Tank S.W.A.T. 01, by URDA director Romanov Higa, was released last week. It's a 30-minute long OAV based on Masamune Shirow's Dominion: Conflict manga, and a fansub is already available via BitTorrent:

[Link Removed]

I think that like URDA, this uses Animation:Master for character animation and LightWave for background and mechanical animation, but I haven't seen anything that confirms it.

Holy cow! I remember reading about this one ages ago, but the project looked like it had been abandoned. Who knew they were still working on it?

I'll be downloading this one right away, and probably eventually buying it too. (I bought the URDA DVD; it was better than I expected.)

Edit: According to his blog, Higa is still using Hash A:M.

From the trailer on his site... it looks top notch!

Please, no links to fansubs/anime downloads or bittorrents.

I understand that fansubs are a bit of a grey area legally, but the AM board isn't the place for it.

Thanks.

OK, sorry. Here are the official Japanese sites for Tank S.W.A.T. 01 and Romanov Higa.

very impressive! I'm blown away with what the Japanese users have done with A:M!

wow...reminds me of what zone of the enders did.3d words 2-d (semingly in this case) characters but zots 3-d was simi anime this is straigt 3-d.still cool though.

Why do they need to do the backgrounds out of A:M?

Many people find it easier to do architectural and mechanical modeling with polygon apps instead of A:M. In addition to URDA, Magical Play was also made by compositing A:M characters with LightWave backgrounds. So far, the most notable toon-rendered Japanese productions to use A:M exclusively are Secret of the Mysterious Egg and Haruwo -- they show that it is possible to model buildings and vehicles in A:M, but it does take more time and effort.

I know some would agree to this. A:M is designed for character creation... but I think it's about time to expand on it.

This program, is sort of a shadow to other programs like lightwave. I think A:M is better then that... they should go all the way for being the leading product for all purpose design & animation.

That's like calling Flash a shadow to Photoshop. They're two different programs. A:M specializes in character animation. If you want software geared towards rapid modeling of environments, get SketchUp.

Like it or not, the reason that A:M excels at user-friendly character animation is because they don't try to be all things to all people. If Hash decided to pursue the CAD market AND the videogame market AND the special-effects market AND the hobbyist market, we'd end up with an unfocused, difficult-to-use program that cost $900.

I don't agree with this. A:M is NOT just for characters--How can you say that if you have looked at the examples on AM:Stills and AM:Films??! You are just plain wrong.

AM can do architectural/mechanical yea, but in a production environment where there's a focus on speed.. it makes more sense to use a poly-based app where you can boolean and cut holes through things quickly and easily.

I'm with Will. Modeling is such a small part of an animation's creation time, and A:M can do mechanical modeling almost as well as anything out there, that the disadvantages of using multiple programs aren't justified by a feature here and there. The major reason studios use multiple products are: 1) Personnel - they have people that are expert in other products; 2) History - A:M wasn't always great at heavily populated scenes; 3) Allegiance - some people in the studio are loyal to other products, and; 4) Reputation - many artists like to be identified by the product they use. If a product is famous, they want to say they use that product.

Politics have way more to do with what product a studio uses than any feature set. We totally preach that A:M should be used for everything. Long term, that's by far the best solution.

Totally not wanting to hijack this thread. I've been excited for this release since I first saw it on Animenewsnetwork.com

I agree with the idea that programs that require a single button to create polygons -are- faster for mechanical things. We can do a Pepsi challenge time test at Hash Bash.

But.

Try and get control of those meshes on the vertex level like you can in AM. Don't even talk about NURBS. What AM does in 2 points, another program may need 30 to look similar (I'm talking curves or bevels).

If animation is part of the equation... then time spent upfront modelling really starts to balance out.

Anyway. Can't wait to see this.

Well, whatever the petty politics that got him to use A:M for the character animation were, we should do more of that.

Actually, since this is a one person show, I'm doubting that politics was a big factor. Or does he have an A:M faction and a Lightwave faction inside his head?

Romanov Higa isn't just a one-person show -- he had a studio staff working for him on the production of Tank S.W.A.T. and URDA.

I noticed that Romanov Higa just posted a note about Tank S.W.A.T. 01 on AnimasPark, the Japanese A:M forum. He confirms most of what we've been discussing in this thread. Here's a translated excerpt:

[...]
Like my other stuff, Animation:Master is used for the characters. Backgrounds are LightWave.
However, since the insides of the tanks have character interactivity, those are all A:M.
[...]

He also mentions (in response to this thread, apparently) that one of the bigger reasons he sticks with LW for backgrounds is the "explosion volumetric shaders." I'm not a LightWave user, but I guess he's referring to Hypervoxels?

wow,nice job.so hold on, dose this mean that he layers the videos and has the video insyc with the movie?

I don't understand the question, but if you're asking about compositing, Higa presumably matches the camera motion between LightWave and A:M, then composites the A:M characters with alpha onto the LW backgrounds.

ok what i ment was.he first renders the characters and what they do...then(or first)he renders the backgrund and other things.then he layers the videos and makes the scean.

but what you said sums it up.