NaturalMotion tech deals break beyond gaming

Oxford-headquartered animation company NaturalMotion has licensed its morpheme engine to a company that doesn’t specialise in game production, but instead offers its own community-focused animation program.

The Muvizu 3D application – now in beta stage – allows users to create animated videos without the need for specialist hardware, software or training. The animation service, which was dreamt up by Digimania, now uses the morpheme animation creation tools to make the creation process more efficient while offering more options.

NaturalMotion sales VP Andy Payne said morpheme “would fill an essential part of their pipeline in powering Muvizu”.

He added: “As animation specialists, we take great pride in playing such an important role in opening up the field to a younger audience that have already proved they have a lot to contribute. Much of the work produced so far has been both highly creative and entertaining, created by movie makers as young as 7 years old.”

Digimania MD Vince Ryan said that NaturalMotion was a “perfect partner” for its project.

He added: “Because we were entering uncharted waters, we’d need helpful support. This came in spades and we thank all at NaturalMotion for their efforts on our behalf."

Lead Artist at Digimania, Barry Sheridan, said the morpheme tool “allows users to create, iterate, and quickly deploy character variations which go towards making compelling sequences in Muvizu “.