MPC has released a breakdown video for the gruesome flashback sequence in Alien Covenant, featuring some impressive fluid sims to create the "Black Goo" and its effect on the engineers. Watch it on Vimeo (but probably not over breakfast).

ILM  has released a video going behind the scenes of the bombing run scene from Star Wars: The Last Jedi.  Watch it on YouTube.

Facebook has announced the ability for users to share 3D posts using the glTF 2.0 file format which supports textures, lighting, PBR shaders and rendering. Also announced are API improvements to enable developers to add 3D sharing to their apps. Foundry's Modo and Allegorithmic's applications have already introduced this feature. More on Facebook's developer blog and the documentation.

Chaos Group has announced the latest beta of V-Ray Next. Beta 2 adds several significant features including the integration of the NVIDIA AI denoiser as an alternative Chaos' own denoising algorithm, the ability to transfer auto exposure and white balance to scene cameras, support for the adaptive dome light and volumetric rendering in V-Ray GPU plus a reorganised and simplified UI, plus much more. You can see the full list of new features, modifications and bug fixes on the V-Ray Documentation site.

In other V-Ray related news, Christopher Nichols recently published a post explaining how V-Ray Next's new hair shader works. You can read it on Chaos Group Labs.

Autodesk has made the Softimage to Arnold plugin's source code available under an Apache 2.0 license on GitHub. The plugin was originally maintained by Solid Angle, recently acquired by Autodesk, who continued development for several years after Softimage's EOL announcement in April 2014. Find out more on GitHub.

Illusionhills has posted a couple of great-looking tests of foliage simulations created in Houdini. The first shows a wind animation on a single palm frond and the second show the full tree with shaders.

Recorded at GDC nearly 5 years ago but only released now, this talk by (at the time) Square Enix Montreal's Dan Taylor is still worth a watch. It aims to "distil the art and science of level design down to a concentrated set of fundamental principles for innovation, engagement, and immersion". Watch it on YouTube.

Paris-based NKI Studios has released a well put together making-of video about their animated commercial for Renault called The Postman, created with 3DS Max. Watch it on Vimeo.