engine 4.0 slashes scan time, boosts photo limits, adds AR guidance and AI PBR and plus free users enjoy unlimited exports. Production-ready, at last.
Houdini 21 Finally Lands: The Buzz Is Over, Time to Actually Use It
SideFX has released Houdini 21, adding rigging, CFX, VFX, lookdev, terrain, and Copernicus updates. The hype is over; time to test in production.
Clay 4.Doh Update Sculpts Blender Workflow
Rahul Parihar’s Clay 4.Doh update expands his Blender clay toolkit with new tools, modifiers, shader improvements, and perpetual free updates.
AI Render for iClone & CC with ComfyUI Integration, Available in Open Beta
Reallusion announces the open beta of AI Render, a completely free plugin that bridges Reallusion’s intuitive 3D software, including Character Creator and iClone—with ComfyUI, the open-source, node-based interface widely regarded as the gold standard for customizable AI visual generation.
EIZO CG3100X: The New Gold Standard for Colour-Critical Work?
EIZO’s new ColorEdge CG3100X offers DCI-4K, HDR presets, 99% DCI-P3 coverage and True Black filter. Available November 2025 for less money than you'd expect!
Marvelous Designer 2025.1: Draw, Wash, Repeat
Marvelous Designer 2025.1 brings Off-Avatar 3D Pen, Denim Wet Wash, AI Pose Generator, and Softbody for custom rigs.
FumeFX 7.0 on Water: New Version Adds NodeWorks Ocean
FumeFX 7.0 for 3ds Max introduces NodeWorks Ocean, a GPU‑accelerated simulation system for waves, foam, spray, bubbles and multiphysics.
Meshroom 2025.1: Templates, Plugins and Photometric Stereo
Update 2025.1: Meshroom adds templates, photometric stereo and a plugin hub. More open, modular and production-friendly.
Tomato Warfare: Milk VFX on Heads of State
Milk VFX Supervisor David Sadler-Coppard on how the team built thousands of CG tomatoes, exploding doors, and digital crowds for Heads of State.
Marmoset Toolbag 5.02 Rolls Off the Assembly Line
Marmoset Toolbag 5.02 adds Decal layers, Smudge tool, Tile Strip system, ray‑traced fog, low‑to‑low baking and workflow enhancements in this latest real‑time VFX update.
These Are the Clones You’re Looking For: Hoplite VFX Fires Up ‘Star Wars: The 212’
Hoplite VFX trades stormtrooper aim for clone trooper precision in Star Wars: The 212. Producer Maurine Fauvert reveals how a two-artist side project turned into a full-blown studio production, complete with Move AI mocap, Blender’s GPU power, and some very unlucky troopers.
Timelapse Orbit 2.0 Keeps Blender WIPs Showreel-Ready
Timelapse Orbit 2.0 automates viewport tracking in Blender to streamline documentation and showreel creation during process video capture.
After Effects 25.4 Lands in August: HDR Metadata, Text-Format Paste, and Layer Staggering
Adobe After Effects 25.4 introduces Quick Offset, Paste Text Formatting Only, and HDR CICP metadata support.
Houdini 21: SideFX pushes for production readiness across the CG pipeline
SideFX releases Houdini 21, promoting Apex, Vulkan, Otus, and major animation and rigging upgrades to production-ready status.
No need to water flowers in August: grow them in Houdini instead
FLOPs is a free, KineFX-based HDA toolkit for creating and animating realistic flowers in Houdini, released by Danny Laursen.
LumaFusion 5.3 Lands on iOS with New Workflow Tools and a Door for Plugins
LumaFusion 5.3 for iOS adds workflow updates, introduces plugin API, and launches CoreMelt’s PaintX as first third-party effect tool.
Autodesk nudges 3ds Max into higher gear with version 2026.2
Autodesk releases 3ds Max 2026.2 with Skin modifier enhancements, Material Switcher speed tweaks, USD scene export and Arnold integration fixes.
Resolve 20.1: Apple Vision Pro, Magic Mask V2, and a Few More Reasons to Backup
DaVinci Resolve 20.1 delivers Apple Vision Pro support, Magic Mask v2, and new editing, Fusion, and Fairlight tools. Backup before updating.
Adobe Substance 3D Reviewer
dobe’s Substance 3D Reviewer enables immersive, cross‑platform 3D feedback in VR and browser. Browser‑based tools such as Autodesk Viewer and Sibe support non‑Adobe workflows.
