This time it's Scaleform, a provider of Flash-based UI tools and middleware for video games, whose technology has been licensed in the development of at least 800 games. The acquisition has yet to be completed. More at Scaleform, Autodesk, Develop.

The NY Times offers a rare behind-the-scenes look at the Pixar Studios complex in California. Watch it on Vimeo.

Microsoft has posted a technology preview showing the combination of Windows Phone 7 and Kinect. Watch it on YouTube.

Unity Technologies has released the latest version of its integrated authoring tool for creating 3D video games and other interactive content. New features include: new DOF with bokeh, improved bloom, new Water prefab in standard assets (includes waves, automatically generated foam on shorelines and more), major performance improvements in OpenGL ES 2.0 (IOS/Android), ability to profile standalone player builds from the Editor (including IOS and Android builds), caching feature usable by all content, etc. More at Unity3D.com.

Take a look at the latest tests that use Kinect for obtaining motion capture data for animating bipeds in Max: video 1-video 2. UK-based artist Reuben Fleming has posted a number of tutorials on the subject.

The new line of workstations features bootable PCI-E solid state storage that allows to boot Windows 7 in about 10 seconds, and Max in a few seconds. Tasks like opening large files, saving large files or loading textures or any other asset at render time will be significantly faster than using traditional hard drives. The interactive performance when scrubbing layered 2K or 4K footage in your compositor is greatly improved. More at RenderStream.

Check out the video on YouTube.

Montreal-based Character Rigging is offering 3DS Max, Softimage and Maya customized rigging services for your characters. More at CharacterRigging.com.