Illuminate labs
Encyclopedia
Illuminate Labs is a Swedish
software company based in Gothenburg
, founded in 2002 and specializing in video games lighting. The company produces two middleware
products called Beast
and Turtle, based on their proprietary LiquidLight technology. Autodesk, Inc.
(NASDAQ: ADSK) has acquired Illuminate Labs on July 21, 2010 in San Rafael, California
for an undisclosed amount.
Illuminate Labs during the third quarter of 2009 also opened an US office in San Francisco.
and baking plugin for Autodesk Maya used for lighting and content creation in next-gen game development. With Turtle you can easily create global illumination for your game levels and then bake the illumination into texture maps, vertex maps or point clouds. Other features include the baking of occlusion and normal maps from highly detailed models to low polygon models. All baked results can be visualized in Maya's viewport using the GPU.
Beast
is a content pipeline tool used for advanced global illumination
and dynamic character relighting. Beast gives you advanced global illumination that enhances the look of your game with little effort. Use Beast to precalculate lighting for light maps, shadow maps and point clouds, to bake occlusion or normal maps or to generate light fields for dynamic relighting of characters and objects.
Illuminate Labs products are used by some of largest and most respected game studios in the world, such as Electronic Arts
, Blizzard
, Sony Computer Entertainment
, Square Enix
and BioWare
.
Illuminate Labs have ready integrations for Beast with Emergent's Gamebryo
Lightspeed and Unreal engine
, Evolution and several other in-house game engine
s. For projects with the product Beast ,not using a ready integration, there is an API. The Beast API is a programming interface designed to make it as easy as possible to create a Beast integration with any game engine.
WET
(A2M)
Mirror's Edge
(EA Digital Illusions Creative Entertainment)
Mortal Kombat (Midway)
EVE Online
(CCP Games)
CrimeCraft
(Vogster Entertainment LLC)
Alpha Protocol
(Obsidian Entertainment Inc)
Dragon Age: Origins
(BioWare)
God of War III
(Sony Computer Entertainment)
Gran Turismo
(Polyphony Digital)
Unity Technologies has announced that the next Unity version 3.0 will feature built-in Beast lightmapping and global illumination off the shelf.
Other partners include 3D Labs, Adobe, Apple, Angstrom, ATI, NVIDIA, Microsoft and Pixologic.
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
software company based in Gothenburg
Gothenburg
Gothenburg is the second-largest city in Sweden and the fifth-largest in the Nordic countries. Situated on the west coast of Sweden, the city proper has a population of 519,399, with 549,839 in the urban area and total of 937,015 inhabitants in the metropolitan area...
, founded in 2002 and specializing in video games lighting. The company produces two middleware
Middleware
Middleware is computer software that connects software components or people and their applications. The software consists of a set of services that allows multiple processes running on one or more machines to interact...
products called Beast
Beast (software)
Beast is a content pipeline tool used for advanced global illumination and dynamic character relighting. Beast is developed and sold by Swedish games lighting technology company Illuminate labs...
and Turtle, based on their proprietary LiquidLight technology. Autodesk, Inc.
Autodesk
Autodesk, Inc. is an American multinational corporation that focuses on 3D design software for use in the architecture, engineering, construction, manufacturing, media and entertainment industries. The company was founded in 1982 by John Walker, a coauthor of the first versions of the company's...
(NASDAQ: ADSK) has acquired Illuminate Labs on July 21, 2010 in San Rafael, California
San Rafael, California
San Rafael is a city and the county seat of Marin County, California, United States. The city is located in the North Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area...
for an undisclosed amount.
Illuminate Labs during the third quarter of 2009 also opened an US office in San Francisco.
The products
Turtle is a sophisticated renderingRendering (computer graphics)
Rendering is the process of generating an image from a model , by means of computer programs. A scene file contains objects in a strictly defined language or data structure; it would contain geometry, viewpoint, texture, lighting, and shading information as a description of the virtual scene...
and baking plugin for Autodesk Maya used for lighting and content creation in next-gen game development. With Turtle you can easily create global illumination for your game levels and then bake the illumination into texture maps, vertex maps or point clouds. Other features include the baking of occlusion and normal maps from highly detailed models to low polygon models. All baked results can be visualized in Maya's viewport using the GPU.
Beast
Beast (software)
Beast is a content pipeline tool used for advanced global illumination and dynamic character relighting. Beast is developed and sold by Swedish games lighting technology company Illuminate labs...
is a content pipeline tool used for advanced global illumination
Global illumination
Global illumination is a general name for a group of algorithms used in 3D computer graphics that are meant to add more realistic lighting to 3D scenes...
and dynamic character relighting. Beast gives you advanced global illumination that enhances the look of your game with little effort. Use Beast to precalculate lighting for light maps, shadow maps and point clouds, to bake occlusion or normal maps or to generate light fields for dynamic relighting of characters and objects.
