San Antonio, Texas ‚ September 29, 2005 -- NewTek, Inc., manufacturer of industry-leading 3D animation and video products, today announced that Zoic Studios relied on the award-winning LightWave 3D® as a key tool in producing visual effects shots for Universal Pictures' Serenity, a Joss Whedon film. Zoic produced about 220 shots for the film, and for many of these LightWave® was used to model, texture, animate, light and render the 3D elements. Of those assets that were created in other 3D applications, many were subsequently rendered in LightWave. "We're honored that the incredibly talented, award-winning artists at Zoic are using LightWave 3D for so many of their projects," said Jay Roth, President of NewTek's 3D Product Group. "LightWave has now been used in over 180 films, many of them Oscar nominees and winners, and NewTek is committed to making LightWave a uniquely powerful tool for feature film production, essential to any pipeline, complimentary to any set of professional production tools, and the most complete and flexible solution for any digital artist or producer."

In 2002, Joss Whedon joined forces with Loni Peristere and the folks at Zoic Studios to create an innovative visual style for the special effects for Whedon's new television series, Firefly. The series picked up an enthusiastic audience during its run, as well as critical acclaim for its well-turned characters, stories and dialog. Zoic's artists took an Emmy and a VES award for their effects work in the series, for which they had used LightWave for 3D content creation and rendering. The DVD has had strong sales, and last year Universal Pictures and Whedon's production company, Mutant Enemy, went into production on a big-screen adaptation, Serenity.

Emile Edwin Smith, a Visual Effects Supervisor for Zoic Studios, helped oversee Zoic's work on the production of the visual effects for both projects. Regarding the work on the theatrical film project, on which he was CG Supervisor and Peristere was Visual Effects Supervisor, Smith said, "Our primary animation and rendering package was LightWave, and we did a good portion of the modeling in it as well, taking advantage of the great modeling tools. We rendered the majority of the shots and FX in it, utilizing the dynamics system for the explosions, the particle system and HyperVoxels™ for missile trails and firefly FX, radiosity rendering, etc. The biggest challenge we nailed with LightWave was the look of the renders. We did do some work in mental ray, but we were able to get the same results out of LightWave and see those results so much faster that it helped our production immensely. LightWave's robustness as a workhorse helped us fix any issues we encountered quickly."

Pricing and Availability

LightWave 3D version 9.0 is expected to be available in the 4th quarter for 795 € for a single user license. The following purchase options are available for a limited time:

LightWave Full seats:

• LightWave [8] full seat (with English printed manual), Vue 5 Infinite, free update to v9 (with electronic manual): 795 € +VAT /UK RRP: £499 +VAT

For registered owners of LightWave [7.5] or earlier:

• LightWave [8] upgrade (with English printed manual), Vue 5 Infinite, Duo USB dongle swap upon request, free update to v9 (with electronic manual): 449 € +VAT/UK RRP:  £299 +VAT

For Registered owners of LightWave [8]:

• LightWave 3D v9.0 upgrade (with electronic manual), Duo USB dongle swap upon request and Vue 5 Infinite: 395 € +VAT/UK RRP: £259 +VAT

For more information or to purchase, visit: www.newtek-europe.com or call NewTek Europe Sales at +33 (0)5 57 262 262.

About NewTek and NewTek Europe.

Newtek Europe is based near Bordeaux, in South West France and deals with Newtek product distribution, communication and technical maintenance for all customers around Europe, Russia, Africa and the Middle East.

With headquarters in San Antonio, Texas, NewTek Inc. is a leading provider of full-featured video editing, animation and special effects tools including Video Toaster™ and LightWave 3D®, winner of the 2003 Primetime Emmy® Engineering Award.

NewTek launched the desktop video revolution in 1990 with the release of the legendary Video Toaster™. The company's products are used worldwide on projects ranging from home video to feature film.
Recent television and film projects using LightWave 3D® include Fantastic Four, The Adventures of Shark Boy and Lava Girl in 3D, Sin City, The Aviator, Aliens of the Deep, "I, Robot", Spiderman 2, Battlestar: Galactica, Access Hollywood and Entertainment Tonight. Recent game titles include Doom III, Unreal Tournament, and Age of Mythology. Recent game titles include Doom III, Burnout 3, Unreal Tournament, Serious Sam for XBox, Age of Mythology, Civilization III, Dead to Rights, Baldur's Gate II, EverQuest and Escape From Monkey Island.

Information about LightWave 3D^®:
http://www.newtek-europe.com/uk/products/lightwave/index.html

LightWave 3D^® artists interviews:
http://www.newtek-europe.com/uk/community/lightwave/index.html

LightWave 3D^® Projects List:
http://www.newtek-europe.com/uk/products/lightwave/projects.html

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LightWave, LightWave 3D and Video Toaster are registered trademarks of NewTek.
TriCaster and VT[4] are trademarks of NewTek, Inc.
All other products or brand names mentioned are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.

Press contact:

Audrey-Jane Belin
Marketing & Communication Department
mail to: aj@newtek-europe.com

Newtek Europe
Europarc
17 avenue Léonard de Vinci
F-33600 PESSAC
Tel:+33 (0)5 57 262 262
Fax:+33 (0)5 57 262 261
www.newtek-europe.com
www.newtek.fr