For those who don’t know the tool: Massive is a standalone crowd simulation app for building agent scenes, with Arnold rendering, and ties into wider Maya and USD pipelines via the commercial line.

Free, but not aimless

A free edition of Massive Crowd Sim is available for non-commercial use. The core promise is simple: crowd simulation with no limits on agent capabilities, and no limits on the number or complexity of agents in a scene. That makes it a legit learning build, not a teaser that stops when you finally get a crowd moving without looking like a synchronized swimming team. The catch sits where you would expect it: renders are watermarked, and the supported renderers list stays short at the moment, with Arnold plus the built-in Velocity renderer listed as supported.

What you actually get day one

The free edition ships with a complete set of video tutorials and a stack of demo scenes. The demos cover a wide range of setups, including quadrupeds, insects, rigid body dynamics, flying, and shooting. That mix matters, because crowd work rarely stays politely bipedal for long, except Military Propaganda Goosestepping, but the studios doing that don’t need free software and have ALL the budget.

Installation is refreshingly old-school

Setup reads like a throwback in a good way. Download the installer, unzip or untar, and run it. On Windows, you run the installer. On Linux, you drop the bin directory into /usr/local/massive/. The manual can be unzipped wherever you want.

After that, the only required step is to activate the license. Optional environment variables exist, with details documented in the manual. If your pipeline team loves containers, reproducible installs, and predictable paths, this is the rare vendor workflow that does not try to reinvent software deployment. The free edition still expects you to behave like a grown-up about where binaries live, especially on Linux.

Licensing: one machine, one account, bring patience

The first launch triggers a license activation window. You enter the same username and password you use for the Massive 101 forum login. If activation succeeds, the license file lands in the .massive directory in your home directory, then the app starts. After that first activation, the app starts immediately as long as the license remains valid.

There is also a hard limit: only one active license is allowed per account, and a six month delay applies before a new license can be issued. That detail matters for lab setups, shared training workstations, and anyone who reformats their OS the way some people change socks. Not judging, just sayin’.

This is also where a free edition stops being magic and becomes process. If you plan to teach a class or run a studio workshop, design around the one active license rule early, not five minutes before teh first session.

Support: community-first, by design

Because the edition is free and limited to non-commercial use, there is no formal support provided. Instead, the Massive 101 forum exists as the help channel, where users can share tips, ideas, and problem solving.

The forum post also says the team will keep an eye on it, and there might be some input from them. If you are used to commercial support tickets with response time targets, this is not that. If you are used to production artists helping other production artists with practical workarounds, this looks familiar, for better or worse.

Export and pipeline limits you should treat carefully

Massive 101 is almost completely fully functional, with the full simulation toolset and no limits on the number or complexity of agents. It also has specific pipeline restrictions, including that motion, cloth, and hair simulation files save in a Massive 101 file format that cannot be used in Massive Prime, plus that USD and geometry export are disabled.

That incompatibility for Massive 101 and the big one is that there isn’t a row of “Assistant stations” for setup, and only one license for the big Massive to bring it all together.

Those details are important if your goal is anything beyond learning and internal tests. Watermarked renders are an obvious non-starter for client finals, but disabled export can be a more subtle trap if you assume you can “just move it into the rest of the pipeline later”. If your studio pipeline leans on USD interchange, treat this as a training build unless you can independently confirm the exact export behavior in your own testing.

Compatibility and pricing, as stated

Compatibility is Windows 10 and Linux, and free for non-commercial use. For commercial pricing, a perpetual floating license of Massive Prime is at $3500, with rental at $2500 per year, and says Massive Prime includes Massive for Maya.

Where this fits with your current crowd toolbox

If you already live inside the Crowdsim-world, this release sits in a useful niche: training, R and D, seeing if Massive fits your needs, personal skill building, and previs-scale experiments where you want to learn behavior authoring without immediately paying for seats.

For teams already hooked on Maya, the commercial ecosystem includes a Maya-integrated edition, and the broader stack talks about rendering integration and pipeline hooks across supported renderers. That larger ecosystem matters, but the free edition itself focuses on learning and local runs, not studio deployment. Also, Maya, by now, has Golaem built in.

https://www.massivesoftware.com/massive101.html

https://www.massivesoftware.com/massive101/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2

The post Massive Crowd Sim gets a free 101-edition first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

For those who don’t know the tool: OctaneRender is a GPU renderer that sits after lookdev and before finals, and it talks fluently with DCC plugins plus OpenUSD and MaterialX, when it is in a good mood.

