Caligari Ships trueSpace2; Advanced modeling functions and interactive rendering bring workstation-class performance into reach of PC users.

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif--(BUINESS WIRE)--June 27, 1995--Caligari Corporation is now shipping trueSpace2 for Windows, award-winning 3D graphics and animation software which makes 3D graphics accessible to 2D illustrators, multimedia producers, game and interactive media developers, animators and many others. trueSpace2 features a host of technical innovations including Shaded Graphics Modeling (interactive rendering of 3D objects), 3D Boolean operations, organic surface sculpting, interactive lighting, procedural textures, the ability to map video onto 3D objects, a variety of animation and broadcast video enhancements, plus much more. With a suggested retail price of $795, trueSpace2 also includes Caligari trueClips, a CD-ROM of over 200 textures and 600 professional-quality 3D objects. trueSpace2is a 32-bit application and ships with Win32 extensions.

trueSpace2 seamlessly integrates organic modeling, photorealistic raytracing and broadcast-quality animation within a usable VR-style interface that encourages experimentation, stimulates creativity, and gives users the ability to easily create stunning renderings and animations. This interface involves users in a three-dimensional perspective workspace where they can shape objects as naturally as if working with clay.

"For an artist, any interruption to the creative flow is a headache. Productivity and creativity go hand in hand, and both are enhanced with trueSpace. And trueSpace2's new Shaded Graphics Mode goes beyond interactive by allowing me to visualize my ideas almost as quickly as I can imagine them," said Paul Safr of MEDIA Innovations in Ontario, Canada.

"trueSpace2 continues to serve the needs of the professional 3D artist who is looking for a less expensive but very powerful Windows-based alternative to DOS- or workstation-based 3D animation programs," said Neil McElwee, vice president of marketing at Caligari Corporation. "But even more significantly, trueSpace2 provides hundreds of thousands of users of 2D graphics and illustration software a clear and complementary migration path toward usable 3D graphics and animation."

Realtime Interactive Rendering

Offering workstation-class modeling performance for the first time under Windows, trueSpace2 provides Shaded Graphics Modeling, the realtime interactive rendering of 3D objects as solids. trueSpace2's interactive rendering is optimized to take advantage of the newest generation of 3D acceleration chips and graphics boards. Now users can fully interact with 3D objects, walk or fly through fully-colored scenes, and immediately see the effects of adding lights or changing their attributes on the fly. Wireframe views are still invaluable for point-editing, but realtime rendering makes it easier to display objects as realistic solids, position them, combine them through Boolean or other operations, and visualize the effects immediately.

"Interactive rendering is the key innovation in trueSpace2," said Roman Ormandy, president and CEO of Caligari Corporation. "trueSpace2 has always been a unique package in that it seamlessly integrates organic modeling, rendering and animation under an `immersive' interface. Users have always found our approach to 3D easy-to-use and understand, but now - with realtime rendering - users can work in full color and progress beyond the CAD-like world of wireframes. This is an enormous benefit for PC users."

Workstation-Class Modeling

Recently named the officially authorized modeler for the PlayStation game machine by Sony Computer Entertainment, trueSpace is renowned for its advanced modeling functions which let users shape objects like clay rather than forcing them to construct objects in a prescribed sequence of steps. In version 2, Caligari fully implements direct manipulation of texture-mapped objects with real-time feedback. Free-form deformations now work without lattices, making it easier to precisely manipulate organic shapes. Numerical controls have been added for point editing and deformations, and auto-dimensioning now greatly facilitates the creation of technical illustrations and product prototypes.

Beyond basic modeling tools such as lathing, extrusion and beveling, trueSpace2 now also includes organic surface sculpting, a feature previously only available on high-end workstations. trueSpace2 also features extremely fast 3D Boolean operations, which enable users to build complex shapes quickly and easily by simulating the real-world effects of chiseling, drilling holes and fusing 3D shapes together. trueSpace2's realtime rendering makes it easier for users to position multiple objects, add or subtract them through Boolean operations, and visualize the results instantly. Because almost every operation can be accomplished in perspective space, traditional orthogonal views are rarely needed anymore.

New Animation and Video Capabilities

In trueSpace2, users can apply AVI movies to objects as textures and display them in real time. Users can play back Video for Windows files as backgrounds and animate light color and intensity.

