Re: New render layers in maya

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Just a thought - in Soft partitions are exclusive: an object can only exist in 
one partition and if it’s assigned to another it gets removed from its previous 
partition. 
In the Maya implementation it looks as if we can have objects in multiple 
collections (=partitions, if I understand correctly), thus with potentially 
numerous overrides. 

So how does the Maya system deal with potentially conflicting overrides?

Thanks,
Jean-Louis

---
Digital Golem
+32 2256 9734
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels
---



> On 20 Apr 2016, at 02:59, Francois Lord  wrote:
> 
> Ok I just watched the video and I must admit this is pretty cool!
> Expressions for collection members, relative overrides with multiplier
> and offset, overrides that can be deactivated...
> 
> It looks like Autodesk got some hints from studios that were using
> Softimage.
> 
> We'll see how it behaves in production, but I say it's promising.
> 
> F
> 
> On 2016-04-19 02:58 PM, Francois Lord wrote:
>> This is the key to success. It made it very simple to work with
>> overrides in XSI but it didn't deal well (at all) with references that
>> change all the time. Using expressions is the way forward. Houdini is
>> using expressions in its stylesheets, Katana is using the equivalent
>> with nodes, we are using expressions in our in-house tool at Framestore.
>> 
>> I remember we had to use very precise workflow rules in XSI to keep
>> scenes clean (back objects partitions always being hidden, foreground
>> partitions always being visible, object matte partitions being called
>> MATTE, etc.)
>> 
>> When you deal with expressions, you need even more rigid rules.
>> Otherwise it quickly become an unusable mess. Also, all objects must
>> respect the naming conventions. And artists who don't follow them must
>> be executed.
>> 
>> F
>> 
>> On 2016-04-18 17:47, Luc-Eric Rousseau wrote:
>> 
>>> Overrides are procedural in XSI (i.e. string-based) but in this
>>> everything else is expression-based and late-bound, which means it can
>>> deal with references and changing scenes.
>> 
> 
> --
> Softimage Mailing List.
> To unsubscribe, send a mail to softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com with 
> "unsubscribe" in the subject, and reply to confirm.
> 


--
Softimage Mailing List.
To unsubscribe, send a mail to softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com with 
"unsubscribe" in the subject, and reply to confirm.

Re: this is the end......

[Jean-Louis Billard]

It’s good to know there’s a few people still around. Our pipeline is still 
firmly Softimage based, with Arnold and Redshift on the render-side, so by all 
means anyone available for freelance work should get in touch and I’ll add you 
to my list. We have a fair amount of projects coming in, with some potential 
upcoming feature work too. 

Here’s my work email: jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com


Cheers,
Jean-Louis
Digital Golem
www.digitalgolem.com 



 
> On 27 Jan 2016, at 16:13, Matt Morris  wrote:
> 
> RIP Softimage! Will carry on making a living with it as long as I can... 
> 
> On that note, had a job go away so if anyone needs a 
> rigger/animator/generalist I'm available until 15th march. Ahem. Scuse the 
> plug.
> 
> https://vimeo.com/mattmos 
> 
> 
> On 27 January 2016 at 15:02, Paul  > wrote:
> End? I just bought 2 new licences today ! 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
> 
> On 27 Jan 2016, at 14:21, Ognjen Vukovic  > wrote:
> 
>> Sorry here comes a shameless plug.
>> Im in London on a job till the end of feb. More lighting/shading based then 
>> generalist, but feel free to contact me off list if you need any help on up 
>> coming stuff after February.
>> 
>> On Wed, Jan 27, 2016 at 2:13 PM, adrian wyer > > wrote:
>> generalists actually... everyone seems to be well ensconced in places still 
>> using soft, and aren't available for short term jobs
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> a
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
>>  
>> [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
>> ] On Behalf Of Sebastien 
>> Sterling
>> Sent: 27 January 2016 14:10
>> To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com 
>> Subject: Re: this is the end..
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> when you guys say freelancer, you mean ICEres, yes ?
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> On 27 January 2016 at 14:08, "Javier Vega (Elástico)" 
>> > wrote:
>> 
>> Yes, this is the end, but I’m still using it in some projects when I need to 
>> work more fast and quickly. Anyway, the users of this list which software 
>> are using right now? Just curiosity. I know that you, Jordi Bares, are still 
>> using it. In my case, as a freelance, I switch it to Maya for some projects 
>> and I’m touching with a lot of satisfaction, Blender.
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> See you!
>> 
>>  
>> 
>>> El 27 ene 2016, a las 15:01, Mirko Jankovic >> > escribió:
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> well I really don;t see that everybody that used SI will just forget 
>>> everything so far.
>>> 
>>> it could be just harder to get in contact with them :)
>>> 
>>> there is still mailing list and si-community so... :)
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> On Wed, Jan 27, 2016 at 2:59 PM, Sebastien Sterling 
>>> > wrote:
>>> 
>>> Goodnight sweet prince.
>>> 
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> On 27 January 2016 at 13:53, Greg Punchatz >> > wrote:
>>> 
>>> Sigh... and yes freelancers are way harder to find : (   
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> On Wed, Jan 27, 2016 at 7:46 AM, adrian wyer 
>>> > 
>>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> well seeing as today is the final day you can purchase stand alone licenses 
>>> of Softimage, i guess i'll be the first to say
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> farewell old friend, long will you be remembered as the better app
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> a
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> ps. still use it everyday, but freelancers are hard to find..
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Adrian Wyer
>>> Fluid Pictures
>>> 75-77 Margaret St.
>>> London
>>> W1W 8SY 
>>> ++44(0) 207 580 0829 
>>> 
>>> adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com 
>>> www.fluid-pictures.com 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Fluid Pictures Limited is registered in England and Wales.
>>> Company number:5657815
>>> VAT number: 872 6893 71
>>> 
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>> 
>>  
>> 
>>  
>> 
>> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> www.matinai.com 

Re: Continued use of Softimage question

[Jean-Louis Billard]

We’re still a Softimage pipeline, and just like most who are replying, the main 
reason is for the ease in lighting, rendering, and pass setup.
We have an Arnold renderfarm but we are finding ourselves using that less often 
in favour of Redshift.
Houdini is on our radar and we’ve been tinkering with it, and we have a Modo 
license but haven’t had the time to even install it.

