Re: The shadow over The Foundry
Totally agree. This news sickened me and if true, could mean great things for Fusion and nothing but bad news for the rest. I've seen the usability and stability of After Effects (AE) decline sharply over the timeframe that AE has been a rental product. Updates cause problems instead of fixing them and development has slowed (even further). Not so with Nuke. Adobe wants VFX to be accessible to the consumer, and while I don't discount the research they have done, some of which has been quite amazing, most of their focus has been on one button type of VFX solutions and not on stability and flexibility, which is what we need and what The Foundry supplies software that excels in. Rotobrush, PuppetTool, CameraTracker all designed to make as close to a one button solution as possible. These tools works great in certain situations, but when the shot gets tough, you quickly run out of options. Nuke is nothing but options, and is far more ICE-like than AE is. Having something as flexible as Nuke owned by a company that has a huge competitive market-dominating product like AE, should send chills up your spine as to how closely it matches the Autodesk Maya/Soft debacle. Sent from my iPhone Please excuse typos and brief replies. Thank you! On Apr 28, 2015, at 2:05 AM, Raffaele Fragapane raffsxsil...@googlemail.com wrote: AD owned and produced a lot of stuff over the years. The various acquisitions you are thinking of in the ME group are a drop in the ocean that is their arch, viz, CAM/CAE budgets. Alias was bought for studio and the inlet in industrial CAM they missed at the time. Maya in and of itself is probably not scratching 3 or 4% of their revenue and I doubt Soft even made it to an integer number. Adobe is already a bigger company than AD for the record, and has MORE of a monopoly on its market segments than AD does. They beat AD in revenue and net by a factor of two most years. Again, I don't know what Adobe you guys are thinking of, but the one I know of is nothing to hope for. They make EA sports and AD ME look positively benign in the VFX geography. On Tue, Apr 28, 2015 at 3:49 PM, Nicolas Esposito 3dv...@gmail.com wrote: If I remember correcty Autodesk, before the big buyout in recent yearsm had only Autocad and 3ds to carry on and make good money...when they start acquiring Alias and all the others they establish themself as the company to go, simply because they were the owners. For me Adobe could possibly be the next Autodesk, but I really hope I'm wrong. 2015-04-28 7:24 GMT+02:00 Raffaele Fragapane raffsxsil...@googlemail.com: There must be another company named Adobe I'm not aware of... Adobe has had nothing but contempt for VFX for years, and people would actually get on board with this? If there is any truth to these incompetently written piece of news whatsoever, and that's pretty much 50/50 at best, be ready to rent. Windows and half arsed Mac ports only, of course. On Tue, Apr 28, 2015 at 1:37 PM, Tenshi S. tenshu...@gmail.com wrote: Better Adobe than Autode$k. Is the less bad co. between both. -- Our users will know fear and cower before our software! Ship it! Ship it and let them flee like the dogs they are!
Re: OT: Modo 901 Sneak Peek
Fxguide.com has some additional feature previews. Faster rendering and less noise. 17 minutes in 801 vs. 6 minutes in 901 for a 2 bounce GI with 20 area lights and detailed geometry. Sent from my iPhone Please excuse typos and brief replies. Thank you! On Apr 8, 2015, at 9:31 AM, Marc-Andre Carbonneau marc-andre.carbonn...@ubisoft.com wrote: Yup even with the new price point, it’s still pretty low. I just checked Cinema 4D Studio(which is the one with everything in it) and it’s 3 695$. Quite a difference from 1 799$ for Modo 901 Also, The Foundry is clever… they’re stretching their teasers and hyping the product… I wouldn’t be surprised either if they’d announce something bigger next time. Cheers, MAC From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Phil Williams Sent: April-08-15 6:06 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: OT: Modo 901 Sneak Peek I think it's been said several times that this part 1 of the sneak peaks, so it's a case of wait and see for the rest... On 8 April 2015 at 10:55, Mario Reitbauer cont...@marioreitbauer.at wrote: Well that is an argument. But in case I don't even want mesh fusion I have to pay it now ;) Modo is still quite avordable so this isn't meant to be any complain. Just curious if there's more coming for the price increase. 2015-04-08 10:37 GMT+02:00 Oscar Juarez tridi.animei...@gmail.com: I guess the price increase for new seats is because now includes mesh fusion, which before was $350 as far as I remember. On Wed, Apr 8, 2015 at 10:15 AM, Phil Williams p...@picmo.co.uk wrote: The product page says this for new purchases: - Purchase 801 now (at 801 prices), and you’ll automatically get upgraded to 901 for free when it ships. On 8 April 2015 at 01:19, Mario Reitbauer cont...@marioreitbauer.at wrote: Well what I see so far is that they increased the price by 300$ for new seats. And I feel the same as you. Waiting for Animation and Rigging enhancements. 2015-04-08 2:10 GMT+02:00 Ed Schiffer edschif...@gmail.com: https://vimeo.com/124320824 http://www.thefoundry.co.uk/products/modo/latest-version it only shows modeling and UV new features. seems great, but don't know if should wait for more rigging and animation ones..
