Maya 5 with Quadro FX Smashes Rendering Barrier; Graphics Industry Leaders Alias/Wavefront and NVIDIA Introduce Hardware Rendering Breakthrough.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

NAB2003

LAS VEGAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 7, 2003

Alias/Wavefront(TM), an SGI (NYSE:SGI) company, revealed today an innovative new Hardware rendering capability in its recently announced Maya(R) 5 software. With Maya 5, customers can produce broadcast quality images up to 20 times faster than ever before possible. Now artists can benefit from advances in programmable shading technology to render a range of resolutions and quality, which stand up to even high definition scrutiny.

Maya 5, in combination with the new NVIDIA(R) Quadro(R) FX graphics engine, provides customers with unprecedented rendering power. Maya 5 is the first 3D application to fully take advantage of the Quadro FX's power and precision to render high quality images with specular highlights, bump and reflection mapping and shadows, that in many cases are indistinguishable from software rendering. The combination of Maya 5 and advanced graphics card technology raises the bar in quality for pre-visualization and boosts speed for broadcast quality output.

Alias/Wavefront received one of the first Quadro FX boards and worked closely with NVIDIA engineers to bring Hardware rendering to Maya 5. Shai Hinitz, Product Manager at Alias/Wavefront, commented, "The stability of the Quadro FX card and driver allowed us to be extremely productive. Maya 5's Hardware Renderer is going to change the nature of rendering for many artists - in the not-so-distant future, the quality and range of effects available with Hardware rendering will change the nature of 3D production forever."

Hardware rendering allows customers to meet deadlines faster and render multiple iterations in production refinement. It also allows them to undertake last minute creative changes that would previously be impossible to accommodate given tight production schedules. Maya 5 continues to push the graphics envelope with its unified rendering workflow, allowing customers to easily render sophisticated imagery faster than they ever imagined possible. Final rendered images, previews and render pass elements can all be created with the use of the new Maya 5 Hardware Renderer.

Accelerated Visual Quality

"Maya's new GPU-powered rendering architecture exploits the full precision and programmability of the entire NVIDIA Quadro FX product line," said Chris Seitz, Manager of Developer Tools, at NVIDIA. "Our collaborative engineering work with Alias/Wavefront leveraged the high-level Cg programming language to provide Maya 5 customers with both a killer platform and seamless access to the power and performance of the Quadro FX."

Availability

Maya 5 was announced on April 6th and will be available in May 2003. For more details on Maya 5 and how to place your order, please visit www.aliaswavefront.com. The Quadro FX is now shipping. For more information on Quadro FX and how to place your order, please visit www.pny.com.

Maya 5 Hardware rendering is available for the Windows(R), Linux(R) and Mac(R) OS X operating systems and works with most programmable graphics Hardware. For supported Hardware and more details, please visit www.aliaswavefront.com.

About Alias/Wavefront

As the world's leading innovator of 3D graphics technology, Alias/Wavefront develops software for the games, film and video, web, interactive media, industrial design, and visualization markets. On March 1 2003, the company was awarded an Oscar(R) for Technical Achievement from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for its development of Maya(R) software, its professional 3D animation and effects package.

Entertainment and games customers include: Acclaim Entertainment, Inc., CNN, Core Design Limited, Digital Domain, Disney, Electronic Arts, Industrial Light & Magic, Factor 5 LLC, Midway Games, Nintendo, Pacific Data Images (PDI), Pixar, Sega, Sony Pictures Imageworks, Square Co., Ltd., Warner Feature Animation and Weta Ltd. Alias/Wavefront is a wholly owned, independent software company of SGI with headquarters in Toronto and custom development center in Santa Barbara. Please visit the Alias/Wavefront web site at http://www.aliaswavefront.com or call 1-800-447-2542 in North America. International contact numbers include: Northern Europe, Middle East and Africa, [phone]; Germany, East & Southeast Europe, 0049 89 31 70 20; France, Spain and Portugal, [phone]; Japan and other parts of Asia Pacific, 81 3 5797 3500 and Latin America, 770 393 1881.

About NVIDIA

NVIDIA Corporation is a market leader in visual computing technology dedicated to creating products that enhance the interactive experience on consumer and professional computing platforms. Its graphics and communications processors have broad market reach and are incorporated into a wide variety of computing platforms, including consumer digital-media PCs, enterprise PCs, professional workstations, digital content creation systems, notebook PCs, military navigation systems and video games consoles. NVIDIA is headquartered in Santa Clara, California and employs more than 1,500 people worldwide. For more information, visit the company's Web site at www.nvidia.com.

The Alias/Wavefront logo is a registered trademark and Alias/Wavefront is a trademark of Alias/Wavefront, a division of Silicon Graphics Limited in the United States and/or other countries worldwide. Maya is a registered trademark of Silicon Graphics, Inc., exclusively used by Alias/Wavefront, a division of Silicon Graphics Limited, and the Maya logo is a trademark of Alias/Wavefront, a division of Silicon Graphics Limited in the United States and/or other countries worldwide. IRIX and SGI are registered trademarks of Silicon Graphics, Inc. in the United States and/or other countries worldwide. NVIDIA and NVIDIA Quadro are registered trademarks or trademarks of NVIDIA Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. Oscar is a trademark and service mark of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds. Windows is either a registered trademark or trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. Mac is a trademark of Apple Computer, Inc. registered in the US and other countries. All other products or companies mentioned are trademarks or service marks of their respective owners. Alias/Wavefront, 210 King Street East, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5A 1J7, Tel: [phone], FAX: [phone]. Copyright (C) 2003 Alias/Wavefront, a division of Silicon Graphics Limited. All Rights Reserved.

For screenshots and press images: http://www.aliaswavefront.com/entertainment/press

Note to Editors: There should be a pipe symbol between "Alias" and "Wavefront". The pipe symbol was changed to a forward slash ("/") for transmission purposes only.