What is OpenFX?

OpenFX is an Open-Source 3D modeling, animation and rendering suite created by Dr. Stuart Ferguson. He made the decision to release the source code to the public in the middle of 1999, and the product formerly named SoftF/X was renamed to OpenFX. It has now been released under the terms of the GNU General Public Licence.

In 2005 a major release 2.2 included a GPU version of the rendering engine that gives a quality that is almost the equal of the software engine.

In 2007 a new class of actor was introduced into the animator that facilitates particle animation.

In 2009 the skeleton structure in the designer was enhances to a give weights to each bone. This facilitates character animation and skinning.

In 2011 a character path follower system was created that make it easy to carry out character animation where a repeated action takes place as the character moves, simulating walking, running and mixed activities are all now one-click operations.

OpenFX continues to be developed with installable releases every 3 months and continuous access to the source code in SVN. It is completely compatible with Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8.

 What can OpenFX do?

A powerful feature-set includes a full renderer and raytrace engine, NURBS support, kinematics-based animation, morphing, and an extensive plugin API.

Plugin capabilities include image post processor effects such as lens flare, fog and depth of field. Animation effects such as explosions, waves and dissolves add enormously to the flexibility of the program. Check out the full list of the various effect types and let your imagination run wild!

 What platforms does OpenFX run on?

Currently, OpenFX only runs on the Win32 platform, which includes Windows 95/98/NT/2000/XP/Win7/Win8. If you are interested in helping to port to other platforms, please join our Development Mailing Lists and help out!