Massive Software Launches Massive Jet

Given the number of Hollywood and Bollywood movies that are increasingly opting for CG crowd shots, this sounds like an interesting product.

The kind of attendance and reverance that SIGGRAPH commands in the Computer arts and Design world has made it the hotspot venue to launch all kinds of software and new versions.

Massive Software recently launched Massive Jet™ at SIGGRAPH 05. The new product is an autonomous agent 3D animation application that enables the creation of large-scale, believable digital crowd shots "out of the box" with high quality and a low learning curve.

A full-functioning package priced under $6K USD, Massive Jet leverages the company's Academy Award®-winning artificial life-based technology, pre-built Ready-to-Run Agent™ library and GPU-accelerated rendering support to allow animators and artists at any facility to quickly and easily produce highly realistic Massive scenes.

A press release states Massive Software Founder and Product Manager Stephen Regelous saying, "We wanted to build a product everyone can use. Massive Jet offers a low learning curve and the power to produce Massive crowds at a cost within reach of all animation professionals. Using a single license of Massive Jet and agents from our Ready-to-Run Agent Library, you can easily fill a stadium, send a thousand people down the block, or stage a huge medieval battle."

"Visual effects companies creating customized crowd behaviors outside those found in our agent library would still use our original flagship product, Massive 2.0," said Diane Holland, CEO, Massive Software.

"For whole new groups of clients such as the smaller 3D shops, or post houses with limited 3D capability that just need some crowds to comp into a shot, there's the more economical Massive Jet." she added.

Amongst other highlights is the GPU accelerated rendering which has been recently launched for the Massive product line. Huge-scale shots can now be rendered 30 times faster at film quality without a render farm or additional software. Massive Jet customers can use desktop-based OpenGL solutions, currently including NVIDIA's Quadro FX 3000 or higher, for a cost-effective crowd-creation pipeline from start to finish.

Massive Jet™ is expected to be available in Q4 2005 for $5,990 USD per license. Massive 2.0 is available now, with licenses priced at $18,000 USD. Details for the Indian market are currently not available.

Interestingly, Massive was founded when Stephen Regelous programmed a unique piece of software for director Peter Jackson to make creation of complicated visual effects scenes involving hundreds of thousands of digital characters a practical reality.

Now a standalone, commercially available product, Massive is used by leading digital production and effects studios including Weta Digital, The Mill, Animal Logic, Rhythm & Hues and Digital Domain. In 2004, Massive was honored with a Scientific and Engineering Award from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and with a Technical Innovation Award at the 3D Awards in Copenhagen.