Katana releases.
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Katana 3.0 View release notes
Hydra Powered Viewport
Katana now features a new, modern viewport powered by Pixar's USD Hydra technology. Designed to render massively complex scenes, the Hydra viewport is a perfect addition to Katana’s Viewer API. Now artists can load huge scenes and view larger portions of their work with buttery-smooth interaction. To compliment this new level of user experience, there’s a set of artist-friendly transform handles, a rich API for creating custom object drawing and manipulators. This new viewport is the game changer all Katana artists have been waiting to have at their fingertips.
Performance Improvements
No matter what program you use, how much work you get done always comes down to performance. Katana is the same and the team have done a lot of work since Katana 2.6. While the new viewport is 7x to 10x faster, Katana 3.0 itself now starts up and loads files 1.5x faster than previous versions. General performance has also been improved by strategic changes to key areas like CEL, OpScript, and Alembic processing.
Improved UI
As a compliment to the new viewport and improved performance, we’ve updated the design of the overall UI, added new transform tools, and made information easier to process, so artists can now get more information from Katana at a glance. All part of our larger plan to merge artist driven workflow and UX with Katana’s power and technical foundation.
Integrated Rendering
Katana 3.0 would be half a solution without a rendering plugin, so Katana 3.0 ships with the NSI powered 3Delight rendering plugin giving users best-in-class production live rendering, free of charge for interactive renders. Fast, powerful, clean rendering and super easy-to-use, this renderer has lots to offer everyone. The 3Delight plugin is the first to tap the full potential of Katana’s rendering APIs. Check out the dedicated page to
find out more.Katana 2.6 Download release notes
UI and UX improvements
Katana 2.6 builds on work started in 2016, with further UI and UX enhancements making it easier to use, even for those picking up the toolset for the first time. We’ve made dozens of fine-tuning improvements to make it faster to get through repetitive tasks, freeing up your time to be creative.
Important steps toward our new Viewer and API
Significant progress has been made towards the new Hydra-based Viewer through a new custom Viewer API, which will allow pre-built, custom viewers to be connected to Katana. Both the new Viewer and the final Viewer API are expected to be fully operational in an upcoming release.
Enhanced tech docs
Katana 2.6 comes with improved technical documentation, allowing you to make custom tools and get technical with shaders and UI parameters more easily.