Chaos V‑Ray 7 Update 2 for 3ds Max: Now With 300% More Night Sky (And AI for Those Who Miss Deadlines)
V‑Ray 7 Update 2 for 3ds Max delivers AI material tools, a new Night Sky, and 3x faster Chaos Cloud GPU rendering.
Houdini 21 : Otto, Otis, Copernicus and 300+ New Features. No, Really
Houdini 21 sneak peek: SideFX previews 300+ features: Otis solver, Otto rig, Copernicus, Vulkan viewport, full rigging and CFX overhaul.
Rebelle 8 Hits Early Access: Brushes Get Bristly, Updates Get Sensible
Rebelle 8 enters Early Access with new Bristle Brushes, NanoPixel 2, RealShader, SoftShadows, and a perpetual license with 1-year free updates.
ARRI ALEXA 35 Xtreme: Frame Rates up, Data Rates Down, Everything Else… Still ARRI
ALEXA 35 Xtreme brings 660 fps, ARRICORE codec, five times longer pre-recording, and 10% less power use. The same sensor, new muscle, all ARRI.
Mesh Match for Maya adds Auto‑Skeleton & Landmark Detection – AI Without the Hype
Mesh Match for Maya now supports facial and body landmark detection plus full‑body skeleton build to accelerate character rigging workflows.
Phantom FX Scoops Up Milk VFX and Lola Post
Phantom Digital Effects acquires award-winning Milk VFX and Lola Post; both will keep their names and leadership after the deal.
Photoshop 2025.7 adds smarter Remove, Firefly‑model control, and refined sharing
Photoshop 2025.7 (version 26.9) adds non‑destructive Remove from contextual bar, Firefly model chooser and share‑to‑apps export control
Cascadeur 2025.2 Adds Motion Styles, Tangent Editing, and Automatic Fulcrum Detection
Cascadeur 2025.2 adds motion-style selection, viewport tangent editing, longer inbetweening and auto fulcrum detection.
Beyond Normal: A Creative’s Guide to Different Minds and Managing Neurodivergent Talent (Part 1)
Creative brilliance doesn’t come in one flavor—and in today’s VFX-landscape, understanding how your team thinks isn’t just good leadership, it’s critical infrastructure.
Rumba 2.0: No More Animators’ Elbow
Rumba 2.0 from Mercenaries Engineering launches, promising faster, artist-friendly Maya-compatible character animation and seamless USD, Alembic, and FBX support.
Blender on iPad Pro at Last—Without Losing Its Blender-ness
Blender Foundation has begun work on a full-feature iPad Pro app with sculpting, Apple Pencil support, and a live demo at SIGGRAPH 2025
IlluGen Drops: Node-Based VFX Tool from JangaFX Now Public, and Free for 14 Days
IlluGen is out now! JangaFX’s node-based VFX tool is public and free for 14 days. Procedural asset workflows for game and real-time VFX.
Samsung Debuts Corporate LED Studio Bundle: ARRI ALEXA 35 Camera Included
Samsung’s Corporate LED Studio Bundle: ARRI ALEXA 35, The Wall IVC, and UNIQVUE. A complete turnkey in-house broadcast offering - Sounds interesting?
Berlin’s Animation-Only Festival FAB 2025 Returns: Japan, Stop-Motion, and 132 Films
FAB returns to Berlin in September 2025 with 132 films, Japanese guests, a stop-motion symposium, and six competitions at silent green Kulturquartier and City Kino Wedding.
From Concept to Play: Streamlining Asset Pipelines with InstaMAT’s Scalable Workflows
Procedural pipelines, scalable and automated asset texturing, physically-based terrain generation, and thousands of generative materials, if that’s your thing, you have to check out InstaMAT!
Ninja TX: Atomos Finally Gives Ninjas SDI, CFexpress, and Cloud: No Ancient Relics Inside
Atomos reveals Ninja TX: 12G-SDI, HDMI 2.0, CFexpress Type B, and all major codecs, ready for 8Kp30 and cloud, $999 from August 2025.
Frank Rueter’s Quest to Stop Nuke Knowledge from Disappearing
Nukepedia’s origin: How Frank Rueter launched the community’s Nuke tool repository and why the relaunch matters in 2025 - and what is coming to nuBridge?
DJV 3.0 Returns: Free VFX Review Tool Gains Timeline & USD Support
DJV 3.0 revives its open-source VFX viewer with OTIO timelines, USD playback, OCIO color management, and multi-track audio under a BSD license.
GSOPs 2.6: The Swiss Army Knife for Gaussian Splatting in Houdini
GSOPs 2.6 delivers free 2D/3D Gaussian Splatting editing, viewport rendering, mesh export, Karma and Solaris integration for Houdini 20.5.
