This is the play that makes the most sense. To get the product to a wider audience one has to think that Autodesk will go the same route with Arnold that it has with its other professional M&E products, namely a free student version coupled with a push to the cloud for rendering. While the company has not committed to 3ds Max publicly, their press release all but confirmed that 3ds Max integration was coming soon. The only other higher priority will be an even tighter Maya integration. It is safe to guess that is the first (or second thing) Solid Angle will address.

Game of Thrones 4 – RodeoFXĪrnold already supports Maya, Houdini, C4D, Katana and other products, but not 3ds Max. This represents a major deal for Autodesk’s Media And Entertainment division.

Autodesk’s wide distribution of Mental Ray was a licensing deal with NVIDIA (Mental Images) but not ownership. A publicly listed company cannot discuss concrete forward plans but there is much that can be read between the lines, even if Autodesk can’t yet confirm it.įirstly, this is the first time Autodesk has had a major renderer in-house. Originally rendered at 8K, this image is hair – with extreme motion blur, rendered in Arnold.įxguide spoke to both Autodesk and Solid Angle’s founder Marcos Fajardo separately over the last week and you can read our direct Q&A with Marcos below. If you are in a location away from Solid Angle’s offices and you’d like to explore Arnold then you can via your local sales guy or reseller. If you are one of the 500 or so current Solid Angle customers, you can remain dealing with the company as it is. The plan is to allow Solid Angle to maintain and grow its high end business, but in concert with the various Autodesk sales channels and re-sellers introducing Arnold to a much wider audience. Solid Angle is now fully owned by Autodesk but sits apart in so far as the brand Solid Angle remains, as does the sales channels and the staff. The plan is for Solid Angle to be a standalone provider, in much the same way Autodesk has done with Shotgun. The deal was first struck in December of last year, and finalized in February. Autodesk has bought Arnold and Solid Angle based in Madrid, Spain and in London, UK.

Autodesk arnold render