New tutorial: Realtime camera motion recording in Maya
My first tutorial is up! Have a look at "Real-time Camera Motion Recording in Maya for under $50: Using a SpaceNavigator for Maya Camera Flythroughs". I also recorded a 15-minute video tutorial that...
View ArticleNew tutorial: Installing Maya 8 on Fedora Core 8
I finally wrote up my notes about how to install Maya on Linux (Fedora Core), with some bonus notes about how to install drivers for an Nvidia video card. You can read the tutorial here.
View ArticleAnnouncement: cgspeed.com release of over 2500 free BVH files
I'm happy to announce the free release of an enhanced BVH conversion of the entire set of 2548 human motions from the Carnegie-Mellon Graphics Lab Motion Capture Database. This is a large set of...
View ArticleFollowup to CMU BVH files release
In the weeks since I released the BVH conversion of the Carnegie-Mellon motion files in July, I've received a variety of email inquiries from people who quite sensibly would like to get the files to...
View ArticleAnnouncing BVHplay, a free BVH animation player
I've just released BVHplay, a free, lightweight, Python-based, multi-OS, open-source playback utility for BVH animation files.To learn more about it and/or download it, head on over to the main BVHplay...
View ArticlePoser-friendly conversion of the CMU BVH files
Mike Sutton of mojodallas.com has taken the BVH conversion release of the Carnegie-Mellon motion capture dataset and run it through his own set of scripts to make it more feasible to use the motions in...
View ArticleNews items
Here are a few news items relevant to the hobbyist CG community:- Craft Animations has released free lite versions of several of their Maya and 3dsMax camera tools, including Craft "4-Wheeler Free",...
View Article3DCG for the hobbyist - a short reference document
I've made some edits to a previously-published "one-pager" document which provides a large number of links to software and tools for 3DCG work. The document is titled 3DCG for the hobbyist - useful...
View ArticleMotion capture report from GDC09, San Francisco
I attended the Game Developer's Conference (GDC'09) in San Francisco on Friday March 27 so that you didn't have to. So if you missed GDC this year, this is your lucky day. I don't develop games, and...
View ArticleCMU 2500-motion database released in 3dsMax-friendly version
I'm pleased to announce a 3dsMax-Biped-friendly BVH release of the Carnegie-Mellon University (CMU) motion database. Last year I released a Motionbuilder-friendly version of the data, but because...
View ArticleVery low-cost portable sound booth
Good audio is critical for any video work - in fact, many creative professionals have noted that more video projects end up unsuccessful due to bad audio than due to any other reason. Traditionally the...
View ArticleWhat the hobbyist animation community needs
I recently received email from somebody in the animation software industry who wondered if I had any comments about the capabilities that hobbyist animators needs. Below is an edited version of my...
View ArticleDancing 3D avatar software
While it's not going to be iClone any time soon, the free software Mikumiku Dance appears to allow a fair amount of animation capability if your thing is making dancing 3D anime-style avatars. The...
View ArticleBlender for fan anime
Blender (with After Effects) comes of age for toon-shaded, anime-based fan animation. Related sites include a brief BlenderNation article, and the creator's own site. Note the use of...
View ArticleCMU motion capture BVH release for Daz characters is in progress
Here's a 60-second test video that I made with a BVH file from the upcoming Daz-friendly conversion of the Carnegie-Mellon BVH dataset. I'm working on a new conversion which will complement the...
View ArticleAnimazoo Gypsy 7 announced - now under $10K
Picture: the Gypsy 7 suit (on the right). The left suit is Animazoo'sinertial-based system, so ignore it - that's not a Gypsy 7 I received an announcement today about the upcoming Gypsy 7 motion...
View ArticleThe cgspeed Daz-friendly release of over 2500 BVH files is now available
I'm pleased to announce the most recent BVH conversion of the Carnegie-Mellon (CMU) motion capture library. The new conversion is for the Daz (daz3d.com) 3rd-generation and 4th-generation characters...
View ArticleA Carrara 8 test
I finally took advantage of the deep-discount offer on Carrara 8 Pro provided by 3D World magazine issue 133, which shipped with a copy of Carrara 7 Pro on the enclosed DVD plus an upgrade-to-8 offer....
View ArticleMotion capture page is currently down / broken
I've received several email messages letting me know that the motion capture page associated with cgspeed is down - this page is hosted within Google Site at...
View ArticleInterim files listing part 1: Original BVH conversions
While I begin to work through the process of attempting to get Google to restore the cgspeed Google Sites content, which contained a variety of notes and explanations about the different filesets, I'll...
View ArticleInterim files listing part 2: 3dsMax-friendly BVH conversions
While I begin to work through the process of attempting to get Google to restore the cgspeed Google Sites content, which contained a variety of notes and explanations about the different filesets, I'll...
View ArticleInterim files listing part 3: Daz-friendly BVH conversions with hip correction
While I begin to work through the process of attempting to get Google to restore the cgspeed Google Sites content, which contained a variety of notes and explanations about the different filesets, I'll...
View ArticleInterim files listing part 4: Daz-friendly BVH conversions, secondary release...
While I begin to work through the process of attempting to get Google to restore the cgspeed Google Sites content, which contained a variety of notes and explanations about the different filesets, I'll...
View ArticleInterim files listing part 5: Updated (2010) Motionbuilder-friendly release
While I begin to work through the process of attempting to get Google to restore the cgspeed Google Sites content, which contained a variety of notes and explanations about the different filesets, I'll...
View ArticleThe CGspeed Sites page content is now restored
I was able to work through a content-restore process with Google, so the original CGspeed Google Sites pages should now be working again. The page that will matter to most people is...
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