• Pick up Apple's M4 iPad Pro for $849 with delivery by Christmas
    appleinsider.com
    Time is running out to pick up an M4 iPad Pro with delivery by Christmas. Both 11-inch and 13-inch models are available at up to $200 off.Save on Apple's iPad Pro before Christmas.Best Buy has the lowest price today on Apple's M4 iPad Pro 11-inch, which is $899 for the general public and $849 for Plus members. Amazon is matching the $899 price, with delivery by Christmas to many locations. The 13-inch model, meanwhile, starts at $1,099 after a $200 discount.11-inch iPad Pro M4 Continue Reading on AppleInsider | Discuss on our Forums
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  • Evelyn Lee inaugurated as the 2025 AIA President
    archinect.com
    Evelyn Lees ascension to the 101st President of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) was capped by her inauguration ceremony last week. The Bay Area-based architect and designer follows Kimberly Dowdell and Emily Grandstaff-Riceto become the third consecutive female architect to hold the position.The AIA's press release highlighted her "technology-driven focus," along with her involvement in other areas of business as an investor and startup advisor, as professional highlights to coincide with her involvement on the Board of Directors of Shepley Bulfinch and Luckett & Farley.Related on Archinect:"We are three recessions away from becoming extinct as a profession" Evelyn Lee on Business Continuity During a Time of Crisis"The rapid pace of technological and environmental change has created challenges that can feel overwhelming," Lee commented. "But moments of tension and uncertaintyare also opportunities. They call us to come together, collaborate, and remind ourselves...
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  • MAD completes flying saucer-shaped installation for Chinas Guangdong Nanhai Land Art Festival
    archinect.com
    MAD Architects has unveiled The Never Hut, an interactive installation at the Guangdong Nanhai Land Art Festival 2024 in Yanqiao Village, Foshan City, China. Set in a village with over 600 years of history, the installation reimagines a former elementary school playground into a community space for rest and connection.Image credit: Zhu YumengImage credit: Zhu YumengInspired by Yanqiao Villages Qing Dynasty architecture, river systems, and its iconic banyan tree, The Never Hut features a flying saucer-shaped structure supported by three tentacle-like forms crafted from local fishing nets. The design responds to environmental elements, swaying subtly with the breeze to create a dynamic relationship between movement and stillness.Image credit: Zhu YumengImage credit: Zhu YumengThe installations bright, colorful eaves provide a shaded, circular space, encouraging interaction among villagers and visitors. The schemes playful aesthetic contrasts with the historic surroundings, establ...
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  • Trahan Architects completes community-enhancing pavilion design in Arkansas
    archinect.com
    A new pavilion design in Arkansas from Trahan Architects in a public park designed by Spackman Mossop Michaelsis making space that encourages creative play while serving the greater needs of its community.Funding for the project was provided through the Walton Family Foundation Design Excellence Program. The stunning images from photographer Tim Hursley capture its bold, "weightless" presence against the flat landscape.Image: Tim HursleyLocated in the city of Springdale, the new Performance Pavilion space designed for 10-acre Luther George Park is made from steel and doubles as a shade canopy when not in use as an events venue and gathering space for up to 3,000 people.Image: Tim HursleyCIG Architecture, the Dutch manufacturer known for its work with Anish Kapoor, Olafur Eliasson, and others, worked closely with the firm to produce the steel shell that will patina over time so as to reveal the effects of the local climate on the architecture.Image: Tim HursleyUses vary ...
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  • Skull and Bones Year 2 Content is in Development Rumor
    gamingbolt.com
    Despite mixed reactions at launch and reportedly less than one million players at launch, Ubisofts Skull and Bones will reportedly receive a second year of content. Insider Gamings Tom Henderson spoke to sources with knowledge of the plans and Season 1 is allegedly coming early next year. This comes after Ubisoft announced the end of support for XDefiant while laying off multiple employees and shuttering Ubisoft San Francisco and Osaka.It will seemingly include new points of interest, PvP modes and World Tiers. Ubisoft is also allegedly looking into premium crossover events a trend among live service titles like Overwatch 2 and Fortnite. Assassins Creed 4: Black Flag is apparently one such event, planned for when the alleged remake arrives.As for why its receiving more content, this is allegedly due to Ubisoft fully committing to support. Despite the relatively poor launch, current player numbers will apparently surprise people, though Henderson couldnt verify them independently.Time will tell if Year 2 plans for the title pan out, so stay tuned for updates. Skull and Bones is available for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC. Check out our review here.
