Products: Darwin Dimensions

To create anything more than just some very basic animation takes time — and skill. While character generator products such as Poser help, they don't have the detailed rigging necessary for full production animation.

With the introduction of Evolver at Siggraph 2006, Darwin Dimensions hopes to solve that. Instead of spending time modeling, skinning, and rigging characters before beginning to work, animators can get a jump on production by generating a “near infinite” number of characters within minutes by combining and mixing physical attributes gleaned from pre-built characters, a sort of “gene pool” as the company likes to call it.

The fun-to-use software is inexpensive ($39) for the starter Evolver Basic version, though you must pay the company for a final render out (prices vary depending upon model complexity). For busy production facilities, it makes sense to shell out for the full blown version — Evolver Pro ($4,995), which lets you create and generate as many characters as you want. www.darwindimensions.com