Overall I think that we are still more efficient using Softimage as it is, than 
we would be switching to a newer workflow, which (without wanting to start that 
whole discussion again) speaks volumes about the quality of Softimage, bearing 
in mind that we can assume its development essentially finished 5 years ago!

Cheers,

Jean-Louis
Digital Golem






 On 19 Aug 2015, at 12:08, Sandy Sutherland sandy.mailli...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 Hi all,
 
 After a stint out of the Softimage fold - mainly in setting up a Houdini 
 rendering and VFX pipeline somewhere, and now I am at Axis animation, doing 
 pipeline tools and setup - I wanted to get a feel for this - 
 
 Who in the world is continuing to use Softimage?  Who might still be on the 
 lookout for high end Soft Riggers, pipeline, tools etc...?
 
 Just wondering, as I consider the future for myself and family.
 
 Thanks
 
 Sandy

Re: Experienced lighters with Redshift

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Thank you for all your replies, both on and off the list.
It’s all good now, but please don’t hesitate to get in touch anyway if you’re a 
Soft+Redshift or Soft+Arnold person since we are often on the lookout for 
freelancers and it’s getting tough finding them these days!

Cheers,
Jean-Louis



Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels





 On 18 Aug 2015, at 19:12, Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
 
 Hi all,
 
 We are pitching on a job where we would need some help with surfacing, 
 lighting and rendering with Redshift (using Softimage, of course).
 It would run through all of September and would be on-site in our office in 
 Brussels.
 
 Please holler if you’re interested!
 
 Cheers,
 Jean-Louis
 
 
 
 
 Jean-Louis Billard
 
 Digital Golem
 BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
 UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
 jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com mailto:jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
 http://www.digitalgolem.com/ http://www.digitalgolem.com/
 53 Rue Gustave Huberti
 1030 Brussels
 
 
 
 
 

Experienced lighters with Redshift

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi all,

We are pitching on a job where we would need some help with surfacing, lighting 
and rendering with Redshift (using Softimage, of course).
It would run through all of September and would be on-site in our office in 
Brussels.

Please holler if you’re interested!

Cheers,
Jean-Louis




Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com mailto:jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/ http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels

Re: Centos6.6 install 2015SP1

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi Thomas, 

Well ultimately I won’t need to run it - it’s handled by Royal Render, but when 
testing in a terminal I am indeed switched to a tcsh session.

Thanks,

Jean-Louis
Digital Golem


 On 12 May 2015, at 15:16, Thomas Volkmann li...@thomasvolkmann.com wrote:
 
 How do you run Softimage/Batch?  You should always use tcsh or csh...
 You could also try to replace the whole mainwin folder with the one from the 
 working 2012 installation and see if it runs then. 
  
 Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com mailto:jean-lo...@photon3.com 
 hat am 12. Mai 2015 um 14:16 geschrieben:
 
 Hi Thomas,
  
 Basically:
  
 ===
  Autodesk Softimage 13.1.140.0
 ===
  
 Aborted (core dumped)
  
  
 I also tried installing 2011SP1, 2012 and 2014SP1.
 The problem only appears with 2014SP1 and 2015SP1, previous versions are ok 
 (I don’t have a 2013 installer so I didn’t check)
  
 The /etc/hosts file issue, I remember that now that you mention it. 
 Wasn’t it something to do with it needing to be formatted for csh rather 
 than bash, or something of the sort?
 I’ll dig down there a bit…
  
 Thanks,
  
 Jean-Louis
 Digital Golem
  
 
 On 11 May 2015, at 18:48, Thomas Volkmann li...@thomasvolkmann.com 
 mailto:li...@thomasvolkmann.com wrote:
 
 What error are you getting on startup/xsibatch? There has been an issue 
 with a wrongly formatted /etc/hosts file that caused segmentation 
 faults...just a shot in the dark
  
 Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com 
 mailto:jean-lo...@photon3.com hat am 11. Mai 2015 um 16:10 geschrieben:
 
 I would love to ignore it, but alas I still get a core dump when running 
 xsibatch!
  
 Looking around I’m finding some people talking about updating OGL drivers, 
 some discussing the Xorg.conf file, and yet more mentioning kernel tweaks. 
 It’s tricky to guess the best route…
  
 Jean-Louis
  
 Digital Golem
  
  
 
 On 11 May 2015, at 15:56, Stephen Blair stephenrbl...@gmail.com 
 mailto:stephenrbl...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 I had the same error but I ignored it, just to see if Softimage would 
 start (and it did).
  
 SAS is a set of DisplayCallbacks for OpenGL and DirectX
  
 
 On Mon, May 11, 2015 at 9:19 AM, Jean-Louis Billard 
 jean-lo...@photon3.com mailto:jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
 Hi Stephen,
  
 So I tried, but for some reason only the first line runs ok. The second 
 one spurts this:
  
  ./Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/Plugins/PLUGINSCOMDLLs.lst”
 
 Loading ../Plugins/libSAS.so:  Unable to load library (Error code 126: 
 The specified module could not be found).  Running REGSVR32.EXE may 
 provide more information
  
 libSAS.so is present in /Plugins, so I’m not sure what’s going on…?
  
  
 Maybe I should roll back to Centos 6.2, which seems to be the officially 
 supported version for Soft2015_SP1?
  
 Thanks for any help.
  
  
 Jean-Louis
  
 Digital Golem
 
 On 7 May 2015, at 22:11, Stephen Blair stephenrbl...@gmail.com 
 mailto:stephenrbl...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 
 
 On Thu, May 7, 2015 at 1:40 PM, Jean-Louis Billard 
 jean-lo...@photon3.com mailto:jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
 Hi all,
 
 The installer for 2015SP1 tells me that Softimage was not installed 
 properly and the log shows these culprits:
 
 Error: Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/bin/XSICOMDLLs.lst
 Error: Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/Plugins/PLUGINSCOMDLLs.lst”
  
  
 Try running those commands yourself. On CentOS 6.5, I was getting a core 
 dump until I ran them.