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  • www.cgchannel.com
    Friday, December 20th, 2024Posted by Jim ThackerTerragen Sky now lets you paint clouds into the sky directlyhtml PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd"Terragen Skys new Sky Paint tools let artists paint clouds directly, working non-destructively on a 360-degree canvas. Video from the TerraTuts YouTube channel.Planetside Software has updated Terragen Sky, its new tool for creating and rendering skies for use in matte painting, virtual production, game environments and architectural visualization.The December 2024 update introduces a new Sky Paint workspace, making it possible to art direct skies by painting clouds into them directly.Generate photorealistic CG skies for VFX, virtual production and gamesUnlike Planetsides flagship application Terragen, which also generates terrain, Terragen Sky is focused on creating CG skies, and features a more streamlined UI and intuitive workflow.As well as sky elements for matte paintings or backdrops for VFX, Terragen Sky can generate 360-degree HDRIs that can be used as environment lights in DCC tools and game engines.You can read more about it in this story on the original early access release.New Sky Paint workspace for painting clouds into skies manuallyThe December 2024 update introduces the Sky Paint workspace, a new environment for painting clouds into skies directly.Each cloud and haze layer has its own 360-degree Canvas on which to work, with users able to paint or erase cloud or haze from the layer using a brush-based workflow.Painting is non-destructive, with users able to edit brush strokes by moving entire strokes around, or using the Stir tool to distort them in a similar way to the Liquify tools in 2D paint apps.It is also possible to change the size and opacity of strokes after they have been created.Users can create and store up to 10 POVs in a scene from which to paint, and can import a reference image to the background of a viewport from which to work.Sky Paint nodes are supported in Terragen 4.8, the latest version of the software, making it possible to export skies created using the new tools to Terragen for editing and rendering.There are also a number of smaller updates and bugfixes: you can find a list in this blog post.Pricing, release date and system requirementsTerragen Sky is available in early access for Windows only. Planetside Software hasnt announced a final release date yet.The early access build is free to anyone with a current subscription to or a current maintenance contract for Terragen. Find pricing details for Terragen in this story on Terragen 4.8.Read more about the new features in Terragen Sky on Planetside Softwares blogRead the online documentation for Terragen SkyHave your say on this story by following CG Channel on Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter). As well as being able to comment on stories, followers of our social media accounts can see videos we dont post on the site itself, including making-ofs for the latest VFX movies, animations, games cinematics and motion graphics projects.Latest NewsTerragen Sky now lets you paint clouds into the sky directlyCheck out the neat new Sky Paint tools in the December 2024 update to the sky-creation tool for VFX, visualization and games work.Friday, December 20th, 2024Planetside Software releases Terragen 4.8Environment generation software gets highly multithreaded rendering, plus heightfield export to 16-bit TIFFs for Unity and Unreal Engine.Friday, December 20th, 2024Photoshop users can now create filters in Substance 3D DesignerCurrent beta build of the image-editing app lets users create and import custom image-stylization filters as Substance 3D .sbsar files.Thursday, December 19th, 2024Pixar releases RenderMan 26.3Check out the new features in the production renderer, including tiled denoising, and support for the new versions of Maya and Houdini.Thursday, December 19th, 2024Create game characters with CC Auto Setup for 3ds Max and V-Ray[Sponsored] Discover how Reallusion's free plugin streamlines the transfer of characters from Character Creator 4 to 3ds Max.Wednesday, December 18th, 2024Leopoly releases Shapelab 2025 and Shapelab LiteCheck out the new features in the sculpting tool for VR and desktop systems, and its new lower-cost edition for Meta Quest 3 headsets.Wednesday, December 18th, 2024More NewsAdobe releases Photoshop 26.2Check out Blender's experimental anime rendering buildsCell Fluids 2.0 for Blender is outUnigine 2.19.1 can now import and export USD filesBoris FX releases Mocha Pro 2025Master Designing Sci-Fi Props for FilmAdobe releases Substance 3D Stager 3.1 in betaNekki releases Cascadeur Mobile 1.2ukasz Czy releases UVPackmaster 3 for MayaBlender add-on ClayPencil turns 2D animation into 3D 'claymation'Foundry releases Nuke 16.0 in betaChaos releases V-Ray 7 for SketchUpOlder Posts
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  • Planetside Software releases Terragen 4.8
    www.cgchannel.com
