Friday, September 24, 2010

Latest News from Bunkspeed has Moved!

Latest News from Bunkspeed has Moved!  Please use this link for all the latest news from Bunkspeed > http://www.blog.bunkspeed.com

Thanks,
The Bunkspeed Team

Monday, September 13, 2010

Worlds Fastest GPU Laptop

The 480M laptop has 352 Fermi CUDA cores (Bunkspeed SHOT rendering power of nearly 3 x Quad i7).  This new wave of laptops are truly a gamechanger for portable rendering performance.

http://www.v3gamingpc.com/buy/avid_p55m.html

NVIDIA rolls out 400m series gpu's for laptops

http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/03/nvidia-gtx-470m-highlights-rollout-of-400m-mobile-gpu-series/

Very soon laptops will be available with up to 288 Fermi based CUDA cores and 1.5GB of video ram.  That's like having the performance of more than two quad core's in your laptop.  When you combine that with an available actual quad core and render in hybrid mode (GPU+CPU), it will be like having 12 cores (24 threads) of equivalent processing power all in a laptop.  The GPU revolution for rendering is only just beginning.

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

University of Alberta, Canada joins the Bunkspeed Education Partner Program

The University of Alberta in Canada is the latest to join the Bunkspeed Education Partnership program for a lab license package of Bunkspeed SHOT and MOVE.









Click the link for more information about the program  http://www.bunkspeed.com/education/

Friday, August 27, 2010

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Illinois Institute of Technology Joins Bunkspeed Education Partnership Program


Illinois Institute of Technology joins Bunkspeed Education Partnership Program with lab licenses of both Bunkspeed SHOT and MOVE.  

Syracuse University joins Bunkspeed Education Partnership Progam





Syracuse University in New Jersey joins the Bunkspeed Education Partnership Program with lab packs of Bunkspeed SHOT and MOVE.  

Thursday, August 12, 2010

RTT and Bunkspeed in new partnership to shape how 3D technology will change the way companies will work in the future

RTT and Bunkspeed, two global leaders of 3D visualization technology, have come to an agreement on an extensive collaboration that will leverage each company’s strengths and combine development efforts. 

The partnership will allow RTT and Bunkspeed to continue to shape how 3D technology will change the way companies work in the future, particularly online.

Sunday, August 1, 2010

Bunkspeed SHOT live at SIGGRAPH on PQ Labs touchscreen

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDX5ydTCmMg&feature=youtube_gdata

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Bunkspeed Featured on Nvidia CUDA GPGPU Newsletter Week in Review July 9, 2010

CUDA APPS
Bunkspeed Launches GPU-Accelerated 3D Rendering Software
Bunkspeed, provider of simplified 3D rendering and animation software, has released Bunkspeed SHOT, an interactive 3D application that brings the power of the GPU to creative professionals. The new version, which acts as a "camera" for 3D data, incorporates innovative iray technology from mental images and runs on NVIDIA Quadro, Tesla and GeForce platforms.

Background: Bunkspeed brought interactive ray tracing (a rendering method that simulates light reflections, refractions and shadows) to the market in 2007 but it was limited to the CPU. The new Bunkspeed SHOT leverages CUDA-based GPUs to dramatically accelerate the user´s workflow. Even the most complex scenes render interactively and in real-time. Bunkspeed also enables users to scale up rendering over multiple machines. A new level of performance and realism is now achievable at less than 20% of the cost of the same level on multiple CPUs.

"As a user of the previous generation software from Bunkspeed, I knew the standard set at the time was tough to beat. Bunkspeed SHOT offers breakthrough usability, performance and quality, and is a pleasure to use…. I am rendering at speeds unimagined just a couple of years ago…." - Peter Crowther, UK-based, computer graphic artist and illustrator
– For more info, see www.bunkspeed.com/SHOT and www.mentalimages.com/iray
– See VizWorld article: http://www.vizworld.com/2010/06/bunkspeed-shot-3d-photorealistic-rendering-simplified/

MCAD Cafe Interview with Bunkspeed CEO at PTC User Conference

 http://www10.mcadcafe.com/video/Bunkspeed-Philip-Lunn-Chief-Executive-Officer/31928/media.html

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Hochschule Darmstadt - University of Applied Sciences becomes latest University to join the Bunkspeed Academic Lab Program

Hochschule Darmstadt Germany joins Bunkspeed's University Lab Program with a 30 seat lab license of Bunkspeed Move.

