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Craft Director Studio
Craft Animations - Craft Director Studio
Based on cutting-edge research in artificial intelligence and autonomous control systems, Craft Director Studio extends creative possibilities by eliminating the time-consuming tasks of keyframing, scripting and rigging. Users gain the experience of a new era of animation with an opportunity to create natural motion paths on-the-fly, optionally with the use of an input device, gaining instant gratification through highly realistic interactive real-time animation.
What do you purchase?
Craft Director Studio is actually a free download. There are a bunch of add-ons that can be added to Craft Director Studio. In fact there are already a bunch of basic tools included for free. By combining these tools you can create new tools. As an example you can create a dump truck with the help of combining 4-Wheeler Free and 1Drotator.
Key Benefits Visual for film and Broadcast - Craft Director Tools provide realistic and accurate vehicle incident and traffic animation, collision visualizations and scene fly-throughs in less time than it takes them to write teleprompter text, allowing more time for creativity.
Previsualization - Craft Director Tools are interactive, providing better real-time control for precise movements exactly as envisioned by a producer or director.
Game Development – Craft Directors Tools allow game developers to enhance in-game cinematics through a modular, configurable system that replicates a specific rig within the host application. Artists may actually “drive” a vehicle within the creative environment, achieving a more realistic product in less time.
Architectural Visualization – Film walk throughs of architectural designs are easily achieved through Craft Director Tools’ unique camera angles and views. Cameras quickly and easily navigate exterior to interior layouts of a scene in realtime, saving the time and cost of an outside animation contractor.
Accident Reconstruction and Forensics – Combined with user research and data, Craft Director Tools can provide near-instant visualizations and simulations of any vehicle accident scene, simulating and recording key-frames in real-time.
Host Applications
Craft Director Studio currently runs in either 3ds Max, 3ds Max Design, Cinema 4D, Maya and Softimage. Both on Windows and OS X. Currently supported operating systems are Windows (32 and 64-bit) and MAC (OSX, Leopard and Tiger, 32-bit).
Adaptors
For every host application that Craft Director Studio is or will be ported to there is a so called adaptor. The adaptor is a translator between the Craft Director Studio system and the host application through which commands generated within the system and its tools are translated to corresponding commands in the host system and vice versa. This means that the user does not work in an external environment when creating animations, the user actually works inside his preferred host application all the time as he is used to. Another important side note for this fact is that Craft Director Studio proficiency in one host application will automatically yield near proficiency within any other host application.
Same workflow
By using an adaptor as a translator for the host application, the workflow remains the same no matter which host application the user is using. Rigging is done directly in the host application which means the user still have access to host application tools like the graph editor to control the animation created with Craft Director Studio’s tools.
Graph Editor
Important to notice is that the animation created with Craft Director Studio is compatible with the host application’s animation curve editor.
All keyframes are alterable in the host application’s standard animation curve editor.
In some host application the host’s PRS (Position Rotation Scale) keyframing controller does not suffice (either it is too slow or gives erroneous results) and therefore Craft Animations has created the proprietary Razorback Animation Controller. It can be turned off whereby the host application’s standard animation controller is used. An interesting side application is that the Razorback Animation Controller also can be used as a filter for other simulators (such as Havok) to make them glitch free.
There is also an option to convert all keyframes that have been created to the host’s standard PRS controller making the scene exportable. This differs from Unplug since unplug deletes all internal Craft Director Studio references to the scene.
Workflow Craft Director Studio workflow is very intuitive. Create a tool, configure its inputs and record. The tool’s motion is recorded in real-time and key-frames are created as the user is recording. Craft Director Studio also has a ton of features to help the user create animation as easily and realistically as possible.
Pre-Rigged Models
Host’s Load and Save functions saves and loads all Craft Director Studio information in a scene. Saved scenes may therefore be merged or referenced into new scenes with all the Craft Director Studio information intact allowing creation of PRM libraries ready to be drag-and-dropped into new scenes (or referenced if using an animation assembly line) fully rigged for being immediately animated on the fly. This functionality also allows for a director to save his favorite camera rig and merge it into any scene.
This then in turn can be used by content creation studios, or modeling artists who sell their models on the Internet, to make their models animatable with great ease.