The alpha, the scope, the fine print

OctaneRender 2027.1 Alpha 1 is out as a public development build intended for testing by experienced users, and it is explicitly not positioned as production ready. Scenes saved in this alpha are not guaranteed to stay compatible with future builds. The build is Windows only right now, the minimum required NVIDIA driver version is 572. The downloads listed for this alpha are the standalone Windows installer and a ZIP archive. Other build types are planned for subsequent releases.

Real time neural viewport, now with thunderbolt energy

The headline feature is a new real-time neural viewport mode that replaces the previous real-time mode. It is built on the neural radiance cache framework introduced in OctaneRender 2026. The alpha describes the new mode as enabling near noise-free interactive rendering at very low sample counts compared to traditional path tracing. The mode is designed to preserve the spectral path-tracing behaviour while improving interactive feedback, even under complex lighting conditions. It combines internal research with NVIDIA DLSS Ray Reconstruction.

In the UI, the alpha notes a dedicated toggle. The real-time neural viewport can be enabled or disabled using a Thunderbolt button in the viewport components bar. Quality settings for the real-time denoiser live under the imager node, with the goal of balancing performance and quality depending on the hardware. If you have ever watched a veiwport go from soup to something readable right as a director walks over, you already know why this matters. The promise here is faster clarity, not just faster pixels.

Upscaling joins the party: DLSS and FSR modes

This alpha adds support for new up-sampling modes based on NVIDIA DLSS and AMD FSR. The build also references AMD FSR 3. The implementation sits in the Upsampler section of the imager node, alongside other up-sampling methods. On the DLSS side, the referenced technology page describes DLSS Ray Reconstruction as an AI method that replaces hand-tuned denoisers with an AI network that generates higher quality pixels between sampled rays in intensive ray-traced scenes. Those statements describe DLSS generally, not a specific Octane integration result. This renderer is CUDA based, and the Windows alpha focuses on NVIDIA GPUs (Big surprise!).

AI Light 2.0: sampling that tries harder

AI Light 2.0 lands as a new light sampling method intended to resolve noise faster. AI Light is described as a hierarchical algorithm for sampling scenes with many light sources, and the update is positioned as a major revision compared to the original introduction back in OctaneRender 4.0.

For lighting heavy setups, this is the kind of change that can alter how fast you converge on creative decisions. If your daily routine includes juggling dozens of practicals, emissive set dressing, and a few too many hero gobos, any sampling improvement tends to show up right where it hurts, in the first minutes of iteration.

USD export and a more hands on USD workflow

OpenUSD workflows get a concrete upgrade. Geometry export to USD is included, and the build adds the ability to export a scene in USD format. The cgchannel overview also notes that geometry export in USD can include limited support for USD Preview Surface materials.

On the editing side, the standalone edition includes a USD Stage editor that allows selecting variants and layers without saving and reopening the USD file. The alpha also adds built in support for authoring variants and muting USD layers directly within the USD geometry archive.

If your pipeline already treats USD as a transport layer between layout, lookdev, lighting, and downstream tools, these changes aim straight at friction. More export options reduce the number of awkward handoffs that turn into late night chat messages that start with “hey quick question….”

UVs and geometry: more room for messy reality

The UV ceiling changes, because production UVs are never as polite as tool demos. The maximum number of UV maps allowed per primitive increases to 10, up from 3, and UV sets can be assigned arbitrary names in DCC apps that support it.

Other geometry and attribute changes include support for named UV vertex attributes, support for using vertex attributes in bump maps, support for colour vertex attributes in vertex displacement, and a Vectron tube primitive addition.

If you have ever inherited an asset with five UV sets and a note that says do not touch UV4, you now have more breathing room. The named UV support also helps keep humans oriented when the same mesh carries multiple UV purposes across shading, decals, and baking.

Changelog nuggets for TDs who read release notes for fun

Beyond new features, the alpha lists a spread of resolved issues and smaller changes. A few examples include fixes around DDS preference crashes, Alembic instancing, several MaterialX node behaviors, and multiple OpenUSD import issues such as points not loading correctly and animated point instances importing incorrectly.

The Lua API gets deprecations in geometry exporter properties, including moving from renderSizeX and renderSizeY to textureRenderWidth and textureRenderHeight, and replacing writeOcsData with embedNativeData. A small UI level tweak removes Clock Rate and Cores fields from the GPU information panel. This is where you start thinking about tool glue. If you have scripts that poke exporter properties or automate export settings, the deprecations are your early warning sign to check for breakage.