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Bunkspeed Shot Featured Today and Tomorrow at the Del Mar Electronics and Design Show


Find Bunkspeed today and tomorrow Del Mar Electronics & Design Show Wednesday, May 5th ~ Thursday, May 6th Del Mar Fairgrounds & Expo Center and see the all new Bunkspeed Shot demonstrated live.  Find us at Booth 760.

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

CADnetworks demonstrates Bunkspeed Shot at the large PNY/NVIDIA booth at FMX in Stuttgart

Come and see Bunkspeed Shot demonstrated on high performance hardware by CADnetwork at the PNY/NVIDIA booth at FMX 2010 May 04-07, in Stuttgart, Germany.

Friday, April 23, 2010

Bunkspeed presents the all new generation Bunkspeed Shot April 30-May 2, 2010 at IDSA's Mideast District Conference - Western Michigan University - Grand Rapids, MI

Mideast District Conference
Faces of Design
April 30-May 2, 2010
Western Michigan University—Grand Rapids, MI

It’s like the heat permeating off the pavement, a blurring of the lines on the road and the horizon ahead of converging design practices as a way of thinking that marries smart ideas with creative solutions. Enter a better tomorrow. Bound together by passion and design of various specialty areas, the profession is evolving and a new face of design is emerging. With innovation leaders such as Darrel Rhea taking the stage and Nathan Young bringing his global influences to the podium, attendees are faced with extraordinary topics and engaging dialogues. Be a part.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Bunkspeed presents the all new generation Bunkspeed Shot April 23-25, 2010 at IDSA's Western District Conference in Denver Colorado

Bunkspeed is proud to follow up our success at the Northeast IDSA conference to show the much anticipated, all new, Bunkspeed Shot at the  Western District Conference "Make A SceneApril 23-25, 2010, Denver Co.  Our previous software innovation HyperShot, was introduced to the industrial design community through the IDSA conferences across America starting back in 2008 so we chose the IDSA to debut again!  We are excited to unveil many man years of dedicated software development in our new generation product for creative professionals Bunkspeed SHOT.  At the show  we will also be showing Bunskpeed Move - The animation and rendering tool for designers.  Move is in its second release, is production ready, and enables designer story telling like never before.



Friday, April 9, 2010

The next generation of HyperShot: Bunkspeed Shot coming in May

Bunkspeed Shot is not a clone of HyperShot.  It is a ground up redesign.  Even faster and simpler workflow.  Detailed scene tree.  Fast hide/show/copy/paste.  Drag and drop everything.   Complete undo/redo.  Import all of all the CAD formats you expect.  Most importantly, an all new unbiased hybrid render engine that runs great on CPU's just like HyperShot, but is signfiicantly accelerated with NVIDIA CUDA based graphics cards.  Many new features and an elegant, intuitive interface that will enable designers, photographers, engineers, or anyone to be render stunning images faster than ever before.


The next generation HyperShot, not just a clone: 
The all new Bunkspeed Shot 

Coming May 2010

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Bunkspeed Featured Designer Joao Paulo Melo Shows Us a Glimpse of the Future

 Joao graduated in industrial design from the College of Fine Arts in Sao Paulo.  He now works as a virtual designer in the Fiat Latin America style center, the only Fiat design studio outside of Italy.  Joao is  responsible for photo realistic renders and virtual presentations during the development of the car and after, for use in advertising and other means of dissemination.  He's always been passionate about the manufacturing process, from idea to sale. He began his career as an Alias modeler, but always liked to model products, render cars, and creation of boards emotionally oriented to advertising. Also in his spare time he likes to create concepts inspired by the work of Daniel Simons, Syd Mead and other concept designers.


Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Bunkspeed to Debut the All New "Bunkspeed Shot" at IDSA NorthEast District Conference "CoCreate" April 16th and 17th

Bunkspeed is proud to debut the much anticipated, all new, Bunkspeed Shot at the Northeast District Conference CoCreate, April 16-17, 2010 Kean University, Union, NJ.  Our previous software HyperShot, was introduced to the industrial design community through the IDSA conferences across America starting back in 2008 so we chose the IDSA to debut again!  We are excited to unveil many man years of dedicated software development in our new generation product for creative professionals.  At the show  we will also be showing Bunskpeed Move - The animation and rendering tool for designers.  Move is in its second release, is production ready, and enables designer story telling like never before.

If you can't make the Northeast conference, you can find us at the Western District Conference  Make a Scene! April 23-25, 2010  The Curtis Hotel—Denver, CO.

