The new Clothy3D tool promises to make character pipelines more flexible, at no cost, at least for now. The software is designed to auto-fit and rig clothing models across a wide range of 3D characters and platforms, offering a set of converters that could connect otherwise separate workflows.

What It Does

Clothy3D can auto-fit and rig clothes from sources like Marvelous Designer, Daz3D, or iClone Character Creator, and also supports 18 body types of Metahuman. It transfers skeletons and skin weights between characters, rigs static meshes with existing skeletons, and even wraps mesh topology and textures from one character to another. Input and output are handled in FBX, and the devs mention support for OBJ and DXF in converters.

Why It’s Interesting

The tool effectively acts as a universal adapter: skeleton transfers, mesh wrapping, and skin-weight conversions could be used to move assets across different ecosystems without tedious manual setup. For pipelines that juggle assets between Unreal Engine, Daz, or Marvelous Designer, that flexibility might save hours.

On top of that, there’s a marketplace attached, where assets can be discovered, bought, and sold. Right now, content is sparse, but the structure is in place and depending on adoption, this could grow into a useful exchange hub.

Caveats

All of this comes with a big asterisk: Clothy3D is brand new and still in a beta-like state. It’s free to use at the moment, but untested in production environments. While the promise of “fit anything to anything” is tempting, reliability across real-world projects remains to be seen. If you’re looking for a weekend experiment or if your pipeline involves a lot of cross-platform character work, Clothy3D might be worth a spin. Just don’t expect the stability of a battle-tested DCC plugin yet.

Interface, Scenes & Exports

Clothy3D’s UI is built around a three-scene viewport layout: left, middle, and right scenes all sharing a synchronized camera view so you always see from the same angle. The left scene acts as a composite view, reflecting the combination of whatever is imported in the middle and right scenes; the right and middle scenes remain independent and each can host its own models or assets. Depending on which tool you’re using (Cloth Convertor, Character Convertor, etc.), the roles of these scenes adapt accordingly. For example, the middle may show cloth, the right the base character, and the left their merged result.

In terms of the UI controls: it features a layered tool-button system, so choosing a top-level action shows context-sensitive button sets beneath it. Hovering on a tool button triggers a tooltip after a moment, helping with discoverability. You can also control viewing options such as whether faces are rendered front/back, or switch the “Color Mode” (normal color, black, or white) to enforce consistent visibility, especially useful for transparent meshes or to show stitching faces.

Mouse navigation is standard: left-drag orbits, middle-drag pans, mouse wheel zooms; the right button largely is reserved for editing mesh elements (faces, vertices, edges) in the middle and right scenes, or for panning in the left view.

Regarding import/export: the middle and right scenes can each independently import and export their own models or assets. The left scene doesn’t allow direct imports (it’s purely an aggregation), but whenever something is loaded into middle or right, it also appears in left. In the “Account & Import/Export” section, you can also see your user account info (e-mail, remaining monthly exports). Export is capped, users get a limited number of exports per month.

Thus the interface is designed to provide parallel views (source / target / result) in lockstep, while keeping editing tools, visibility toggles, and import/export flows relatively consistent across the different modules.

Character Convertor

The Character Convertor tool lets you ingest an arbitrary rigged tetrapod base character (in FBX or DAE format) and produce a standardized interchangeable base character asset. First, you import your rigged base character into the middle scene. Optionally, you can clean up or edit that character, for example, delete unused meshes like clothes or weapons, duplicate or align meshes, hide faces, adjust vertex positions, or even tweak skeletons and skin weights.

Then you wrap a target interchangeable base character (in the right scene) to match the imported rig. Two wrapping approaches exist: applying an existing deformer template (faster, if one matches the character topology) or manually deforming via point/face matching (with a Character Builder or import of partial shapes, then matching points/faces). As you wrap, you can iteratively adjust both source and target geometry to improve the match. After wrapping, you configure parameters in the processing flow, run automatic steps, and finally export your new interchangeable base character to disk.