Availability, licensing, and pricing

This alpha is available alongside the stable OctaneRender 2026 releases. The software is offered as rental only via Studio+ subscriptions. The pricing listed is €23.95 per month or €239.88 per year, and the Studio+ subscription page also lists an annual price presented as 19.99 € per month billed yearly.

Free Prime editions are also available for OctaneRender and Octane X, with the Prime editions limited to rendering on a single GPU and offering a smaller set of DCC integration plugins. The alpha download links themselves require a licensed customer login for access. That is where OTOY enters the picture in the most practical way possible.

Production reality check

This build is explicitly framed as experimental, and it is not recommended for production use. That guidance aligns with the normal alpha reality: features change, files drift, and stability work continues in later builds.

New tools and innovations should always be tested before use in production, ideally on representative scenes with your actual assets, shading conventions, and deadline pressure.

What to watch while you test

The big workflow test is whether the neural viewport mode makes iteration measurably smoother on your scenes, and whether AI Light 2.0 shifts your sampling strategy. The second test is whether USD export plus USD Stage editing reduces round-trip times in YOUR pipeline. The third is whether the DLSS and FSR upsampler options behave predictably inside your lookdev and review loop, especially when you rely on consistent framing and visual stability.

https://render.otoy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=85551

The post OctaneRender 2027.1 alpha goes neural first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Manuel Kotulla.

For those who don’t know the tool: Unity is a realtime game engine that ships to desktop and consoles, and Platform Toolkit sits in the build and platform integration layer, so your release pipeline spends less time arguing with targets and more time making frames.

What changed and when

A Unity product update at the Game Developers Conference included two platform-focused announcements. First, official Steam support is planned, including a native solution intended to help bring games to the platform. This support should be covering Steam, Steam Deck, and Steam Machine.

Second, targeted enhancements to the engine Linux runtime are planned with the goal of native performance increases. The same update frames this work as a way to reduce reliance on running Windows builds through Proton.

https://twitter.com/unitygames/status/2031777294394552663

Steam support without the scavenger hunt

If you have shipped on Steam before, you already know the punchline: it is possible, but the path has historically depended on what you integrate and how you maintain it over time. The new message is about making that experience feel like a supported lane rather than a community tradition. The announcement describes a built-in platform toolkit that will facilitate the workflow of bringing games to Steam. That phrasing matters for production because it points to changes that sit inside your day to day build and release loop, not just documentation or a sample project you copy once and then forget until it breaks on a Friday.

So for now, the important production takeaway is narrower and still useful: the roadmap points at a native solution for Steam targeting Steam Deck and Steam Machine as part of the same effort.

Linux runtime work aimed at less Proton reliance

The second half of the update calls out targeted enhancements to the Linux runtime in Unity, framed around native performance gains and removing the need to rely on Windows through Proton.

For teams shipping to Linux ecosystems, that focus is notable because runtime changes tend to land below your gameplay code and sometimes below your rendering decisions. When runtime behavior shifts, it can affect performance, stability, input, windowing, threading, and the kinds of issues that only appear on particular hardware and driver mixes.

Still, the direction is clear enough to influence planning. If your release strategy currently depends on Windows builds plus Proton, the announcement signals that native Linux performance is a priority area rather than an afterthought. That can change how you triage bugs, where you invest profiling time, and how you communicate platform expectations internally.

What is still missing

The story is big, but the specifics are currently thin in the provided material. There is no published schedule in the sources for when official Steam support will ship. There is no description of what the native solution includes, whether it is a package, an editor workflow, a build target configuration, or a set of services. There is no compatibility matrix that spells out editor versions, player versions, or which OS targets are covered.

That means any team looking to act immediately should treat this as a roadmap signal rather than a shipping feature drop. It is a green light to pay attention, not a license to rewrite your platform plan overnight.

https://unity.com

https://gdconf.com

The post Official Steam support lands on Unity roadmap first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

For those who don’t know the tool: GIMP is a free, open-source cross-platform image editor for painting and comp work, and it plays nicely with Inkscape when you need vectors and pixels to stop bickering. Think Blender for images.

Momentum, but with fewer faceplants

GIMP 3.2 ships as the first 3.2 release dated 2026 03 14, following a year of design, development, and testing by volunteers and the community, with an explicit plan to streamline releases after 3.0. The headline theme is non destructive layers. Text layers already lived that life. Now Link Layers and Vector Layers join the party, and they come with a new safety latch: you must Rasterize before destructive edits like painting. When you regret that choice, Revert Rasterize clears destructive edits and returns the layer to its non destructive state. That little switch quietly saves hours and reputations.

