Syflex announces Sylyn
Syflex’s montage of teaser images of Sylyn, its upcoming node-based 3D animation software. The developer is currently calling for artists to help alpha test the software. Click the image to view it at full-size.
Syflex has announced Sylyn, a “brand-new, fully node-based 3D animation” system. The new product, which is still in alpha, will include a full copy of Syflex’s eponymous cloth-simulation software.
A work-in-progress procedural animation system
There’s very little info about Sylyn on Syflex’s site, but it seems to be a completely procedural animation system.
Every part of its functionality can be represented as a node, while “new nodes can be created by combining and connecting nodes. These … can then be added to the menu, and become part of the software.”
Since any input to a node can be animated via a graph animation node, that opens up the possibility of creating a wide range of types of animation.
The montage of screenshots on Syflex’s website show both technical animation – for which this type of system would seem a more natural fit – and character work. There’s even what looks to be a Boolean operation.
The animation graph itself looks fairly simple, but the software is still early in development, and Syflex has a record of developing production tools, with Syflex itself having been used on a range of movies and cinematics.
Pricing and availability
Syflex is currently inviviting artists to alpha test Sylyn. There’s no information on pricing or a release date yet.