First Alias furthered its continuing strategic partnership with Weta Digital, now the 3D graphics technology powerhouse has formed a stronger alliance with Los Angeles-based motion capture production company House of Moves. Alias will develop and integrate House of Moves' Diva software into future versions of Maya. House of Moves motion capture technology has been used in PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN and SPIDER-MAN, and is increasingly utilized in games, commercials and music videos.
"Alias recognizes the unique strengths and leadership that House of Moves has contributed to high end character animation in the CG industry," says Bob Bennett, general manager, product development, Alias. "We're committed to continually push the boundaries of character animation and are elated to leverage their technology to bring ever greater strategic animation advancements to our Maya product line."
"House of Moves and Alias have worked closely for years on new technologies to enable animators more flexibility in the creation of great character animation," says Tom Tolles, president and ceo, House of Moves. "Licensing our Diva technology to Alias will serve to provide animators with more flexible and intuitive character animation tools than ever before"
As a leading innovator of 3D graphics technology, Alias (www.alias.com) develops award-winning software, custom development and training solutions for the film and video, games, Web, interactive media, industrial design, education and visualization markets. In 2003, the company was awarded an Oscar for Technical Achievement from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for its development of Maya software, the professional 3D animation and effects package. Alias is a wholly owned, independent software company of SGI with headquarters in Toronto and Custom Development Center in Santa Barbara.
House of Moves (www.moves.com) is best known for its motion capture work on features and interactive games, as well as the developer of Diva, the acclaimed motion capture editing and animation repurposing tool used by Industrial Light & Magic, Sony and Weta.
Bill Desowitz, former editor of VFXWorld, is currently the Crafts Editor of IndieWire.
