Below are news items from July 2004-December 2004

form·Z 5.0

November 10, 2004

AutoDesSys is very pleased to announce form·Z 5.0. This new release incorportates v. 4.5 and will be released within a month. For more details go to form·Z 5.0.


PRESS RELEASE
Columbus, Ohio- November 10, 2004

AutoDesSys, Inc. is very pleased to announce form·Z 5.0. This new version incorporates v. 4.5 and is expected to be released within a month.

"This is an exciting development that happened behind the scenes that we are now ready to share with the general public" said Chris Yessios, President of AutoDesSys. form·Z 5.0 incorporates version 4.5 which was not released to the broader user community, except to a special group of beta testers and plugin developers. V. 4.5, first and foremost, offered the new API technology and script language of form·Z. During the beta testing effort, many features initially planned for v. 5.0 were also completed. This development led to the release of v. 5.0 simultaneously with v. 4.5.

The API technology and the script language of form·Z are both methods that invite the user to develop his or her own extensions to the program. This can be done either through a plugin that is developed outside of form·Z or through a script that is developed using form·Z's own editing environment.

A plugin is written in the C or C++ computer language and is compiled into a binary library. A script is written in the form·Z script language (FSL), which is a simplified version of the C language. It is intended for a novice programmer who may get started with adding extensions to form·Z without having to set up a complete C or C++ based development environment. Once a script has been written, it is generally fairly straightforward to convert the FSL code of the script to real C or C++ code for use in a plugin.

The form·Z API provides access to much of the form·Z functionality including modeling operations, interface elements, data access, memory management and math functions. The API supports nine types of extensions: custom attributes, file translators, object types, renderers, commands, palettes, RenderZone shaders, tools, and utilities. All of these are available for plugin development. The latter five are also available for scripts. The API includes over 3,000 functions which are explained through an HTML based on line documentation and a PDF based developer guide. The form·Z 5.0 package contains a number of ready to run examples for scripts and plugins that are expected to prove valuable as learning resources.
AutoDesSys expects that savvy users will take full advantage of the plug-in and scripting capabilities to add their unique personal enhancements to the power of form·Z.

form·Z 5.0 is the first native OS X version and represents the end of support for the classic MacOS operating system. It requires OS X 10.2 or later.

form·Z 5.0 supports Windows XP, 2000, NT, ME and 98. Windows 95 is no longer supported.
form·Z 5.0 offers a wide variety of new features -
Please see the v. 5.0 features page »



PRESS RELEASE
Columbus, Ohio- November 14, 2004

AutoDesSys, Inc. is very pleased to announce the recipients of the annual Joint Study awards to deserving students from around the world. "Just back from Cambridge and Toronto, Canada where the 12th annual form·Z Joint Study Awards were presented at a dinner hosted by auto.des.sys during the ACADIA (Association for Computer Aided Design in Architecture) Conference, we are delighted to share the results of the this year's academic awards" said Chris Yessios, president of AutoDesSys. The awardees receive a User License of form·Z RadioZity.

AutoDesSys has established the form·Z-University Joint Study Program to support the education of students in 3D modeling at universities world wide. This program currently involves about 300 universities that use form·Z to teach three dimensional Architectural Design, Urban Design, Product and Industrial Design, Visualization and Illustration. At the end of each academic year, autoodesosys collects the projects created by the students who learn three-dimensional design using form·Z and nominations are accepted from their schools for awards. A jury is selected to judge the nominated projects and the results are printed in the annual Joint Study Report, aptly subtitled "Partnerships in Learning". The jury consists of both academicians and professionals who receive the projects to be judged without names or school affiliations.

The recipients of the Awards of Distinction this year are:

The selection of the awards was made by five jurors outside of AutoDesSys, all experts or theorists of computer aided design. They are listed below, in alphabetical order:

The projects and more details about this year's winners may be seen at /Joint_Study.html. The awards will be published in the Joint Study Report which will also include many of the projects that were submitted from schools that belong to the Joint Study Program.

2004 Joint Study Award Winners

November 15, 2004

The form·Z-University Joint Study Awards for 2004 were announced and given out on November 12, 2004, during the ACADIA Conference, in Cambridge, Canada at a dinner ceremony hosted by AutoDesSys, Inc.

This year's recipients of the Awards of Distinction in Architecture, Interior Design, Product Design, and Visualization and Illustration, Fabrication, Animation and High Schools came from England, Japan, Thailand and the United States.

The Honorable Mention Awards were also announced at this time.

From left to right are:
James Cornetet-University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA; Ian Peters-Blackpool and The Fylde College, Blackpool, Lancashire, UK; Jay Axe-Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, USA; Michael Hemme-Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, USA; Nami Nakasaki-Tama Art University, Tokyo, Japan; Peter McMullan-Blackpool and The Fylde College, Blackpool, Lancashire, UK.

View the award winning projects here »

SIGGRAPH 2004


Having recently returned from the 2004 SIGGRAPH show in Los Angeles, we are delighted to have seen so many current users and to have attracted more new ones. Our new booth received many compliments and was constantly busy. Our demonstrations were much appreciated and raised the interest for v. 4.5, the next major update, scheduled for release by the end of summer. Sincere thanks to all those that visited!.