Link Layers let you pull an external image into a composition and scale, rotate, and transform it without losing quality or sharpness. The layer updates when the source file changes, and you can create one via Open as Link Layer in the File menu. You can also swap the linked file later in Layer Attributes.

Vector Layers arrive through the Path tool. You can draw shapes with adjustable fill and stroke settings, and the vector shape updates as the path changes. Non-destructive rotate, scale, and transform apply here too, so the shape stays editable longer. Yes, we like GIMP, and it is fun to watch the momenutm build when layers start acting like they understand revision notes.

Filters stack higher, and channels get invited

Non-destructive filters now apply to channels, not just layers and layer groups. They also apply to the new non-destructive layer types, so you can keep edits flexible without immediately baking them in. Layer groups get a neat trick: an empty group set to Pass through can carry non-destructive filters that affect all layers below it. Stack multiple filters on that group and you get an adjustment style workflow that stays tidy instead of turning into a layer salad.

A new Vibrance filter lands via updated GEGL. It combines Saturation and Hue Chroma behavior for selective saturation, with a specific goal of keeping skin colors from getting over saturated. You can reach it through the GEGL Operations tool or by searching actions with slash. The release also ships companion updates for babl and GEGL as part of the wider toolchain refresh.

New tools and innovations should be tested before use in prdouction, especially when they touch core layer behavior and color pipelines.

Brushes, text, and other daily annoyances get nerfed

A new paint mode called Overwrite replaces color values as you paint without blending alpha values together. It targets pixel art workflows, and it pairs best with the Pencil Tool.

The MyPaint Brush tool updates to the newer Version 2 API from MyPaint. That upgrade adds 20 new brushes, including an arrow brush, grouped under the Dieterle tag. Text editing gets less in-your-face. The on canvas Text Editor can be dragged out of the way while you type, and it supports common shortcuts like Ctrl plus B, Ctrl plus I, and Shift plus Ctrl plus V for paste unformatted text.

https://peer.tube/videos/embed/64DzkCtrEw9aDr88urpAnj

Exports get more grown up

Format support expands, including built-in support for more formats and export support for JPEG 2000, a standard for digital cinema. Export support is added for PSB large document files, matching existing import support. The DDS plug-in can export BC7. The OpenEXR plug-in can render Luminance Chroma images in full colour rather than grayscale. Vector Layers also affect export: SVG and PDF export can include raster and vector layer data together. Import support is added for AVCI (a HEIF variant with H.264 images encapsulated in HEIF).

The small print, literally and figuratively

On Windows, the downloads page lists supported OS as Windows 10 1903 or newer. Now Windows 7 anymore, and that makes you sad, take loooong look in the mirror. On Linux, distribution options include AppImage, Flatpak via Flathub, and Snap via the Snap Store.

GIMP 3.2.0 is the last version distributed as 32 bit on Windows. Starting with 3.2.2 and later micro versions, there will be no 32 bit Windows build. One side effect is that the 32 bit TWAIN plug in for scanning on Windows stops being distributed, with guidance to use manufacturer scanning software for now and an invitation to help build a 64 bit WIA plug in. Pricing is free, and open source – biut you can always donate, they REALLY have earned some help!

https://www.gimp.org/release-notes/gimp-3.2.html

https://www.gimp.org/downloads/

The post The GIMP Team boosts GIMP 3.2 first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

For those who don’t know the tool: Redshift from Maxon is a GPU renderer for Cinema 4D, Maya, 3ds Max, Houdini and Katana. It targets final-frame GPU rendering and USD Solaris pipelines, sitting at lookdev and lighting in production.

Consolidation, not features

Maxon has released Redshift 2026.3.0. The build includes plugins for Cinema 4D, Maya, 3ds Max, Houdini and Katana. It is a maintenance release focused on stability, host compatibility and incremental displacement updates. No new headline rendering features are introduced.

On Apple hardware, Redshift now requires macOS Sonoma 14 or higher. Maxon recommends macOS Tahoe 26.2 as the latest officially supported version, while noting known rendering artefacts on Intel CPU plus AMD GPU systems on Tahoe. On Windows and Linux, updated NVidia driver minimums apply, including specific requirements for Blackwell 50xx GPUs. Linux requires glibc 2.28 or higher.

Texture displacement cleaned up

Texture displacement receives performance improvements and several correctness fixes. The update resolves holes in meshes, vertical artefacts in the software ray tracer and cases where displacement disappeared on tessellated meshes without UVs.

Support for smooth normals has been added to texture displacement. The UV Context Projection node gains a new camera selection mode for camera projection mapping.

