Village Gamer

-From VFS– Save on production time and costs by seamlessly transferring your 3D experience to Softimage|XSI in this comprehensive course in the most advanced 3D animation software for games, film, and TV. Guided by 3D expert and teacher Craig Slagel, you’ll also find out how to tap into Softimage’s powerful new ICE (Interactive Creative Environment) and get a running start on using this revolutionary platform to increase production efficiency and consistency. Learn how to code less and create more.

November 22-23, 2008
Vancouver Film School
1380 Burrard Street
9am – 6pm Sat. & Sun.

Price: $795 CAD (includes Saturday & Sunday). Only 20 spaces available and spaces limited to 2 per registrant. Contact softimage@vfs.com to enquire about group bookings.

Special Discount Rate for Students and Alumni of Vancouver Film School
A limited number of seats are available to VFS students and alumni at the special discount rate of $695. Register for the discount rate now! (requires a valid VFS email address)

Prior to the In-Depth Training Weekend, registrants will receive exclusive advance preparation materials.

Day 1 – XSI Transition
Saturday, November 22, 9am – 6pm
XSI Transition is a production-based course designed to help artists trained on Autodesk Maya and Autodesk 3DS Max transition to XSI quickly and painlessly. Participants will learn a variety of production techniques for modeling, texturing, animation, lighting and rendering in XSI. The course also introduces industry-leading tools and workflows unique to XSI, including:

• Completely non-destructive workflow
• GATOR, for transferring surface attributes between models
• Ultimapper, for generating film-quality normal maps
• The powerful clip-based animation mixer
• Much, much more!

Participants will also learn how to take full advantage of XSI’s next-generation Gigapolygon core architecture to work with finely sculpted, massively detailed characters and environments.

At the end of the course, participants will have a solid understanding of how XSI can help save production time and reduce costs. It’s a comprehensive introduction to the most advanced 3D animation software for games, film, and TV productions.

Day 2 – XSI ICE for Technical Artists
Sunday, November 23, 9am – 6pm
Illustrated by real-world production challenges, this course focuses on the power of ICE to create Intelligent Effects – not simple deformers or particles systems, but effects that react to their environment to simulate realistic effects and, most importantly, are fully art-directable. This course shows the power of ICE.

Participants will receive an overview of ICE, building ICE trees, using Nodes and Compounds, and will explore the many advanced capabilities of the ICE platform, including:

• ICE Deformers
• ICE Fire
• ICE Rigid Bodies
• Fun with ICE