Thursday, March 11, 2010

DD Studio and Bunkspeed Collaborate on promotional video for Eastman




This is a very nice example of the kind of promotional video that can be created in Bunkspeed HyperMove 2010.  In this example, the integrated physics engine of HyperMove Pro was used.  Art direction and product design was provided by DD Studio, animation and rendering was done by Bunkspeed.

Shenkar College of Engineering and Design Joins Bunkspeed Academic Program

Shenkar College of Engineering and Design was founded in 1970, with the goal of serving Israeli industry in all that relates to academic qualifications and R&D services for modern industries.

Shenkar is an institute of higher education and, like all the public universities in Israel, is supervised and financed by the Israeli Council for Higher Education. Shenkar offers degree courses in all the subjects studied. Tuition fees are in line with the fees charged by Israeli universities. 




Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Mikkeli University of Applied Sciences, Finland, joins the Bunkspeed Academic Program


Mikkeli University of Applied Sciences, Finland, has joined the Bunkspeed Academic Program with addition of a lab license of Bunkspeed Move.


About Mikkeli University - Our mission is to provide the highest professional expertise as well as applied research and development work for the needs of the working life. We offer a wide range of study programmes to choose from, and we will help you prepare for exciting career opportunities every step of the way. At Mikkeli University of Applied Sciences, we are committed to academic excellence and place special emphasis on international awareness and the development of entrepreneurial skills.

Thursday, February 11, 2010

New Featured Designer Adrian Barran, 4th year Transport Design Student at Coventry University

Adrian is currently in his 4th year studying Transport Design at Coventry University, he has always been passionate about cars and design. It was in his second year at university that he was introduced to Alias and discovered how powerful 3D modelling was in the design process. Last year Adrian was selected for a summer placement at Land Rover (Gaydon) to do Alias modelling, this placement improved his modelling skill and ability. The placement also helped him decide that 3D modelling and visualisation is the career path he wants to take once he graduates from Coventry university at the end of the year.

See all the images here



Animation created in HyperMove 

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Bunkspeed® powers its next generation of software with mental images’ iray® Technology

Combines fast and intuitive workflow of Bunkspeed with power and accuracy of mental images® iray® rendering technology­—creating a powerful, accelerated and easy-to-use next generation real-time rendering tool with unprecedented photorealism.

CARLSBAD, Calif. —February 3, 2010--Bunkspeed, Inc, a leading global provider of rendering and visualization software for design, engineering, and marketing, announced today it has selected iray® rendering  technology from mental images®  to power its next generation software to be called Bunkspeed SHOT™—the  company's revolutionary easy to use, real-time photorealistic rendering application.  Bunkspeed SHOT™ vastly simplifies the complex process of 3D object rendering, putting the power of photorealistic imagery directly into the hands of designers, photographers, engineers, architects, creative agencies, and all creators of 3D content.

Bunkspeed was the first to offer an intuitive "virtual digital camera" in the form of interactive real-time ray tracing with its introduction of HyperShot®, whose simple and elegant workflow enabled digital designers to bring their creations to realistic life, in minutes not hours—freeing them from the complex technical processes so often related to 3D rendering tools, and with much better results.

Bunkspeed SHOT’s ability to use either the CPU, GPU or both, promises to be faster than ever before, scaling seamlessly on one or more machines to make optimal use of any particular hardware configuration.  Bunkspeed SHOT’s integration with mental images’ iray rendering technology, fully exploits the powerful parallel processing power of NVIDIA CUDA-enabled GPUs, encouraging more rapid iterations with stunning photorealistic accuracy.

Tightly combining the intuitive and interactive Bunkspeed SHOT™  workflow with the reality matching accuracy of iray materials and lighting, allows creative users in any field, on any hardware, to intuitively produce the highest quality image output without the steep learning curves of other rendering solutions.  

"The combination of Bunkspeed SHOT and iray® is an extremely exciting development for us and the industry.  It demonstrates our standing commitment to our customers to constantly innovate and improve our products, and to remain the leader in accessible and truly easy-to-use photorealistic rendering for all creators of 3D content." said Anthony Duca, COO of Bunkspeed.

“mental images is very pleased that Bunkspeed has chosen iray as their official rendering technology,” says Randy Ochs, Vice President of Business Development and Sales, North America for mental images. “We are excited that iray will allow users of the new Bunkspeed SHOT™ to create accurate, photorealistic 3D images by harnessing the power of the GPU and NVIDIA CUDA  architecture for unbelievably fast photorealism. We welcome Bunkspeed to our list of OEM Partners who have selected mental images technology to enable greater rendering performance in their products. ”
Bunkspeed SHOT™ integrated with ira rendering technology— is a combination of unprecedented power, elegance and accuracy. Bunkspeed is raising the bar once again, enabling users to continue to "Render them speechless"™.