Re: Centos6.6 install 2015SP1

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi Thomas,

Basically:

===
 Autodesk Softimage 13.1.140.0
===

Aborted (core dumped)


I also tried installing 2011SP1, 2012 and 2014SP1.
The problem only appears with 2014SP1 and 2015SP1, previous versions are ok (I 
don’t have a 2013 installer so I didn’t check)

The /etc/hosts file issue, I remember that now that you mention it. 
Wasn’t it something to do with it needing to be formatted for csh rather than 
bash, or something of the sort?
I’ll dig down there a bit…

Thanks,

Jean-Louis
Digital Golem


 On 11 May 2015, at 18:48, Thomas Volkmann li...@thomasvolkmann.com wrote:
 
 What error are you getting on startup/xsibatch? There has been an issue with 
 a wrongly formatted /etc/hosts file that caused segmentation faults...just a 
 shot in the dark
  
 Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com mailto:jean-lo...@photon3.com 
 hat am 11. Mai 2015 um 16:10 geschrieben:
 
 I would love to ignore it, but alas I still get a core dump when running 
 xsibatch!
  
 Looking around I’m finding some people talking about updating OGL drivers, 
 some discussing the Xorg.conf file, and yet more mentioning kernel tweaks. 
 It’s tricky to guess the best route…
  
 Jean-Louis
  
 Digital Golem
  
  
 
 On 11 May 2015, at 15:56, Stephen Blair stephenrbl...@gmail.com 
 mailto:stephenrbl...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 I had the same error but I ignored it, just to see if Softimage would start 
 (and it did).
  
 SAS is a set of DisplayCallbacks for OpenGL and DirectX
  
 
 On Mon, May 11, 2015 at 9:19 AM, Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com 
 mailto:jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
 Hi Stephen,
  
 So I tried, but for some reason only the first line runs ok. The second one 
 spurts this:
  
  ./Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/Plugins/PLUGINSCOMDLLs.lst”
 
 Loading ../Plugins/libSAS.so:  Unable to load library (Error code 126: The 
 specified module could not be found).  Running REGSVR32.EXE may provide 
 more information
  
 libSAS.so is present in /Plugins, so I’m not sure what’s going on…?
  
  
 Maybe I should roll back to Centos 6.2, which seems to be the officially 
 supported version for Soft2015_SP1?
  
 Thanks for any help.
  
  
 Jean-Louis
  
 Digital Golem
 
 On 7 May 2015, at 22:11, Stephen Blair stephenrbl...@gmail.com 
 mailto:stephenrbl...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 
 
 On Thu, May 7, 2015 at 1:40 PM, Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com 
 mailto:jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
 Hi all,
 
 The installer for 2015SP1 tells me that Softimage was not installed 
 properly and the log shows these culprits:
 
 Error: Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/bin/XSICOMDLLs.lst
 Error: Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/Plugins/PLUGINSCOMDLLs.lst”
  
  
 Try running those commands yourself. On CentOS 6.5, I was getting a core 
 dump until I ran them.

Re: Centos6.6 install 2015SP1

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi Stephen,

So I tried, but for some reason only the first line runs ok. The second one 
spurts this:

 ./Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/Plugins/PLUGINSCOMDLLs.lst”

Loading ../Plugins/libSAS.so:  Unable to load library (Error code 126: The 
specified module could not be found).  Running REGSVR32.EXE may provide more 
information

libSAS.so is present in /Plugins, so I’m not sure what’s going on…?


Maybe I should roll back to Centos 6.2, which seems to be the officially 
supported version for Soft2015_SP1?

Thanks for any help.


Jean-Louis

Digital Golem

 On 7 May 2015, at 22:11, Stephen Blair stephenrbl...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 
 
 On Thu, May 7, 2015 at 1:40 PM, Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com 
 mailto:jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
 Hi all,
 
 The installer for 2015SP1 tells me that Softimage was not installed properly 
 and the log shows these culprits:
 
 Error: Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/bin/XSICOMDLLs.lst
 Error: Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/Plugins/PLUGINSCOMDLLs.lst”
 
 
 Try running those commands yourself. On CentOS 6.5, I was getting a core dump 
 until I ran them.

Re: Centos6.6 install 2015SP1

[Jean-Louis Billard]

I would love to ignore it, but alas I still get a core dump when running 
xsibatch!

Looking around I’m finding some people talking about updating OGL drivers, some 
discussing the Xorg.conf file, and yet more mentioning kernel tweaks. It’s 
tricky to guess the best route…

Jean-Louis

Digital Golem



 On 11 May 2015, at 15:56, Stephen Blair stephenrbl...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 I had the same error but I ignored it, just to see if Softimage would start 
 (and it did).
 
 SAS is a set of DisplayCallbacks for OpenGL and DirectX
 
 
 On Mon, May 11, 2015 at 9:19 AM, Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com 
 mailto:jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
 Hi Stephen,
 
 So I tried, but for some reason only the first line runs ok. The second one 
 spurts this:
 
  ./Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/Plugins/PLUGINSCOMDLLs.lst”
 
 Loading ../Plugins/libSAS.so:  Unable to load library (Error code 126: The 
 specified module could not be found).  Running REGSVR32.EXE may provide more 
 information
 
 libSAS.so is present in /Plugins, so I’m not sure what’s going on…?
 
 
 Maybe I should roll back to Centos 6.2, which seems to be the officially 
 supported version for Soft2015_SP1?
 
 Thanks for any help.
 
 
 Jean-Louis
 
 Digital Golem
 
 On 7 May 2015, at 22:11, Stephen Blair stephenrbl...@gmail.com 
 mailto:stephenrbl...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 
 
 On Thu, May 7, 2015 at 1:40 PM, Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com 
 mailto:jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
 Hi all,
 
 The installer for 2015SP1 tells me that Softimage was not installed properly 
 and the log shows these culprits:
 
 Error: Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/bin/XSICOMDLLs.lst
 Error: Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/Plugins/PLUGINSCOMDLLs.lst”
 
 
 Try running those commands yourself. On CentOS 6.5, I was getting a core 
 dump until I ran them.
 
 

Re: Centos6.6 install 2015SP1

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Thanks for the tip - I’ll try tomorrow when I’m back in the office.

Cheers,

Jean-Louis
Digital Golem


 On 7 May 2015, at 22:11, Stephen Blair stephenrbl...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 
 
 On Thu, May 7, 2015 at 1:40 PM, Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com 
 mailto:jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
 Hi all,
 
 The installer for 2015SP1 tells me that Softimage was not installed properly 
 and the log shows these culprits:
 
 Error: Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/bin/XSICOMDLLs.lst
 Error: Application/bin/cmdreg -f Application/Plugins/PLUGINSCOMDLLs.lst”
 
 
 Try running those commands yourself. On CentOS 6.5, I was getting a core dump 
 until I ran them.