Additional fixes address deformation motion blur with displacement, incorrect auto-bump behaviour, and noisy details on scaled meshes. Material blending issues involving stacking and the Material Blender shader have also been corrected.

Hydra and Solaris updates

Redshift adds support for Houdini 21.0.559 and 21.0.596 and drops support for 20.5.654 and 21.0.440. The Hydra delegate now supports the Solaris 21.0 statistics panel in the latest Houdini 21.0 production build.

Hydra 2.0 fixes include motion blur limitations, primvars sampling issues, light linking problems, nested instancing errors and live updating of custom light and camera parameters. Support has been added for USD implicit surface primitives, USD mesh lights via the Geometry Light LOP, and updated USD and Alembic procedurals. AOV-related bugs affecting ObjectID, Depth, cryptomatte, deep and Refractions Light Groups have been fixed.

Redshift 2026.3 is a stabilisation release aimed at removing pipeline friction introduced in earlier 2026 builds. As always, new tools and innovations should be tested before use in production.

// Redshift 2026.3.0 Release Notes
// https://support.maxon.net/hc/en-us/articles/Redshift-2026-3-0-2026-02-February-10-2026

The post Redshift 2026.3 fixes displacement headaches first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

For those who don’t know the tool: DJV is an open source image sequence viewer and playback tool for VFX and animation. It runs on Linux, macOS and Windows, supports OCIO colour management, and is typically used for dailies, shot review and quick sequence inspection without licence infrastructure.

DJV 3 has been evolving through incremental releases, culminating for now in version 3.3.3. We missed the earlier 3.x updates, so let’s summarise.

Version 3.3.3 is the latest tagged release. It adds one feature and resolves two bugs. The new feature enables the Escape key to close the secondary window. The fixes address a flipped export issue and incorrect tool tooltips. No further technical detail is provided in the release notes regarding the root cause of the export flip or the tooltip behaviour. Not independently verified at press time. Prebuilt binaries are provided for Linux x86_64, macOS arm64 and Windows amd64. Assets include tar.gz, dmg, exe and zip packages. SHA256 checksums are published for the binaries. To understand the significance of 3.3.3, it is necessary to look at the broader 3.x changes.

Sequence awareness and file handling

One of the more practical changes in the 3.3 branch arrived in version 3.3.0. The built in file browser can now display image sequences as a single item with an associated frame range. Instead of listing every frame as an individual file, the browser aggregates them into a sequence entry.

This change affects directory navigation and review workflows directly. For facilities handling large EXR sequences, reducing file list clutter improves browsing speed and visual clarity. The release notes describe this as a display change in the built in file browser. No additional details are given about sequence detection rules or supported naming conventions beyond the example provided for command line input.

The command line in 3.3.0 now accepts file sequences written in hash notation, such as render.#.exr. This aligns with established VFX naming patterns and allows users to load sequences from the terminal using shorthand notation.

Keyboard shortcuts expanded

Keyboard customisation received significant attention in 3.3.0 and 3.3.2. Version 3.3.0 introduced primary and secondary keyboard shortcuts. It also added a search box to the keyboard shortcut settings. The Tab key can now be assigned to shortcuts, including combinations such as Ctrl+Tab and Ctrl+Shit+Tab for changing the current file. The spelling in the official notes reads Ctrl+Shit+Tab.

A fix in 3.3.2 addressed the keyboard shortcuts search box. Another fix in 3.3.0 resolved keyboard shortcut behaviour in the secondary window. In 3.3.2, the version number was added to the window title, and a command line flag was introduced to print the version. A dialog for displaying system information was also added. These additions are small but relevant for deployment and support scenarios. Being able to query the version from the command line simplifies scripting and diagnostic workflows.

Mouse behaviour and interaction changes

Version 3.3.0 updated mouse configuration in several ways. Extra 1 and Extra 2 buttons were added to the mouse settings. A frame shuttle scale was introduced in the same settings panel. The default mouse mapping was changed so that the left mouse button performs frame shuttle and the middle mouse button pans. This represents a behavioural change for existing users migrating from earlier versions. A separate fix in 3.3.0 corrected swapped middle and right mouse buttons in the settings.

In 3.3.2, pixel and mouse binding labels were added to the colour picker and magnifier tools. The release notes state that both tools now update when picking with the mouse. This suggests synchronised feedback between cursor interaction and tool UI. Version 3.3.3 then added Escape key support for closing the secondary window. Together, these changes reflect ongoing adjustments to interaction ergonomics rather than new feature domains.