PRICING AND AVAILABILITY
 
The next generation of Bunkspeed SHOT™ fully integrated with iray® rendering technology will be available starting within the second quarter of 2010 and . will be made available as a free 30 day trial, an upgrade to all current Bunkspeed HyperShot customers, and no charge to all those on maintenance or pre order. For more information about Bunkspeed SHOT, please visit www.bunkspeed.com/shot. For more information about iray®, please visit www.mentalimages.com/iray.

ABOUT BUNKSPEED

Bunkspeed is a leading global provider of visualization software and services for design, engineering, and marketing. Headquartered in Los Angeles, California, our advanced visualization technologies leverage digital engineering assets and contribute to enlightened decision-making in the digital design process. Our clients gain a cost effective way to deliver sales and marketing imagery, and realize significantly reduced product development costs. Bunkspeed’s customers include Nissan, Ford Motor Company, Volvo, Jaguar, Land Rover, Pininfarina, Chrysler, Frog Design, Smart Design IDEO, Acushnet Company, Dell, Gillette, Gulfstream and many others. For more information on Bunkspeed’s products and services, please visit: www.bunkspeed.com

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Bunkspeed HyperMove used in creation of the new Cobra S2 Mens Driver product "360"

The 360 View animation on this page http://www.cobragolf.com/drivers/S2MensDriver.aspx is another great example of the kind of production product animation created exclusively in HyperMove.  The animation was rendered to this impressive result using SnapShot render mode reducing production time significantly.



Bunkspeed HyperMove was build to allow designers to easily create this kind on animation in a very short time allowing for more and more of this interactive content to be integrated into impactful websites.

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

University of South Australia moves forward with Bunkspeed





University of South Austalia moves forward with Bunkspeed by adding 61 licenses to their program.

Founded in 1991, the University of South Australia is an innovative, outward-looking university built on more than a century's experience as a leader in educating professionals and applied research.

UniSA is part of the influential Australian Technology Network (ATN), an alliance of five prominent universities from each mainland state. The ATN's aim is to help enhance Australia's social and economic wealth by creating, disseminating and applying new knowledge.

At UniSA we value world-class scholarship that meets the needs of the global community and solves real-world problems. We engage with industry and the professions in our teaching and research endeavours, so our graduates can gain professional experience and are immediately able to put this knowledge into practice.

Our Vision, Mission and Values statement, our graduate qualities, and our achievements encapsulate what we stand for as an institution and what we offer to students, staff and the wider community.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Hochschule Munchen Joins Bunkspeed Educational Partnership Program


Hochschule München, Bavaria’s largest university of applied sciences. joins the Bunkspeed educational partnership program with a 30 license lab pack of HyperShot Pro.

The University of Applied Sciences – München was founded in 1971 by the amalgamation of seven colleges of technology and higher education, some of which date back to the early 19th century. Today it is the largest university of its kind in Bavaria and one of the largest in Germany. Its great variety of well-structured study programs, the instruction in small groups, its internationality and excellent contacts with industry and commerce make UASM a highly renowned university.

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Nissan's V2G Concept for LA Autoshow brought to life with Bunkspeed Software

Nissan Design America's visualization expert James Cronin, brings their 2009 entry into the Los Angeles Autoshow's Design Challenge to life with Bunkspeed's HyperMove. All animation and rendering was completed with HyperMove and post effects were created with After Effects. Click on the images to see them full size. The model is highly detailed and a collaboration amongst a number Nissan designers and artists. See the autoshow
Design Callenge entrants here.
A fantastic example of the quality of work created in Bunkspeed software.










Tuesday, December 1, 2009

California College of the Arts (CCA) Becomes the Latest University to Join the Bunkspeed Educational Partnership Program



California College of the Arts
(CCA), the largest regionally accredited, independent school of art and design in the western United States has joined Bunkspeed with the addition of the "Bunkspeed Educational Partnership Program Package" which consists of 30-seats of our top of the line HyperShot Pro. We are excited to have CCA join our program and welcome them to the Bunkspeed family.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

Product Manager David Randle takes us through HyperMove in "Animation for Designers"

Replayed from the November 12th's Webinar, Bunkspeed Product Manager takes you through animation of a watch mechanism, camera fly's and material animation. An informative and useful tutorial on all HyperMove's animation elements. A must see for creation of animation in HyperMove.

