Red Giant Software releases Trapcode Mir
Red Giant Software has released Trapcode Mir, Peder Norrby’s new plugin for generating quick-rendering 3D geometry within After Effects for motion graphics work.
Unlike Video Copilot’s Element 3D, which imports and renders existing 3D models within After Effects, Mir takes a more abstract approach, deforming a polygon grid with fractal noise.
The geometry can be displayed as wireframes, points or solid geometry, and there is a choice of three shading modes: flat-shaded, Phong, or ‘density’, which creates an effect like smoke.
Up to eight lights can be placed within the scene, and the plugin supports screen-space ambient occlusion.
Runs on any modern GPU
Mir is GPU-based, but via OpenGL rather than CUDA, so it should run on any graphics card which supports OpenGL 2.1 or higher and has at least 512MB VRAM.
The plugin requires After Effects CS4 or above, and runs on Mac OS X 10.6+ or Windows XP+.
Trapcode Mir costs $99 as a standalone, or $899 as part of Trapcode Suite 12: a collection of Peder Norrby’s other plugins including Form, Particular and Lux, all of which also receive minor updates.
Read more about Trapcode Mir on the Red Giant Software website
Read more about Trapcode Mir on Peder Norrby’s blog (Includes other demo videos)