Re: Maya strengts (anyone?)
On May 22, 2014, at 2:25 PM, Meng-Yang Lu ntmon...@gmail.com wrote: If I had a nickel for questions starting with... In Maya, can you... The answer is always yes. Getting to that yes more often than not is really painful. Yes!!! Perfectly stated, Lu.
Re: Any recent nice new projects using emWhatever?
How about Cinema 4D Eric? Have you had a look at their SDK? On May 17, 2014, at 2:14 AM, Eric Mootz e...@mootzoid.com wrote: Thanks for your feedback, Tim! Personally I would just love to port emTopolizer and emPolygonizer to Modo. The only thing that is missing in the Modo SDK is not functionality but documentation and examples. Note that I have not taken a look at Modo 801 yet. I will get back to them as soon as I'm done with the stuff I'm currently working on. Let's see how it goes. Cheers, Eric Am 16.05.2014 19:46, schrieb Tim Crowson: Eric your post on their forum a while back about lacking documentation was very helpful for them realizing the effects of poor SDK documentation. Others have reported the same thing, and I think they've realized what they're missing out on (3rd party awesomeness = more Modo seats). I'm optimistic that they'll put some real time into this. I would definitely stay involved as you have time and continue to give them feedback on what you need. They definitely need guidance on what developers want to know and are looking for. -Tim On 5/16/2014 10:00 AM, Eric Mootz wrote: Hey Sergio, Good to hear. However I am more interested in the C++ API. Hopefully they improved things there, too! Cheers, Eric Am 16.05.2014 16:44, schrieb Sergio Mucino: Eric. I'm not a developer, and I've only been using Modo for less than a year, but it seems there has been some progress on that front. I'd check it out for sure. At least on the Python side of things, things are getting a lot nicer. 801 introduced some new user classes that make it easier to work with the Python API. There's still some holes left to cover, but I like how it's working. Sergio Muciño. Sent from my iPad. --
Re: 2015 downloads
Thanks for the update Angus. Appreciate the heads up! On May 8, 2014, at 12:24 PM, Angus Davidson angus.david...@wits.ac.za wrote: Finally managed to get our reseller (as our ARC accounts now go via a reseller) to send me a copy of the email with the link to the new site that worked. Had to redo the registration (so heads up for those in the same boat) But have finally got the license and busy downloading the installs. Another heads up Maya LT isn’t grouped with Maya/Soft/Max/Mudbox its in its own little drop down From: Angus Davidson angus.david...@wits.ac.za Reply-To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Date: Thursday 08 May 2014 at 12:57 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: 2015 downloads HI Maurice Its now the 8th of May on this side of the world and no ARC 2015 versions. Please can you follow up to make sure there hasn’t been any delays. Kind regards Angus From: Angus Davidson angus.david...@wits.ac.za Reply-To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Date: Tuesday 15 April 2014 at 10:11 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: 2015 downloads Hi Maurice Thank you. Kind regards Angus From: Maurice Patel [maurice.pa...@autodesk.com] Sent: 15 April 2014 07:58 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: 2015 downloads Hi Angus, I have heard back that Suites, including Softimage will go live on ARC on May 7th Maurice Maurice Patel Autodesk : Tél: 514 954-7134 From: Maurice Patel Sent: Tuesday, April 15, 2014 12:57 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: 2015 downloads Yes, I understand. It will be uploaded to the ARC site I am just not sure when yet maurice Maurice Patel Autodesk : Tél: 514 954-7134 From:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Angus Davidson Sent: Tuesday, April 15, 2014 11:43 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: 2015 downloads Hi Maurice Thanks. Unfortunately installing the trial version doesn't allow us to then use the arc License (as it only allows up to the 2014 versions) Kind regards Angus From: Maurice Patel [maurice.pa...