Disney’s PTex now open-source

Disney has just release previously discussed PTex under an open-source (BSD) license and made it publicly available to all.

The new open source library supports Catmull-Clark subdivision surfaces (including quad and non-quad faces), Loop subdivision surfaces and polymeshes (either all-quad or all-triangle). Also, several data types are supported including 8 or 16-bit integer, float, and half-precision float. An arbitrary number of channels can be stored in a Ptex file. Arbitrary meta data can be stored in the Ptex file and accessed through the memory-managed cache.

The source code is available in a github repository, and you can watch a demonstration of PTex in use after the break.

Ptex Overview. via CGSociety

PG

This story written by Randall Hand

Randall Hand is a computer graphics programmer and news junky that's been working in the field for the last 15 years. He's responsible for visualizations generated on some of the most powerful supercomputers in the world, ytnef, mullion support in ParaView, and VizWorld.com.

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  • http://www.88renders.com William – 88renders (Architectural Rendering)

    Hello Randall,

    Do you know if PTEX is now being used more broadly across Disney and Pixar’s other feature films? If it allows an arbitrary number of channels then it could be quite useful in improving workflow speed. Also have you heard if it has made it’s way to 3dsMAX?

    Cheers,

    William

  • Randall Hand

    @William
    From recent presentations by disney, it seems PTEX is used pretty widely is almost all of the Disney/Pixar films as the preferred UV mapping solution. however, I’m not aware of any ‘easy’ way to get it into 3dsmax yet.

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