In effect, the Character Convertor acts as a bridge: you bring in a rig you want to preserve or reuse, deform a canonical interchangeable skeleton mesh to match it, and output a version you can reliably use in downstream tools like cloth fitting, skeleton transfers, or asset marketplaces.

Tutorials

Clothy3D already comes with a sizeable set of tutorials to help users ramp up. There’s a Studio Quickstart that introduces the core UI and navigation, along with dedicated quickstarts for Character Convertor, Cloth Convertor, Dress3D, Skeleton Transfer, and Deform3D. Beyond the basics, workflow guides walk through Unreal Engine integration (UE5.4), building characters via the Character Builder, wrapping and matching meshes, and using deformer templates for quicker results.

The clothing workflow is covered extensively: tutorials explain converting standard garments, preparing clothes for Metahuman, simulating and rendering cloth, working with Marvelous Designer assets, managing double-sided or layered clothing, and fine-tuning shape control points. Other deep dives address transfer points for skin weights, keeping selected parts rigid, smoothing weights, or adding auxiliary bones. There are also lessons on editing and converting skeletons, rigging static characters, handling complex footwear like high-heel shoes, and preparing/publishing assets to the marketplace.

The post Clothy3D: New Tool for Clothing Auto-Fit, Rigging & Mesh Transfers first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

Hold onto your graphics tablets, folks—Blender 4.4 has officially entered beta as of February 6, 2025. The development team is now focusing solely on bug fixes, while Blender 4.5 development kicks off. This beta phase invites users to test the new features and provide feedback to ensure a polished final release.

A Familiar Face on the Splash Screen

Upon launching Blender 4.4, users are greeted by a new splash screen featuring the protagonist from the Oscar-nominated, Golden Globe-winning animated film Flow, created entirely with Blender. Director Gints Zilbalodis recently shared insights into his Blender experience, discussing his solo approach to lighting and rendering for Flow.

https://twitter.com/gintszilbalodis/status/1887201020452765741?mx=2

Animation Gets Organized with Slotted Actions

In the realm of animation and rigging, Blender 4.4 introduces Slotted Actions. This feature allows animators to store animations of multiple entities within the same Action, streamlining the management of complex scenes.

Compositor Enhancements: A Clearer Glare

The Compositor has received significant updates, notably a complete overhaul of the Glare node. These improvements aim to provide more control and better results in post-production workflows.

Grease Pencil and Geometry Nodes: More Power to the Pencil

Grease Pencil continues to evolve, with updates enhancing its functionality for 2D animation within the 3D environment. Geometry Nodes have also seen advancements, offering more flexibility for procedural modeling tasks.

Get Involved: Test and Provide Feedback

Blender 4.4 is in beta until March 12, 2025. Users are encouraged to download the beta version and test the new features, reporting any issues or feedback to help refine the final release. As always, it’s wise to thoroughly test new tools before integrating them into production projects.

For a detailed overview of the new features and to download the beta, visit the official Blender website. Stay tuned for more updates as Blender continues to push the boundaries of open-source 3D creation.

Note: All features mentioned are sourced directly from the official Blender 4.4 beta release nptes.

The post Blender 4.4 Beta Makes a Splash first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

3D-Info is a free, open-source and cross-platform tool that enables the visualisation of 3D scenes in USD format. It is aimed in particular at department heads in filming (camera, set decoration, staging etc.) and in the animation sector such as production management and direction. Other users who want to view USD 3D assets also benefit from the user-friendly interface, which does not require any additional dependencies.

With 3D Info, users can adjust and export cameras and images, take measurements on set, share notes or play animations. Props, animated characters or sets can also be opened. Technically, the tool allows you to view the hierarchy of “stages” and “layers”, which are specific concepts of the USD format.