[OT] : Digital Golem needs you!

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hello,

We’re looking for a Softimage generalist with good ICE skills for a 3-4 week 
job starting as soon as next week.
If anyone is interested please contact me on the above email or my work email: 
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com

Also we need a creature/character animator for a couple of weeks, starting asap 
so don’t hesitate to get in touch!


Many thanks,
Jean-Louis



Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels

Re: humanize maya, SOFT top 5

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Oh, I forgot to mention groups, but I’ll add that one thing I’ve always wished 
for is “exclusive groups”. 
Basically they would behave like partitions in that objects can only be in one 
at a time, just that they would work outside of the context of a pass (and 
obviously would be able to contain any object type)

JL





Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels




On 25 Mar 2014, at 15:02, Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:

 Here’s a few.
 (I include many that have been already mentioned because I’m assuming that 
 this brings them higher up in the list of what’s important. This means that 
 inevitably I’m having to put down more than 5 so that some other ones can get 
 mentioned - sorry Alastair!)
 
 - Sticky Keys/Supra Keys system
 - Multi selection PPGs
 - Snapping / Pivot placement  alignment (it’s done so well in Soft it always 
 amazes me)
 - Middle click repeat command (which works at any submenu level BTW)
 - EXPLORER - not just how legible it is but also the way we can change its 
 context (scene/pass/layer/etc.), use filters, perform searches...
 - Transient explorer - I have mine remapped to tab and I use it all the time, 
 it avoids having to open an explorer window for many quick tasks
 - Text menus
 - Dragdrop throughout
 - Perform calculations in number/text boxes
 - Single selection mode
 - Memo cameras
 - Ease of customisability
 - Legibility of interface
 
 Also, something I very much used in the old SI3D interface was the ability to 
 map commands to spacebar+any key 
 It instantly gave you a huge amount of possibilities. 
 I find it odd in Maya that the biggest key on the keyboard is used to 
 minimise/maximise views.
 
 Cheers,
 Jean-Louis
 
 
 
 Jean-Louis Billard
 
 Digital Golem
 BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
 UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
 jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
 http://www.digitalgolem.com/
 53 Rue Gustave Huberti
 1030 Brussels
 
 
 
 
 On 25 Mar 2014, at 11:16, Alastair Hearsum hear...@glassworks.co.uk wrote:
 
 Hello friends
 
 Me again with my TOP 5's
 
 I have had some minimal contact with the Humanize Maya people. Lets get our 
 views across with our TOP 5 Softimage user workflow/interface experiences. 
 As usual a list with a brief description.
 Here are some random examples 
 
 1)Middle mouse to repeat last function
 2)Multiple windows
 You can have many graph editors, outliners, property pages open at once.
 3) Really contextual menus
 4) Comprehensive universal drag and drop of parameters
 Quickly set up expressions.
 5) Text rather than icons, general stylishness of interface
 
 
 Alastair
 
 
 
 -- 
 Alastair Hearsum
 Head of 3d
 
 33/34 Great Pulteney Street
 London
 W1F 9NP
 +44 (0)20 7434 1182
 glassworks.co.uk
 Glassworks Terms and Conditions of Sale can be found at glassworks.co.uk
 (Company registered in England with number 04759979. Registered office 25 
 Harley Street, London, W1G 9BR. VAT registration number: 86729)
 Please consider the environment before you print this email.
 DISCLAIMER: This e-mail and attachments are strictly privileged, private and 
 confidential and are intended solely for the stated recipient(s). Any views 
 or opinions presented are solely those of the author and do not necessarily 
 represent those of the Company. If you are not the intended recipient, be 
 advised that you have received this e-mail in error and that any use, 
 dissemination, forwarding, printing, or copying of this e-mail is strictly 
 prohibited. If this transmission is received in error please kindly return 
 it to the sender and delete this message from your system.
 

Re: humanize maya, SOFT top 5

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Here’s a few.
(I include many that have been already mentioned because I’m assuming that this 
brings them higher up in the list of what’s important. This means that 
inevitably I’m having to put down more than 5 so that some other ones can get 
mentioned - sorry Alastair!)

- Sticky Keys/Supra Keys system
- Multi selection PPGs
- Snapping / Pivot placement  alignment (it’s done so well in Soft it always 
amazes me)
- Middle click repeat command (which works at any submenu level BTW)
- EXPLORER - not just how legible it is but also the way we can change its 
context (scene/pass/layer/etc.), use filters, perform searches...
- Transient explorer - I have mine remapped to tab and I use it all the time, 
it avoids having to open an explorer window for many quick tasks
- Text menus
- Dragdrop throughout
- Perform calculations in number/text boxes
- Single selection mode
- Memo cameras
- Ease of customisability
- Legibility of interface

Also, something I very much used in the old SI3D interface was the ability to 
map commands to spacebar+any key 
It instantly gave you a huge amount of possibilities. 
I find it odd in Maya that the biggest key on the keyboard is used to 
minimise/maximise views.

Cheers,
Jean-Louis



Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels




On 25 Mar 2014, at 11:16, Alastair Hearsum hear...@glassworks.co.uk wrote:

 Hello friends
 
 Me again with my TOP 5's
 
 I have had some minimal contact with the Humanize Maya people. Lets get our 
 views across with our TOP 5 Softimage user workflow/interface experiences. As 
 usual a list with a brief description.
 Here are some random examples 
 
 1)Middle mouse to repeat last function
 2)Multiple windows
 You can have many graph editors, outliners, property pages open at once.
 3) Really contextual menus
 4) Comprehensive universal drag and drop of parameters
 Quickly set up expressions.
 5) Text rather than icons, general stylishness of interface
 
 
 Alastair
 
 
 
 -- 
 Alastair Hearsum
 Head of 3d
 
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 +44 (0)20 7434 1182
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 Harley Street, London, W1G 9BR. VAT registration number: 86729)
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Re: An Open Letter to Carl Bass

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi Chris,

And thanks for having taken the time to write such a long explanation.

I too have been around Softimage for twenty years (as a user, but also as an 
instructor) and have followed it along its bumpy road, so nothing that you 
recount surprises me.