Slow-Motion
To increase the accuracy or skill of the user controlling a camera or vehicle, a slow-motion factor can be set in the main interface yielding one half, one 4th or one 8th recording speed. The slow motion is done by increasing the FPS internally. While recording in slow motion everything is smooth, but when the recording finishes, keyframes are only created according to the actual frame rate.
Custom Parameter Settings
Except for the presets already included in each tool the user may create his/her own custom parameter presets which can then be saved, loaded and exported.
Custom Input Device Settings
Except for the example presets included in every tool the user may create his/her own custom input configurations. These can be saved, loaded and exported.
FPS change safe
The FPS can be changed after recording without affecting the animation. The FPS can be temporarily increased to increase the accuracy of the simulations.
Distributed Rendering
Craft Director Studio works excellently with distributed rendering (some applications may need conversion of keyframes to the host application’s standard PRS controller (done in the preferences dialog), or Unplugging would also yield this effect).
Motion blur safe
Craft Director Studio allows objects to rotate multiple turns during one frame as well as creating rotation animation curves that can be larger than 360 degrees. Therefore the motion blur will be correctly rendered.
Cloning
This feature clones the whole structure of a tool: all parameters, all input settings, renames all instances and makes a copy of everything that has been parented to the dummies. I.e. makes an identically functional copy of the whole branch. It is done by selecting a branch and then either right-click on it selecting Clone, or hitting the Clone button, or select Clone in the Tool menu.
Hide/unhide low-poly
Use these buttons to hide the tool’s dummy objects and get a better view of the final result. Unhide the objects if you need to re-rig something or add to the rig.
Hide/unhide high-poly
Use these buttons to either show or hide the high-poly models attached to the dummy objects of a tool. This enables the user to get a much better view of the rigging process. It can also be very useful to hide the high poly models during recording for a smoother FPS.
Low-poly on Record
Toggling between high-poly and low-poly dummies can be done automatically when recording starts and stops to increase the graphics frame rate during recording. This setting can be found in Craft Director Studio’s preferences.
Unplug scene from Craft Director Studio to make it independent of Craft Director Studio
(for render farms, distribution etc)
Craft Director Studio has a feature called “Unplug”. This feature removes all of Craft Director Studio’s connections from the scene but keeps the animation made with its tools. This can be very useful when sending a scene to a render farm so that the scene is no longer dependent on the tool.
Countdown timer
There are two countdown timers: Start and End. The Start countdown time starts animation playback a number of seconds before the start frame and then starts recording. This gives the user some time to grab the input device.
End countdown time shows a countdown clock to signal the end of the timeline if the option has been checked to stop at the end.
Auto-expanding timeline (during recording)
While recording the timeline may either automatically expand when reaching the end or optionally stops at the end of the timeline after displaying a countdown.
System Requirements
Windows 32-bit Microsoft® Windows Vista® Business (SP1 or higher)
Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional (SP2 or higher)
Autodesk® 3ds Max® 6, 7, 8, 9, 2008, 2009, 2010
Autodesk® Maya® 7, 8, 8.5, 2008, 2009, 2010
Autodesk® Softimage® 7.5, 2010
MAXON® CINEMA 4D® R10, R10.5, R11 OS X 32-bit Apple® Mac OS® X 10.4.1 operating system or higher
Autodesk® Maya® 8.5, 2008, 2009, 2010
MAXON® CINEMA 4D® R10, R10.5, R11 Windows 64-bit Microsoft® Windows Vista® Business (SP1 or higher)
Microsoft® Windows® XP x64 Edition (SP2 or higher)
Autodesk® 3ds Max® 9, 2008, 2009, 2010
Autodesk® Maya® 8, 8.5, 2008, 2009, 2010
Autodesk® Softimage® 7.5, 2010
MAXON® CINEMA 4D® R10, R10.5, R11 Recommended
Hardware 64-bit system with 8Gb of RAM (for massive scenes) Recommended Input
Devices Logitech Dual Action™
Optional: Logitech Extreme™ 3D Pro for Craft Helicopter™, Craft Airplane™ and Craft Airplane™ Extended
Optional: 3Dconnexion SpacePilot™ for advanced camera movements
Optional: Immersion MicroScribe® for Craft Digitizer Cam™
Based on cutting-edge research in artificial intelligence and autonomous control systems, Craft Director Studio extends creative possibilities by eliminating the time-consuming tasks of keyframing, scripting and rigging. Users gain the experience of a new era of animation with an opportunity to create natural motion paths on-the-fly, optionally with the use of an input device, gaining instant gratification through highly realistic interactive real-time animation.
