SAN FRANCISCO — Artists from around the world used media and entertainment software from Autodesk Inc. (www.autodesk.com) to help bring many of 2016's most popular films to the big screen. The company also received recognition from The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, earning a Scientific and Technical Achievement Award (Sci-Tech) for the Arnold Renderer.
"The amazing display of artistry in the Oscar-nominated work each year consistently raises the bar, and we're proud to have lent a hand in providing the technology for artists to bring amazing stories and visuals to audiences worldwide," says Autodesk senior VP, Chris Bradshaw. "Autodesk congratulates all of this year's nominees and appreciates the many studios that used Autodesk offerings to contribute to this year's Academy Award-nominated films. And to see Arnold, our newest addition to Autodesk Media & Entertainment, earn a Sci-Tech is icing on the cake."
In the Academy Awards’ Best Visual Effects category, all five nominees — Deepwater Horizon, Doctor Strange, The Jungle Book, Kubo and the Two Strings and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story — were created with help of Autodesk Maya. In some cases, additional Autodesk offerings were used, including 3DS Max, the Flame family, the Arnold renderer and Shotgun Software. Visuals for all five films were produced by thousands of artists working out of studios across four continents. Their work spanned previsualization, visual effects, virtual cinematography, post production, and color grading.
Each year, the Academy hosts a special awards ceremony to honor achievements that "demonstrate a proven record or contributing significant value to the process of making motion pictures." This year, Marcos Fajardo, Alan King and Thiago Ize received a Scientific and Engineering Award for the Arnold renderer, a modern ray tracer designed to efficiently render the complex geometry in computer-generated animation and visual effects films. Arnold is now a part of the Autodesk Media & Entertainment portfolio. The technology was awarded for its highly optimized geometry engine and novel ray-tracing algorithms, which unify the rendering of curves, surfaces, volumetrics and subsurface scattering. The honor marks the tenth Sci-Tech Award presented to scientists, designers and technologies from Autodesk.