Virtual Reality News: 27 May 2002Virtual Reality News: 27 May 2002
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According to a quarterly report filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, SGI has received a waiver of default for not being in compliance with a credit facility covenant. The company said it obtained a waiver of the default from its lender during the fourth quarter. The company said that it was unable to comply with the covenants and if the default wasn't waived, it could have a significant impact on working capital. The asset-based credit facility provides up to $75 million in borrowing. The facility is secured by US accounts receivable and inventory, the pledge of some intellectual property and a $7 million cash deposit.
URL: http://www.sgi.com
Users, Applications
& Projects
01 Tiger Reconfigurable Simulators to get DI-Guy
02 VR & Schizophrenia
03 Endovascular Surgery Planning Tool
04 Alchemy for Hockey
05 Bentley & Arc Second to Develop Software
Quote of the Issue
06 Greg Bentley, Bentley Systems
Products & Services
07 Motion Capture Hardware
08 Lightweight Display Systems
09 Tools for Architects
10 Bentley Targets I/RAS C
11 Version 12 of Solid Edge
12 Mercedes-Benz WorldRacing
13 Auto Racing with Arcade Look and Feel
14 Graphics Cards for AMD Processors
15 UMC to Collaborate on new Matrox Chip
Companies &
Markets
16 Present & Future Support for ATI Technologies
17 NVIDIA: Problems but Profits
18 Di-O-Matic to Support FBX
19 Shipbuilding Software Collaboration
20 Bentley Plans to Distribute CloudWorx
21 Agile & Cimmetry Extend Relationship
22 Autodesk Revenue Falls - CFO Resigns
23 Sega Cuts Losses - Concentrates on Software
24 Investment Fund for Games Developers
Standards, Patents
& Benchmarks
25 Patents for Facial Animation & Visual Sensing
People
26 Chairman of Defense Science Board Joins E&S
27 Acclaim gets new Sales Chief
Worth Watching
28 Miniature Flat-Panel Displays
29 Touchscreen Flat-Panel Display
30 Video Processor Boxes
Events & Calls
for Papers
31 2002 European Simulation Interoperability Workshop
32 SIGGRAPH 2002
33 VR World Congress V
34 PRESENCE 2002
35 Collaborative Virtual Environments 2002
36 Symposium on Interactive 3D Graphics
37 More Events
The U.S. Army has chosen Boston Dynamics to provide Dismounted Infantry (DI) simulation for the Tiger Reconfigurable Simulators at several U.S. Army Battle Labs. The Tiger family of reconfigurable simulators was developed by Raytheon Electronic Systems as a modular platform for building training systems and testbeds for research, development, and evaluation of future war fighting and material concepts. DI-Guy is software for adding lifelike human characters to real-time simulated environments. Hundreds of organizations worldwide, including all branches of the U.S. Armed Forces, use DI-Guy for training, mission planning, and analysis. DI-Guy has cross-platform support for Windows, IRIX, and Linux, and is DIS/HLA compatible.
URL: http://www.bdi.com
At the Annual Meeting of the American Psychiatric Association, attendees "saw" what happens inside the mind of a person with schizophrenia. A VR experience puts participants on a city bus and surrounds them with the sights and sounds seen and heard by a person with schizophrenia. Janssen Pharmaceutica Products, LP, created the simulation to educate psychiatrists and other healthcare professionals on what it is like to have a severe mental illness. The experience was created based on the descriptions of audio and visual hallucinations provided by both persons with the illness and their physicians. Schizophrenia affects more than 2 million people in the United States.
A new endovascular surgery planning tool has been created by the Manchester Visualization Centre (MVC) using AVS/Express data visualization software. The MVC's custom software combines visualization techniques with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to allow non-invasive, pre-surgical analysis of aneurysms. The MVC received funding for the work from The Sir Jules Thorn Charitable Trust, which was founded in 1964 and provides grants for medical research and humanitarian purposes.