What do you purchase?
Craft Director Studio is actually a free download. There are a bunch of add-ons that can be added to Craft Director Studio. In fact there are already a bunch of basic tools included for free. By combining these tools you can create new tools. As an example you can create a dump truck with the help of combining 4-Wheeler Free and 1Drotator.
Key Benefits Visual for film and Broadcast - Craft Director Tools provide realistic and accurate vehicle incident and traffic animation, collision visualizations and scene fly-throughs in less time than it takes them to write teleprompter text, allowing more time for creativity.
Previsualization - Craft Director Tools are interactive, providing better real-time control for precise movements exactly as envisioned by a producer or director.
Game Development – Craft Directors Tools allow game developers to enhance in-game cinematics through a modular, configurable system that replicates a specific rig within the host application. Artists may actually “drive” a vehicle within the creative environment, achieving a more realistic product in less time.
Architectural Visualization – Film walk throughs of architectural designs are easily achieved through Craft Director Tools’ unique camera angles and views. Cameras quickly and easily navigate exterior to interior layouts of a scene in realtime, saving the time and cost of an outside animation contractor.
Accident Reconstruction and Forensics – Combined with user research and data, Craft Director Tools can provide near-instant visualizations and simulations of any vehicle accident scene, simulating and recording key-frames in real-time.
- Extremely fast animation simulation software.
- Work directly in 3ds Max, Cinema 4D, or Maya.
- Save time through automatic keyframing.
- Increase quality through the use of real-time physics.
Host Applications
Craft Director Studio currently runs in either 3ds Max, 3ds Max Design, Cinema 4D, Maya and Softimage. Both on Windows and OS X. Currently supported operating systems are Windows (32 and 64-bit) and MAC (OSX, Leopard and Tiger, 32-bit).
Adaptors
For every host application that Craft Director Studio is or will be ported to there is a so called adaptor. The adaptor is a translator between the Craft Director Studio system and the host application through which commands generated within the system and its tools are translated to corresponding commands in the host system and vice versa. This means that the user does not work in an external environment when creating animations, the user actually works inside his preferred host application all the time as he is used to. Another important side note for this fact is that Craft Director Studio proficiency in one host application will automatically yield near proficiency within any other host application.
Same workflow
By using an adaptor as a translator for the host application, the workflow remains the same no matter which host application the user is using. Rigging is done directly in the host application which means the user still have access to host application tools like the graph editor to control the animation created with Craft Director Studio’s tools.
Graph Editor
Important to notice is that the animation created with Craft Director Studio is compatible with the host application’s animation curve editor.
All keyframes are alterable in the host application’s standard animation curve editor.
- In the curve editor keys can be scaled to make an animation shorter or longer to match exact timings.
- Soft selection can be used on the keyframes.
- Use animation layers to fine tune the simulated animation curves.
- In the curve editor key reduction methods can be applied if the user finds it necessary.
In some host application the host’s PRS (Position Rotation Scale) keyframing controller does not suffice (either it is too slow or gives erroneous results) and therefore Craft Animations has created the proprietary Razorback Animation Controller. It can be turned off whereby the host application’s standard animation controller is used. An interesting side application is that the Razorback Animation Controller also can be used as a filter for other simulators (such as Havok) to make them glitch free.
There is also an option to convert all keyframes that have been created to the host’s standard PRS controller making the scene exportable. This differs from Unplug since unplug deletes all internal Craft Director Studio references to the scene.
Workflow Craft Director Studio workflow is very intuitive. Create a tool, configure its inputs and record. The tool’s motion is recorded in real-time and key-frames are created as the user is recording. Craft Director Studio also has a ton of features to help the user create animation as easily and realistically as possible.
Pre-Rigged Models
Host’s Load and Save functions saves and loads all Craft Director Studio information in a scene. Saved scenes may therefore be merged or referenced into new scenes with all the Craft Director Studio information intact allowing creation of PRM libraries ready to be drag-and-dropped into new scenes (or referenced if using an animation assembly line) fully rigged for being immediately animated on the fly. This functionality also allows for a director to save his favorite camera rig and merge it into any scene.