However, what *does* intrigue me is the fact that recently, in the last couple 
of years, and despite the lack of marketing push and development by Autodesk, I 
truly believe that Softimage was finally beginning to gain ground. Many, many 
high profile commercials had been made with it, as well as playing a big role 
in a few features (Lego being the obvious and most pertinent example).
This was in large part due to ICE, of course, but nevertheless it seemed that 
Softimage was being talked about more than ever before, and infact it seemed to 
be gaining ground in a few educational facilities too.

Of course I’m not privy to information about number of users or seats sold, but 
I can’t help wondering if the figures haven’t been skewed by the introduction 
of bundles that effectively show up as Maya or 3DSMax licenses, despite the 
fact that Softimage was the software being used. 

Care to comment?


Thanks,
Jean-Louis



Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels




On 25 Mar 2014, at 14:34, Chris Vienneau chris.vienn...@autodesk.com wrote:

 HI Emilio,
 
 
 
 I think that now you have heard from Carl I think I will weigh in here and 
 what I am writing comes from having been in and around softimage for twenty 
 years as I grew up in Montreal and came onto the tech scene around 1993 when 
 Softimage was on fire and right before it got bought by Autodesk. There is no 
 doubt that Softimage starting in 1986 had the early lead in animation 
 software and when I started at Discreet Logic even had a claim on Flame code 
 with Eddie. Microsoft was a crazy rising star at that point and bought them 
 up as all entertainment tools were sold snipped

Re: An Open Letter to Carl Bass

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi Maurice,

Thanks for the insight, it’s interesting to see the figures. 
But given what you say in your last paragraph, don’t you think it would have 
been worth trying to keep things going at least another year to see where this 
momentum was going?

Regards,
Jean-Louis


Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels





On 25 Mar 2014, at 18:41, Maurice Patel maurice.pa...@autodesk.com wrote:

 Hi Jean-Louis,
 
 That is not really the case. Our data shows that in the past two years there 
 was a significant decline in both new seat sales and subscription renewal 
 (note: this does not reflect declining usage as much as that usage was not 
 growing and that users were choosing not to renew Subscription for reasons 
 already discussed elsewhere). However more telling was what was happening 
 with Suites. There has been a consistent but extremely low usage of Softimage 
 in the Suites (less than 6% in 3ds Max ECS Premium, less than 2% in Maya ECS 
 premium. Skeptics will say yes but that is to be expected why would anyone 
 use two animation products. 
 
 Things get very interesting (and telling) when you look at the ECS Ultimate 
 though - and remember we are talking about usage of a single user license.  
 Usage of 3ds Max is 53%  and Maya is 39% Softimage is less than 3%. So given 
 a choice users do use two 3D animation applications, they just do not seem to 
 want to use Softimage as much as they do either Maya or 3ds Max. Now before 
 my words get thrown back in my face this is just ONE data point and we use 
 many to make decisions - and like any data there are always caveats to take 
 into consideration with any given data point. 
 
 As to why you feel things were gaining ground. There is a good reason for 
 that. There have always been great projects done by Softimage users - some 
 recently were maybe more high profile than usual. More importantly, over the 
 past year there has been an incredible increase in activity from Softimage 
 users themselves, promoting their work, as the community rallied together. 
 What you were seeing was more a result of that than an increase in the usage 
 of Softimage. And I am not going to argue that this community was way more 
 creative in doing this than Autodesk was, is or could be.
 
 maurice
 
 Maurice Patel
 Autodesk : Tél:  514 954-7134

Re: humanize maya, SOFT top 5

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi Shuting,

That’s not the same thing at all I’m afraid. In Softimage *every* menu has it’s 
own memory of the last command accessed. So you can middle click any menu and 
repeat its last command (as long as there has been one used within the session)

Regards,
Jean-Louis



Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels

On 25 Mar 2014, at 18:46, Shuting Chang shuting.ch...@autodesk.com wrote:

 Hi Paul,
 
 I am a design in Maya team. I am collecting the feedback from this email 
 group and use them to improve Maya.
 I agree that Maya icons need some texts. But for “5”, in Maya we have “g” to 
 repeat last action. Hope this is helpful.
 
 Thank you,
 Shuting
 
 From: Paul Griswold 
 pgrisw...@fusiondigitalproductions.commailto:pgrisw...@fusiondigitalproductions.com
 Reply-To: 
 softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com 
 softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 Date: Tuesday, March 25, 2014 at 12:40 PM
 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com 
 softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 Subject: Re: humanize maya, SOFT top 5
 
 I think part of the problem with a lot/all of the devs working on Maya is - 
 you guys use this stuff day in and day out and you already understand how  
 why things are the way they are.
 
 I would strongly urge the entire Maya team to do some real user interface  
 usability testing with a 3rd party testing service.  Get people from all 
 sorts of backgrounds and actually record them trying to use Maya to achieve 
 specific tasks.  My gut instinct says, most of the team will be very 
 surprised at how unintuitive and difficult Maya is for most people that don't 
 live in the Maya universe.
 
 As for top 5:
 
 1.  Text based everything - I hate the shelf in Softimage as well as the UV 
 editor.  Get rid of icons entirely.
 
 2.  Drag and drop divots  simple expressions.
 
 3.  Consistent UI - this was my last wish for Softimage.  I wanted the FXTree 
 to be updated to match ICE and the Render Tree (and possibly the schematic 
 view to get updated as well).  There should not be more than 1 style of graph 
 in Maya and all navigation should use the same mouse/key combo everywhere.  
 Additionally, revisit what things are named.  As mentioned in a previous 
 email - why is there at tab called Renderer and a tab called Rendering, or a 
 tab called Shading and a tab called Surfaces? Maybe to long-time Maya users 
 that makes sense, but if you open the software for the first time, that makes 
 absolutely no sense at all.
 
 4.  Sticky keys.
 
 5.  Middle-click repeat the last action.  I use this every day of the week.
 
 
 -PG
 
 
 
 
 On Tue, Mar 25, 2014 at 12:25 PM, Luc-Eric Rousseau 
 luceri...@gmail.commailto:luceri...@gmail.com wrote:
 Text not icons
 
 I don't understand this one.  Which part of the UI is this a problem
 with that it isn't in Softimage?
 