Animation for All: Reallusion AccuRIG 2.0 and Friends Keep Things Moving
AccuRIG 2.0 puts 4,500+ animations a click away. Reallusion’s animation and rigging ecosystem is picking up speed.
Game Boy Robot: When Nostalgia Gets a Quad-Based Makeover
Game Boy nostalgia meets quad-based hard-surface modeling in Benavidmark’s detailed 3D robot tribute—every production step dissected.
Wacom MovinkPad 11: Standalone Sketching, No PC (or iPad) Required
Wacom MovinkPad 11 offers an 11.45″ Android tablet, pro-grade pen, and PC-free sketching for $449. Ready for artists wanting less Apple, more drawing.
Substance 3D Designer 15 arrives
Substance 3D Designer 15 arrives with a new real-time/path-tracing renderer, in-viewport post FX, and direct scene-based material editing.
InstaMAT 2025 Graduates: Terrain, Ray Tracing, and Polyverse. Now That’s a Release!
Free for small teams, a next level texture-workflow, collaboration tools, a finely tuned asset library and much more!
SynthEyes 2025.5: Now With Fewer Headaches Per Pixel
SynthEyes 2025.5 lets VFX artists export lens distortion, harness AI for tracking, and parent meshes with less tedium. Now with 17K BRAW support.
Unigine 2.20: Now with More Splat and a Whole Lot Else
Unigine 2.20 debuts Gaussian Splatting, UI Designer, XR and renderer upgrades, multithreaded shadows, mesh compression, and sweeping engine optimizations.
Artists Must Adapt: 3DModels.org Launches “One Car Challenge”
3DModels.org invites artists to transform an identical base car model into a unique render. Deadline is September 30.
Blender 4.5 LTS is here!
Blender 4.5 LTS has launched today, bringing two years of long-term support and a significant wave of upgrades.…
SDF Modeler 0.5.3: Sculpt, Blend & Trace – Refined Free SDF Concept Tool
SDF Modeler 0.5.3 adds push/avoid/emboss/deboss blends, spline curvature, 3‑axis mirror, export bugfixes and UI enhancements.
Graphite: open‑source vector design tool with a twist
Graphite launches in browser alpha, mixing layer‑based drawing with procedural node graph, desktop apps and bitmap editing due later in 2025.
„For Those Who Dare“
These days you wouldn’t always have to go for an expensive, professionally calibrated screen if you are not working for extremely demanding clients. Has the age of correct colors finally arrived? What about HDR? Let’s have a broader look!
No DRM, No Fuss: Digital Production Archive Now Online
The Digital Production archive is live: all issues as DRM-free PDFs via Dropbox, exclusively for subscribers.
The Noise You Want, None You Don’t: Bubblebird’s Browser Generator Delivers
Free browser noise generator by Bubblebird Studio: 2D/3D seamless noise, Perlin/Voronoi/random, PNG export, presets, normal maps, MIT licensed.
Oil Gets Real: Rebelle 8’s RealShader and SoftShadows Put Ray Tracing on the Canvas
Escape Motions unveils Rebelle 8 with RealShader, real-time ray traced shadows, environment maps and 20× NanoPixel export. Early Access late Q3.
V‑Ray Developer Chaos Becomes Blender’s Gold Sponsor
Chaos joins Blender Foundation as Gold sponsor with a €30,000 annual pledge, coinciding with the release of V‑Ray 7 for Blender.
Over 1,500 Free PBR Textures from LotPixel’s Library
LotPixel has released over 1,500 scan‑based PBR texture sets in JPEG format, with resolutions up to 8 K, and…
Plastic Software upgrades Plasticity to 2025.2 with HDRIs, physical materials, new surfacing tools
Plastic Software’s Plasticity 2025.2 adds HDRI lighting, physical materials, new shaders and continuity tools in a surfacing-focused upgrade.
Packer‑IO with Blender integration!
Packer‑IO 1.3 merges scale‑aware UV packing, multithreading, and smarter hole‑filling with UnwrellaConnect for Blender.
Parrot Sample: Engine Switch from Unity to Unreal Without Headaches?
Parrot Game Sample offers annotated Blueprints, C++, feature parity and walkthroughs to simplify engine migration.
Procedural Village People: SideFX Lets Houdini Users Play Skylark Architect
SideFX publishes Project Skylark’s Houdini assets and eight snappy tutorials: procedural tools for clouds, bridges, bottles, and a healthy dose of fantasy architecture.