Current limitations

The first beta version of 3D-Info currently offers limited functions. The focus was on ease of navigation and consistency of visualisation. The visual rendering in 3D-Info is identical to that in usdview and Nvidia’s Omniverse Composer, as the same Storm rendering engine from Pixar is used. The development process required considerable effort to implement the USD framework correctly. The developers prioritised the features requested by partner studios Loops Creative Studio and Plateau Virtuel, which already work with the USD format.

CST’s goal is to support the film industry. With the increasing use of virtual production, the need to validate 3D assets in pre-production is growing. 3D-Info is intended to remedy this situation and facilitate the use of 3D for everyone involved. The idea for 3D-Info was born when Frédéric Fermon, one of the main developers, was looking for a tool that could visualise 3D assets in an understandable way without having to open a DCC. After discussions with artists, TDs and virtual set designers, it became clear that an easily accessible viewer with annotation capabilities was needed.

Development challenges

The USD format documentation is extensive but scattered in places. The file format lacks a formal description, which makes development difficult. Different parts of the Pixar library were created by different people at different times, resulting in slightly different architectures. The choice fell on the Qt framework for the graphical interface, which facilitates the implementation of certain widgets. However, this also brings challenges, for example in the handling of keyboard events. Another issue is the evolution of the library versions. Currently the version used is frozen, but in the future it will be necessary to adapt to new versions.

Public roadmap and support

The developers are calling for the beta version to be tested and feedback to be provided. 3D-Info should at least be useful as a viewer for models or the hierarchy of USD stages and layers. Here you can find the Git, information, images and more: trello.com3d-info

The post CST-USD Viewer in beta first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Jürgen Firsching.

In nuce: As Shawn Olson, product owner for 3ds Max at Autodesk, announced on 28 October this year , the USD implementation in 3ds Max has been enriched with an update (USD for 3ds Max). It is said that thanks to several new core functions of the public beta of this version 0.3, 3ds Max and USD (Universal Scene Description) will move closer together. In his message, Olson explains the advantages of USD – and that it is not just a new file format, but also a programming interface that allows non-destructive collaboration across software boundaries. Last but not least, Shawn sees time and cost savings as convincing advantages of the Universal Scene Description.

In toto: Below are some of the most interesting new features that come with the update for the USD implementation in 3ds Max. For a complete list, see Shawn Olson’s announcement at area.autodesk.com – or the almost 40-minute video linked there, which demonstrates what version 0.3 of USD for 3ds Max (USD for 3ds Max) offers.

• New USD Stage Object: This allows a USD file to be loaded directly into 3ds Max. According to the announcement, this differs significantly from the method of loading USDs into 3ds Max as before – because USD Stage Objects are to be loaded into 3ds Max in a similar way to XRef scenes, with the difference that the source data is not 3ds Max data.
• The ShaderWriter has also been added, which allows users to control how an object is exported – beyond the limitations imposed by the standard export.
• Updates for the USD SDK (Software Development Kit): Users can now work with C , Python and Maxscript.

Clicked further: The graphic in the lead image of this news item was created by Environment Artist Ethan Olson, who works as a New World Environment Artist at Amazon Games .

Sources: cgpress.org ( message from CGPress Staff), area.autodesk.com ( message from Shawn Olson)

The post USD for 3ds Max 0.3 released! first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.

In nuce: KeenTools has released a new beta version of GeoTracker – GeoTracker 2022.2.2. GeoTracker is a plug-in for After Effects that can be used to track 3D objects and simplify match-moving tasks. The most important new features of the new version include support for After Effects 17.0 as well as various bug fixes and improvements. GeoTracker 2022.2.2 was released on 18 October. The plug-in is also available for Nuke .

In toto: A number of videos on GeoTracker were recently published on KeenTools’ YouTube page – including some that introduce the plug-in and its range of functions and help beginners to try out GeoTracker for the first time. Interested parties can find the videos on both points linked below.