 You have the shelf at the top of the UI, but that's just shortcuts to
 things that are already in the menu.  Hide the shelf if you don't want
 it (there is also a shelf in XSI)
 
 For the viewport (panel) toolbar, if you don't use it, you can hide
 it (shift+ctrl+m) - these are all shortcuts to the items also in the
 menu.  It certainly would not make sense to turn that into text
 buttons, although they should be generally fewer and bigger buttons
 there.
 
 But again these are shotcuts to the text menus. Everything is
 menu-based in Maya.
 
 winmail.dat

Re: An Open Letter to Carl Bass

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi Andres,

Unfortunately Chris already explained that, and it makes sense: AD have to pay 
for third parties libraries. It’s not worth it for them given the small revenue 
stream.

I think we’re collectively tripping if we think we are going to get AD to 
revoke their decision.
What we need to do now (for those, like me, who want to stay with Soft) is to 
make sure we keep using it to create great work, generate enough demand for 
third parties to invest time in developing for it, and just keep having fun 
using a great piece of software for the years to come until a credible solution 
comes along and gives us the opportunity to move on in a graceful way.

Regards,
Jean-Louis


Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels

On 25 Mar 2014, at 18:51, Andres Stephens drais...@outlook.com wrote:

 Why are you refusing a sale to studios who want to invest years into a 
 product you already have, coded and no-longer need to develop much?

Re: ICE - When will we have todays functionality in Maya?

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Perhaps Bifrost is the foundation of the next-gen package from Autodesk……?

Just a thought.

Jean-Louis


On 21 Mar 2014, at 14:52, Chris Marshall chrismarshal...@gmail.com wrote:

 But by approaching it in this way, it'll only ever be a bolt on, that surely 
 can never achieve that level of flexibility that we have with ICE at the 
 heart of Softimage.

Re: What use is ICE really?

[Jean-Louis Billard]

I keep asking myself if anyone at Autodesk even considers the possibility that 
they might have made a big mistake?


Anyway, here’s some ICE stuff:

https://vimeo.com/68035569 — Neural network creation
https://vimeo.com/64077456 — ICE used to control the boat movement on the 
water, as well as for all the boat rigging and sails simulation
https://vimeo.com/60450003 — Used to create and then explode the ice…
https://vimeo.com/43619675 — ICE used for the grass, but also for a 
cobbled-stone-road-designer compound
https://vimeo.com/30435359 — Used for the crosshatching as well as some other 
inking
https://vimeo.com/14934033 — ICE strands
https://vimeo.com/89426397 — Post-its generated and controlled in ICE (you’ll 
likely have seen it in another thread)

Obviously ICE is also used in “invisible” ways in many other jobs, making 
things work behind the scenes.

Jean-Louis





On 21 Mar 2014, at 21:34, Tim Crowson tim.crow...@magneticdreams.com wrote:

 Am I the only one who finds it bizarre that we should illustrate to AD why 
 ICE is cool? Shouldn't the applications of its product be well-known to them, 
 considering the decision to kill it? I'm not saying this to be 
 facetious...but shouldn't they, as the entity that develops and maintains it, 
 be aware of how it has been used, and aware of the capabilities of their own 
 software?
 
 Alastair, was the question posed because the person you spoke with was 
 genuinely unaware of what their product (ICE) does? Say it ain't so. We 
 bought this and developed it, but we don't really know what it is...
 
 -Tim
 



Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels

Re: Digital Golem : Brillant and beautiful

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi Vincent,

I’m glad someone’s picked up on this.
I’m dead serious about it - I am willing to put my money where my mouth is, but 
of course strength will be in numbers, and I too am curious to know how many 
people/seats would be ready to invest.
I have 8 Softimage seats here at Digital Golem. I’ll gladly put their yearly 
maintenance into something more worthwhile.

Fabric Engine would be the safest bet, since it seems to offer future 
portability.

Needs to be discussed but I’d be curious to hear other voices.

Cheers,
Jean-Louis




On 20 Mar 2014, at 18:57, Vincent Fortin vfor...@gmail.com wrote:

 Cool work!
 
 I'd like to comment on Jean-Louis' idea...
 
 There clearly are benefits for studios to keep Softimage in their tool box a 
 few more years, as expressed by many users here.
 And I hope to see it happen instead of watching this community burst.
 
 But for those willing to go that route, collaboration must play its part in 
 order to
 
 - stop the whining.
 - gather numbers: how many active seats? Can we borrow/buy licenses from 
 other studios? Share assets.
 - define what's needed to keep SI up-to-date in the market as long as 
 possible.
 - and like Jean-Louis suggests, gather money and put developers under 
 contract.
 
 I have no idea if 750,000$/year is possible (i doubt) but I'd put it all in 
 the hands of Fabric Engine.
 They represent your best way to extend the functionality of your beloved 
 software as well as make your investment fructify beyond Softimage's real 
 lifespan. Because it will become obsolete one day or the other.
 If Fabric Engine are interested in the amount brought to the table, then you 
 can figure-out a plan that will be beneficial to both parties for the 
 upcoming years. Imagine hiring someone like Eric Mootz full time to develop 
 both FE and SI.
 
 But in order for this to work properly, people will need to organize even if 
 this means adopting some minimally legal convention, obviously depending how 
 far you want the collaboration to go.
 
 This tightly knit community has always played a major role in the success of 
 Softimage and the studios exploiting it. For me, the only way for those 
 studios to continue to excel (read survive) despite the circumstances is to 
 build stronger links between each other and make clever moves.
 
 my 0.02c
 
 
 On Wed, Mar 19, 2014 at 7:57 PM, Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com 
 wrote:
 Hi Peter,
 
 No - subscription hasn’t gotten us much in the past few years.
 I would, however, be happy to put the subscription money into funding a dev 
 team, as was suggested in another thread.
 
 For the sake of argument: if there were just the equivalent of 1000 Softimage 
 licenses worldwide for which individuals or companies were prepared, like me, 
 to pay their subscription money to keep developing Softimage 
 addons/tools/plugins, you would have (assuming $750/year/seat) $75/year, 
 which is 7 or 8 full time developers + administrative costs.
 
 Makes you think…
 
 
 
 Jean-Louis
 
 
 
 On 20 Mar 2014, at 00:18, pete...@skynet.be wrote:
 
 It’s a good lesson for the future – if paying subscription does not 
 guarantee the survival and future of a software - do you really want to pay 
 subscription?
  
