FX Composer (free)

[Tami]

[url=\"http://developer.nvidia.com/object/fx_composer_home.html\"]FX Composer[/url] is a powerful integrated development environment for shader authoring. With support for DirectX and OpenGL, HLSL, COLLADA FX, and CgFX, as well as .fbx, .x, .3ds, .obj, and .dae formats, FX Composer provides true cross-platform functionality.

We strongly recommend that you read through the Quick Tutorial (linked from FX Composer's new Start Page), as well as the User Guide (also linked from FX Composer's Start Page) to get a good understanding of FX Composer's extensive capabilities. These include Shader Library integration, ShaderPerf analysis, animation support, COLLADA support, scripting, effect and project wizards, customizable toolbars and layouts, and much more.

The release also bundles [url=\"http://www.mentalimages.com/2_4_1_mentalmill_ae/\"]mental mill Artist Edition[/url], which allows you to author shaders visually by connecting nodes. You can export shaders from mental mill Artist Edition to FX Composer, where you can apply them to real-world geometry and perform more complex operations.

[i][b]Key Features of FX Composer 2[/b][/i]

[b]* Cross-API Support[/b]

[i] o DirectX 9 and OpenGL
o HLSL, COLLADA FX Cg, CgFX shading languages [/i]

[b] * User-Friendly Shader Authoring[/b]

[i]o Shader Creation Wizard with templates[/i]

[i]o Full-featured Code Editor[/i]
+ Code folding for functions, techniques and passes
+ Tab stop display
+ Line number display
+ External file modification monitoring
+ Jump-to-include files

[i]o Properties panel for tweaking shader parameters[/i]
+ High dynamic range color picker

[i]o Material panel for managing materials[/i]
+ Display of per-material textures
+ Tone mapping for per-material textures

[i]o Easy material creation and management interface[/i]

[i] o Hundreds of sample shaders[/i]
+ NVIDIA Shader Library integration
+ Sample projects ranging from simple to complex

[i]o Advanced scene manipulation[/i]
+ Create and manipulate basic geometric shapes, lights, and cameras
+ Import .3ds, .fbx, .dae, .x, .obj files
+ Drag-and-drop light binding
+ Drag-and-drop texture binding
+ Skinning and animation

[i]o Texture Viewer[/i]
+ Support for .dds, .jpg, .bmp, .png, .tif
+ Drag-and-drop textures onto object materials

[i]o mental mill™ Artist Edition[/i]
+ Artist-friendly visual shader authoring
+ Ability to export to FX Composer via CgFX and HLSL

[i]o Convenient Start Page[/i]
+ Recent projects
+ Quick Start Tutorial
+ Quick links to User Guide and other useful documentation
+ Single-click access to open effects and create new ones
+ Single-click access to open COLLADA documents

[i]o Integrated Shader Performance Tuning via NVIDIA ShaderPerf 2.0[/i]
+ Support for CgFX, COLLADA FX, and HLSL shaders
+ Compare shader techniques across multiple GPUs
+ View data in tables or graphs
+ See shader throughput, register usage, instruction counts, and branching performance

[i] o Convenient Pipeline Integration Features[/i]
+ Semantic and Annotation remapping
+ Advanced Scripting Support
# Full Python scripting
# Custom toolbar for scripting support
+ Extensible plug-in Architecture with SDK

[i]o Complete COLLADA support[/i]

+ Project and Asset Management (Project Explorer and Library Viewer)
# Author COLLADA assets
# Create and remove COLLADA documents
# Move, delete, and copy COLLADA assets across COLLADA documents
# View COLLADA assets by category

+ COLLADA format support
# Material Instance Scene Binding
# Material Instance Vertex Binding
# Skinning
# Triangulation with holes
# Support for rendering COMMON Profiles
# Vertex Stream Remapper

+ Conversion of CgFX to COLLADA FX Cg

[i] o Comprehensive Undo/Redo support[/i]

[i]o Comprehensive Documentation[/i]
+ User Guide
+ Quick Tutorial