URL: http://www.avs.com
SolWorks, a first party studio, has selected Intrinsic Alchemy as the engine that will be used for all internal titles. Alchemy is currently being used as the engine in the console hockey title that SolWorks is developing.
Bentley Systems and Arc Second Inc have signed a letter of intent to complete a software development and licensing agreement. Bentley intends to leverage Arc Second's mobile engineering technology based the on Microsoft Windows CE platform. Arc Second develops and licenses hardware and software technology for a wide variety of applications, including construction, facilities management and manufacturing plants operation. The two companies plan to bring new mobile applications to AEC professionals so they can manage and publish design and engineering content for use and capture in the field, where it's needed most.
"Bentley believes that 3D Laser Scanning and the resulting very rich, dense point clouds represent an important new source of content that will be widely incorporated by our users in the future," - Greg Bentley, CEO of Bentley.
Tyrell Innovations has begun manufacturing motion capture hardware and offer a magnetic system with up to 1000 sensors per actor (3D per sensor), an system with up to 1000 sensors per actor, a facial system and universal stereoscopic adaptors with a USB v.1.0 interface.
Liteye Systems has selected eMagin Corp's high resolution SVGA+ organic light emitting diode (OLED) microdisplays for use in the company's lightweight display systems. Liteye plans to incorporate the microdisplays in wearable computer applications it will manufacture under a recently announced license agreement with IBM and in thermal imaging products. eMagin's displays will be incorporated with Liteye's HMD units that will be using IBM's headset technology. The active matrix color SVGA+ OLED microdisplays will provide 800 x 600 pixel resolution. Because the emissive OLED microdisplay requires no backlight and has system functionality built into the display, the entire system is compact.
URL: http://www.liteye.com
URL: http://www.emagin.com
Vantage Point Technologies is using Numerical Design's NetImmerse 3D graphics engine to develop VantagePoint Perspective, a set of visualization tools for use in architectural design, urban planning and commercial development. The product, which will be available in July 2002, allows customers to create real-time, i3D models on their PCs using data derived from CAD packages. VantagePoint Perspective also manages customer data, giving architects, designers, builders and real estate agents the tools to plan, communicate and envision their designs in a digital environment. Such visualizations can have a variety of uses, such as architectural and building development, city planning and e-commerce - as is being currently demonstrated by Cubicspace via their new web site.
URL: http://www.vantagepointtechnologies.com
URL: http://www.ndl.com
URL: http://www.cubicspace.com
Bentley Systems has released MicroStation Descartes for MicroStation V8 which features visualization with image draping using 3D terrain models. MicroStation Descartes is an imaging solution for mapping, visualization and raster-to-vector conversion projects. Designed for both production and visualization, MicroStation Descartes is used worldwide by engineers and planners in many disciplines, including Civil Engineering, Plant Design, Geoengineering, Facilities, and Architectural Design. Bentley is offering a promotional price for Descartes for users of competitive products such as I/RAS C. During the "Open it Up" promotion, registered users of I/RAS C can "upgrade" to Descartes V8 for $888.
EDS has announced version 12 of Solid Edge CAD software. Solid Edge V12 delivers Insight.NET web services for collaboration and communication and a new Stream/XP user interface. V12 adds process-driven capabilities for wiring-harness design; faster drawing creation; and extended, unique associative interoperability with other EDS products such as I-deas and Unigraphics NX. Solid Edge combines a set of options to migrate 2D data to 3D with tools for the 2D documentation process.
URL: http://www.solidedge.com
URL: http://www.eds.com
TDK Mediactive will publish and distribute the debut title of the 3D racing simulation game Mercedes-Benz WorldRacing (MBWR) for the North American market exclusively for the Xbox video game system from Microsoft this fall. MBWR features 3D Landscape Engine, which facilitates the creation of unique tracks up to 50 kilometers long. The advanced 3D proprietary engine creates immersive environments and a `virtually realistic' full driving experience on and off road. The player can select his favorite model car from a complete current range of vehicles from Mercedes-Benz. Each model is sculptured based on original data from Mercedes-Benz.