The new animated deformations are likely to create the most dazzling animation effects of trueSpace2. Just as on high-end workstations, texture-mapped objects can now be deformed by editable primitive objects such as planes and pipes in real time. This allows for effects like pushing a car through a keyhole or a video clip being deformed by an undulating surface. Objects can become more or less transparent in the course of an animation, and fog as well as bump and environment maps can now be keyframed. A keyframe monitor was added to make it easy to coordinate all the new keyframe animation parameters. Spline-based animations have also been enhanced. By adding and deleting spline nodes, users gain precise control over the acceleration of objects; keyframes can now be copied, shifted and stretched. Path, keyframe, and hierarchical animations can be integrated through a visual time-line editor.

Improving upon its broadcast video capabilities, trueSpace2 provides field rendering, a technique which effectively enables users to double the NTSC and PAL standard frame rate from 30 or 25 frames per second (fps) to 60 or 50 fps respectively. This capability, essential for professional videographers, reduces flicker and makes animations look extra-smooth when played back from videotape.

Procedural Textures and Rendering Enhancements

Procedural textures are now available to create custom non-tiling materials such as wood, granite and marble. Thus, if an object is cut in half, the grain of the wood continues naturally on the newly exposed surface of the cut. Procedural textures also helps simplify large-scale projects by eliminating bitmap files that take a lot of storage space and have to be carefully projected onto objects to look natural and not show the seam of the image.

trueSpace2 features a motion blur tool which creates or replicates the human perception of an object or a whole scene in motion. Users can also modify the hyperfocal distance to achieve depth of field and determine which objects are in sharp focus and which are blurred. The ability to modify depth of field adds further "photographic" realism to trueSpace2 scenes.

New Supported Plug-ins and File Formats

In addition to supporting 3D formats such as AutoCAD .DXF, 3D Studio, WaveFront, Imagine and LightWave, and the import of standard formats like .BMP and .TGA, trueSpace2 now supports Adobe Photoshop plug-ins, PostScript and Adobe Illustrator formats, as well as FLIC and JPEG.

trueClips CD-ROM

trueSpace2 also includes Caligari trueClips, a CD-ROM of over 200 textures and 600 professional-quality 3D objects. trueClips is designed as a companion product to trueSpace and provides users with a rich library of nearly half a gigabyte of professionally-designed content to be used as royalty-free building blocks and materials for trueSpace creations.

System Requirements

Caligari trueSpace2 requires a 386 CPU (486 or Pentium is preferred), Windows 3.1 or higher, 8 MB of RAM (16 MB is preferred) and 10 MB of free hard disk space. A CD-ROM drive and Windows graphics accelerator are also recommended.

Pricing and Availability

Caligari trueSpace2 for Windows is available now for a suggested retail price of $795. The upgrade is $149 to registered trueSpace 1.0 users. Through May 31, 1995, upgrades are free for customers who purchased trueSpace 1.0 after November 14, 1994. Caligari trueSpace2 is distributed through Egghead, Fry's Electronics, Ingram Micro, Inc. and Academic Distributing in the US; Sumitomo Metal Industries (SMI) in Japan; DTP Partner and Computer2000 in Germany; Tricom in Korea; and Roderick Manhattan & Assoc. in the UK.

About Caligari Corporation

Caligari Corporation was founded in 1985 with the mission to facilitate human communication through the development and marketing of software-based 3D environments. This mission is based on a paradigm shift from seeing the PC as a machine serving existing communication media (such as press or video) to seeing the network of PCs as a new communication medium itself. The company has a proven track record in 3D interface design and has continued to develop and improve its core 3D technologies over the last ten years. To achieve realtime, navigable 3D worlds on the World Wide Web, Caligari will build support for VRML (Virtual Reality Modeling Language) into future products. Caligari Corporation is headquartered at 1933 Landings Dr., Mountain View, California, 94043. Phone: [phone] or 415/390-9600. Fax: [phone]. -0-

Note to Editors: Caligari, Caligari trueSpace, Shaded Graphics Modeling, viewSpace and Caligari 3D World Builder are trademarks of Caligari Corporation. Other company and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.

CONTACT: Caligari Corp., Mountain View

Neil McElwee, 415/390-9600

or

McLean PR

Kim Haas Dion, 415/513-8800

Internet:[e-mail]