Click further: The new GeoTracker beta can be downloaded from keentools.io. KeenTools’ range of software is not limited to GeoTracker. FaceBuilder, for example, is a plug-in for Blender and Nuke that can be used to create 3D heads based on photos (Digital Production reported on 11 August this year).

KeenTools GeoTracker for After Effects (Beta)

Basics of Geometry Tracking – GeoTracker for After Effects Tutoria

The post Release of the beta of GeoTracker 2022.2.2! first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.

In nuce: VFX software developer Sitni Sati has announced that FumeFX 6 for 3ds Max has entered the beta phase. The highlight: FumeFX 6 Beta is now available to users free of charge – or as a fully functional, commercial licence. The description of the presentation video on YouTube states that FumFX 6 Beta is offered equally for learning purposes, non-commercial projects and blockbuster film projects of large studios – without any costs incurred during the current beta phase. The free beta offer is valid up to and including 21 December 2022 and includes a node-based system that affects, among other things – but not exclusively: Particles, Ropes, Rigid Body Dynamics, Soft Body Dynamics, Cloths and Voxel Grids.

Click further: The presentation video for FumeFX 6.0 is linked right here below. Digital Production last reported on the simulation software FumeFX on 13 April 2018 – at that time on the release of version 5.0. All further information can be found on the website of the VFX software developer Sitni Sati.

The post FumeFX simulation software available as a free beta! first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.

In nuce: According to Ymmanuel Flores, the Substance 3D add-on for Blender has entered the beta phase – and is available to users for free download. This was announced by 3D artist Ymmanuel via his Twitter account. The benefit for users: The add-on allows Substance 3D materials to be uploaded directly into Blender 3.0 (or higher). Users can also make changes to the materials via the Blender user interface.

Background information: In a comment on Twitter, Ymmanuel says that he had already developed a standalone version of the add-on a few years ago – at that time without support from Adobe. But now, thanks to the support that has arrived, Ymmanuel is able – as the 3D artist writes – “to develop the add-on from the perspective of a 3D artist who uses both Substance 3D and Blender on a daily basis.” Ymmanuell goes on to say that the add-on will be made freely available to “anyone who needs it”.

Clicked further: Adobe users can find out more about the add-on at auth.services.adobe.com . In the video below, Ymmanuel demonstrates his add-on in a one-hour livestream (now archived on Ymmanuel’s YouTube channel Xolotl Studio). The demonstration starts at minute 02:00. Ymmanuel Flores is not only active on Twitter , but also on Artstation.

Blender Addon for Substance Showcase!

The post For Blender: Substance 3D add-on released first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.

In nuce: Chaos Group has released V-Ray 6 for 3ds Max as an open beta. But Maya users should also pay attention to the V-Ray 6 beta: the features that Chaos Group is rolling out for 3ds Max will be similar for Maya. However, according to the developers, the final release of V-Ray 6 is still months away. Until then, many new features are likely to follow. A date for the final release has not yet been announced.

Feature delights: Below are four of the features that definitely deserve your attention.

• Chaos Scatter: A stand-alone tool for object scattering. This provides users with an alternative to more comprehensive third-party scattering plugins. Chaos Scatter was introduced together with the release of Corona 8 at the beginning of the year.
• VRayEnmesh Modifier: This allows you to repeat geometries along an object surface – completely without instantiation. This should work in a similar way to how users are familiar with tiling a texture. In contrast to instantiation, no additional memory space is required for repeating geometries. According to the Chaos Group, VRayEnmesh modifiers are particularly useful in the application of: Fences, chainmail, fabric structures – or similar small-scale, repetitive structures.
• VRaySky: Procedural clouds are now being added. However, it should not currently be possible to render inside or above the cloud plane. A special feature: The clouds should also cast shadows on surrounding fog.
• Finite Dome Mode: This concerns the V-Ray Dome Light. According to the official description, this allows you to adjust light projections on ground surfaces even more precisely. You control the finite dome mode via three parameters: Radius, projection height and ground blend.

