RV 3.8 becomes first high-end player released as 64 bit on Windows, OSX and Linux
December 17, 2009 - Tweak Software, developers of RV, the image and sequence viewer for animation and visual effects, today announced the availability of RV 3.8. With the release of the new version, Tweak begins offering its popular RVIO Sequence Converter as a separate product and delivers significant new features.
Tweak’s RV software is in use by leading VFX and CG animation studios such as Industrial Light & Magic, Weta Digital, Tippett Studio, and Aardman Animations. RV’s professional, high-performance toolset is built on an open, extensible architecture allowing users to adapt the software to their own pipelines and styles of working.
“RV has a kind of dual personality. First it’s a refined tool for artists that helps get work done without getting in the way. Second, it’s a part of studio infrastructure that shops of all sizes can customize to make playback into a seamless, integrated part of the pipeline. This new release has important advances for both aspects of RV” explains Seth Rosenthal, President and Co-Founder of Tweak.
RV 3.8 includes new tools and performance enhancements that help make it easier for artists to collaborate, review work, and review media with audio, such as:
- Annotation tools to mark up RV sessions by drawing on the frame
- One-click sync so artists can easily connect and review media (including synced drawing)
- Audio waveform display and timeline magnifier to inspect audio sync
- 64-bit processing on all platforms (Windows, Linux, Mac OSX)
- Hardware acceleration for the RVIO Sequence Converter for faster image conversions, color corrections, and slap comps.
The new release also extends Tweak’s industry-leading pipeline integration capabilities, with:
- The ability to launch RV from links in web pages, email, chat, documents, and more, using the 'rvlink' URL
- HTTP support in the scripting language for communicating with web servers
- Python network API for controlling RV remotely
RV 3.8 also lays the groundwork for the announced integration of Shotgun Software’s leading production tracking solution with RV. Alan Trombla, Tweak Director of Product Development explains, “RV’s integration with Shotgun shows off the flexibility of both products. All the core technology has been built into RV 3.8 and with this release we are kicking off the official RV/Shotgun beta.”
With the release of RV 3.8, Tweak Software offers three product options: RV solo ($299 per license), RVIO ($199 per license), and an RV/RVIO bundle ($399). Licenses can float among workstations or be installed on a single computer. RV and RVIO are available directly from Tweak Software, www.tweaksoftware.com.
About RV
RV is a real-time, film resolution, high-dynamic-range image and sequence viewer for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. The application also includes native support for stereo 3D, Remote Sync, 2K uncompressed playback from disk, and HDR LUTs. RV combines a flexible architecture with a lean, polished design tailored to professional digital artists. Free downloadable trial versions of the software are available upon request at www.tweaksoftware.com.
About Tweak Software
San Francisco, CA-based Tweak Software was founded in 2007 to develop tools that address real-world production needs of VFX and animation professionals. The company was co-founded by Jim Hourihan and Seth Rosenthal in 2007 and joined by Alan Trombla in 2008. Jim Hourihan is the recipient of two Sci-Tech Academy Awards and is best known for developing Dynamation, the first commercial particle system that was subsequently incorporated into Autodesk’s Maya software. Hourihan also spent six years as a principle R&D engineer for Industrial Light and Magic where he developed many tools still in use at the facility today. For more information, visit www.tweaksoftware.com.