Production-Level
Tool Helps Amateurs, Indie Game Developers and Small Studios Rework Their Mocap
and Animation Data for Free
Animation on the go. High-grade retargeting for the little
guy. With the influx of smaller studios entering into the independent film and
game development industries, ideas like these are becoming more important.
Today, they will be achieved with the release of IKinema™
LTD’s WebAnimate – an all-in-one platform that can professionally retarget and
customize animation through your browser.
Based
off the same IKinema technology that major studios like Framestore and 20th
Century Fox trust, WebAnimate’s built-in toolset allows users to fashion rigs, manipulate
bones, retarget/ customize motion capture data and animation all in the span of
a few minutes. With this program, independent studios and individuals working
on games, films, and mobile projects can now realize realistic and believable
animation at a price they can afford. Free.
“It’s time to make high-quality
tools available to everyone in the animation
community,” says Alexandre Pechev, CEO of IKinema. “We recognized a need for an
affordable solution for small studios and amateurs exploring this field, so we
adapted our product to address it. WebAnimate will give all indie developers a
new power tool for their creative arsenal.”
Over
the course of the next year, users can expect to see new features added to WebAnimate.
The introductory version of the platform will allow for the retargeting of
motion capture data to models from standard formats such as bvh, FBX, and in the
near future, c3d. Both experienced and beginner users alike can use this
platform to quickly port motion capture data from cloud or local sources
directly to their models. They can also tap into the vast number of free mocap
files that reside online. Traditionally, this functionality has been only
available to high-end markets.
WebAnimate democratizes this toolset by making this
high-end software accessible to anyone who wants to use it; in part, by tapping
into the well-traveled ground of their browser.
Because
IKinema’s solver works off of a
browser, users are able to animate or retarget from anywhere. This is
especially helpful for development teams with members that telecommute from across
the globe. With WebAnimate, they only have to sign on to the Internet to start
collaborating on projects from afar. For a small studio, this flexibility will
save a lot of money and will give their artists some room to focus on the
things that make them happy; like the speed at which WebAnimate allows them to
dynamically animate human and fantasy characters.
“People live online. So why can’t their
animation tools live there too?” added Pechev. “WebAnimate was created to not
only level the playing field, but to place it where most people spend their
workday. We think this will yield some exciting results.”
Pricing
and Availability
WebAnimate
is available now and can be used by visiting http://www.ikinema.com/webanimate/. It will remain free of charge while in its beta
period. After that, users will only be charged when their animations or poses
are exported for commercial use. However, it will always be free to try out and
experiment within WebAnimate, as well as store or use the scenes you create in
a proprietary format.
About IKinema
Based in the UK,
IKinema™ uses patent-pending technology for fast full-body solving and
animation. With customers ranging from Framestore’s London Studio to Twentieth
Century Fox’s pre-visualization department, IKinema’s technology enables animators to rig characters and
stream, record and retarget motion capture data in a fraction of the time and
cost of alternative solutions. Available as game middleware, standalone
software or an online solution, IKinema’s technology is poised to radically
simplify the motion capture workflows for professional production studios and
bring real-time motion editing within the reach of home users.
©
Copyright 2011 IKinema is a registered trademark of IKinema LTD., in the UK and/or
other countries. All products or brand
names mentioned are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective
holders.
For more information, press only:
Liaison
Inc.
Heidi
Lowell, (503) 796-9822, Heidi@liaisonpr.com
Reader
contact:
IKinema LTD
Surrey Technology Centre, 40 Occam Road
The Surrey Research
Park
Guildford, UK GU2
&YG
+44 2071939839