Click further: To find out about the full range of features in the open beta of V-Ray 6 for 3ds Max, click over to chaos.com/blog – or read through the associated release note. The video below beats the drum for V-Ray 6.

V-Ray 6 for 3ds Max – coming soon

The post V-Ray 6 goes into open beta! first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.

• TyFlow Pro is released. Pricing and licence models have also been announced
• What is TyFlow? A plugin for 3ds Max for the purpose of particle simulation
• Pricing: TyFlow Pro is offered as a perpetual licence and costs 495 US dollars. However, a discount of 100 euros is currently being advertised
• Trial version: Also available. It even has most of the features that the paid version offers
• Ready to start your creative project with TyFlow? We already reported on 06.12.2021 about a tutorial from “State of the Art Academy” that is worth copying

In nuce: TyFlow Pro is released. Pricing and licence models were announced as part of the release.

What is TyFlow? A plugin for 3ds Max to simulate clothing, snow, but also orgies of destruction. To put it in advertising terms: TyFlow makes particle simulation fun. TyFlow has been in an open beta phase for three years now and has since been able to gather a number of enthusiastic users around it. Even after the release of the paid version of TyFlow, which we report on here, the beta version will continue to be available free of charge. However, the beta phase will not receive any further updates.

Pricing: TyFlow Pro is offered as a perpetual licence. New customers wishing to purchase such a licence must pay USD 495. However, the website is currently advertising a discount of 100 euros, which will apply until the first of March this year. The price includes a maintenance plan with a term of one year, which can be extended for a price of USD 295. The prerequisite for this is that this extension is obtained within 30 days of the expiry date (of the maintenance plan). It sounds like ancient Egyptian algebra, but it’s true.

Trial version: A free trial version is also available, which comes with most of the same features as the paid version. However, the features multithreading, GPU acceleration and TyCache export are excluded.

Click further: You can find out more about the full release of TyFlow and the newly added features in the functional scope of the porny particle simulation tool on the corresponding website.

Ready to start your creative project with TyFlow? Back on 6 December 2021 , we told you about a tutorial from “State of the Art Academy” that is worth following, in which you can find out how the snow simulation works in TyFlow. We think so: The tutorial is not just a must-click for fans of nostalgic, crisp red Great Britain phone boxes!

The post TyFlow | Release first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.

Nvidia’s GauGan is now called Canvas – and is available as a beta. The app can be used to transform crude drawings into pretty works of art.

The trick to Canvas is that it uses Generative Adversarial Networks (GAN) to convert segmentation maps into images. To do this, Canvas uses a deep learning model that has been trained on millions of images. The second trick with Canvas is that the whole thing runs in real time. While you are still slapping your clumsy children’s drawings onto the digital canvas, Canvas transforms your blobs into high-quality works of art that would fetch top prices at Sotheby’s or Christie’s. Or something like that. While the app was previously accessible in the browser, it is now designed as a desktop app. One side effect of this is that you need an RTX-capable graphics card to use Canvas.

If you want to know how GANs actually work and what Generators and Discriminators have to do with them, we recommend our current issue 04 : 2021, where you will find the article “Katze ergo sum?” by our author Björn Eichelbaum, who breaks down how AI (artificial intelligence), ML (machine learning) and DL (deep learning) can be explained using cat pictures in a popular science style.

You can download the beta of Nvidia’s Canvas here. The Nvidia forum welcomes feedback on the beta. The video below will give you a flavour of the Canvas app.

Introducing the NVIDIA Canvas App – Paint With AI

The post Canvas | Sketching-App first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Patrick Poti.

At the 3D and Motion Design Show, Maxon recently gave an insight into upcoming features – for Redshift, Red Giant and Cinema 4D. With Project Neutron, Python 3, USD, Redshift RT you can look forward to some new features in upcoming versions (even if, as usual, it will take longer until a complete end-to-end workflow is available and fully functional).

