Kinematic / Changelog / What's new

Release 0.5.0

What's new in 0.5.0.

A new name, a timeline on every graph, and modeling, sculpting, painting, photo and sound editing in the viewport.

Download Kinematic 0.5.0 Read the full changelog

01New name

Meet Kinematic.

The app has a new name. It is the same app, free and open as before.

.kin

Graphs now save as .kin files.

macOS

macOS asks for camera and microphone access again. Allow it once more.

Windows

On Windows, remove the older version from Installed apps yourself.

Why Kinematic exists→Get 0.5.0→

02Every graph

A timeline on every graph.

A bar along the bottom of the window plays, pauses and scrubs whatever you built. Nothing to wire first.

Play, scrub, loop, mark.: Press I and O to set a loop, M to drop a marker, and type a time to jump straight to it.
Generators start on Play.: No Startup node to wire. Press Play and they run.
Simulations scrub.: Drag back through a simulation and it plays from its cache.
Sync to the show's clock.: Sync the timeline to MIDI timecode, LTC or MIDI clock.

TimelineTimelineGateUITransport

Animate on the timeline→Lock a show to timecode→

The timeline bar folded to one row: go to start, step back, play, pause, stop, step forward, go to end, Playing, 00:00:01:06, frame 36 — The bar, folded to one row

UnfoldedLoop · 30 fps

0306090120150180

DropChorus

diagram: the ruler, a loop range and two markers

Click the time and type

`126`	frame 126
`4.2 s`	4.2 seconds
`00:00:04:06`	that timecode
`3.1.2`	bar 3, beat 1, sixteenth 2
`+1 bar`	one bar on from the playhead

In the viewport

Model, sculpt, retopo and paint where you see the work. Each move adds a step to the graph, so it stays open to change.

03Create

Model in the viewport.

Pick points, edges or faces and edit them right where they are. Each tool adds its node to the graph as you go.

ExtrudeInsetBevelLoop cutKnifeSlidePokeBridgeBooleansEdge marksSnappingTyped values with units

Mesh tools work on only the parts you picked, and you can type an exact value, units and all.

3DGeoExtrude3DGeoInset3DGeoPolyBevel3DGeoLoopCut3DGeoBoolean

Things to model→

the Cut menu on a box: loop cut, knife, boolean, slice

04Create

Sculpt with a pen.

Push, pull and carve a mesh in the viewport. When the shape is right, lift a shell off it for a helmet or a mask, and trim the edge.

3DGeoSculpt3DGeoDynamicSculpt3DGeoExtractShell3DGeoTrim

Things to sculpt→

Pressure and tilt

Light strokes build up, heavy strokes dig in. The pen shapes every stroke.

Detail where you work

With dynamic detail the mesh splits only under the brush, so a small brush adds fine detail.

Symmetry

Mirror strokes across X, Y or Z, or repeat one around an axis.

Layers and masks

Keep a pass on its own layer. Hold parts still with a mask.

Face sets

Split the surface into named sets and hide what is in the way.

Alphas and stencils

Stamp texture through the brush, or hold a stencil over the model.

Voxel remesh

Rebuild a stretched mesh evenly, so the brushes behave again.

History

Step back to any stroke. A saved sculpt opens without replaying its strokes.

05Create

Clean it up. Unfold it. Bake it.

Turn a heavy sculpt into a light mesh that is ready for a game, a render or a print.

Retopology

Draw a low-poly mesh right over a sculpt, or start it from a quad remesh. Turn triangles back into quads.

Unwrap automatically, then relax, stitch, align, stack and straighten islands, across UDIM tiles.

Baking

Bake normal, ambient occlusion, curvature and height from the high mesh onto the low one.

3DGeoRetopo3DGeoQuadRemesh3DGeoTrisToQuads3DGeoUVRelax3DGeoUVStraighten3DGeoBakeMaps

Retopo and UV projects→

the Surface menu: unwrap, paint on the surface, bake, decal

06Create

Paint on the model.

Paint straight onto a surface, in layers with masks, and watch the material change as you go.

ColorRoughnessMetallicEmissiveHeight

Mask a dirt layer so it lands only in the dents.
Put a picture on a surface as a decal.
Place copies on a surface by hand, right where you want them.