Colour management and UI indicators

DJV 3 integrates OCIO for colour management. In 3.3.0, the colour tool was updated to display the OCIO configuration name. At the same time, the path for the OCIO and LUT file names was hidden within the tool.

Status bar indicators were added in 3.3.0 to display whether colour controls, the audio sync offset or the output device are enabled. In 3.3.2, additional status bar indicators were introduced to display when mirroring is enabled.

In 3.3.0, compare overlay and difference modes were fixed to prevent image flipping. In 3.3.3, a flipped export issue was also fixed. The two issues are described separately in their respective release notes, with no explicit statement linking them.

The cumulative effect is a reduction in unexpected image inversion behaviour in both interactive comparison and export contexts, based on the wording of the fixes. The specific code paths affected are not described. Not independently verified at press time.

Playback behaviour

Version 3.3.0 modified playback speed behaviour. The release notes state that playback speed can be increased and decreased by pressing forward or reverse multiple times. This implies incremental speed changes tied to repeated transport input. A magnify tool was added in 3.3.0, along with grid labels. The magnify tool was later enhanced in 3.3.2 with pixel and mouse binding labels and updated mouse interaction behaviour.

Platform specific fixes and build updates

The 3.3.x series includes multiple platform and build fixes.

Version 3.3.0 fixed compilation on Rocky 8 and addressed excessive CPU usage caused by the clipboard on Gnome. It also fixed the mouse settings to only show the Command key on macOS.

Version 3.3.1 was dedicated to macOS package fixes. No further detail is provided in the release notes.

Version 3.3.2 fixed an issue with the window title bar appearing off screen.

The 3.3.0 release notes list a library update to SDL2 release 2.32.10. No additional third party dependency changes are described in the provided notes.

Version 3.3.3 assets include Linux, macOS and Windows builds, with SHA256 hashes published for verification.

What has not changed

Based on the official notes provided, the 3.3 branch does not introduce new file format support, new codec integrations, or changes to core rendering architecture. There is no mention of GPU acceleration updates, threading model changes or cache redesigns in the referenced releases.

There is also no pricing information, as DJV is distributed as free open source software via GitHub.

Any assumptions about performance improvements, stability gains beyond listed fixes, or pipeline scale suitability would be speculative and are not supported by the cited documentation. Not independently verified at press time.

Version 3 so far

Taken together, DJV 3 up to 3.3.3 reflects iterative refinement. Sequence aware browsing, expanded shortcut handling, improved mouse customisation, clearer OCIO labelling, and a series of bug fixes define the branch.

For studios using DJV as a lightweight review tool, the changes are operational. They reduce friction in file browsing, clarify status indicators, and address specific bugs such as flipped compare modes and flipped export.

As always, new tools and updates should be tested in controlled conditions before deployment in production environments.

// https://github.com/grizzlypeak3d/DJV

The post DJV 3.3.3 fixes flipped export and adds Escape first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

Neat Video is a GPU-accelerated denoising plug-in for NLEs, compositors and grading systems, including Premiere Pro, After Effects, Final Cut Pro, Motion and Baselight. It builds device specific noise profiles and applies spatial and temporal filtering inside the host application.

OFX plug in across Windows, macOS and Linux

Neat Video v6 is available as a plug in for OpenFX hosts on Windows, macOS and Linux. Version 6.1 of the Neat Video v6 plug in for OFX hosts adds support for Baselight 7. This extends compatibility for grading workflows using OpenFX on macOS and Linux in that host.

Expanded support in other hosts

According to the vendor, version 6.1 adds compatibility with the latest versions of several major host applications. These include Premiere Pro 2026 on Windows and macOS and After Effects 2026 on Windows and macOS. On macOS, version 6.1 supports Final Cut Pro 12 and Motion 6 from Apple. The plug-in is compatible with standalone versions purchased from the App Store as well as bundled versions of Final Cut Pro 12 and Motion 6 included in Apple Creator Studio. The vendor states that the Neat Video 6.1 plug in functions identically in both cases, allowing users to switch between those versions if required. Support for Baselight 7 has also been added, as noted above, via the OFX plug in.

Default Noise Profile and Filter Preset controls

A key update in version 6.1 is the introduction of new controls to simplify using a fixed noise profile and filter preset when working with a series of clips with the same noise. The stated aim is to speed up the overall setup process when applying multiple instances of the noise-reduction effect to similar materials.

Users can now set the Default Noise Profile using the current noise profile. This is implemented through a new button with a popup menu in the Device Noise Profile panel and through new commands in the main menu under Profile.