    Friday, December 20th, 2024Posted by Jim ThackerPlanetside Software releases Terragen 4.8html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd"Planetside Software has released Terragen 4.8, the latest stable version of its environment generation tool for VFX, motion graphics and general CG work.The update adds support for the Sky Paint tools in Terragen Sky, Terragens companion app, the option to export heightfields as 16-bit TIFFs, and makes significant performance improvements.One of the first off-the-shelf tools for generating VFX-quality landscapesFirst released in the 2000s, Terragen is one of the original professional landscape-generation tools, having been used at VFX studios including ILM, Digital Domain and MPC.As well as terrain itself, it can generate surface water features, atmospheric and weather effects, clouds and skies, and is capable of generating and rendering very large environments.It continues to be updated steadily, typically receiving an update per year.Terragen 4.8: better integration for Terragen Sky and shading of deforming objectsThis years update, Terragen 4.8, introduces support for the new Sky Paint tools in Terragen Sky, Planetsides dedicated software for creating skies, free in early access to Terragen users.Artists can now paint clouds inside Terragen Sky, then export the project to Terragen for further editing or rendering.The update also introduces a new sticky world space for shading deforming objects, making it possible to use shaders on animated world space objects without textures sliding.It is supported on the Transform Input Shader, Transform Merge Shader and Distance Shader.In addition, the real-time 3D Preview now respects the shadow-casting settings of light sources.Performance improvements to rendering and heightfield generationUnder the hood, there are some significant performance improvements.The old maximum of 64 CPU threads per render has been removed, making it possible to take advantage of highly multi-core processors on Windows 11, Windows Server 2022, Linux and macOS.The Heightfield Erode operator has also been multithreaded, making calculation much faster, although unlike the old single-threaded mode still available for backwards-compatibility output is not deterministic, generating slightly different results each time it is run.In addition, interactivity in scenes with multiple cloud layers and performance of animated deformations have both been improved.Export heightfields as 16-bit TIFFs for use in game enginesFor pipeline integration, Terragen can now export heightfields as 16-bit TIFF and RAW files as well as 32-bit EXRs.The 16-bit files are intended for use in game engines like Unity and Unreal Engine, rather than offline rendering.Pricing and availabilityTerragen 4.8 is available for Windows, Linux and macOS. There are five price tiers, based on how much you earn as an individual artist or studio, ranging from earnings of $50,000/year to over $1 billion/year.Perpetual licences cost between $199 and $980, depending on which tier you fall in, while subscriptions cost between $10/month and $56/month, or $96/year and $492/year.Read an overview of the new features in Terragen 4.8 on Planetside Softwares blogRead a full list of new features in Terragen 4.8 in the online release notesHave your say on this story by following CG Channel on Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter). As well as being able to comment on stories, followers of our social media accounts can see videos we dont post on the site itself, including making-ofs for the latest VFX movies, animations, games cinematics and motion graphics projects.Latest NewsTerragen Sky now lets you paint clouds into the sky directlyCheck out the neat new Sky Paint tools in the December 2024 update to the sky-creation tool for VFX, visualization and games work.Friday, December 20th, 2024Planetside Software releases Terragen 4.8Environment generation software gets highly multithreaded rendering, plus heightfield export to 16-bit TIFFs for Unity and Unreal Engine.Friday, December 20th, 2024Photoshop users can now create filters in Substance 3D DesignerCurrent beta build of the image-editing app lets users create and import custom image-stylization filters as Substance 3D .sbsar files.Thursday, December 19th, 2024Pixar releases RenderMan 26.3Check out the new features in the production renderer, including tiled denoising, and support for the new versions of Maya and Houdini.Thursday, December 19th, 2024Create game characters with CC Auto Setup for 3ds Max and V-Ray[Sponsored] Discover how Reallusion's free plugin streamlines the transfer of characters from Character Creator 4 to 3ds Max.Wednesday, December 18th, 2024Leopoly releases Shapelab 2025 and Shapelab LiteCheck out the new features in the sculpting tool for VR and desktop systems, and its new lower-cost edition for Meta Quest 3 headsets.Wednesday, December 18th, 2024More NewsAdobe releases Photoshop 26.2Check out Blender's experimental anime rendering buildsCell Fluids 2.0 for Blender is outUnigine 2.19.1 can now import and export USD filesBoris FX releases Mocha Pro 2025Master Designing Sci-Fi Props for FilmAdobe releases Substance 3D Stager 3.1 in betaNekki releases Cascadeur Mobile 1.2ukasz Czy releases UVPackmaster 3 for MayaBlender add-on ClayPencil turns 2D animation into 3D 'claymation'Foundry releases Nuke 16.0 in betaChaos releases V-Ray 7 for SketchUpOlder Posts
