Issue 7

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COVER STORY: DREAMWORKS' MADAGASCAR
THE KINGS OF THE CG JUNGLE
Go behind the scenes at DreamWorks Animation. Learn how they brought classic cartoon style to 3D animation, and the secrets behind animating the massive CG jungle.
BY ERIC S. KELLER

TUTORIALS

CREATING CHARACTER SETS, PART 1
Character Sets are the key to quickly animating in Maya.
BY PETER RATNER

DISCOVERING THE MISSING LINK:
THE POWER OF FX_HARDLINK
Using FX_HardLink, learn to create a chain of monkeys, a sea of candy, and a buoy floating in water. You'll learn exciting tips and tricks for using this powerful tool.
BY WILLIAM "PROTON" VAUGHAN

EXTRACTING SURFACE MAPS FROM DIGITAL CAMERA FILES, PART 2
Learn how to extract the basic surface maps from digital RAW photo textures. Use RGB color channels to produce the color, bump, specular, and diffuse surface channels for LightWave.
BY STEPHEN M. BURNS

FITTING IN:
PLACING MATCHMOVE CAMERAS INTO AN ENVIRONMENT
Getting a proper solution in a matchmoving application is only half of the battle. This tutorial shows how to place the camera correctly into an environment.
BY TIM DOBBERT

PARTICLE PARTY TRICKS
Creating a looping particle system is not as painful as you'd expect. These tricks using ParticleFX controls and Key Effect should get some ideas going in your head.
BY DEUCE BENNETT

UVS IN MODO 103
This article will give you a quick look into modo 103's cool new UV unwrap feature.
BY DAN ABLAN

MENTAL RAY FOR MAYA SERIES
PART 3: TEXTURE/LIGHT BAKING
Light and color baking workflows using Maya 7 and mental ray. Covers new features in Maya 7, as well as creating custom shaders and custom mental ray shaders new to Maya 7.
BY BOAZ LIVNY

MAYA 7: REVIEW
Boaz and Dariush kick Maya 7's tires. Is it a worthwhile upgrade from 6.5 or before?
BY DARIUSH DERAKHSHANI AND BOAZ LIVNY

SHAKE 4 ANIMATION:
STRAIGHTENING OUT CURVES
This tutorial introduces using the Curve Editor in Shake 4-which can help make an artist's work easier to edit and manage.
BY RANDI L. MUNN

RENDERMAN ARTIST TOOLS
PART 2: DIVING DEEPER
Explore shader writing to gain an understanding of this extremely powerful tool.
BY PETER HARTWIG

RAG DOLL DYNAMICS
Create a skeleton for your own rag doll in XSI, and learn how to connect the rigid bodies.
BY MARKO VUKOVIC

INCORPORATING FX_LINK INTO AN EFFECTS SHOT
Using animated nulls and animated geometry along with Fx_Link to create a range of special effects shots.
BY AARON KENT

PERFORMING AN EXORCISM USING ONLY COMBUSTION 4 AND A TABLET
A detailed description of masking techniques using the tools in Combustion, as well as a review of the improved capabilities of the new Intuous3 tablet from Wacom.
BY CHRISTINE GOLDBY

ESSENTIALS: SIMPLE ENDOMORPHS
Find out how creating and using Endomorphs can be a very efficient method for animating objects that don't call for a high degree of rotation.
BY ANDREA CARVEY

XTRAS

STOP STARING AND START LAUGHING, OR CRYING OR SCOWLING OR WHATEVER…
This article reviews state-of-the-art desktop facial animation, focusing on a valuable book that covers artistic principles of facial animation. It also reviews a high-powered facial animation software application and demonstrates the application of techniques taught in the book to create facial animation with the software.
BY MITCH ROSEFELT

PRODUCTION ENVIRONMENTS:
THE PITALLS OF 2K PLAYBACK
Choosing the wrong playback solution can cost you time, customers, jobs-even your reputation. A look at a solution (Digital Ordnance's Frame Thrower) to this growing need is discussed, with some insights as to how it can meet your needs.
BY LINDA BAILEY

DEPARTMENTS

KOOSHLINGS
BY DARIUSH DERAKHSHANI

GATOR, IS IT IN YOU?
BY RAFFAEL DICKREUTER

STUFF
BY BRAD CARVEY

GIDGETS AND GADGETS
BY WILLIAM "PROTON" VAUGHAN

FINAL RENDER
BY ANDREA CARVEY

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