You rendered them speechless with HyperShot.
Now it is time to move your audience with HyperMove.

A one hour webinar to learn how you can make your products come to life by quickly creating various types of animations. The best part? Work directly with your HyperShot files.

This webinar will cover:

- Importing and preparing your model
- Setting up your scene
- Setting up an animation
- Combining and controlling your animations
- Creating the final output
- ... and much more.

If you ever thought about animation, you really don't want to miss this webinar.



Click here to watch (Quicktime 7 or X required):
http://www.bunkspeed.com/downloads/Webinars/2009_11_12/2009_11_12_Reference.qtl

Friday, November 6, 2009

Nissan's V2G Concept for LA Autoshow brought to life with Bunkspeed Software

Each year car designers from Southern California compete in the LA Design Challenge. This years entry from Nissan is brought to life by their designers using Bunkspeed software. See competition details here:

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Bunkspeed Introduces Services




As we've grown, more and more of our customers have asked us to provide support services. We are proud to introduce Bunkspeed Services. Our highly experienced and energetic team is available for training, implementation, image creation, render farm outsourcing, data preperation, modeling and more. Please visit www.bunkspeed.com/services for more information.

Friday, October 16, 2009

Black and Decker Senior Designer, Tom Murray, uses HyperMove to Bring New "Ready Wrench" to Life

Black and Decker just launched the Ready Wrench, a handy little tool that has some of the most common sockets built right into one tool. It’s gonna be a big seller this Christmas. Senior Black and Decker designer, Tom Murray, composed the animations on the site with Bunkspeed Hypermove. A flash developer then created the controls. Check out the animations. Tom was not responsible for the design of the product. Click here to go to the site.

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

THE WEB MARKETING ASSOCIATION IS PROUD TO PRESENT THIS 2009 WEBAWARD For Outstanding Achievement in Web Development to Bunkspeed


Bunkspeed has won another award..this time for web development "For Outstanding Achievement in Web Development" for the Web Marketing Association.

Click here to see details

"Bunkspeed Receives 2009 Los Angeles Award"

U.S. Commerce Association’s Award Plaque Honors the Achievement


WASHINGTON D.C., June 8, 2009 -- Bunkspeed has been selected for the 2009 Los Angeles Award in the Computer Graphics Service category by the U.S. Commerce Association (USCA).

The USCA "Best of Local Business" Award Program recognizes outstanding local businesses throughout the country. Each year, the USCA identifies companies that they believe have achieved exceptional marketing success in their local community and business category. These are local companies that enhance the positive image of small business through service to their customers and community.

Various sources of information were gathered and analyzed to choose the winners in each category. The 2009 USCA Award Program focused on quality, not quantity. Winners are determined based on the information gathered both internally by the USCA and data provided by third parties.

About U.S. Commerce Association (USCA)
U.S. Commerce Association (USCA) is a Washington D.C. based organization funded by local businesses operating in towns, large and small, across America. The purpose of USCA is to promote local business through public relations, marketing and advertising. The USCA was established to recognize the best of local businesses in their community. Our organization works exclusively with local business owners, trade groups, professional associations, chambers of commerce and other business advertising and marketing groups. Our mission is to be an advocate for small and medium size businesses and business entrepreneurs across America.

SOURCE: U.S. Commerce Association

CONTACT:
U.S. Commerce Association
Email: PublicRelations@us-ca.org
URL: http://www.us-ca.org

Thursday, September 10, 2009

HyperShot '10 Screenshots "Sneak Peak on Develop 3D"

posted by al dean

Model courtesy of Mark van der Quaak, dppb (www.dbbp.com).

This just in from DEVELOP3D's Mac:Design sister site: I'll make no bones about it. I love rendering. From when I started in the world of 3D-based design, I used to dig into 3d Studio when it was a DOS product and horrendous to use. All the way through my professional career as a designer, it stayed with me and even when I moved into the world of publishing I found myself still engaged (and still do, to this day) in freelance gigs.

There's something engaging and addictive about taking staid, boring looking CAD geometry that's at the heart of the design process through to create photorealistic assets (be it imagery or animations) that shows the viewer exactly how that product is going to appear when manufactured.