Similarly, users can set the Default Filter Preset using the current filter settings. This is available via a new button with a popup menu in the Filter Settings panel and through new commands in the main menu under Filter. When the filter is applied to additional clips in the same series, new instances automatically load the Default Noise Profile and Default Filter Preset.

The improved representation of the names of the current noise profile and current filter preset makes it clear when defaults are in use. Their names are displayed in the Device Noise Profile and Filter Settings panels.

The Input Data Gain section in Preferences is disabled when the Default Noise Profile is used. The vendor states that this is because the actually applied gain is determined by the Default Noise Profile in that case.

Reset controls and minor fixes

Version 6.1 adds a new Reset button in the Device Noise Profile panel and a corresponding command in the main menu under Profile to reset the current noise profile. A new Reset button with a popup menu has also been added to the Preferences dialog. This allows users to reset settings on the current page, reset settings on all pages, or re enable all optional messages and dialogs that were previously disabled.

Neat Video 6.1 is available as a free update for licensed users of version 6. Users of earlier major versions can upgrade with a discount. Demo editions are available for evaluation. As always, new tools and updates should be tested in a controlled environment before deployment in production.

// https://www.neatvideo.com/blog/post/neat-video-61-host-support-better-workflow
// https://www.neatvideo.com/download/history/ofx-plugin

The post Neat Video 6.1 updates OFX and host support first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

For those who don’t know the tool: 3DEqualizer by Science-D-Visions is a high-end 3D tracking and matchmoving tool used in VFX and compositing workflows. It connects to Maya, Blender, Nuke and others to generate precise camera and object solves for integration of CG elements.

Over the winter break, Science-D-Visions released 3DEqualizer4 Release 8.1. The update focuses on precision and pipeline reliability, with several technical improvements aimed at matchmove and postvis specialists.

Piggyback rigs and postvis tools

The standuot addition is a new control pane for computing main camera motion from a piggyback or auxiliary camera, including 360-degree setups. This workflow allows the calibration of static camera-to-camera transformations directly from calibration or production shots. Science-D-Visions also provides a demonstration video of this workflow. To simplify onset capture, a new import script lets users load footage directly from movie files, reducing dependency on external transcoding tools.

Small but targeted refinements

Release 8.1 introduces a new high-pass filter in image controls, a frequently requested addition for analysing fine detail in tracking plates. It also adds start-frame parameters to USD and Alembic exports, allowing more precise control when aligning sequences in downstream departments. A new Attribute Editor plugin demonstrates how to reference 3D models directly from USD files, intended as an example for studios developing their own custom pipeline tools. The update further includes a rewritten Blender export script (v2.0) that matches the design of the Python-based Maya exporter from Release 8.0.

Technical updates and Python 3.11

Under the hood, 3DEqualizer 8.1 moves to Python 3.11. The runtime update brings better session management, new methods for converting OpenCV-style lens distortion to native 3DE formats, and improved image buffer handling. Several older tools were refined, including decimation of 3D models with correct UV handling, enhanced curve filtering, and better distance constraint behaviour. The development team also addressed multiple stability issues: bug fixes cover 2D track exports to Flame, curve editor display errors, long-lat conversion crashes, and problems with rolling shutter exports.

Export and scripting improvements

Maya export now includes user preferences, the “object pgroup z distance” tool gained motion path transfer functionality, and file requesters now display file sizes in human-readable format. The ScriptDB installer received fixes for SSL warnings, and the “reel in points” and “import 2D tracks” tools were corrected for minor issues.

Pricing and compatibility

3DEqualizer 8.1 runs on Windows 10+, glibc 2.17+ Linux, and macOS 13.5+. Perpetual licences cost €7 699 (around USD 9 065), while subscriptions range from €65 per week to €1 704 per year. As always, new builds should be tested in non-critical environments before being rolled out to production shots, especially given the shift to Python 3.11 and updated exporters, which may affect pipeline compatibility.

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The post 3DEqualizer 8.1 Adds Piggyback Camera Solves first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

For those who don’t know the tool: MoonRay is DreamWorks Animation’s in-house Monte Carlo path tracer, open-sourced in 2023 under Apache 2.0. It drives DreamWorks’ film rendering pipeline and supports hybrid CPU/GPU (XPU) modes. MoonRay integrates with DCCs via its Hydra delegate (hdMoonRay) for tools such as Houdini and Katana. The project includes the Arras framework for distributed rendering and collaboration across clusters.

Light Path Visualiser Enters the Scene

The new light path visualiser in moonray_gui is the most visible change in version 2.34.0.1. It lets artists trace how rays travel through a scene, showing how light interacts with surfaces, volumes, and materials. The visualisation is colour-coded by ray type and can reveal sampling or shading inconsistencies that are otherwise invisible. It also serves as a diagnostic tool for debugging light source or material behaviour.