This then in turn can be used by content creation studios, or modeling artists who sell their models on the Internet, to make their models animatable with great ease.
Slow-Motion
To increase the accuracy or skill of the user controlling a camera or vehicle, a slow-motion factor can be set in the main interface yielding one half, one 4th or one 8th recording speed. The slow motion is done by increasing the FPS internally. While recording in slow motion everything is smooth, but when the recording finishes, keyframes are only created according to the actual frame rate.
Custom Parameter Settings
Except for the presets already included in each tool the user may create his/her own custom parameter presets which can then be saved, loaded and exported.
Custom Input Device Settings
Except for the example presets included in every tool the user may create his/her own custom input configurations. These can be saved, loaded and exported.
FPS change safe
The FPS can be changed after recording without affecting the animation. The FPS can be temporarily increased to increase the accuracy of the simulations.
Distributed Rendering
Craft Director Studio works excellently with distributed rendering (some applications may need conversion of keyframes to the host application’s standard PRS controller (done in the preferences dialog), or Unplugging would also yield this effect).
Motion blur safe
Craft Director Studio allows objects to rotate multiple turns during one frame as well as creating rotation animation curves that can be larger than 360 degrees. Therefore the motion blur will be correctly rendered.
Cloning
This feature clones the whole structure of a tool: all parameters, all input settings, renames all instances and makes a copy of everything that has been parented to the dummies. I.e. makes an identically functional copy of the whole branch. It is done by selecting a branch and then either right-click on it selecting Clone, or hitting the Clone button, or select Clone in the Tool menu.
Hide/unhide low-poly
Use these buttons to hide the tool’s dummy objects and get a better view of the final result. Unhide the objects if you need to re-rig something or add to the rig.
Hide/unhide high-poly
Use these buttons to either show or hide the high-poly models attached to the dummy objects of a tool. This enables the user to get a much better view of the rigging process. It can also be very useful to hide the high poly models during recording for a smoother FPS.
Low-poly on Record
Toggling between high-poly and low-poly dummies can be done automatically when recording starts and stops to increase the graphics frame rate during recording. This setting can be found in Craft Director Studio’s preferences.
Unplug scene from Craft Director Studio to make it independent of Craft Director Studio
(for render farms, distribution etc)
Craft Director Studio has a feature called “Unplug”. This feature removes all of Craft Director Studio’s connections from the scene but keeps the animation made with its tools. This can be very useful when sending a scene to a render farm so that the scene is no longer dependent on the tool.
Countdown timer
There are two countdown timers: Start and End. The Start countdown time starts animation playback a number of seconds before the start frame and then starts recording. This gives the user some time to grab the input device.
End countdown time shows a countdown clock to signal the end of the timeline if the option has been checked to stop at the end.
Auto-expanding timeline (during recording)
While recording the timeline may either automatically expand when reaching the end or optionally stops at the end of the timeline after displaying a countdown.
System Requirements
Windows 32-bit Microsoft® Windows Vista® Business (SP1 or higher)
Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional (SP2 or higher)
Autodesk® 3ds Max® 6, 7, 8, 9, 2008, 2009, 2010
Autodesk® Maya® 7, 8, 8.5, 2008, 2009, 2010
Autodesk® Softimage® 7.5, 2010
MAXON® CINEMA 4D® R10, R10.5, R11 OS X 32-bit Apple® Mac OS® X 10.4.1 operating system or higher
Autodesk® Maya® 8.5, 2008, 2009, 2010
MAXON® CINEMA 4D® R10, R10.5, R11 Windows 64-bit Microsoft® Windows Vista® Business (SP1 or higher)
Microsoft® Windows® XP x64 Edition (SP2 or higher)
Autodesk® 3ds Max® 9, 2008, 2009, 2010
Autodesk® Maya® 8, 8.5, 2008, 2009, 2010
Autodesk® Softimage® 7.5, 2010
MAXON® CINEMA 4D® R10, R10.5, R11 Recommended
Hardware 64-bit system with 8Gb of RAM (for massive scenes) Recommended Input
Devices Logitech Dual Action™
Optional: Logitech Extreme™ 3D Pro for Craft Helicopter™, Craft Airplane™ and Craft Airplane™ Extended
Optional: 3Dconnexion SpacePilot™ for advanced camera movements
Optional: Immersion MicroScribe® for Craft Digitizer Cam™