  
  
 

Re: Digital Golem : Brillant and beautiful

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Thanks for the kind comments.

Yes all in Softimage, naturally!

Our pipeline is Softimage-Arnold-Nuke and despite all the turmoil I can tell 
you I have no intention whatsoever to change that in the near future.
It works, it works well, and nothing else right now can touch it.

So Autodesk can shove their “innovation” right back up their collective arse 
and choke on it -- as far as I’m concerned they’ve just killed a member of my 
family.

Cheers,
Jean-Louis


On 19 Mar 2014, at 04:39, Tenshi Sama tenshu...@gmail.com wrote:

 
 Nice! All in Softimage?
 
 
 On Tue, Mar 18, 2014 at 8:18 PM, Francisco Criado malcriad...@gmail.com 
 wrote:
 Excelent work, so nice!
 
 
 On Tuesday, March 18, 2014, olivier jeannel olivier.jean...@noos.fr wrote:
 https://vimeo.com/groups/ice/videos/89426397
 
 Kudos to Digital Golem !
 

Re: Digital Golem : Brillant and beautiful

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi Peter,

No - subscription hasn’t gotten us much in the past few years.
I would, however, be happy to put the subscription money into funding a dev 
team, as was suggested in another thread.

For the sake of argument: if there were just the equivalent of 1000 Softimage 
licenses worldwide for which individuals or companies were prepared, like me, 
to pay their subscription money to keep developing Softimage 
addons/tools/plugins, you would have (assuming $750/year/seat) $75/year, 
which is 7 or 8 full time developers + administrative costs.

Makes you think…



Jean-Louis



On 20 Mar 2014, at 00:18, pete...@skynet.be wrote:

 It’s a good lesson for the future – if paying subscription does not guarantee 
 the survival and future of a software - do you really want to pay 
 subscription?
  
  
  

Re: A more graceful retirement - my counter offer

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi all,

I’d like to chime in if I may.

I run a very small company in Brussels called Digital Golem that’s been around 
for almost 8 years, and our pipeline is essentially Softimage-Arnold-Nuke, 
with a bit of ZBrush thrown in for good measure.
One of the biggest reasons we are able to be competitive in this tough market 
is thanks to Softimage being a fully rounded and mature package offering a 
complete toolset for our needs. 

I started using SI3D 20 years ago, (working mostly in London, as well as being 
a Softimage certified trainer) and the same artist-friendly philosophy that was 
the driving force behind the development of SI3D was equally apparent in the 
next-gen XSI, and then some. I have yet to see another 3D package offer so much 
of a toolset in such an efficient way.
I can honestly say that I would *never* have ventured into setting up a company 
(with all the blood, sweat  tears involved) were it not for Softimage.

So the issue I’m confronted with now is that as a small company I have 
absolutely no other viable option that will not involve large sums of cash to 
be spent in re-tooling and re-pipelining, or a serious drop in efficiency, and 
quality, while we re-train. Also I cannot afford to employ an RD team just to 
make things work.  It is an extremely demoralising situation.

Now, no one here is under the illusion that Softimage hasn’t got its share of 
problems, and as Luc-Eric explained, there are issues right at the core of 
Softimage that will be close to impossible to resolve and will become 
showstoppers in future development. So ultimately we *will* need something new, 
but right now nothing comes close to replacing Softimage, and if something does 
turn up in 2 years time, we would need another 12-24 months for the transition.

SO, all this to say that I strongly support Greg’s suggestion to give Softimage 
another 4 years of life, and to add my voice to the many that are hoping to 
sway Autodesk into finding a better solution.

Cheers,

Jean-Louis





Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels



On 11 Mar 2014, at 03:49, Greg Punchatz g...@janimation.com wrote:

 Hello Autodesk,
 
 My name is Greg Punchatz , Senior Creative Director at Janimation. I have a 
 proposal, or call it a counter offer on the proper way to retire Softimage.
 
 First off, if you don't know who I am, I feel like I have been part of the 
 Softimage team since the beginning of Sumatra testing. I spent countless 
 hours creating content on my own time and letting Softimage use my personal 
 work as the sample scenes that make up a good deal of the Softimage library. 
 Because of this relationship I have many, many very dear friends from all 
 eras of Softimage. From the very top to the bottom of Softimage, I was always 
 welcomed as one of the family. 
 Our company, Janimation, was instrumental in helping promote XSI from its 
 earliest days from being its first customer demo at the XSI launch party. To 
 its final days giving Avid and Autodesk permission to use our work for 
 promoting Softimage launches. We did this because we truly believe it is the 
 best software on the planet for what we do and that's commercial work. 
 Softimage is lighter on its feet out of the box for the kind of work the post 
 production world is doing today in commercials. I don't know a single CG 
 supervisor that knows each package equally that would rather take a 
 commercial through a single package other than XSI.
 
 That being said, I believe Autodesk needs to be working on a completely new 
 3d software package. I would hope that is the plan. I also understand that if 
 you are working towards moving us all to one package, Softimage by market 
 share alone is the logical one to first retire as it creates the least 
 income. 
 
 So if it's time has truly come (even though I believe it is the most complete 
 out-of-the-box 3-D solution you provide currently) I think there is a more 
 elegant... let's say, a kinder gentler way for Softimage to be put into 
 retirement. You can continue to benefit from our subscription support while 
 we have enough time to move our existing pipeline to somthing else.
 
 Please consider keepinng the current small development team you already have 
 for FOUR more years.
 
 With a single focus on these three things: opening up the SDK,
 
 working with 3rd party folk,
 
 and fixing long outstanding low-level requests.
 
 It's nothing but a win-win situation, you still get our money, and we get to 
 evalute Maya along the way. It's going to take a lot more than two years for 
 a lot of us to be able to make a tranistion completely.
 
 I'm not sure if Autodesk realizes this, but while the team in Singapore was 
 not making giant leaps technologically, they were on their way to leaving 
 Softimage in a much better state. They need a bit more time than you

Re: Python cross platform problem

[Jean-Louis Billard]

OK! Thanks Alan and Oscar for the insight.

Cheers,

Jean-Louis


On 18 Nov 2013, at 18:52, Alan Fregtman alan.fregt...@gmail.com wrote:

 The animation caching pipeline I wrote at work looks at the construction 
 history stack and if it's operator-free it plots that item's global 
 kinematics, else pointcaches. This way we don't have to really think about it 
 if it's an insane asset.
 
