Welcome to the second issue of the Turtle newsletter!

In addition to providing tutorials, and tips and tricks to help you get the most out of the incredibly cool tool Turtle, this newsletter shares a little of whatever we find interesting or exciting or earth-shattering at the moment - from industry news to private islands for sale and anything in between. We hope you find the info here entertaining and useful and welcome any input you have for the future.
Happy reading!

Turtle 3: Making its Mark in the Gaming Industry

There’s no doubt that the gaming industry has found something it likes in Turtle 3. At least if our client list is any indication. Almost everyone who is anyone in the industry is using Turtle. Names like Bioware, Blue Castle Games, Cinematics Solutions Group, Climax Group, Crystal Dynamics, Dice, Electronic Arts, Eurocom, Game Republic, Guerrilla Games, Ninja Theory, Nintendo, Polyphony Digital, Sony Computer Entertainment, Surreal Games, Valve Software, and, well, we could go on and on. The question is naturally’ “why?”.

Click here to get the Turtle product sheet and find out for yourself

Get Your Hands on Some Free Turtle

(Now with support for 64 bit, Maya 8!)

If you didn’t know by now, we think the best way to show you what Turtle 3 is all about is to, well, show you. Or to let you show yourself, to put it even more accurately.

By following the link below you can get an absolutely free trial version, with full functionality, of the only product in the world that combines advanced rendering technology with sophisticated baking functionality in a single integrated toolset. Naturally, it’s a time-limited trial, but it’s a full version with full access to support for the entire period and (did we mention?) absolutely free. With Turtle 3 you can treat standard rendering and baking in the same way, enabling you to spend more of your time on the right kind of work and less on… well you get the picture. And time is also (after all) money. We’re sure that once you try the Turtle you’ll never want to give it back!

So once again, we don’t think you should take our word for it. So why not download a free evaluation copy and see for yourself what all the fuss is about?

Download a free trial

Happenings in the World of Turtle

SOUPED-UP TURTLE!

The new patch release 3.1.0.6 adds a new “directional ambient occlusion feature” (courtesy of Chris Green from Valve Software). This feature stores ambient occlusion from up to four different hemisphere regions in each of the 4 color channels of an output texture.

If you already own a license, click here to download Turtle 3.1.0.6

TURTLE MAKING RENDERING HEADLINES

3DWorld magazine featured a glowing review of Illuminate Labs’ Turtle 3. We were especially pleased to see them point out that the amazing time savings brought by Turtle (their tests reported Turtle as being up to 15 times as fast as Mental Ray) can result in more creative experimentation and better end results. (Something we’ve been saying for a while).

Click here to read the review in pdf-format

HEAVENLY REVUES FOR THE TURTLE

Ninja Theory, producers of Heavenly Sword, are hot for the Turtle. “Turtle is a precious tool in our creative pipeline and we couldn't possibly have expected it to become so much better,” explains Hugues Giboire, Art Director, Ninja Theory Ltd. “With version 3, it has definitely become the ultimate weapon for all our next generation game art asset creation needs.”

Click here to read more about Heavenly Sword and other raves from Turtle users

VOLVO TO INCREASE INVESTMENT IN ILLUMINATE LABS

Volvo Technology Transfer, which develops and supports new businesses that have relevance for the Volvo Group, has chosen to increase its ownership position in Illuminate Labs. This increase, achieved through a recent new emission of shares, confirms Volvo’s belief in the company and its technology. “Illuminate Labs’ technology can help to significantly reduce the cost of producing marketing material and speed up design processes," says Johan Carlsson, Investment Director, Volvo Technology Transfer.

To read the entire Press Release, click here.

THE TURTLE TEAM WELCOMES NEW MEMBER

Malin Dellgran joins Illuminate Labs to head Market Communication and Public Relations. Illuminate Labs has appointed Malin Dellgran as its head of market communication and public relations. “Malin’s experience from both the media and advertising industries makes her a perfect addition to our expanding team,” says Magnus Wennerholm, CEO.

Happenings in the bigger world outside of Turtle

Cool stuff, interesting stuff, educational stuff and other just plain stuff:
(Where our developers are surfing right now)

Turtle Tips & Tricks

It can be hard to start using a new renderer, since you don't know the terms, the interface, and all that stuff. These short tutorials will get you started. Once you've shed the training wheels, there's a more advanced Tutorial section on our website under Support.

Surface Transfer
Go to Surface Transfer Mini Tutorial

Texture Baking
Go to the Texture Baking Tutorial

Enviroment Map Rendering
Go to the Environment Rendering Tutorial

Spreading the Love

(or stopping it altogether)

If you have a friend (or colleague or someone youve just met) that might be interested in Turtle or our newsletter, please feel free to forward their address to us so we can include them in our mailings. And if (for some unknown reason) you choose not to receive the newsletter in the future, click below to unsubscribe.

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