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packages of the year. Here are the terrific 10 items that earned the most votes, in
alphabetical order:
3ds Max (3D Studio Max) ’09. Employed in many of the top Hollywood film
productions, videogames and TV commercials, but also priced for the home studio, this
full-featured 3D modeling, animation, rendering and effects solution has everything you
need to create high-quality content. The latest version, 3ds Max 9, offers new rendering
capabilities, improved interoperability with industry-standard products including Revit
software, lighting simulation and analysis technology, and additional time-saving
animation and mapping workflow tools. The software now comes in two distinct flavors
to better meet the specific needs of entertainment and visualization customers. In
addition, greater OBJ translation fidelity and more import/export options allow for more
accurate data transfers between 3ds Max and digital modeling packages, including the
new Autodesk Mudbox software. Suggested retail price is $3,495, with upgrades from
3ds Max 2008 going for approximately $895.
Adobe Creative Suite 4 Master Collection. Adobe has crammed a bunch of its popular
software applications into this little box. This comprehensive, cross-media creative
environment offers users a wide variety of options for designing print, interactive, web,
film, video and mobile content. Integrating new versions of widely used Adobe software,
the suite allows artists to design freely with images, vectors, video and sound, moving
easily from page to screen. The Master Collection combines Adobe InDesign CS4,
Photoshop CS4 Extended, Illustrator CS4, Acrobat 9 Pro, Flash CS4 Professional,
Dreamweaver CS4, Fireworks CS4, Contribute CS4, After Effects CS4, Premiere Pro
CS4, Soundbooth CS4, OnLocation CS4 and Encore CS4 with additional tools and
services. You get all that for $2,499, or upgrade for $899.
Maya ’09. Once the crown jewel in Alias|Wavefront’s arsenal of digital creation tools,
Maya is now a sibling of Autodesk’s 3ds Max. Maya ’09 launched just in time to
celebrate the 10-year anniversary of the popular 3D modeling, animation, rendering and
effects solution. Highlights of the latest release include a new Maya Assets toolset and
other new tools for managing the complexity and size of scenes, a new Render Proxy
feature in mental ray, additional multi-threading work and algorithmic speedups,
accelerated modeling workflow and collaborative, iterative projects and pipelines. The
software has a new animation layering paradigm that provides animators with increased
non-destructive flexibility, as well as an updated Render Pass toolset that offers precise
control over render output and optimizes integration with Autodesk Toxik procedural
compositing software. The suggested retail price is $1,995 for Maya Complete 2009
(standalone) and $4,995 for Maya Unlimited 2009 (standalone). The upgrade price from
Maya Complete 2008 is $899, and the upgrade from Maya Unlimited 2008 is $1,249.
Pixologic’s ZBrush 3.1. It’s not surprising that many of today’s 3D artists, game
developers and CG model supervisors have embraced this leading software application.
The 3.1 version offers a new Brush Palette and features such as color mask and back-face
masking, as well as poseable symmetry, user-assigned hotkeys, support of square alphas,
refined user interface and higher subdivision levels. This slickly integrated modeling,
texturing and illustration environment also offers instant feedback and real-time response
—kind of like a friendly teacher (priced at $599) you can count on when you need to
deliver a challenging digital sculpting assignment!
Toon Boom Software. Our readers had a hard time picking among the Montreal-based
company’s family of various products, but one thing they all agreed on was that the
Emmy-winning solutions have made 2D animation much easier and user-friendly.
Whether they’re aimed at home users (Toon Boom Studio), boutique shops, freelancers
and educators (Toon Boom Animate or Toon Boom Digital Pro) or traditional film/TV
industry studios (Toon Boom Opus and Harmony), they’ve been hugely influential in the
creation of modern animation projects in the past two decades. They even have a great
model for beginners—Flip Boom, which is ideal for learning the basics. Keep in mind
that some of the notable 2D animated features of recent years (The Triplets of Belleville,
The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie and Curious George) used Toon Boom software in
their pipelines!
Wacom Cintiq 12WX. Aaaah, Wacom tablet, how do we love thee. It’s easy to admire
the beautiful design, the 12.1” TFT display and the way the 4.4 pound gizmo offers the
advantages of a wide-format LCD monitor with Wacom’s pro pen technology. We could
mention the point accuracy, the fast cursor control and the 1,000-plus levels of pressure-
sensitivity on the pen tip and eraser, but once you take a look at the 12WX, the heart
takes over the mind. Most important of all, you can take this small wonder home for only
a grand.