Capcom has announced auto modellista, a true cell-shaded arcade-style racing action for the PlayStation2. auto modellista includes a new 3D cell-shaded art style called "Artistoon" using Capcom's proprietary technology to give auto racing an arcade look and feel. auto modellista is not officially approved by Sony Computer Entertainment America.
3DLabs, ATI, Matrox and SiS are planning to develop graphics cards supporting the upcoming AMD Opteron and eighth-generation AMD Athlon processors. With AGP-8X, HyperTransport and x86-64 technologies, AMD will use open, industry standards to advance graphics technology in both 32-bit and 64-bit environments.
URL: http://www.amd.com
Matrox Graphics Inc and UMC, a semiconductor company, are to collaborate on the new Matrox Parhelia-512 graphics chip. A high-fidelity GPU, Parhelia-512 uses UMC's 8-layer 150nm (0.15um) process technology, which allows for reasonable power dissipation and a manageable die size. This AGP 4X device supports frame buffers of up to 256MB in size and integrates two 400 MHz RAMDACs, a TV encoder and support for dual TMDS transmitters.
URL: http://www.umc.com
URL: http://www.matrox.com
Currently there are over 25 games available that support ATI's SMARTSHADER, SMOOTHVISION or TRUFORM technologies, with over 100 in development for release in the next year including games from: 3D Realms, ArenaNet, Attention To Detail, BioWare Corp, Burut, Croteam, Cryptic Entertainment, Digital Extremes, Fox Interactive, Gas Powered Games, Gearbox Software, Id Software, Interplay Entertainment, Kaboom Studios, Kuju Entertainment Ltd, Legend Entertainment, Lionhead Studios, LucasArts Entertainment Company, Mad Doc Software, Mucky Foot, Novalogic, Pivotal Games, Project 3 Interactive, Rage Games Ltd., Raven Software, Relic Entertainment, Remedy Entertainment, SEGA, Silicon Dream Studios, Similis Game Development, Sony Online Entertainment, Ubi Soft Entertainment and Vivendi Universal Games. ATI's SMARTSHADER, programmable pixel shader technology, SMOOTHVISION, programmable full scene anti-aliasing and TRUFORM, higher order surfaces technology are supported by ATI's RADEON 8500 and RADEON 8500LE products available from ATI and its board partners.
URL: http://www.ati.com
nVidia has been troubled by insider-trading issues, as well as a pricing dispute with Microsoft over chip prices for the Xbox game consoles as well as increased competition, particularly from Intel, but net income tripled and sales more than doubled in its fiscal first quarter as the company continues to benefit from sales of the Xbox video-game console. The company reported net income of $83.2 million for the period ending April 28, up from $26.7 million in the year-earlier period. Revenue more than doubled to $582.9 million from $240.9 million a year earlier.
Kaydara and Di-O-Matic Inc have announced support for the FBX file interchange format in the next version of Di-O-Matic's Facial Studio, a facial modelling and animation package, and in Morph-O-Matic, a morphing solution for discreet 3ds max. The Kaydara FBX file format allows the universal interchange of 3D data between all the major 3D content creation packages on the market, and paves the way for Di-O-Matic users to access material from leading content providers.
Intergraph Corporation and Det Norske Veritas Software (DNVS) have signed a letter of intent to complete a software licensing and distribution agreement. The proposed five-year, multi-million dollar agreement includes collaboration by the two companies in the shipbuilding, offshore and plant design markets. Intergraph's new shipbuilding software shares core technology with SmartPlant 3D and aims to streamline shipbuilding processes, lower manpower and material costs and reduce the time to construct world-class vessels.
URL: http://www.intergraph.com
URL: http://www.dnv.com
Bentley Systems and Cyra Technologies Inc, a Leica Geosystems company, have plans for Bentley to distribute Cyra's CloudWorx application software for Bentley MicroStation. CloudWorxn lets engineers and designers take advantage of rich, 3D point clouds directly in MicroStation. Point clouds represent a powerful source of information content for organizations and projects that require accurate "as-built" or "as-is" information.