Platform Updates: macOS Tahoe Joins, Linux Builds Simplified

MoonRay can now build natively on macOS Tahoe, with Sonoma and Sequoia still supported. The renderer also benefits from dependency updates and inculde fixes, easing compilation on a broader range of Linux distributions. The release aligns with both VFX Reference Platform 2024 and 2025, ensuring compatibility with current production libraries and compilers.

New Features Across the Pipeline

Version 2.34.0.1 expands flexibility for lighting and shading setups. Per-lobe lightsets are now available in both vector and XPU modes, allowing finer control of multi-lobe BSDFs. Image maps gain bindable “scale” and “offset” attributes, and SceneVariables documentation for image sizing has been clarified. Performance-wise, MoonRay now shares CPU and memory affinity data between processes using shared memory, improving parallel job efficiency. Timing measurements have switched to a more efficient RDTSC-based method for NUMA [non-uniform memory access] systems, offering more stable profiling results. Artists can also now select lights and cameras for object-space transformations directly in map shaders, simplifying custom shading graph workflows.

Fixes: From Subsurface Scatter to Fisheye Crashes

A long list of bug fixes makes this release notably production-friendly. Key repairs include:

• Fixed a mesh tessellation issue in tiled renders with the FisheyeCamera.
• Resolved DwaTwoSidedMaterial artefacts caused by previous lobe lightset work.
• Corrected crashes when exceeding BSDF lobe limits or loading oversized MeshLights, which now trigger warnings instead.
• Addressed a memory usage spike in vector and XPU modes.
• Fixed missing lightset assignments in vector subsurface scattering and adjusted over-bright subsurface shading on creases.
• Corrected normal direction errors in scalar mode and improved TransformSpaceMap behaviour.
• Fixed adaptive light sampling, volume bounce contributions, and a crash in OpenImageIO 2.4.8 statistics when no images were opened.

Under the Hood: Clean-Up and Refactoring

DreamWorks also restructured several internal libraries. The noise library moved from moonshine/lib/common to moonray/lib/common, simplifying dependencies. The integrator logic for Cryptomatte was reduced in complexity, and redundant intersection path types were removed. Code clean-up continues across lib/rendering/shading, improving maintainability without changing behaviour.

Availability

MoonRay 2.34.0.1 is available now as open-source via the official repository. It can be compiled for Linux and macOS (Tahoe, Sonoma, and Sequoia). GPU rendering requires NVIDIA CUDA/OptiX or Apple Silicon.

Caution Before Production

As with any open-source renderer update, production users should validate the build and test scene compatibility before deployment in live pipelines.

The post Rays Behaving Badly No More: MoonRay 2.34.0.1 Fixes the Path first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Bela Beier.

In a move that’s sure to delight post-production professionals, Blackmagic Design has released DaVinci Resolve 19.1.4, bringing ProRes support to Windows and Linux platforms. This update marks a significant enhancement for cross-platform workflows, allowing editors and colorists greater flexibility in their projects.

ProRes Support Across Platforms

The standout feature of this update is the introduction of ProRes support for Windows and Linux users. Previously, ProRes—a high-quality video codec developed by Apple—was predominantly accessible on macOS. By extending support to other operating systems, Blackmagic Design enables a more seamless experience for professionals working across different platforms.

Benefits for Post-Production Workflows

With ProRes support now available on Windows and Linux, post-production teams can expect improved compatibility and efficiency. This update facilitates smoother collaboration between professionals using diverse systems, reducing the need for time-consuming transcoding processes. As a result, editors, VFX artists, and colorists can focus more on their creative tasks and less on technical hurdles.

Availability and Pricing

DaVinci Resolve 19.1.4 is available for download on Blackmagic Design’s official website. The update is free for existing users, maintaining Blackmagic Design’s commitment to providing accessible, high-quality tools for the creative community. For new users, DaVinci Resolve offers both a free version and a Studio version with advanced features, priced at $295.

A Word of Caution

While the addition of ProRes support is a welcome development, it’s advisable to thoroughly test this new feature within your specific workflow before implementing it in critical projects. Ensuring compatibility and stability in your production environment is crucial to maintaining project integrity.

For more details and to download the update, visit Blackmagic Design’s official support page.

The post DaVinci Resolve 19.1.4: ProRes Support Now on Windows and Linux first appeared on DIGITAL PRODUCTION and was written by Günter Hagedorn.