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  • On This Day in 1951, Four Illuminated Lightbulbs in Idaho Were Evidence of the First Time a Nuclear Power Plant Generated Electricity
    www.smithsonianmag.com
    These four lightbulbs augured a future with nuclear power. Argonne National Laboratory via FlickrFlickrDeep in the sagebrush steppe of southeast Idaho on December 20, 1951, a team of nuclear physicists gathered around four 200-watt lightbulbs dangling from a slack wire. Then, Harold Lichtenberger, the project manager, flipped a switch. The bulbs lit up. Most of the time, flipping a light switch doesnt need an audience. The team of scientists was reportedly nonchalant, too. This is it, one scientist said when the bulbs illuminated, according to Rick Michal in Nuclear News.But this was no mere flick of the finger: For the first time in history, a nuclear reaction had generated a significant amount of electricity.For the time being, it only powered four bulbs. But the future looked bright from the small brick building outside of Arco, Idaho.Development of the Experimental Breeder Reactor-I, as the reactor that powered the lightbulbs was known, began in the late 1940s, as the United States government sought to develop a nuclear reaction process that would extend its finite supply of uranium.Uranium-238 is uraniums most relatively abundant isotope, making up 99 percent of the naturally occurring form of the element. However, unlike the scarce and radioactive uranium-235 isotope, uranium-238 is stable and nonfissionable without high-energy neutrons.A breeder reactor, like the one scientists in Idaho were trying to build, converts uranium-238s nonfissionable material into fissionable material more rapidly than the nuclear fuel is consumed, Popular Mechanics explained in 1952, a process that would contribute to expansion of our atomic program.As scientists initiate the process of artificial nuclear decay, uranium-238 atoms absorb neutrons in the reactor core, becoming relatively more fissionable plutonium-239 atoms. When a plutonium nucleus in a breeder reactor is hit with a high-energy neutron, it splits, releasing heat and more neutrons. The process becomes a self-sustaining source of energy, in the form of heat, as the reaction continues.A secret 1949 government feasibility report written by Lichtenberger, Walter Zinn and Aaron Novickall veterans of the United States top-secret Manhattan Project that furthered nuclear research and created the worlds first nuclear weaponsconcluded that from the nuclear point of view there is much attraction toward a fast neutron reactor for breeding.Experiments with EBR-I began in early 1951. In the compact brick building, a complex process of nuclear reactions took place leading up to the moment when Lichtenberger flipped that switch.First, a liquid metal coolant consisting of an alloy of sodium and potassium flowed through the reactor core, where it absorbed heat from the artificial decay process. As it returned back to its supply tank, it transferred its heat to a secondary liquid metal coolant, which was pumped to a boiler, transferring heat to water and generating enough steam to turn a turbine.At 1:50 p.m. on December 20, as Lichtenberger flipped the switch, the first electricity generated from nuclear energy flowed from the turbines into the four lightbulbs.When I turned the switch, Lichtenberger later told The Idaho Statesman, I guess I was more interested in how the circuit breakers would function than I was in the significance of the test.In fact, power production, Atomic Energy Commission officials told the Statesman, was merely incidental to the experiments main goals: measuring the efficacy of the breeder process and converting nonfissionable material into fissionable material. The generation of electricity was simply a side project.The next day, the EBR-Is output reached 100 kilowatts, powering all the electronics in the building, another promising indication of the development of nuclear power.Interest in breeder reactors waned after the 1960s as the available global uranium supply increased and scientists developed more efficient enrichment methods. But the little brick building near Arco still proudly calls itself the Worlds First Nuclear Power Plant. Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.Filed Under: Electricity, Environment, Nuclear Power, On This Day in History, Physics, Sustainability
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  • GamesIndustry.biz presents The Year In Numbers 2024
    www.gamesindustry.biz
