News

Release of Cheetah3D 3.2

09. May. 2006

Cheetah3D 3.2 has been released today. This is a serious feature update, and contains many important new features, such as support for rendering caustics. You can now render these nice light patterns caused by the focussing of light behind (say) a lens or a glass of wine. Thanks to the integration of caustics, the entire lighting system has been rewritten. All the formerly different light types have now been combined into a single unified light source which makes it much easier to switch between different types of lighting. Version 3.2 also allows you to save your scenes as binary .jas files. This new binary file format usually generates much smaller files — which subsequently load much more quickly. Last but not least, the workflow has been seriously overhauled, with features like an enhanced toolbar, and a copy-paste facility for Bezier paths between Intaglio and Cheetah3D.

Check out the winners of the Cheetah3D character modeling contest.

Changes since the last update:

Added the rendering of caustics
- Reflective and refractive caustics
- Caustic tag
Added unified light source
- All light types in one object (allows easy switching between different light sources)
- possibility to chose between different axes
Added binary .jas export
- significant reduction in file size
- much faster loading and saving of files!
Enhanced Toolbar
- popup menus
- "small symbols" work
- "text mode" works
Added Intaglio ( www.purgatorydesign.com/Intaglio ) copy and paste support
Added FBX import/export to Intel version
Added bug reporter toolbar item
Added new render settings
- reflection On/Off
- refraction On/Off
- textures On/Off
- max ray depth (up to 8)
Enhanced properties editor
- unavailable properties are disabled now (see new light object)
Crumple Tool now works in all modes
Enhanced Flip Normal tool
Adding a object automatically switches to object mode
Clicking into subview doesn't unselect objects
Added "Document::redrawAll()" Javascript function
Enhanced "Base::setParameter()" Javascript function
Fixed "Tool script" UI redraw bug
Fixed bug with 1bit tiff import
Fixed crashing bug in smart folders
Fixed bug in "cast shadows" property of Render tag
HDRI and Displacement texture are correctly loaded again when opening files
3DS, 3DMF and H exporter now always exports UV coords
Removed "Knife" tools from context menu
Childs of camera object now redraw correctly
Double clicking files with fog tag won't crash
Many other small bug fixes