E-on Software has announced that its Vue 10 product line will be unveiled beginning in early November, bringing with it faster rendering performance, render comparisons, spline and road tools, streamlined terrain editing and a new dynamic rock create technology as well as a physical water shading engine. Overall, Vue 10 is expected to improve speed, efficiency and focus on terrain and object creation, along with better “photographic” effects.
The Vue 10 product line will consist primarily of three branches, with Vue Infinite and Vue xStream aimed at CG professionals; Vue Esprit, Studio and Complete aimed at 3D artists; and Vue Pioneer, 3D Superhero and Frontier (along with accompanying theme packs) aimed at 3D beginners and enthusiasts. The high-end pro solutions will ship first.
The new version features a comprehensive spline toolset that can quickly create eco-systems and terrain, and now uses an automatic “path-finding” algorithm to easily create roads on the surface of terrains. A new library of rock templates incorporates single or grouped rocks into eco-systems, with new variations created for each rock in a template. The new water shading engine allow for more realistic light absorption in a body of water and produce better underwater caustics.
Vue 10 lets users set the phase of animated elements on a per-instance basis, with the new Lean-Out control making it possible to define how the eco-system instances will “lean out” towards zones of lower density. Improvements have also been made on terrain editing, including precise previewing of active zones while painting with an Environment Constrait applied and mask rotation enabling or disabling. A new Strata3D node is now available for stratified rock formations such as canyon walls, and a Custom 3D terrain brush has been added along with improved material painting.
Users can now stack and compare previous renders, and overlay two renders (even with multi-pass layers) and use HDR difference tools for better analysis. Faster, lightweight “render clones” can be created to test effects without altering the original render. Vue 10 also now offers edge-based anti-aliasing (along side the previous color-based anti-aliasing), improved depth-of-field and motion blur, multiple camera aspect ratio variation, and up to 30 percent faster rendering speed along with many other tweaks and improvements.
Uses of the higher-end Vue products who are under maintenance agreements will get the upgrade for free, but can also opt to download a pre-release version of their Vue 10 upgrade now for testing. Customers who purchased Vue 9.5 xStream or Infinite recently (within 30 days of the release) will also receive a free upgrade. Vue 9 Esprit, Studio or Complete users who are part of Cornucopia Software’s Vue Product Subscription Program are also eligible for a free upgrade.