The problem has, until very recently, been that rendering, both to set-up the scenes, materials, textures, lighting then processing that information, has a headache. to create truly photorealistic images takes time and skill to do, then, when you've got it about right, even with today's ultra powerful machines, took time to process - and when you consider that creating that imagery (whether it be static images or animations) was typically a highly iterative process of set-up, test render, tweak, render again, the whole thing took more time than it should have.

This, I'm glad to say, has changed in the last year or so. There are a number of applications launched onto the market that make this process much more efficient. Progressive rendering technology, whereby you don't have to wait for a render to complete before you get a good idea of what your project look, makes things easier. This, combined with technologies like HDR (High Dynamic Range) images that make lighting set-up much easier as well as multi-core processing workstations (progressive renderers are typically CPU driven). One of the leading lights of this movement has been Bunkspeed (www.bunkspeed.com), established a few years ago, to bring a core technology to market that enables the 3D user to create stunningly photorealistic imagery, without the headaches traditionally associated with the process and the flagship product in the company's portfolio is HyperShot.

HyperShot was launched two years ago and has been growing in popularity amongst many industry sectors and professions since. The core concept is that you connect to your CAD data, read it in, add materials, choose an environment (based on HDR images, which contain both scene information and a greater amount of information about lighting conditions within that scene than standard images) and watch the display update to show you what you're going to get. While it's heavily skewed towards the number of CPUs or core you have your workstation, even on the most modest of laptops, Hypershot gives you update speeds that are close enough to real-time.

Now, while HyperShot isn't a unique application in using this type of technology, the things I've always loved about it are two fold. Firstly, it's both Windows and Mac-based and has been since the very early releases and secondly, the interface is so sparse, typically driven by keyboard shortcuts and mouse interaction, rather than complex dialogs. This makes for a very intuitive working process and if I'm honest, it get very very addictive. HyperShot's been through a pretty rapid release cycle in the last two years and while the latest version, 1.9, has just been released, the last few months have also seen the Beta program for the next major release, HyperShot 2.0, get underway.

HyperShot 2.0?


Image courtesy of Peter Allen, Marketing Director at UC Santa Barbara.

I first got a peak at HyperShot for Mac's next major release at the PTC World user event last this year and saw something that took my breath away. While many organisations are looking to 'go mac' of late, it's not often you find a 3D professional application that is atuned to the Mac way of things working and following the Cocoa UI guidelines closely. But this is what the Bunkspeed team has been working on and I can finally begin to lift the lid of what HyperShot 2.0, or as it's to be called, HyperShot '10 is going to bring to the Mac community. Before we do that, I wanted to get an insight into what Bunkspeed have planned, I got on the phone to Thomas Teger.



Thomas is the Director of Marketing and Strategic Planning at Bunkspeed (you'll guess that from the picture, right?) and one of those people I love running into at the various events - mostly because he's 19 feet tall and because he's German, can enjoy a drink without disappearing off to bed at 10pm. Thomas is a CAD industry veteran, having worked at both PTC and UGS (now Siemens PLM) and was influential in bringing both NX to the Mac and driving the development of a now defunct PTC product called Pro/Concept (also Mac-based). These days, he's one of the four provisional patent holders for HyperShot (together with Founder & CEO Philip Lunn, COO Anthony Duca, and Chief Scientist Dr. Henrik Wann Jensen), and the driving force behind any new development for HyperShot. His passion for the Mac and Apple products started in 1992 while writing his Master's Thesis on a PowerBook 170 at BMW AG in Munich, Germany.
Al Dean: Hey Thomas. Let's talk about HyperShot and the Mac. You've had a Mac native version of HyperShot pretty much since inception. Could you explain why you made that choice?
Thomas Teger: When I first saw the concepts of realtime raytracing that turned into HyperShot in early 2006 I knew that this had great potential in a number of markets. Since HyperShot breaks down the barriers of traditional raytracing, it opens up the door for many more people who would never been able to create a photographic image from 3D data. The Mac community is traditionally all about the creativity. Photographers, retouchers, marketing people - all Mac. This made it easy to decide to port HyperShot to the Mac. On top of it, HyperShot has been built on an incredible advanced, flexible, and state of the art architecture. "Porting" - if you want to call it that - to the Mac was basically "free". When we showed the concept of HyperShot in 2006 at the IDSA international conference in Austin, TX, we had both versions running side by side. It was awesome.

