Chaos Launches Chaos Envision Beta – A New Real-Time AEC Assembly and Animation Tool

Transform Massive CAD Files Into Animated, Fully Ray-Traced Scenes in a Matter of Minutes

KARLSRUHE, Germany

December 3, 2024

Today, Chaos launches the public beta of Chaos Envision, the first AEC presentation tool to put 100% real-time ray tracing, push-button animation and render-ready imports all in one place. Designers can finally assemble massive scenes without compromise, using a library of ready-made assets and their own design data to create compelling work faster than ever before.

“The trade-offs have always been steep when it comes to presentation products. Speed shreds fidelity, CAD designs won’t carry over, and big files sometimes won’t even load,” said Phillip Miller, VP Product, Solutions for Artists at Chaos. “With Envision, these problems just go away, so designers can work without interruption and explore options without any prework.”

Envision is an independent, real-time 3D assembly and animation tool that helps designers explore, animate and present their work in ways that would break traditional CAD products. As data comes in from tools like Rhino and Revit, designers can start building on it at a scene or object-based level, giving them maximum flexibility over their vision. And because each visualization is 100% fully ray traced, users can now enjoy V-Ray-like photorealism in both their design and marketing projects.

Anything, From Anywhere

Envision makes it easy to bring multiple 3D components into a single space, so designers can quickly arrange scenes packed with building, site and other key material information. As Envision accepts content from any application that hosts Enscape or V-Ray, users never have to worry about scene prep or data loss. What begins in a design tool or Enscape will carry over, as-is, enabling designers to bring more fidelity to their lighting, materials and assets right away.

Once the data is in, designers can start elevating scenes as they see fit. Whether that’s tweaking objects, animating people or adding entourage with Chaos Cosmos and Chaos Scatter, users can now craft stunning visualizations that quickly get at the heart of a building or environment. As designs evolve, the choices made in Envision are applied to the evolving CAD objects, enabling fast iterations and no do-overs.

Easy Animation

Envision is designed to make animation exceedingly simple for AEC teams. Through a direct integration of the Chaos anima engine, users can now drag-and-drop people or crowds into scenes in a moment’s notice, and then direct their movement by drawing a path. These path tools can also be applied to other objects and cameras for more cinematic looks.

In addition, Envision will support variation-based animation to help designers depict sun studies, construction phasing or even cycle through design options. With these features, most visualization teams should be able to start animating in minutes.

As part of this launch, Chaos is also releasing two bridge exporters for SketchUp and Rhino, with a Revit option to follow in 2025. Built on the same code as the Enscape-to-V-Ray Bridge, these exporters will make it so users can export to Envision without having Enscape or V-Ray installed.

“When we started building the Chaos ecosystem, we really operated from a place of ‘What do most people need to be successful?’” added Miller. “By taking away common bottlenecks like interoperability and putting asset libraries, purpose-built renderers, animation tools and more in one place, you can really clear the way. And that’s what most people want.”

about chaos

Founded in 1997, Chaos is a leading global visualization technology company. Chaos is defining visualization by offering accessible tools, simplifying and accelerating workflows, and empowering visual storytelling for artists, architects, designers and other creative professionals.

Chaos’ portfolio of visualization technologies for architecture and design, media and entertainment, and product e-commerce includes:

V-Ray, a physically based renderer that has been honored with an Academy Award and an Engineering Emmy
Enscape, a high-quality real-time rendering and virtual reality plugin
Corona, an artist-friendly photorealistic renderer
Cylindo, a 3D furniture product visualization platform for e-commerce
Anima, a 3D/4D animation software to add realistic people and crowds to visualizations

Headquartered in Karlsruhe, Germany, Chaos has nearly 800 employees and offices in 11 cities worldwide. It is actively seeking new talent across multiple departments to continue expanding its ecosystem.

For more information, visit chaos.com, chaos-enscape.com, chaos-cylindo.com and axyz-design.com.