Press Release: Okino Announces PolyTrans-for-Maya Plug-in System

Related links on the Okino WEB site:


Okino Computer Graphics Pre-Releases Integrated Version of its
PolyTrans 3D Data Translation Product for Alias|Wavefront's Maya.

Okino's PolyTrans-for-Maya Integrates Dozens of New 3D File Formats into Alias|Wavefront's Maya

[Maya Screen Snapshot]

Toronto, Canada - January 1st, 2000 -- Okino Computer Graphics today pre-released its much requested PolyTrans-for-Maya product, a native plug-in version of Okino's popular PolyTrans 3D data translation product, now integrated directly into the Alias|Wavefront Maya/NT product. This native integration provides a vital new link between the Maya 3D animation/modeling package and other popular 3D packages or file formats such as 3D Studio MAX, SoftImage, Lightwave, OpenFlight, IGES 5.3, ACIS SAT, DirectX, DXF, Pro/Engineer (SLP), QuickDraw-3D, Renderman RIB, Solid Edge, Solid Works, trueSpace and many others (as listed below).

PolyTrans-for-Maya is the first fully integrated suite of translators for Maya that support the most popular 3D file formats. In the tradition of all Okino 3D data translators, resulting translated files are 'Render Ready' meaning that they can be loaded and rendered in the destination program (Maya, SoftImage, 3D Studio MAX, Lightwave, etc.) with little or no changes necessary. The translation process accommodates polygonal meshes, trimmed NURBS (export-only in the first release), hierarchy, vertex normals/colors/texture-coordinates, material and texture mapping parameters, lights, cameras, object/camera/light animation conversion (file format specific) and automatic 2D bitmap conversion (when necessary).

"When Okino began development of PolyTrans and NuGraf over a decade ago we envisaged a time when the software would be able to cross-convert data between all major 3D animation packages, a time when the concept of 3D data "interoperability" (foreign to most 3D software of the '90s) would benefit both the developers and users of 3D animation packages, and a time when animators/modelers no longer had to work with a single 3D package to bring a job to completion. With the release of Maya, and our native PolyTrans-for- Maya software, I believe this time has finally come," said Robert Lansdale, President & CEO of Okino Computer Graphics, Inc. "This increasing level of interoperability was first seen well over a year in advance prior to the release of PolyTrans-for-Maya, a time when we began to receive up to a dozen requests per day for native Maya support - a level of demand we had never experienced before. These users were quickly incorporating Maya into their production pipelines, in growing numbers, and PolyTrans was the missing data translation link between Maya and their existing 3D packages. The end result of this demand, PolyTrans-for-Maya, represents our most complex and development-intensive native version of PolyTrans developed to date; a converter that cleanly, accurately and quickly moves Maya mesh/NURBS/scene/animation data to/from the most popular 3D file formats and software packages. As we say in our product brochure, download a demo and see for yourself."

"Our customers have been anxiously awaiting the availability of a versatile translator that will allow them to bring assets created with other software packages into Maya," said Tom Reyburn, marketing manger for entertainment and third-party products for Alias|Wavefront, Inc. "The native PolyTrans-for-Maya plug-in will now allow them to take full advantage of Maya's advanced technology for all of their projects by easily importing work from a wide range of other products. We are very pleased to have been able to work so closely with Okino through our Conductors developer program to help them bring this product to market."

"Alias|Wavefront is extremely pleased to see Polytrans-for-Maya," said Bob Bennett, product line manager at Alias|Wavefront. "Maya customers will certainly benefit from the increased array of file formats that can now be seamlessly brought into Maya. Maya users in our key markets of film and video, game development, visualization, and commercial, corporate and broadcast production can now freely transfer scene content to and from most 3D file formats and applications."

"At Midway Games we have recently added the Alias|Wavefront Maya product to our new 3d game design and development projects," said Dave Zabloudil, 3D artist/animator from Midway Games. "We have found Okino's new PolyTrans-for- Maya product an indispensable tool to connect all of our existing 3D software tools to Maya. We are also happy to see Okino continue to evolve their PolyTrans software and to listen to our requests for desirable new features."