@autodesk.com] Sent: 15 April 2014 05:33 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: 2015 downloads Hi Angus, We are still looking into that one. It’s managed by a different team to the student education team. Maurice Maurice Patel Autodesk : Tél: 514 954-7134 From:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Angus Davidson Sent: Tuesday, April 15, 2014 11:14 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: 2015 downloads Hi Maurice Thank you very much. Now we just need the 2015 versions on the academic.autodesk.com site (which is unfortunately still the one I need) Kind regards Angus From: Maurice Patel [maurice.pa...@autodesk.com] Sent: 15 April 2014 04:00 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: 2015 downloads Hi Guys, Softimage 2015 is now up on the student portal. Checked this morning Maurice Maurice Patel Autodesk : Tél: 514 954-7134 From:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Angus Davidson Sent: Tuesday, April 15, 2014 7:05 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: 2015 downloads Hi Jon I figured as such. That’s why I have been trying to get something official from either Maurice or Steve as it has rather big implications for the edu sector. Kind regards Angus From: Jon Hunt jonathan.m.h...@gmail.com Reply-To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Date: Tuesday 15 April 2014 at 12:58 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: 2015 downloads Hi Angus, Yes it was during a call with Steve that he said that the student version would be made available. Obviously me saying this isn't the official answer. Jon On Tue, Apr 15, 2014 at 10:31 AM, Angus Davidson angus.david...@wits.ac.za wrote: Hi Tenshi Only the 2015 versions of Maya and Maya LT are up at students.autodesk.com, No 2015 versions are up via the academic.autodesk.com portal yet. We are still awaiting official confirmation to the mailing list that the 2015 version of Softimage will indeed be offered for another year via the student site. I am very angry at this current time. Audodesk gave the EDU community one month to sort out their entire future and they haven’t been able to answer two simple questions and activate the 2015 versions of Softimage in either the academic or student download portals in the same time. Incredibly frustrated. Their whole handling of the Academic
Re: Center mode (was RE: humanize Maya, SOFT top 5)
Totally agree. And just to chime in, I use center mode many times per session, per day. Essential workflow. Sent from my iPhone Please excuse typos and brief replies. Thank you! On Apr 2, 2014, at 7:00 PM, Raffaele Fragapane raffsxsil...@googlemail.com wrote: Harder than that, the equivalent would be to select all components, move and rotate them numerically, then figure out the reciprocal transform of what you just did and apply it to the object's transform. Center mode is also not equivalent or obsoleted by neutral poses, nor it's equated by Maya's pivot control. It's sorely missed by many in Maya. On top of that, Maya snapping facilities, particularly when it comes to rotations, are wonky and often don't work at all. The modelling toolset, several interaction modes with the pivot, and many other things don't support snapping, and most certainly don't support matching transforms. Adding insult to injury, matching or resetting transforms in Maya is highly deficient out of the box, as it will often work on the whole hierarchy regardless of what you intended to do. Lastly, center mode worked seamlessly with all manipulation tools, you could switch to center mode and have child compensation on and snap/match to another object. This offers unequalled control over geometry handling in relation to its center. In Maya I've always found pivots superior to neutral pose for a long list of reasons, at least functionally, though the manipulation itself is weak (again, Maya is generally weak and fragmented in dealing with rotations). Maya's handling of reciprocating transforms between transform proper and geometry though leaves A LOT to be desired, and a page or two from XSI's book should be taken. On Thu, Apr 3, 2014 at 2:25 AM, Luc-Eric Rousseau luceri...@gmail.com wrote: Is that always true in your scenarios? Moving center in Softimage is like moving all the points of the geometry. (What brent calls transforming the geometry) Knowing that it does that, wouldn't the simplest work-around for your specific scenario in Maya be to select all points and move/rotate them. -- Our users will know fear and cower before our software! Ship it! Ship it and let them flee like the dogs they are!