3DGeoTexturePaint3DGeoDecal3DGeoPlacePoints

Things to paint→

Pictures and sound

Edit a photo or a recording in the viewport, with the same stack of steps you can go back to.

07Edit

Edit photos in the viewport.

Crop, develop and grade a photo where you see it. Every change lands in a stack, where you can compare it or switch it off.

CropDevelopCurvesSelect subjectSelect skyColor rangeRefine edgePaintTextLayersCloneHealLiquifyLooks

Select the subject or the sky, then grade it on its own.
Clone, heal and liquify with a brush.
Steady a shaky clip, even out flicker, and track a flat surface through a shot.

ImageDevelopImageSelectShapeImageMaskRefineImageHealImageLiquifyImageStabilize

Photo projects→

a sunset with the sky selected and developed, and the graph it built

a clip with noise cleaned, a cut, and loudness set to -16 LUFS

08Play

Edit sound in the viewport.

Select a range of a clip and work on it. You do not even need to press Play.

TrimCutFadeRide the volumeEQClean noiseNormalizeMarkersRecorded takes

Record a take from a live sound and keep it. Drop markers on a clip and jump between them. Each edit is a step you can go back to.

AudioTakeAudioClipPlayerAudioEditRangeAudioGainEnvelopeAudioDenoiseAudioMarkers

Sound editing projects→

Across the app

Settings, panels and menus every graph gets, plus new ways to build on Kinematic.

09App

Project resolution.

Set one picture size for the whole project. Renders, patterns, resizes and recordings set to Project follow it, even while the graph runs.

Name extra sizes, such as an LED wall or a preview.

The Objects panel listing a scene with a box, a sphere, a camera and a light, then a render, a circle, a noise picture, an oscillator and an LFO

10App

Objects browser.

A sidebar list of everything the graph makes: shapes, scenes, renders, sounds and data, each with a live thumbnail. Click one to see it.

See the Objects panel on the tour→

11App

Accessibility.

Use Kinematic with VoiceOver, Narrator, NVDA or Orca. Drive the canvas and the viewport from the keyboard alone.

Turn on high contrast or reduce motion in Preferences.

Accessibility in Kinematic→

A faceted crystal shaded by a hand-written material — a crystal shaded by a hand-written material

12Perform

Shader updates.

ShaderMaterial takes up to 8 textures, reads scene shadows and environment light, and knows the time.

ImageShader writes 32-bit float on every output. PbrMaterial gets a height map input.

ShaderMaterialImageShaderPbrMaterial

Write the look→

13Perform

Send to menus.

Drive DMX from channels or sound, play channels as MIDI notes, send a table over OSC, or project a picture through a light. One pick adds the nodes.

ChannelDataToDmxChannelDataToMidiTypedDataToOscImageToDmx

Light the room→

kin_manifest.toml

[permissions]
gpu = true
audio = false
midi = true
serial = false

__init__.py

# a row in the viewport's Add menu
kinematic.viewport.add_menu_item("Add", "Grid scatter",
    operator="my_ext.scatter",
    params={"pattern": "grid"},
    submenu="Procedural")

14Developers

Python updates.

Extensions can add items to the viewport's Add menus.

They ask before they use the graphics card, audio, MIDI or a serial port. Kinematic asks you once per extension.

Build an extension→

Also in 0.5.0

And plenty more.

The smaller changes, in short. The changelog has every one.

Pick single copies of an instanced object in the viewport to select, move or delete them.
Settings cards in the viewport replace the old slider strips, with a redone right-click menu.
Map skeleton or pose fields onto a viewport handle from a popup.
New nodes: 3DGeoSequenceRead, 3DGeoDimension, 3DGeoRigGoalPoints, 3DGeoRigPoseBank, PhysicsBodiesFromPieces.
Null nodes for SVG, volume, NURBS, MIDI, DMX, JSON and OSC.
A wide variety of fixes and quality of life improvements across the app.

Read the full 0.5.0 changelog→Browse every demo→

Free and open. Yours, forever.

No account, no license key. macOS, Windows, Linux and Raspberry Pi.

Download Kinematic 0.5.0