Side Effects Sponsors LA SIGGRAPH Meeting - X2: X-Men United

Santa Monica, CA---Side Effects Software, developer of theaward-winning Houdini family of 3D software, announced sponsorship ofthe May 20, 2003, Los Angeles SIGGRAPH Chapter meeting highlightingX2: X-Men United. Held at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts& Sciences theater in Beverly Hills, the event will feature "makingof" presentations of the film's visual effects as well as a screeningof the movie in its entirety. Presentations will be made by artistsfrom Cinesite Hollywood and Rhythm & Hues, lead productionfacilities on the project who used Side Effects Software's Houdiniextensively to create everything from X2's Nightcrawler teleportationeffects to Storm's tornadoes. A 20th Century Fox release, X2: X-MenUnited opened this month to the biggest worldwide weekend boxoffice return in history.

"More and more, top visual effects artists are applying skills inHoudini to create innovative visual effects with all of the benefits ofhaving pipelines that are powerful, flexible and scalable," said TonyCristiano, Side Effects Software's COO and VP of U.S. Operations."Houdini was the primary commercial software package used by Rhythm& Hues for X2, and Cinesite cultivated a considerable poolof Houdini talent that will springboard from this movie to many otherupcoming Hollywood productions. We are looking forward to the May 20thL.A. SIGGRAPH meeting, and to bringing a showcase of Cinesite's andRhythm & Hues' stellar work to the visual effects community."

Directed by Bryan Singer, X2: X-Men United is the most recentin a line of motion pictures, including Daredevil,Spider-Man and XXX, that have seen ramped up use ofHoudini. Houdini was also a key visual effects tool for X-Men,released in 2000 and also directed by Singer. Four of the Side EffectsSoftware creators of Houdini were honored in March by the Academy ofMotion Picture Arts & Sciences with a Scientific & EngineeringAward.

For X2, Houdini was used by Rhythm & Hues to model, animate andrender particle and volumetric effects for such elements as snow,water, clouds, blood, debris and breaking glass. The facility also usedHoudini to add engine thrusts, heat distortion and dust to X-Jetsequences, and created nearly 100 individual "attack" tornadoes for thefilm's dog-fight scene.

Cinesite used a Houdini effects and rendering pipeline toimaginatively bring Nightcrawler's "BAMF" capability from comic bookpage to the screen. This impressive new mutant effect, in which thecharacter disappears into trailing residuals of smoke, was achieved byinstilling fluidic smoke-like behavior on particles that collapsed uponthemselves. Cyclops' beams, Pyros' lobbed CG fireballs and Dr. JeanGrey's deflective shield effects were all created using Houdini,Houdini VEX shaders and Houdini Mantra.

These and other visual effects from the movie will be illuminated byartist-presenters including Tornado Effects Lead Doug Bloom and LeadEffects Animator Mike O'Neal (Rhythm & Hues), and CG SupervisorGreg Anderson, CG Effects TD Craig "X-Ray" Halperin and CG SupervisorArnon Manor (Cinesite) at the May 20th meeting, which will take placein the Samuel Goldwyn Theater, Academy of Motion Picture Artists &Sciences, 8949 Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills, CA. Side EffectsSoftware will demonstrate the Houdini family of products during areception from 6:30 ­to 7:30 pm, the presentation will begin at7:30 pm and the screening will immediately follow the presentation. Formore information, please visit the L. A. SIGGRAPH website at http://la.siggraph.org.

About Houdini
The Houdini family of animation software offers digital artists anunprecedented level of power, flexibility and control based onaward-winning technology. The comprehensive feature set includesmodeling, animation, character tools, particle and channel operations,compositing, integrated rendering with Houdini Mantra, and much more.All Houdini applications work together seamlessly and are available forthe NT, Linux, IRIX and Solaris operating systems.

About Side Effects Software
Established in 1987, Side Effects Software is a world leader in thedevelopment of advanced 3D graphics and special effects software foruse in film, broadcast and game development. Today, Side EffectsSoftware leads the field of non-linear animation with its unique,award-winning Houdini technology. Houdini is used by numerous digitalcontent creation leaders including Digital Domain, DreamWorks SKG,Electronic Arts, Namco, Nickelodeon, Rhythm & Hues, Sega, SonyPictures Imageworks, Walt Disney Feature Animation, and Weta DigitalLtd.

For more information about Side Effects Software and its products,please visit http://www.sidefx.com.