Earlier this year, we announced our partnership with PiXYZ Software to provide Unity automotive and transportation customers with the best CAD import and data preparation software for real-time 3D. Since then, we’ve been hard at work improving how our products work together and developing new features.

With PiXYZ for 2018.1 came new algorithms and an improved interface. Today, we are excited to announce a refreshed set of PiXYZ products for 2018.2 is available from the Unity Store.

Automate CAD data import and prep with Python scripting — now included in PiXYZ STUDIO

One of the biggest changes is the addition of Python script editing to PiXYZ STUDIO. Python editing was previously only available with the purchase of PiXYZ STUDIO Editor, now all PiXYZ STUDIO customers can modify and create scenarios for automating the import and preparation of CAD data. PiXYZ STUDIO now also comes with ready-to-use scenarios for common data preparation tasks and a new Import Wizard.

Despite all this added functionality, the price of PiXYZ STUDIO remains the same! As a result of this change, PiXYZ STUDIO Editor is being retired – existing customers will be able to renew with PiXYZ STUDIO when current subscription terms expire.

We are also introducing a new product, PiXYZ STUDIO.batch, which provides all of the features of PiXYZ STUDIO plus scripted file input and output. This enables batch processing of large volumes of data, and STUDIO.batch is well suited to the needs of enterprise customers – if you’re interested, please contact your Unity representative.

Enhanced collaboration comes to PiXYZ REVIEW

PiXYZ REVIEW allows for the easy import of a wide range of CAD models, point clouds, and mesh data from a wide variety of sources for efficient collaboration among teams and partners: engineers, project leaders, marketing product managers, training experts, VR experts. Now with v2018.2, PiXYZ REVIEW includes AR and VR features that were previously exclusive to PiXYZ REVIEW Premium. All PiXYZ REVIEW customers can now collaborate using a mixture of immersive AR and VR devices as well as conventional displays. With this change, PiXYZ REVIEW Premium is retiring, and the price of PiXYZ REVIEW is aligning with PiXYZ PLUGIN for Unity.

Powerful features provide convenience and extended capabilities

PiXYZ CONNECT is server-based and provides a web front-end so larger companies can provide CAD import and data preparation as an internal web service for employees. Now with v2018.2, PiXYZ CONNECT can, together with a license of Unity, directly generate Unity runtimes. This is a powerful feature that supports a wide range of enterprise applications. In addition, PiXYZ STUDIO and PiXYZ CONNECT share some powerful new features. Both products can now generate lightweight proxy meshes, which can be useful to provide geometrically accurate and highly performant meshes for collision, light baking, and other purposes.

PiXYZ has always been a great solution for decimating meshes from CAD data, as PiXYZ understands NURBS patches and can optimize decimation while maintaining smooth surface curvature. But with this release comes a new algorithm option for decimating meshes that are more organic in form or which are purely mesh data with no NURBS patch information. Together with the LOD creation tools in PiXYZ, this provides more power than ever to generate exactly the content you need, whether you are creating marketing experiences or mobile training apps.

PiXYZ PLUGIN also sees its share of new features. Metadata is now imported as properties within Unity when the full product hierarchy is imported, something which previously required PiXYZ STUDIO. Once you import a CAD file, your metadata is visible in the Inspector window for each object in the hierarchy. Note that this works only for uncompressed hierarchies.

High-octane performance improvements for large and complex CAD data models

The most dramatic improvement comes from work we’ve done together with PiXYZ to optimize performance of the PiXYZ PLUGIN for Unity. We identified opportunities to more efficiently call into Unity APIs and PiXYZ used the new C# Job System to create Game Objects in Unity. The combination of these changes has resulted in impressive improvement, especially on larger and more complex models. We’ve seen reductions in the time to import and prepare CAD data ranging from 50% to more than 80%!

Join us for a one-hour live session on how Unity and PiXYZ can help bring your idea to life

Finally, on Tuesday, August 21 at 10:00 PST, we’re holding our first Auto webinar “Real-Time 3D for Auto: From CAD to Unity” so you can learn how today’s best-in-class CAD-import solution and real-time rendering tools can quickly bring great ideas and products to life. Spaces are limited, so register now.

There’s more to come!

We’re not even close to being finished. We’ve received great feedback from customers about PiXYZ, and we’re continuing to work closely to make the best CAD import and data preparation solution even better. In upcoming releases, look for more features addressing the needs of specific industries beyond automotive, further performance improvements, and some cool new features related to importing materials. The PiXYZ team is hard at work on improving customer experience outside of the product too, with improved documentation and tutorials.

In the meantime, please share your wish list items for PiXYZ in the comments section below. We read every comment, even if we don’t respond to them all, and we’d love to hear your ideas for making the combined power of PiXYZ and Unity even more relevant for your business. Check out this site for more information or to get the PiXYZ packages.