Re: Rigging or Character TD type courses question
Well, generic rigs also allow you get your bases covered to spend more time with the more intricate / advanced character setups that can run on top of them. Granted if you're building tools for auto-rigging you'll want to design them to be as versatile as possible. Eric Thivierge http://www.ethivierge.com On Thu, Jun 21, 2012 at 7:15 PM, Michal Doniec doni...@gmail.com wrote: Second that, generic auto rigging scripts often yield generic results. Of course for some productions consistency and ability to chuck out tons of generic rigs is important. On Wed, Jun 20, 2012 at 4:37 PM, Alan Fregtman alan.fregt...@gmail.com wrote: * Another tip: Even though scripting small repetitive tasks is not a bad idea, if you're new'ish to rigging, stay away from making the ultimate auto-rigger script, because chances are your methods will evolve with practice, your script will thus soon be outdated and if you use the script to make the -same- setup -every time- you may not find yourself looking at ways to do things differently, and in my opinion you'll never innovate if you work the same way forever. On Wed, Jun 20, 2012 at 10:13 AM, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@gmail.com wrote: You learn a lot in production working on things and improving your own work, but also working with / around others with different approaches allows for filling your rigging toolbox too. Working with different riggers and animators helps you learn what different people like in rigs and can come up with solutions for different projects a lot more rapidly. My terribly late night feeling. ;) Eric Thivierge http://www.ethivierge.com On Thu, Jun 21, 2012 at 12:06 AM, Guillaume Laforge guillaume.laforge...@gmail.com wrote: Rigging is very similar to programming. Courses are very important of course, but you will learn much more efficiently by spending more time on doing your own rigs (and animating them) than reading too many books ;). -- -- Michal http://uk.linkedin.com/in/mdoniec
ICE Color Attribute Q
I need to pass gradient color from ICE to the Rendertree, and following the docs, I have set up the ICE Tree with Get Data and Set Data for the pointcloud.Color. Now when I look up the attribute in the Rendertree for a Polygonizer object I only get Use Default Value in the dropdown menu of the Color_Attribute shader. I am sure I am doing this wrong, but the docs explain it like this. What might I have missed? Morten
Re: ICE Color Attribute Q
Hi Morten, Is the node plugged in? It won't list things properly if it's floating, disconnected. It also won't be proper if the material is not yet applied on those meshes. (It uses the current objects with the material to populate those Attribute lists.) If it's still flaky, then you may need to force the attribute to be visible (by using Show Values in its connection) as it could be the dreaded internal ICE optimization thinking oh, you're not using that attribute in the ICE tree, so I'm gonna ignore it.. Good luck! Cheers, -- Alan On Thu, Jun 21, 2012 at 7:28 AM, Morten Bartholdy x...@colorshopvfx.dkwrote: ** I need to pass gradient color from ICE to the Rendertree, and following the docs, I have set up the ICE Tree with Get Data and Set Data for the pointcloud.Color. Now when I look up the attribute in the Rendertree for a Polygonizer object I only get Use Default Value in the dropdown menu of the Color_Attribute shader. I am sure I am doing this wrong, but the docs explain it like this. What might I have missed? Morten
Re: ICE Color Attribute Q
I don't think it is because of some optimization. Attributes data will be pulled only if used in Softimage. So if the Render Tree need it, it should be available. Morten, is you color applied on the polygonizer mesh ? It sounds like you are setting it on the point could but want to use it on the mesh ? On Thu, Jun 21, 2012 at 9:05 AM, Alan Fregtman alan.fregt...@gmail.comwrote: Hi Morten, Is the node plugged in? It won't list things properly if it's floating, disconnected. It also won't be proper if the material is not yet applied on those meshes. (It uses the current objects with the material to populate those Attribute lists.) If it's still flaky, then you may need to force the attribute to be visible (by using Show Values in its connection) as it could be the dreaded internal ICE optimization thinking oh, you're not using that attribute in the ICE tree, so I'm gonna ignore it.. Good luck! Cheers, -- Alan On Thu, Jun 21, 2012 at 7:28 AM, Morten Bartholdy x...@colorshopvfx.dkwrote: ** I need to pass gradient color from ICE to the Rendertree, and following the docs, I have set up the ICE Tree with Get Data and Set Data for the pointcloud.Color. Now when I look up the attribute in the Rendertree for a Polygonizer object I only get Use Default Value in the dropdown menu of the Color_Attribute shader. I am sure I am doing this wrong, but the docs explain it like this. What might I have missed? Morten
Re: ICE Color Attribute Q