URL: http://www.bentley.com
URL: http://www.cyra.com
Agile Software and Cimmetry Systems have extended an existing relationship whereby Agile Software will embed Cimmetry's 3D and EDA visualization and collaboration technology into Agile8, an integrated set of solutions to manage the product record. Agile is expanding its agreement with Cimmetry by broadening the number of formats available to customers to include 3D & EDA formats.
URL: http://www.agile.com
URL: http://www.cimmetry.com
Autodesk Revenue fell 6.7% to $229.3 million from $245.7 million for the quarter ended April 30, compared with a year earlier. Autodesk's chief financial officer, Steve Cakebread, CFO at Autodesk, is leaving the company to become CFO at Salesforce.com. Sales of Discreet, a subsidiary of Autodesk, products declined every quarter in its previous accounting year.
Sega's losses for the latest fiscal year fell in the year the company ceased production of its Dreamcast console to concentrate on software. Sega, creator of the Sonic the Hedgehog character, lost $140 million for the fiscal year ended in March. Sales fell 15%. The Dreamcast was launched in Japan in 1998 and world-wide sales of the console reached approximately 10 million. More than 30 million of PlayStation 2 machines have been sold worldwide. Sega sold 3.5 million copies of 14 game titles for the PlayStation 2 in fiscal 2001, 1.2 million copies of eight titles for the GameCube, and nearly 1.7 million copies of 13 titles for the handheld GameBoy Advance. It sold 660,000 copies of seven games for the Xbox.
NFM (Noble Fund Managers Limited), the investment arm of UK-based investment bank Noble Group, is launching a financing vehicle for funding the development of console and PC games. The fund is designed to provide the necessary financing required by entertainment software developers to accelerate growth, while reducing the need to tie up a publisher's funds until the game has been completed and delivered. The fund is set for an initial closing at the end of June 2002, with a final closing in September. The fund size will be $35 million and will be used to capitalize game development throughout the UK. It is primarily aimed at established developers and publishers and will initially target console and PC games.
Eyematic has received four patents covering its facial animation and visual sensing technology. Eyematic's recently released FaceStation software uses this technology to automate the 3D facial animation process for game, feature film, television, web and wireless content creation. The U.S. patents describe technology developed by Eyematic over the last ten years. As implemented in FaceStation, this technology allows an actor to "drive" a fully textured 3D head in real-time using their own facial expressions and head movements. The FaceStation software accomplishes this using a standard Windows PC and video device, such as a webcam or DV camcorder. No motion capture hardware or facial markers are required. Eyematic's technology resulted from investigations into how the human brain processes visual information. The research was led by Dr Hartmut Neven, Eyematic chief technical officer and Professor Christoph von der Malsburg, co-founder and director of the Neuroinformatic Institute in Bochum, Germany. Eyematic FaceStation is now available for a suggested retail price of US $1,995. The company has additional patents pending.
Mr David J Coghlan and Dr William Schneider Junior were elected to the Board of Directors at Evans & Sutherland's annual meeting on May 16, 2002. David Coghlan is chief executive officer of Quadrant Group Limited, based in the United Kingdom. Dr Schneider is president of International Planning Services Inc. He serves as an advisor to the U.S. government in several capacities; he is a consultant to the Departments of Defense, Energy, and State, and was appointed by Secretary of State Rumsfeld in March 2001 to serve as chairman of the Defense Science Board. He is also chairman of the Department of State's Defense Trade Advisory Group. He serves on several boards, including BAE Systems, Inc.
URL: http://www.es.com
Acclaim Entertainment Inc has appointed Christopher Hickey to the position of Senior Vice President of Sales. Mr. Hickey will be responsible for overseeing the sales, distribution and direct marketing of the Company's video games, strategy guides and affiliated publishing. Prior to joining Acclaim, Hickey served as Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Computer Associates' channel business.