Cinema 4D: Project Neutron

With Project Neutron, the node-based workflow in Cinema 4D is to be more closely integrated. With the new engine, Maxon wants to enable new procedural modelling techniques, motion graphics and visual programming, but not “force” them. In other words, if you don’t have a direct application for it, you don’t have to familiarise yourself with new workflows. Similar to the Object Manager, the new functions will be optionally available via a new GUI. In the examples so far, the developers show animated sphere arrays, procedural forest landscapes and mesh workflows, as well as procedural fish swarms, dual mesh functions and more. Project Neutron will be available for the first time as a Tech Preview in the upcoming Cinema 4D R22 versions. An exact release date for the autumn, as well as feature scope is not yet available.

Python 3 and USD support

Things are also continuing in other important areas – in line with the requirements of the VFX Reference Platform, the Python 3 standard is already part of many DCCs. According to Maxon, most of the changes should be backwards-compatible in order to minimise the transition from 2.7.7 to 3.7.7 for pipeline TDs and developers – at least in theory. You can find more information on this here on the Maxon blog.

While Maxon has taken care of the exchange around the Cineware plug-ins, the next version of Cinema 4D will now also be able to import and export USD formats. In the preview, this includes geometry, materials, cameras and lighting. The supported formats are…

• USDC binary files
• USDA ASCII file format
• USDZ format (for augmented reality applications)

Availability

After the new subscription-only C4D S22 version, the update for the next perpetual Cinema 4D Release 22 is still pending for this year. A permanent licence (R21) currently costs 3364 euros, the annual subscription starts at just under 58 euros.

Further information: To the official Maxon website

The post Cinema 4D: Project Neutron announced first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

The Foundry promises that everything will be better now – and that Nuke 10, which should be ready in spring next year, will be faster, more stable, bug-free and packed with new great features, mainly in Paint, rendering, playback and export as well as a new OpenColorIO integration. Once again.

Nuke Studio will get extra features, including effects directly on the timeline, a realtime keyer (also on the timeline), more control over audio and more performance.

New raytracer / renderer

According to Foundry, a new ray render node adds a native ray tracing rendering engine – which should be better than the previous scanline renderer. The new engine is said to be faster and less resource-intensive, particularly for motion blur, point light shadows, non-linear spherical projection and with support for reflections and ambient occlusion.

Smart Paint

NukeX and Nuke Studio now have a “Smart Paint Toolset” which, according to the manufacturer, is intended to enable a completely new workflow for textures and paintings, even in scenes that contain complex movements or fine details. The toolset is designed to generate vectors that automatically calculate shifts and distortions in an image sequence across multiple frames, making manual cleaning partially superfluous.

Real-time keying

Nuke Studio is getting a new chroma keyer that, according to The Foundry, will work in real time directly on the timeline. Based on the new Blink Script GLSL interface, GPU-accelerated bluescreens and greenscreens are keyed fast enough to continue working immediately – but also with the quality needed for the final polish. If you combine this with the overlay track, context-sensitive changes and adjustments should be possible.

Further updates

GPU: Nuke is finally GPU-compatible – if several identical Nvidia GPU cores are available, these will now be used. In addition, AMD cards are now also supported and, together with the last announced Boltzmann initiative for GPUs, there will probably be some speed increases in the future. (Boltzmann summarised: AMD is building an interface that also allows AMD cards to be addressed by CUDA features, which would eliminate the separation of the GPU worlds – if everything works out.

Roto Paint: The stability and speed of the Roto Paint node is said to have been further improved, and so the need to split rotos across several nodes should be eliminated in future.

Pipeline: Nuke 10 gets the usual polishing of existing brakes and bottlenecks, including further ACES support, OpenColorIO in LUT management, updates in the Pyside and OpenEXR libraries and Blink Script can now address the GPU.

We’ll see which of these will make it into the final release – but we’ll have something to drool over until mid-January, won’t we?

The post New Nuke 10 is near! first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.