    GamesIndustry.biz presents The Year In Numbers 2024Our annual infographic reveals the global games market value, best-selling games, biggest mobile markets, and more Feature by James Batchelor Editor-in-chief Published on Dec. 20, 2024 Tis the season to be jolly pouring over pie charts, bar graphs, tables and any other statistics we can throw at you.Yes, the approach of the holiday break means the annual GamesIndustry.biz Year In Numbers infographic is ready to go, perfectly capturing the current state of the video games market in one (admittedly very long) JPG image.As always, a huge thank you to the experts that share their data and help us compile this together. In the infographic below, you will find:The global games market value (courtesy of Newzoo)Total boxed vs digital revenues (also via Newzoo)The biggest mobile games, publishers and countries, both by revenue and downloads (thank you, Sensor Tower)The best-selling games in the UK (from Nielsen GfK), US (from Circana) and Japan (from Famitsu)The most covered games and companies, in terms of number of articles (provided by ICO via Footprints, based on data from over 18,000 websites)The biggest influencers on YouTube, most watched trailers and game promo videos, and the most popular video games on TikTok (courtesy of Fancensus)With that, GamesIndustry.biz presents The Year In Numbers 2024:
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  • How AI Models Learn to Solve Problems That Humans Cant
    www.marktechpost.com
    Natural Language processing uses large language models (LLMs) to enable applications such as language translation, sentiment analysis, speech recognition, and text summarization. These models depend on human feedback-based supervised data, but relying on unsupervised data becomes necessary as they surpass human capabilities. However, the issue of alignment arises as the models get more complex and nuanced. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University, Peking University, MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab, University of Cambridge, Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems, and UMass Amherst have developed the Easy-to-Hard Generalization (E2H) methodology that tackles the problem of alignment in complex tasks without relying on human feedback.Traditional alignment techniques rely heavily on supervised fine-tuning and Reinforcement Learning from Human Feedback (RLHF). This reliance on human capabilities serves as a hindrance when scaling these systems, as collecting high-quality human feedback is labor-intensive and costly. Furthermore, the generalization of these models to scenarios beyond learned behaviors is challenging. Therefore, there is an urgent need for a methodology that can accomplish complex tasks without requiring exhaustive human supervision.The proposed solution, Easy-to-Hard Generalization, employs a three-step methodology to achieve scalable task generalization:Process-Supervised Reward Models (PRMs): The models are trained on simple human-level tasks. These trained models then evaluate and guide the problem-solving capability of AI on higher-level complex tasks.Easy-to-Hard Generalization: The models are gradually exposed to more complex tasks as they train. Predictions and evaluations from the easier tasks are used to guide learning on harder ones.Iterative Refinement: The models are adjusted based on the feedback provided by the PRMs.This learning process with iterative refinement enables AI to shift from human-feedback-dependent models to reduced human annotations. Generalization of tasks that deviate from the learned behavior is smoother. Thus, this method optimizes AIs performance in situations where human engagement becomes obscure.Performance comparison shows significant improvements on the MATH500 benchmark, a 7b process-supervised RL model achieved 34.0% accuracy, while a 34b model reached 52.5% accuracy, using only human supervision on easy problems. The method demonstrated effectiveness on the APPS coding benchmark as well. These results suggest comparable or superior alignment outcomes to RLHF while significantly reducing the need for human-labeled data on complex tasks.This research addresses the critical challenge of AI alignment beyond human supervision by introducing an innovative, easy-to-hard generalization framework. The proposed method demonstrates promising results in enabling AI systems to tackle increasingly complex tasks while aligning with human values. Notable strengths include its novel approach to scalable alignment, effectiveness across domains such as mathematics and coding, and potential to address limitations of current alignment methods. However, further validation in diverse, real-world scenarios is necessary. Overall, this work marks a significant step toward developing AI systems that can safely and effectively operate without direct human supervision, paving the way for more advanced and aligned AI technologies.Check out the Paper and GitHub Page. All credit for this research goes to the researchers of this project. Also,dont forget to follow us onTwitter and join ourTelegram Channel andLinkedIn Group. Dont Forget to join our60k+ ML SubReddit. Trending: LG AI Research Releases EXAONE 3.5: Three Open-Source Bilingual Frontier AI-level Models Delivering Unmatched Instruction Following and Long Context Understanding for Global Leadership in Generative AI Excellence.The post How AI Models Learn to Solve Problems That Humans Cant appeared first on MarkTechPost.
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