K-3D (open source)

[Tami]

[url=\"http://www.k-3d.org/wiki/Main_Page\"]K-3D[/url] features a robust plugin architecture and visualization pipeline, designed to scale to the needs of professional artists. K-3D has been written from the ground up to generate motion picture quality animation using RenderMan render engines. We strongly recommend the Aqsis (http://www.aqsis.org) render engine for use with K-3D.

K-3D's innovative interactive tutorial system will introduce you to basic use of the program. New tutorials can easily be recorded and shared with the rest of the community.

K-3D allows you to create and edit documents in multiple realtime OpenGL solid, shaded, texture-mapped views. You can even model, animate, and interact with animations while they play back for maximum productivity!

The following features apply to the 0.5/0.6 source tree:

Platforms:
* GNU / Linux (stable).
* Win32 (stable).
* MacOSX (unstable).
* BSD (untested).
* Solaris (untested).

License

* GNU General Public License (GPL).

Workflow

* Procedural modeling and animation.
* Interactive tutorials.
* Unlimited hierarchical undo/redo.

Viewing

* Camera: pan/tilt, zoom, dolly, modeling and tripod modes.
* Viewing Modes: Detailed selection of visible features.
* Hide / unhide geometry.
* Funny

Modeling

* Powerful scene graph Procedural Modeling with complete modeling history.
* Selection: Objects, meshes, faces, edges, patched, curves, point groups, points.
* Geometry types: Polygon, NURBS, subdivision, blobby.
* 3D Primitives: Cone, circle, cushion, cylinder, disk, grid, paraboloid, polyhedron, sphere, torus.
* Boolean modeling operations (using GTS library).
* Text: FreeType2 support.
* Instantiation: Create duplicates without adding gemometry to the scene.

Animation

* Visualization Pipeline allows arbitrary dataflow - any object property can be connected to any other compatible property.
* Animate any value.
* Unlimited number of animation channels.
* Bezier curve channels.
* Animate modeling operations.

Materials and Textures

* Textures with 16-bit float bitdepth.
* Procedual RenderMan shaders.

Rendering

* Full RenderMan Support: Aqsis, Pixie, BMRT, PRman, 3Delight, Render Dot C.
* Extensible support for alternate render engines and models: Yafray.
* Render OpenGL previews to disk.

Scripting

* Python engine (preferred engine for new script development).
* K3DScript engine (minimal scripting engine for tutorials / macros).
* Support for alternate script engine plugins and environments.

Compositing

* Basic 2D compositing.
* Bitdepth 16-bit float per channel.

Supported Formats

* Geometry Formats: Wavefront OBJ, GTS and a raw format are fully supported, other ones are optional and depend on PLIB installation. Experimental plugins include OpenFX, OFF, RIB and X formats.

* Image Formats:
o JPEG (all platforms).
o PNG (all platforms).
o TIFF (all platforms).
o OpenEXR (requires optional OpenEXR plugin).
o BMP (requires optional ImageMagick plugin).
o SUN (requires optional ImageMagick plugin).