While not common for Okino press releases, we would like to openly acknowledge and thank all the people at Alias|Wavefront who helped, and continue to help, make PolyTrans-for-Maya a reality. It is very rare that we gain such immediate and continued access to key API technical support people, to the core Maya development team, to the Maya marketing people, to the ears' and eyes' of the Maya product management team, or to the Maya field representatives and sales offices. It is the prodding, support and feedback from the Maya team, and from Alias|Wavefront, that has made this converter suite a reality.

Okino's "PolyTrans" and "NuGraf Rendering System" Software, An Overview

Okinos stand-alone 'PolyTrans Model/Scene/NURBS/Animation Translator' for Windows and SGI IRIX was released in August 1996 and has gone on to become one of the most acclaimed and respected 3D geometry translators. Unlike most translation programs which only convert basic polygon geometry, hierarchy and some shading information, PolyTrans is unique in its ability to convert every aspect of a 3D model file; this includes all geometry (meshed polygons, NURBS and quadrics), object hierarchy, pivot points, smoothing data (vertex normals), vertex colors, (u,v) texture coordinates, lights, cameras, texture projection methods and animation. In addition, PolyTrans accurately matches the color, shading and texture mapping parameters between the input and output file formats resulting in models that will render faithfully in the target rendering program.

Okinos NuGraf Rendering System is the elder sibling of PolyTrans that includes, in addition to everything in PolyTrans, high-end scanline and multi-threaded ray tracing (for product and CAD visualization), material editing, bitmap and procedural texture mapping, texture projection methods, extended user interface and text creation. NuGraf received the 'IEEE Technical Excellence Award' from IEEE CG&A Magazine in 1997 and the "Golden Pixie" award for 1998. It is intuitive for beginners, deep and rich with features for experts.

Okino software is used world wide by thousands of professionals, covering such varied groups as engineering, manufacturing, government, defense related, production studios, digital effects houses, animation studios, 3D content developers and most major 3D game development companies. An interesting list of notable users can be viewed online at http://www.okino.com/conv/users.htm.

Industry Standard Export File Formats

The new native version of PolyTrans-for-Maya allows Maya data to be imported/exported from virtually any 3D modeling, animation, rendering, CAD, landscape (DEM) or design package. Supported formats include (* = export only, # = import only): 3D Studio MAX (a copy of 3DS MAX is required), 3D Studio r4, ACIS SAT (#), Alias PolySet, Apple 3DMF (Quickdraw-3D), DirectX (*), DXF, Fractals Detailer, IGES 5.3, Imagine, Lightscape (*), Lightwave, OpenGL C Code (*), OpenFlight, POV 2.0/3.0 (*), Pro/Engineer .SLP, Renderman RIB (*), Renderware (*), SoftImage .hrc models and scene databases, StereoLithography .STL, Strata StudioPro v1.75, trueSpace, USGS DEM (#), Vistapro DEM (#), VRML 1.0 (*), VRML 2.0 and Wavefront OBJ. New for v3.0 of PolyTrans and NuGraf are: Cinema-4D (*), Electric Image FACT (ideal for Form/Z support), Nichimen's GameExchange2 (#, Mirai), Houdini .geo (#), Minolta Vivid 700 (#), Solid Edge (#, via OLE D&M), Solid Works (#, via OLE D&M) and well supported VRML2 import. The converters have been developed by Okino Computer Graphics over a period of 12 years and are complete implementations of their respective file formats.

Animation Conversion Through Accurate Keyframe Resampling & Reduction

Through years of research, development and refinement, PolyTrans has come to include the industry-leading major feature of animation conversion. Simply put, animation conversion is a hard problem! To convert between the different mathematics used by each major 3D animation package, and their different methods of internally representing 3D animated objects, Okino Computer Graphics has developed a unique "animation conversion engine". This engine allows raw animation data to be imported from the most popular 3D animation programs, accurately played back in real-time, resampled to alternate forms of animation mathematical representation and exported to other 3D animation file formats. Note that PolyTrans converts function curve based animation; it does not convert procedural or Inverse Kinematics (IK) animation data.

