Terragen 2 Release Date Announcement

[Matrix2003 - (Bill Reid)]

Terragen 2 Release Date Announcement announced by John McLusky, at
Planetside Software.

Planetside Software is pleased to announce the release date of its
flagship product, Terragen 2, for 1st quarter 2008.

Terragen 2 Deep Edition will be released on the 15th of February, 2008
and will be available initially in a download-only format. A beta
version will be released on the 4th of January 2008 to licensed users.

Final pricing for the Deep Edition will be announced closer to release
and discounts will continue to be available for upgrades from Terragen
v0.9 and for academic use. Pre-release pricing for Terragen 2 will
continue until the 15th of February. The complete Animation module,
with significantly enhanced animation tools will be made available
later in 2008.


We regret that we were unable to meet our 2007 release window but we
know that the quality of the end product is of greatest importance. We
are confident that this slight delay will help ensure the final
release is a stable, full-featured application ready for serious
production use.

Terragen 2 features a robust displacement engine, powerful geometry
instancing, a full planetary atmosphere model, and global illumination
algorithms designed to complement its highly realistic volumetrics
engine. The Deep Edition provides extensive control over the creation
and appearance of a landscape rendering through its node interface.


Beta Version


We will be releasing a Beta version of the product on the 4th of
January which will include significant improvements not seen in the
Technology Previews released so far:

- Efficient utilization of multi-core and multi-processor computers
for rendering
- Ray-traced transparency and reflections with improved stability and
rendering speed
- Important optimizations and corrections for global illumination and
the rendering of atmospheres and clouds.
- Greatly improved long term stability of the user interface on
Windows
- Multiple 3D previews or shader previews in separate windows, with
the ability to view and manipulate various built-in orthographic views
or any camera in a project
- A new navigation panel which lets you navigate around a scene
quickly and easily using simple controls
- Many other additions and improvements to the user interface


The Beta version will be available only to licensed users of Terragen
2 Technology Preview, Deep Edition. We will continue to provide a free
edition of Terragen 2 which will be available shortly after the final
product release in February. Specific limitations of the free edition
will be announced when it is made available.


The Planetside Software Team