Illuminate Labs products are used by some of largest and most respected game studios in the world, such as Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts, Inc. is a major American developer, marketer, publisher and distributor of video games. Founded and incorporated on May 28, 1982 by Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer games industry and was notable for promoting the designers and programmers...
, Blizzard
Blizzard
A blizzard is a severe snowstorm characterized by strong winds. By definition, the difference between blizzard and a snowstorm is the strength of the wind. To be a blizzard, a snow storm must have winds in excess of with blowing or drifting snow which reduces visibility to 400 meters or ¼ mile or...
, Sony Computer Entertainment
Sony Computer Entertainment
Sony Computer Entertainment, Inc. is a major video game company specializing in a variety of areas in the video game industry, and is a wholly owned subsidiary and part of the Consumer Products & Services Group of Sony...
, Square Enix
Square Enix
is a Japanese video game and publishing company best known for its console role-playing game franchises, which include the Final Fantasy series, the Dragon Quest series, and the action-RPG Kingdom Hearts series...
and BioWare
BioWare
BioWare is a Canadian video game developer founded in February 1995 by newly graduated medical doctors Ray Muzyka, Greg Zeschuk, and Augustine Yip. BioWare is currently owned by American company Electronic Arts...
.
Illuminate Labs have ready integrations for Beast with Emergent's Gamebryo
Gamebryo
Gamebryo is a game engine, originally from Numerical Design Limited , and the successor to NDL's NetImmerse engine.Since the creation of Gamebryo, NDL merged into Emergent Game Technologies...
Lightspeed and Unreal engine
Unreal Engine
The Unreal Engine is a game engine developed by Epic Games, first illustrated in the 1998 first-person shooter game Unreal. Although primarily developed for first-person shooters, it has been successfully used in a variety of other genres, including stealth, MMORPGs and RPGs...
, Evolution and several other in-house game engine
Game engine
A game engine is a system designed for the creation and development of video games. There are many game engines that are designed to work on video game consoles and personal computers...
s. For projects with the product Beast ,not using a ready integration, there is an API. The Beast API is a programming interface designed to make it as easy as possible to create a Beast integration with any game engine.
Games titles
Several game titles has been made using one or both of the two products. (There are more examples on games that have used Beast and Turtle in the Illuminate Labs Gallery on their website.)WET
Wet (video game)
Wet is a 2009 third-person shooter action video game, developed by Artificial Mind and Movement and published by Bethesda Softworks for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 video game consoles. The game puts heavy emphasis on killing a large number of opponents while engaging in stylish acrobatic moves...
(A2M)
Mirror's Edge
Mirror's Edge
Mirror's Edge is a single-player first person action-adventure video game developed by EA Digital Illusions CE and published by Electronic Arts. The game was announced on July 10, 2007, and was released for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in November 2008. A Microsoft Windows version was released...
(EA Digital Illusions Creative Entertainment)
Mortal Kombat (Midway)
EVE Online
EVE Online
Eve Online is a video game by CCP Games. It is a player-driven, persistent-world MMORPG set in a science fiction space setting. Characters pilot customizable ships through a galaxy of over 7,500 star systems. Most star systems are connected to one or more other star systems by means of stargates...
(CCP Games)
CrimeCraft
CrimeCraft
CrimeCraft is a free-to-play online Persistent World Next-generation Shooter dubbed "PWNS" by developer Vogster Entertainment and published at retail by THQ...
(Vogster Entertainment LLC)
Alpha Protocol
Alpha Protocol
Alpha Protocol is a third-person espionage role-playing video game, developed by Obsidian Entertainment, their first title for an original IP, and published by Sega. The game revolves around the adventures of field agent Michael Thorton...
(Obsidian Entertainment Inc)
Dragon Age: Origins
Dragon Age: Origins
Dragon Age: Origins is a single-player role-playing video game developed by BioWare's Edmonton studio and published by Electronic Arts. It is the first game in the Dragon Age franchise...
(BioWare)
God of War III
God of War III
God of War III is an action-adventure video game released by Sony Computer Entertainment's Santa Monica division for the PlayStation 3 in March 2010...
(Sony Computer Entertainment)
Gran Turismo
Gran Turismo (series)
is a popular and critically acclaimed series of racing simulation video games developed by Polyphony Digital.Developed exclusively for PlayStation systems, Gran Turismo games are intended to simulate the appearance and performance of a large selection of vehicles, nearly all of which are licensed...
(Polyphony Digital)
Partners
The company has many partners and is part of Epic’s Integrated Partners Program, an Emergent Certified Partner and an official Autodesk Conductors partner.Unity Technologies has announced that the next Unity version 3.0 will feature built-in Beast lightmapping and global illumination off the shelf.
Other partners include 3D Labs, Adobe, Apple, Angstrom, ATI, NVIDIA, Microsoft and Pixologic.