by John Gross

Time flies like an arrow. Here we are wrapping up another NAB. I'm writing this message a few days before NAB, so I can't talk about what I haven't seen yet--with one exception--LightWave. NewTek came through (or at least, will in a few days) and surprised a lot of folks by announcing a new shipping version of LightWave. LightWave 5.0 (Intel and Alpha versions) will start shipping on Tuesday, April 16th. The manuals and CD's are being duplicated while I am writing this and should be set to go for NAB. While NewTek won't be selling it in their booth, they will have a no-cost, direct sales line available for orders. LightWave 5.0 will sell for $1,495.00 for Intel, Alpha, MIPS and Amiga version s (SGI version price to be announced). Upgrades for existing Intel, Alpha and MIPS version customers will be $495.00. Upgrade prices and ship dates for SGI and Amiga versions will be announced at a later date (I would expect sometime in May-June).

So, what's in LightWave 5.0? A lot. Both Modeler and Layout have OpenGL support for real-time shaded object redraw and background image generation. Windows95 and NT support OpenGL in software, but if you have an OpenGL accelerator card, you can expect to dramatically increase your performance. Because Modeler has the ability to show color shaded objects, it became necessary to implement some way of changing/creating simple surface adjustments (color, smoothness, Specularity, etc) directly in Modeler. That, combined with the re-vamped Import/Export features make Modeler and Layout more integrated.

Perhaps one of the coolest new features in Modeler is the addition of MetaNurbs. Like Metaform did, MetaNurbs takes polygonal based modeling one step further. Imagine being able to take a metaformed object and move it's points around to modify the shape of the metaform. When you model with MetaNurbs, you are modifying the "cage" around a metaformed-like object by simply dragging control vertices that are formed at the junctions of the original objects polygons. An object is converted to MetaNurbs and back again by simply hitting the Tab key when you have selected a number of polygons. You have to see it to realize how simple it is to create great looking objects quickly.

Layout has some great new additions as well. Among them are the use of multiple textures in the same surface and displacement/clip channels as well as the ability to use Alpha images for textures to create decals on surfaces. Add to that projection images for spotlights, interactive Zoom/Cone angle controls, improved plug-in support and some interface improvements and you get one hell of a nice upgrade. The addition of a lot of cool new plug-ins doesn't hurt either.

One quick note about the shipping 4.0 version of Modeler before I wrap up: There is a patch available on the NewTek BBS and on-line services that will upgrade the Rev C version of Modeler to include proper support for True-Type fonts plus a few bug fixes. Hmmm, maybe you shouldn't bother with the patch--just go to the 5.0 version!

John Gross
Editor