 Actionclips are very light in my experience. On top of that, you can choose 
 to work with referenced actions, and then you can just keep updating a 
 particular filepath with the latest animation and when the scene is reloaded, 
 it's there.
 
 
 
 
 
 On Mon, Nov 18, 2013 at 11:51 AM, Oscar Juarez tridi.animei...@gmail.com 
 wrote:
 Alembic can save transforms and point caches, you could try with Exocortex 
 Crate, that would help on the file size front.
 You could also script saving plotted global transforms on geometries which 
 don't have and envelope or deformer and save them to a clip which you load in 
 your rendering scene, you would need to assume that if it has an operator on 
 the animation section of the stack then its being deformed, if its clear then 
 it's transforming. Just be sure you keep the centers in the same place 
 between your rigged version and your rendering version of the asset.
 
 All of that is scriptable, with Crate I think you get that behavior out of 
 the box.
 
 
 On Mon, Nov 18, 2013 at 3:31 PM, Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com 
 wrote:
 Yes that’s what we did previously on a model that had just a few surfaces to 
 cache (a mouse).
 Here however we have a robot with hundreds of elements, some rigid and some 
 deformed, with a pretty huge geometry count. Things risk getting big pretty 
 quickly, so I was hoping to avoid caching unless it was strictly necessary.
 
 Incidentally, what would be the best practice to cache rigid elements (i.e. 
 transforms only, no geometry) to avoid having large amounts of data written 
 out?
 
 
 Jean-Louis
 
 
 
 
 On 16 Nov 2013, at 02:57, Cesar Saez cesa...@gmail.com wrote:
 
  Or you can just cache the rigs (en everything else) before send them to the 
  farm... just saying :-)
 
 
 Jean-Louis Billard
 
 Digital Golem
 BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
 UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
 jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
 http://www.digitalgolem.com/
 53 Rue Gustave Huberti
 1030 Brussels
 
 
 
 
 

Re: Python cross platform problem

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Yes that’s what we did previously on a model that had just a few surfaces to 
cache (a mouse).
Here however we have a robot with hundreds of elements, some rigid and some 
deformed, with a pretty huge geometry count. Things risk getting big pretty 
quickly, so I was hoping to avoid caching unless it was strictly necessary.

Incidentally, what would be the best practice to cache rigid elements (i.e. 
transforms only, no geometry) to avoid having large amounts of data written out?


Jean-Louis




On 16 Nov 2013, at 02:57, Cesar Saez cesa...@gmail.com wrote:

 Or you can just cache the rigs (en everything else) before send them to the 
 farm... just saying :-)


Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels

Python cross platform problem

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Hi SI warriors,

We have a rig that was made by someone using some python script based property 
sets.
He did all this in a windows environment, but the moment we send the scenes to 
our linux based renderfarm the clients fail to render.

Looking at his script I see the lines:

import win32com.client
from win32com.client import constants as c

It looks like this is what is failing, since the module doesn’t exist in linux, 
but since I am not a python-head, and google hasn’t been any help, I’m hoping 
that some kind soul here will be able point me in the right direction.


Thanks,

Jean-Louis





Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels

Re: Python cross platform problem

[Jean-Louis Billard]

H… ok, but where does the module reside for it to be accessible by Linux? 
Are they installed by XSI?


Jean-Louis




On 15 Nov 2013, at 15:18, Luc-Eric Rousseau luceri...@gmail.com wrote:

 these are Windows API modules, but I think they should run in xsibatch
 on linux. But no way they'll work outside of XSI.
 
 On Fri, Nov 15, 2013 at 9:13 AM, Jean-Louis Billard
 jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
 Hi SI warriors,
 
 We have a rig that was made by someone using some python script based 
 property sets.
 He did all this in a windows environment, but the moment we send the scenes 
 to our linux based renderfarm the clients fail to render.
 
 Looking at his script I see the lines:
 
 import win32com.client
 from win32com.client import constants as c
 
 It looks like this is what is failing, since the module doesn’t exist in 
 linux, but since I am not a python-head, and google hasn’t been any help, 
 I’m hoping that some kind soul here will be able point me in the right 
 direction.
 
 



Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels

Re: Python cross platform problem

[Jean-Louis Billard]

Oooh now that sounds like it could be right…! 
I’ll go check it out and see.

Thanks!

Jean-Louis 




On 15 Nov 2013, at 16:30, Jon Swindells squi...@gmail.com wrote:

 on deb:
  /usr/Softimage/Softimage_#year#_SP#/Application/python
 
 could it be that your soft python isn't registered on your render boxes ?
 
 from your /app/bin
 mwpython win32com/axscript/client/pyscript.py
 
 
 On 15 November 2013 16:49, Jean-Louis Billard jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
 H… ok, but where does the module reside for it to be accessible by Linux? 
 Are they installed by XSI?
 
 
 Jean-Louis
 
 
 
 
 On 15 Nov 2013, at 15:18, Luc-Eric Rousseau luceri...@gmail.com wrote:
 
  these are Windows API modules, but I think they should run in xsibatch
  on linux. But no way they'll work outside of XSI.
 
  On Fri, Nov 15, 2013 at 9:13 AM, Jean-Louis Billard
  jean-lo...@photon3.com wrote:
  Hi SI warriors,
 
  We have a rig that was made by someone using some python script based 
  property sets.
  He did all this in a windows environment, but the moment we send the 
  scenes to our linux based renderfarm the clients fail to render.
 
  Looking at his script I see the lines:
 
  import win32com.client
  from win32com.client import constants as c
 
  It looks like this is what is failing, since the module doesn’t exist in 
  linux, but since I am not a python-head, and google hasn’t been any help, 
  I’m hoping that some kind soul here will be able point me in the right 
  direction.
 
 
 
 
 
 Jean-Louis Billard
 
 Digital Golem
 BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
 UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
 jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
 http://www.digitalgolem.com/
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 Jon Swindells
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Jean-Louis Billard

Digital Golem
BE: +32 (0) 484 263 563
UK: +44 (0) 7973 660 119
jean-lo...@digitalgolem.com
http://www.digitalgolem.com/
53 Rue Gustave Huberti
1030 Brussels