Academy Award winning production house Digital Domain has bought a site license of Katana from The Foundry. Taken on by The Foundry in November 2009 Katana is an environment for preparing 3D assets for rendering. It allows artists to define and control look and lighting while maintaining performance with very large datasets. Katana operates non-destructively using a rule-based approach allowing modeling look development animation and lighting teams to work in parallel. Currently using a pre-release version of Katana Digital Domain is the first studio to purchase Katana since The Foundry took on development in 2009. The Foundry's engineering effort in consultation with a broad range of users is ensuring Katana becomes a flexible product that can ultimately integrate with any pipeline and any renderer in any facility. Bill Collis CEO The Foundry says “We’re thrilled to have such a highly respected customer embrace Katana at this stage. Digital Domain have been actively involved throughout alpha and this significant investment is a true display of confidence in the technology and the route the team are taking. We look forward to progressing our position in the market with our launch later this year. “ Cliff Plumer CEO Digital Domain says “The Foundry has always understood production and continues to deliver innovative technology that benefits artists individually and studios as a whole. The integration of lighting and compositing with Katana and Nuke is a powerful combination that brings a new level of efficiency to our pipeline.” Already in development at Sony Pictures Imageworks for over six years Katana is production proven in full-scale CG feature animation and VFX films. Through its innovative recipe based approach Katana enables facilities large and small to build highly scalable and efficient lighting pipelines without a large internal engineering effort. Katana is scheduled for commercial release in September. The Foundry www.thefoundry.co.uk
