After 5 years of development as a Blender(c) python script, MakeHuman has finally become mature enough to be a standalone software program. And still Open source under GPL - which basically means - free.

The Python script was translated to C and an OpenGL GUI was added. A pre-Alpha version is now available for download.

However, as a pre-alpha version, the developers highlights these issues:

“- We have called this release a DEMO, not because of the existence of a commercial version, nor because a particular license is necessary; but, simply, because within the fixed date for this pre-alpha, the program’s ability to save your creation is not implemented. The beta release version, scheduled for 20 November, will include this ability for both the MakeHuman specific and .obj formats, the latter for import by several widely used 3D modeling programs.

- Being a pre-alpha, many elements are still incomplete. Morphings must be improved and calibrated, many icons will be created or modified, and the current GUI buttons must be considered temporary. Facial expressions are not yet active, although there are some MakeHuman Emotion Expression System (MEES) morphings now available for experimentation.

However, this version gives, already, a good idea of what we have accomplished:

- Over 750 basic parametric morphing targets.
- Uses less than 10 MB RAM.
- Very low CPU usage (on some computers, this value does not even register)
- Professional renders with RenderMan® compliant engines.

Remember! To produce a render from MH, you need either one of these two great rendering engines: AQSIS or PIXIE “