Guillaume, do you mean if I have set the color data on the mesh? No it has no ICE tree - I just try and look up the attribute from the Rendertree. Morten Den 21. juni 2012 kl. 15:17 skrev Guillaume Laforge guillaume.laforge...@gmail.com: optimization. Attributes data will be pulled only if used in Softimage. So if the Render Tree need it, it should be available. Morten, is you color applied on the polygonizer mesh ? It sounds like you are setting it on the point could but want to use it on the mesh ? On Thu, Jun 21, 2012 at 9:05 AM, Alan Fregtman alan.fregt...@gmail.com mailto:alan.fregt...@gmail.com wrote: Is the node plugged in? It won't list things properly if it's floating, disconnected. It also won't be proper if the material is not yet applied on those meshes. (It uses the current objects with the material to populate those Attribute lists.) If it's still flaky, then you may need to force the attribute to be visible (by using Show Values in its connection) as it could be the dreaded internal ICE optimization thinking oh, you're not using that attribute in the ICE tree, so I'm gonna ignore it.. Good luck! Cheers, -- Alan On Thu, Jun 21, 2012 at 7:28 AM, Morten Bartholdy x...@colorshopvfx.dk mailto:x...@colorshopvfx.dk wrote: I need to pass gradient color from ICE to the Rendertree, and following the docs, I have set up the ICE Tree with Get Data and Set Data for the pointcloud.Color. Now when I look up the attribute in the Rendertree for a Polygonizer object I only get Use Default Value in the dropdown menu of the Color_Attribute shader. I am sure I am doing this wrong, but the docs explain it like this. What might I have missed? Morten
Re: ICE Color Attribute Q
OK so I quickly tried applying an ICE tree to the polygonizer and getting the pointcloud.color - so far so good. Problem now is it seems I can't plug that color in to a set data node using self.color - the set data node stays red. A context issue? Morten Den 21. juni 2012 kl. 15:17 skrev Guillaume Laforge guillaume.laforge...@gmail.com: optimization. Attributes data will be pulled only if used in Softimage. So if the Render Tree need it, it should be available. Morten, is you color applied on the polygonizer mesh ? It sounds like you are setting it on the point could but want to use it on the mesh ? On Thu, Jun 21, 2012 at 9:05 AM, Alan Fregtman alan.fregt...@gmail.com mailto:alan.fregt...@gmail.com wrote: Is the node plugged in? It won't list things properly if it's floating, disconnected. It also won't be proper if the material is not yet applied on those meshes. (It uses the current objects with the material to populate those Attribute lists.) If it's still flaky, then you may need to force the attribute to be visible (by using Show Values in its connection) as it could be the dreaded internal ICE optimization thinking oh, you're not using that attribute in the ICE tree, so I'm gonna ignore it.. Good luck! Cheers, -- Alan On Thu, Jun 21, 2012 at 7:28 AM, Morten Bartholdy x...@colorshopvfx.dk mailto:x...@colorshopvfx.dk wrote: I need to pass gradient color from ICE to the Rendertree, and following the docs, I have set up the ICE Tree with Get Data and Set Data for the pointcloud.Color. Now when I look up the attribute in the Rendertree for a Polygonizer object I only get Use Default Value in the dropdown menu of the Color_Attribute shader. I am sure I am doing this wrong, but the docs explain it like this. What might I have missed? Morten
Re: Who has switched to Vray and loves it?
Hey Marc-Andre! Well, I´m using Vray since two years (also the beta) for certain projects, not for all. It performed quite well. I like the integration and the concept of having identical parameters over all the different packages. That way you can easily adapt tuts from other application. I like the look Vray generates and I like the straight forward setup of a scene. You will get nice results really quick. The five rendernodes are cool, and I think, you get 5 more standalone rendernodes (for Vray archives), if I got it correct... Currently setting it up for my own little render backyard. I think you get a good renderer for your money. Support is excellent and very responsive on bugreports and other stuff...very nice guys ;) cheers, oli Am 21.06.2012 21:11, schrieb Marc-Andre Carbonneau: Hi, I'm wondering who has switched to VRay for Softimage completely and loves it. I don't seem to see much commercials or movies stating they have used Vray for Softimage. Has it picked up? Now, after a few months now, how does it compare to Arnold? Why have you picked VRay instead of Arnold? How's Vray's buy one get 5 free for your farm working for you? Thanks. Marc-Andre
Re: Who has switched to Vray and loves it?
I agree with you. It's way easier than mentalray. On Thu, Jun 21, 2012 at 4:15 PM, Mirko Jankovic mirko.janko...@aeonproduction.com wrote: Hmm I found Arnold learning curve to be really really short and in less than a week you can be production ready.
Re: Who has switched to Vray and loves it?