As shown in the right diagram, the internal "engine" stores the raw imported animation data as a series of hierarchical "channels" (such as X/Y/Z translation), each of which has a "controller" which simulates the most popular animation interpolation methods (Bezier, TCB, etc.), and to each controller a series of keyframes representing the animation curve over time. This ensures accurate retention of the imported animation data.

A vital aspect of accurate animation conversion is the "keyframe resampling & reduction" algorithm of PolyTrans; as shown below, this algorithm allows incompatible animation methods to be converted with tolerance-based accuracy. The example below shows how X/Y/Z Euler rotations (from Lightwave or Maya) are converted into the mathematically different Quaternion rotation method (used by DirectX and 3DS MAX, for example).

Major Benefits of PolyTrans-for-Maya to Maya Users

Some of the major benefits Maya users will gain from PolyTrans-for-Maya include:

Applicable WEB pages

The following are pertinent pages on the Okino WEB site relating to this press release:

Available Through VARs

The NuGraf Rendering System and PolyTrans are available directly from Okino Computer Graphics and through a growing number of Value Added Resellers (VARs) in the design, CAD and multimedia markets. Fully functional demonstration versions (with minor limitations) of the software, along with the new native version of PolyTrans-for-Maya, are available through Okinos Internet WEB site at http://www.okino.com.

Product Pricing

For product pricing, to locate an authorized VAR or for customer inquiries, please contact Okino Computer Graphics at (905) 672-9328 or toll free at (888) 3D-OKINO (1-888-336-5466).

System Requirements

PolyTrans-for-Maya requires a copy of Maya/NT 2.0 or newer from Alias|Wavefront (v2.5 preferred), and a copy of Okino's PolyTrans software or its NuGraf Rendering System software (PolyTrans is fully integrated into NuGraf as one program), either which must be purchased along with Okino's "add-on converter bundle" option to obtain Maya support. PolyTrans operates efficiently with Pentium.-based computers equipped with Windows 95/98, Windows NT 4.0 or higher, 32MB of RAM, a SVGA video card, and a hard disk with 70Mb of available space. 3D hardware accelerators are supported for Windows 95/98 and NT but are not required.

PolyTrans also runs under IRIX 4.2 or greater for Silicon Graphics machines as a command line program (Maya support on IRIX will not be available until sometime in 2000). The NuGraf Rendering System operates efficiently with Pentium.-based computers equipped with Windows 95/98, Windows NT 4.0 or higher, 64MB of RAM, a SVGA video card, and a hard disk with 55Mb of available space. 3D hardware accelerators are supported for Windows 95/98 and NT but are not required.

Company Background

Headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Okino Computer Graphics specializes in the development of 3D photo-realistic rendering, visualization and model translation technology. This technology is currently used within Okinos NuGraf Rendering System product, its PolyTrans data translation program and its NuGraf Developers 3D Toolkit. For more information on Okino Computer Graphics, please call 905-672-9328 or visit Okino Computer Graphics Internet WEB site at http://www.okino.com.

Documents Available Electronically

Attention editors. This document, as well as screen snapshots and related documents for the Press (in Word for Windows format) can be obtained electronically by visiting http://www.okino.com/press/magpics.htm

PolyTrans and NuGraf are registered trademarks of Okino Computer Graphics, Inc. Okino is a trademark of Okino Computer Graphics, Inc. Maya is a registered trademark of Alias|Wavefront and SGI. All other brand names, product names, or trademarks belong to their respective holders.

Editorial Contact:

Robert Lansdale
Okino Computer Graphics
T: (905) 672 9328
F: (905) 672 2706
Email: lansd@okino.com
WEB: http://www.okino.com