AD: How does the Mac user base stack up against the windows variant?
TT: Our Mac user base is at about 10% of our entire install base and growing strongly. More and more people are converting to the Mac, now that you can have dual boot capability. Students in particular are gravitating very strongly to the Mac, but also more and more design houses. Of course you know what the major obstacle is: the support of common CAD formats on the Mac. When we came out with the Mac version of HyperShot, we only offered support for OBJ. Quite limiting, isn't it? Today we are offering support for native Rhino and SketchUp, as well as OBJ, Collada, FBX, and 3ds.

AD: I've been playing with the HyperShot 2.0 Beta and the interface has been shifted to a Cocoa-based UI. It's looking slick. How much more work have you got to do before you take 2.0 to market?


Image courtesy of Carter Hickman Design (www.carterhickmandesigns.com)

TT: Thanks, Al. We worked long and hard on developing the interface that turns HyperShot into a true Mac application that will be appreciated and embraced by all Mac users out there. As you know we have started our beta program about 4 weeks ago. We started with a small team of 10 people representing various industries. With the improvements that we made over the past few weeks we are close to being feature complete, and the app is also very stable. Some folks like Carter Hickman for example are using v2 4 hours a day to do production work. He can't go back - you saw his comments. Same with Peter Allen from UC Santa Barbara. The biggest hurdle right now is to make sure that everything works with Snow Leopard. And then there is some more cleanup required, bug fixes and UI polish for the most part. We are close! The official name will be HyperShot '10 to match the rest of our product line. Following the Apple lead here ... iPhoto '09, iLife '09, iWork '09 - you get the picture ;-).

AD: One thing that's kind of irritating is that the Mac platform has much fewer translation options that the Windows version (predominatelty, the SolidWorks and Pro/E connectors are missing). Could you give me an explanation of why they don't work on the mac platform?
TT: Agreed - as mentioned above this is a big reason for the adoption rate still being small is the lack of support for traditional CAD formats. We are getting many requests for support of additional file formats. IGES, STEP, and SolidWorks are the top requests, followed by the support for AliasStudio Tools. I am happy to announce that we will support IGES and STEP in version 2. I am personally rather disappointed that SolidWorks is not releasing the API for eDrawings on the Mac. It is so close. This would solve my, or better the users problem. I've asked repeatedly for it, but the answer was always "sorry, not available". On the other hand we allow people to run HyperShot on the Windows side with the same license, as long as it is installed on the machine. So if you have SolidWorks or Pro/E installed on the Windows side, install HyperShot and the plugin (free on our website) and then import your CAD files into HyperShot and save out the .bip file. And then continue to work on the Mac side. Works great.
AD: Any plans to bring HyperMove or HyperDrive to the Mac
TT: Plans - yes, time frame - no. We are carefully evaluating the needs and market requirements here.

AD: Have you got a feeling for any performance difference between Windows and Mac? Anything to be gained?
TT: Since HyperShot is 100% CPU based you are getting identical performance on either platform in realtime. I found though that the final rendering is about 10% faster on Mac OS X compared to Windows Vista 64bit. Even though the realtime performance is identical on Windows and Mac OS X, it still "looks and feels" better on the Mac. There is just something about the Mac - it is hard to describe.

AD: Is the Snow Leopard release giving you any headaches?
TT: I've been running Snow Leopard since the day after it came out and have not experienced any problems with the current version of HyperShot. I have a few customers that are reporting some issues, so I will need to figure out what is going on. We are experiencing some unexplainable things with HyperShot '10 that work great under Leopard but fail under Snow Leopard. That is now our major focus until the release - make sure that everything is working flawlessly under both Leopard and Snow Leopard. Tiger, by the way, will no longer be supported.

AD: I've heard (mostly from your competitors, I'll admit) all manner of rumours about Bunkspeed. Do you want to clear those up and talk about the company's performance in the last few years and how you're doing in the market place?
TT: Absolutely, Al. Bunkspeed is stronger than ever. The fact is that Bunkspeed is 100% self funded and profitable since year two of its inception (Bunkspeed was founded in 2002 by Philip Lunn, CEO of Bunkspeed). HyperShot has been incredibly successful since its introduction in June of 2007. To date we have close to 2,000 customers that are using HyperShot on a daily basis. We started out really strong in Industrial Design, and are now tapping more into Engineering, and of course marketing. We are very successful in "building the bridge" from design and engineering all the way into marketing. Despite economic downturn, our year to date revenues are up compared to last year. As companies are cutting cost, they still order more software from us to help with that process. We certainly made some internal adjustments earlier in the year to make sure we focus on areas that promise growth. We are still a small company, so we must be careful on how we spend our money and where to ensure maximum return on investment. Rumors where of course fueled by the fact that we didn't have a presence at Siggraph this year, since we had a fairly large previous two years. We carefully evaluated the situation. Fact is that many companies cut down on "unnecessary" expenses and would not send any representatives, and trade show attendance was the first one to be cut. Also, Siggraph for us has been a branding event more so than a revenue generator. We felt that our brand has been well established in the industries we are going after - ID, Engineering, and Marketing. This was another reason for us to sit this one out. We are continuing to focus on being present at other events that cater to our markets we are going after such as user conferences and IDSA conferences (Industrial Designers Society of America). Being part of the PTC User conference this year for example opened up many doors to new accounts. As I said before, Bunkspeed is stronger than ever and poised for some serious growth.
Later this week, I'm going to give you a sneak peak into what's coming up in the next release, so stay tuned.

Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Politechico Di Milano Joins Bunkspeed University Program


Politecnico di Milano adds 60 HyperShot and HyperMove Pro licenses for their design students.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

U.S. Commerce Association selects Bunkspeed to Receive the 2009 Los Angeles Award

Bunkspeed Receives 2009 Los Angeles Award

U.S. Commerce Association’s Award Plaque Honors the Achievement

WASHINGTON D.C., June 8, 2009 -- Bunkspeed has been selected for the 2009 Los Angeles Award in the Computer Graphics Service category by the U.S. Commerce Association (USCA).

The USCA "Best of Local Business" Award Program recognizes outstanding local businesses throughout the country. Each year, the USCA identifies companies that they believe have achieved exceptional marketing success in their local community and business category. These are local companies that enhance the positive image of small business through service to their customers and community.

Various sources of information were gathered and analyzed to choose the winners in each category. The 2009 USCA Award Program focused on quality, not quantity. Winners are determined based on the information gathered both internally by the USCA and data provided by third parties.

About U.S. Commerce Association (USCA)

U.S. Commerce Association (USCA) is a Washington D.C. based organization funded by local businesses operating in towns, large and small, across America. The purpose of USCA is to promote local business through public relations, marketing and advertising.

The USCA was established to recognize the best of local businesses in their community. Our organization works exclusively with local business owners, trade groups, professional associations, chambers of commerce and other business advertising and marketing groups. Our mission is to be an advocate for small and medium size businesses and business entrepreneurs across America.

SOURCE: U.S. Commerce Association

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Bunkspeed Releases HyperShot v1.9

New Version Adds new Capabilities to Make Material Finishes Look Even More Realistic

Los Angeles, California, August 4, 2009 – Bunkspeed today announced the immediate availability of HyperShot v1.9, another eagerly awaited upgrade to the groundbreaking HyperShot product released two years ago.

HyperShot is the first digital camera for 3D data. Using scientifically accurate materials and real-world lighting in real-time the patent pending application gives anybody involved with 3D data the ability to create photographic images in a matter of minutes, independent of the size of the digital model.

This new version delivers significant improvements in the area of material definition that allow clients to get an even more realistic look to their finishes, as well as create completely new materials quickly and easily. Overall usability, performance, and integration with leading 3D CAD applications has also been greatly enhanced, delivering a greater user experience with even better image results.

Peter Kossev, Principal of Pixel Mathematics, a provider of high-end product development consulting to many of the world's top manufacturers and a beta tester of this new version said: "Yet another big step ahead from the guys at Bunkspeed! HyperShot v1.9 is a result of their relentless pursuit for perfection, with the even more powerful bump mapping and many other significant improvements which make our process much faster, with better results".

The company adopted HyperShot when it was just released. HyperShot has since fundamentally changed the firm’s product development process, and is now being used on every project for design decisions, client presentations, and sales and marketing imagery.

Image courtesy of Pixel Mathematics, created for Sonoma Wireworks

“HyperShot continues to spread rapidly in the digital 3D world”, says Philip Lunn, CEO and Founder of Bunkspeed. “Whether it is Industrial Design, Engineering or Marketing, there is a critical need for a renderer that is simple to use, delivers fast and extremely accurate results, can handle the largest and most complex 3D data sets with ease, and is affordable. We are committed to deliver innovative features inside HyperShot quickly, to allow users to create even better images in a shorter amount of time."

HyperShot v1.9 is available for immediate purchase and download on both Windows and Mac systems. The upgrade to v1.9 is free for existing customers.

For more information on HyperShot, to download a free trial or purchase a copy of the software visit: www.bunkspeed.com/hypershot.