Kopin Corporation has been showing current, emerging and future consumer, military, medical and industrial products enabled by patented CyberDisplay family of miniature flat-panel displays. The CyberDisplay is claimed to be the world's smallest, lightest, highest resolution active matrix LCD (liquid crystal display). The Company ships more than 400,000 displays per month to Hitachi, JVC, Panasonic and Samsung all of whom have chosen the CyberDisplay 320 to replace bulky, power-sapping cathode ray tubes. Among the imaging products shown are a 3D Image Binocular from Sanyo and a full colour image engine from Kaiser Electro-Optics.
URL: http://www.kopin.com
Planar Systems is unveiling a 12.1-inch touchscreen flat-panel display for point-of-sale and information kiosk applications. Planar's line of flat-panel display platforms now includes 12.1-, 15- and 17.4-inch touchscreen models. In 2002, worldwide sales of monitors for point-of-sale and kiosk applications is predicted to exceed $800 million, with sales growing from 7.9 million units in 1999 to 14.2 million units by 2005.
ViewSonic has unveiled its NextVision line of video processor boxes with the introduction of the NextVision 6 and the NextVision 5. NextVision products are high definition video processors that enable consumers to extend the use of their display products to multiple forms of digital entertainment, including high definition TV (HDTV). A 3D comb filter supports both EDTV and HDTV resolution formats including 480P, 720P and 1080i. ViewSonic Corporation has also added to its line of monitors with four displays that provide enhanced viewing capabilities, including up to three times brighter images than current displays.
193.31 2002 European Simulation Interoperability Workshop
The 2002 European Simulation Interoperability Workshop (Euro SIW) is sponsored by the Simulation Interoperability Standards Organization (SISO) in cooperation with The Society for Computer Simulation - Europe International Training Equipment Conference (ITEC, Ltd.). The 2002 Euro SIW will be held June 24-26, 2002 at the University of Westminster, UK.
URL: http://www.sisostds.org/siw/02euro/index.htm
193.32 SIGGRAPH 2002
ACM SIGGRAPH is dedicated to the generation and dissemination of information on computer graphics and interactive techniques: San Antonio, Texas, USA - July 21-26, 2002 (exhibition 23-25).
193.33 VR World Congress V
VR World Congress V will be held in Paris, France on September 9th and 10th, 2002 and offers an exceptional opportunity to identify project partners to make proposals to the European Commission's Sixth Framework Programme (the budget for the 5th was $3.5bn). A copy of the current working draft agenda is available. The delegate fee for this not-for-profit event is just $150 and, as numbers are limited, early registration will be essential.
193.34 PRESENCE 2002
Thanks to Wijnand IJsselsteijn of the Human-Technology Interaction Group at the Department of Technology Management, Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands for bringing to our attention PRESENCE 2002 in Portugal on October 9,10,11, 2002
URL: http://www.presence-research.org
193.35 Collaborative Virtual Environments 2002
ACM Collaborative Virtual Environments 2002: Bonn, Germany - September 30-October 2, 2002. CVE 2002 is a conference dedicated to the design, development and use of collaborative virtual environments (CVEs). Submission deadlines for Papers, Posters, Panels, Workshops, and Tutorials is May 1st 2002.
193.36 Symposium on Interactive 3D Graphics
2003 Symposium on Interactive 3D Graphics: California, USA - April 27 to 30, 2003. Papers Deadline: 15 September 2002
URL: http://movesinstitute.org/I3D.html
For extensive information about events relevant to the European VR/i3D community, see the events pages on El.pub: for Europe: base05.htm, for the rest of the world: connone.htm
| About VREfresh news Each edition of virtual reality news is now published on a separate page, ensuring that links (particularly from VREfresh) continue to remain current. To view news from previous issues, please use the navigation buttons below. |
VREfresh Email alerter of news items and associated URLs, send an email with your name, organisation, country (and for the US a zip code) to the Editor via the link above. |
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