V-Ray for Blender: Chaos releases Renderer into the Open Source Universe
V-Ray for Blender lands with CPU, GPU, and Chaos Cloud support, plus 5,600+ free Chaos Cosmos assets. Special pricing for Blender users now available.
Lola Post’s VFX Survival Guide on Walking with Dinosaurs
Lola Post’s Rob Harvey shares VFX details on Walking with Dinosaurs 2025: 800 shots, 200 artists, Unreal Engine for dinosaurs, and zero Jurassic Park liberties.
CityEngine 2025.0: Street Designer Arrives, Perpetual Licensing Leaves
CityEngine 2025.0 brings multi-lane Street Designer, Visual CGA Editor improvements, and drops perpetual licenses for ArcGIS Professional subscription only.
OpenVAT Adds VAT Encoding to Blender—Real-Time Asset Ready
OpenVAT encodes animated Blender geometry into VATs with normals, PNG/EXR output and real‑time engine support for Unity, Unreal, and Godot.
Reallusion’s CC4.54 & iClone 8.54 Let You Snag, Try and Buy Assets Without Leaving the App
CC 4.54 and iClone 8.54 bring in-app trial assets, instant DA Point checkout, and low-cost iContent licence for rapid prototyping.
Thunderbolts* Vaults: Digital Domain on Marvel’s Most Grounded Brawl
Digital Domain VFX Producer Ryan Wilk breaks down Marvel’s Thunderbolts* vault chaos, Ghost phasing, and why less is more for photoreal CG.
ScatterFlow Add-on brings gravity‑aware scattering to Blender
Apex Assets releases ScatterFlow, a Blender 4.4 add‑on enabling physics‑based scattering with optional asset pack.
Blackmagic URSA Cine 17K Slides Into Netflix’s List
Blackmagic URSA Cine 17K is now Netflix-approved but still unavailable to general buyers—professionals might consider early Christmas shopping.
3DCoat 2025 with Node-Based Sculpting and RealityCapture
Pilgway ships 3DCoat 2025 with a Node Room, RealityCapture photogrammetry, new Hotkey Manager, UI themes, Soft Booleans and Smart Hybrid tech.
O3DE 25.05 delivers deep technical refinements: Atom, ROS 2, XR, MGPU and more
O3DE 25.05 expands Atom renderer, multi‑GPU, ROS 2 SimInterfaces Gem, TrackView, Android/Script Canvas fixes and Hugo‑module docs.
BlenderDay & Summer School 2025 return to Mannheim
BlenderDay and Summer School take over Mannheim July 25–27 featuring a keynote by Laura Körting and game‑focused workshops.
Pomfort Debuts Silverstack XT v9 with Real‑Time Workflow Automation
Pomfort releases Silverstack XT v9, featuring chained, parallel workflow automation, real‑time Jobs View, and Stream Deck integration.
Cinema 4D 2025.3 gets liquid sim and UDIMs
Maxon Cinema 4D 2025.3 debuts GPU based liquid sims with fill emitter and Liquify modifier, adds UDIM/texel density tools, AI Asset Browser search, and native Laubwerk plant support.
LumaFusion 2.3 Android HDR support at Last
LumaFusion 2.3 for Android (June 24, 2025) debuts HDR and 10‑bit color support (Rec.709, HLG, HDR10, DisplayP3) with stability fixes.
ICE Nexus: Now Streaming, Pixel by Pixel
ICE Nexus launches June 25 with Arcware, exploring real-time 3D pixel streaming, digital humans, and virtual showrooms in a free online event.
Adobe ships Photoshop 26.8 — Text now bends to your will
Adobe Photoshop 26.8 debuts automatic text resizing, AVIF/JPEG XL support and a cloud‑based Select Subject backend.
RealityScan 2.0: Epic Gives RealityCapture a New Name and New Tricks
Epic overhauls RealityCapture into RealityScan 2.0, complete with AI masking, LiDAR fusion, and a mobile-first workflow focus.
Modeler 2025.2 for Houdini Lands: Hard‑Surface Modelling Makeover
Alexey Vanzhula’s Modeler 2025.2 rebuilds hotkeys, shading presets and moves to Qt6, offering a smoother hard‑surface workflow in Houdini.
MoonRay 2.15: Developer Joy with NUMA, GUI Control & Fisheye Finesse
MoonRay 2.15 adds a new regression suite (~400 tests), NUMA tuning, rdla_gui, per‑BSDF lightsets, fisheye FOV and TwoSidedMap—confirm stability before use.