Ziva VFX 1.5 is building upon the five major tools released in Ziva VFX v1.4, which offered users even greater artistic functionality, including Maya Fields compatibility and automatic muscle growth. As the creative tools continue to grow, it is paramount to Ziva that we maintain and continually improve the computational efficiency of our technology, so creators can adopt the best character tools without sacrifice.

The most notable new function in Ziva VFX 1.5 is the new time integration algorithms that can produce livelier dynamics without increasing the overall simulation time. Prior to VFX 1.5, highly dynamic characters could only be achieved with very small time steps, leading to longer simulation times. With the new release, natural secondary motion can be achieved with significantly larger time steps, making it much more feasible to simulate lifelike creatures that bend, jiggle and stretch in a way that the audience would expect. Users can navigate to the Integrator drop-down menu bar and test the new time integration options:

1. Backwards Euler (most damped)

2. BDF2 (less damped)

3. TR-BDF2 (least damped)

For an existing creature, simply re-sim with a different integration option to get a better result right away without increase the sub-steps.

For additional release information, please watch the video above or visit the Ziva Documentation for the official release notes.