Pixar makes RenderMan free for non-commercial use
Use for tools development is fine too. Ships with Maya and Katana plugins; Houdini and C4D to come.
Tuesday, March 24th, 2015
Maya
Nvidia launches Iray 2015
GPU-based renderer gets support for instancing, AxF material format. New Maya plugin and server edition also in development.
Monday, March 23rd, 2015
Nvidia unveils Quadro M6000
Jason Lewis runs through the specs of Nvidia's new top-of-the-range pro GPU, and reveals some early benchmark results.
Thursday, March 19th, 2015
DNA Research ships 3Delight for 3ds Max 2.0
RenderMan-compliant renderer used on Elysium now available for 3ds Max. The first licence is free.
Thursday, March 19th, 2015
Fabric Engine 2.0 to add visual programming system
Updated: Create high-end VFX tools by wiring nodes together, Softimage ICE-style. See a demo video here.
Tuesday, March 10th, 2015
Get a free region rendering tool for Maya and Arnold
Download Arvid Schneider and Rico Koschmitzky's neat add-on for MtoA, plus two new bonus helper tools.
Tuesday, March 10th, 2015
Hans Godard releases RBF Solver for Maya
Naughty Dog TD's neat add-on automatically fires off complex correctives to fix mesh deformation issues in rigs.
Monday, March 9th, 2015
Nvidia releases PhysX source code on GitHub
Get the full C++ source of the top game physics system, including the clothing and destruction libraries.
Thursday, March 5th, 2015
Nvidia releases new mental ray Alembic import shader
Free download adds support for hair and subdivision controls for NURBS and sub-Ds. Works with Maya 2015.
Friday, February 20th, 2015
Mainframe North releases Mash 3.3 for Maya
Set of 27 handy motion graphics nodes now available on Linux as well as Windows and Mac OS X.
Wednesday, February 18th, 2015
LuxRender 1.4 ships
Free physically based renderer moves to new core architecture; renders 'at least two times faster'.
Monday, February 9th, 2015
Miquel Campos releases mGear for Maya for free
Download this open source modular character rigging framework, based on the Gear system for Softimage.
Monday, February 9th, 2015
3Dconnexion unveils 'first mouse for CAD pros'
But don't let that put you off: the CadMouse comes with software profiles for 3ds Max and Maya too.
Monday, February 9th, 2015