Well, I easily found some videos showing click here, enter this value for Vray. While there were buttons in Arnold, I was really not sure of what I was doing. But to tell the truth, I really did not try a lot. Le 21/06/2012 22:15, Mirko Jankovic a écrit : Hmm I found Arnold learning curve to be really really short and in less than a week you can be production ready.
Re: Who has switched to Vray and loves it?
There are _a lot_ more buttons in Vray than in Arnold! ;) The combination of GI algorithms ( primary / secondary) alone is intimidating. The funny thing in Arnold is that the result most of the time converges to the same image, only the rendertime varies if you e.g. shoot rays that you don't actually need to sample or have useless diffuse rays bounce inside your glass objects. Optimizing Arnold scenes can be a time consuming process as well, but it's not mandatory to get a result. It's only mandatory if you need a result in time. ;) I remember the not so good old mental ray times where optimizing scenes made the difference between a rendered image and a crashing renderfarm. But on the other hand I kind of masochistically liked the challenge of pushing the right buttons. Cheers Steffen 2012/6/21 olivier jeannel olivier.jean...@noos.fr Well, I easily found some videos showing click here, enter this value for Vray. While there were buttons in Arnold, I was really not sure of what I was doing. But to tell the truth, I really did not try a lot. Le 21/06/2012 22:15, Mirko Jankovic a écrit : Hmm I found Arnold learning curve to be really really short and in less than a week you can be production ready. -- PGP-ID(RSA): 0xCCE2E989 / 0xE045734C CCE2E989 Fingerprint: 394B 3DA9 9A9A 96C6 3A5A 0595 EF92 EE1F
Re: Who has switched to Vray and loves it?
I'm not a render / surfacing guy myself but I really appreciate your involvement in the XSI community AND for reaching out to the community for crits. Thumbs up! Eric Thivierge http://www.ethivierge.com On Fri, Jun 22, 2012 at 8:03 AM, Kamen Lilov kamen.li...@chaosgroup.comwrote: ** I'd like to chime in to this discussion. What are the things in VRay/XSI you hate most? A missing feature, clumsy configuration, poor documentation, any kinds of instabilities, etc? Disclosure: I run the XSI integration team at ChaosGroup so, obviously, I am not impartial to this discussion. But I am keen on making the product work well for all you VFX folks out there :) and I can take criticism. Shoot at will :)
Re: Rigging or Character TD type courses question
That post is worth its bit count in gold! Very awesome post Brad thanks so much! Eric Thivierge http://www.ethivierge.com
Re: Rigging or Character TD type courses question
Awesome read, Brads write is is really epic. Sandy any luck finding a course? are you thinking more programming or rigging? On Fri, Jun 22, 2012 at 9:08 AM, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@gmail.comwrote: That post is worth its bit count in gold! Very awesome post Brad thanks so much! Eric Thivierge http://www.ethivierge.com -- --- Simon Ben Anderson blog: http://vinyldevelopment.wordpress.com/
Re: xsi stereo camera to Nuke?
you get back plate shifting on the camera which is kind of like optical shift if i remember correctly( its been a while since I wrote the stereo camera we used in production) On Fri, Jun 22, 2012 at 12:27 AM, Ben Houston b...@exocortex.com wrote: It should be possible via Exocortex Crate / Alembic soon, I believe we don't yet support optical shift though in XSI. -ben On Thu, Jun 21, 2012 at 10:01 AM, Chris Johnson chr...@topixfx.com wrote: We're not having much luck with this. using .fbx. Anyone else had any luckGraham, Andy? -- Best regards, Ben Houston Voice: 613-762-4113 Skype: ben.exocortex Twitter: @exocortexcom http://Exocortex.com - Passionate CG Software Professionals. -- --- Simon Ben Anderson blog: http://vinyldevelopment.wordpress.com/
RE: Rigging or Character TD type courses question
Hi Si, Yes we decided on something - it is for Pearl to do. And yes there were some awesome courses raised here - thanks again to all who replied. S. _ Sandy Sutherland Technical Supervisor sandy.sutherl...@triggerfish.co.za _ From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] on behalf of Simon Anderson [simonbenandersonl...@gmail.com] Sent: 22 June 2012 01:50 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Rigging or Character TD type courses question Awesome read, Brads write is is really epic. Sandy any luck finding a course? are you thinking more programming or rigging? On Fri, Jun 22, 2012 at 9:08 AM, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@gmail.commailto:ethivie...@gmail.com wrote: That post is worth its bit count in gold! Very awesome post Brad thanks so much! Eric Thivierge http://www.ethivierge.com -- --- Simon Ben Anderson blog: http://vinyldevelopment.wordpress.com/