Re: My revelation on Softimage
Exactly my feelings. Sent from my iPhone Please excuse typos and brief replies. Thank you! On Mar 24, 2014, at 4:42 AM, Arvid Björn arvidbj...@gmail.com wrote: Thing is, even if they'd just add the tiniest stupid little things to each release, which would take close to zero effort, I'd still pay maintenance for it forever. I think most would be happy to pay just to make sure that Softimage doesn't break with future graphics drivers, OS versions etc. That's basically ALL I need. Everything else is ICEing on the cake. On Mon, Mar 24, 2014 at 8:44 AM, Szabolcs Matefy szabol...@crytek.com wrote: [...] I think the current version would be pretty much enough for me for years. What would Autodesk benefit from this? NIL. I might suppose even, that Maya and Max are intentionally uncomfortable to use, and lacks feature, because this way they might keep their Subscription program running.
Re: An Open Letter to Carl Bass
+1 On Mar 24, 2014, at 4:36 PM, Martin furik...@gmail.com wrote: Hi Maurice I don't think anyone who is going to start a CG career will do it based on SI even if you don't stop selling it for a few months or years! It isn't logic to do it. Only those who are already Softimage users and have Softimage based projects running will need new licenses to use a few years more. There are still too many projects based on Softimage in the industry and we need to be able to buy Softimage licenses for at least a year or two to be able to pick those jobs and finish them! I was planning to buy one license soon, go freelance and probably buy a few more later before the announcement. So should I just give up and don't take those jobs ? just because you decided that that was the best solution for us? You should have give us time to plan what to do with our business. Isn't it bad enough that you discontinue, without warning, the best tool we have to make a living ? Martin Sent from my iPhone On 2014/03/25, at 4:27, Maurice Patel maurice.pa...@autodesk.com wrote: The bundle is a transition bundle therefore it is only for those who already have Softimage to get access to Maya or 3s Max for free Existing customers can also purchase new seats to increase capacity if they need to Softimage is discontinued from sale because we would prefer for anyone starting a career or a business not to do so on a product we are no longer developing. However if you really want it there is an option: Softimage will be in the Ultimate Suite for 2 more years, If you are a student with an accredited institution you should qualify for special discount rate too. BTW - everything has a cost and implementing and maintaining offerings in our systems is not trivial Maurice Maurice Patel Autodesk : Tél: 514 954-7134 From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Emilio Hernandez Sent: Monday, March 24, 2014 2:59 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: An Open Letter to Carl Bass What I still don't understand is why Autodesk cannot still deliver Softimage last version to Max or Maya suite, bundle or whatever name it has. I know they've saying a lot of reasons, but really none of them makes anysense to me. After all we will be buying Maya, MAX seats to get Softimage. It still means revenue from them for a software they are going to stop devoloping, addressing bugs or fixes. Ok. Don't sell Softimage seats perse, but package Softimage like Toxic. Let the user decide what tool he wants to work with. Just keep the Send to Softimage button regardless of the Maya version. This is no additional cost to Autodesk. Is this too much to ask? --- Emilio Hernández VFX 3D animation. 2014-03-24 12:23 GMT-06:00 Nuno Conceicao nunoalexconcei...@gmail.commailto:nunoalexconcei...@gmail.com: So for what I understood you can buy your first license only till the 28th then after this you are able to purchase more. If you have no licenses after this date you wont be able to purchase Softimage anymore... :( So I would suggest you get in touch with a retailer asap, he will be able to confirm this info obviously On Mon, Mar 24, 2014 at 6:19 PM, Nuno Conceicao nunoalexconcei...@gmail.commailto:nunoalexconcei...@gmail.com wrote: I think you have until the 28th March to be able to purchase Softimage for the first time (not a current client) On Mon, Mar 24, 2014 at 4:52 PM, Martin furik...@gmail.commailto:furik...@gmail.com wrote: Hi Maurice, Where can I have more info about this ? I was contemplating the possibility to buy a few licenses in the near future before the EOL announcement because I will most probably have some SI projects on my own and I don't have a commercial license right now (I work with my current employer license) and may need extra hands later, so If I buy the current version would I be able to purchase a few more seats later? Or am I too late for this? Thanks Martin Sent from my iPhone On 2014/03/25, at 1:07, Maurice Patel maurice.pa...@autodesk.commailto:maurice.pa...@autodesk.com wrote Softimage will be available too but under slightly different conditions: prior version usage. winmail.dat
Re: An Open Letter to Carl Bass
I guess the costs Maurice spoke of (with keeping something in their system) that is associated with Toxik and Matchmover, is more palatable for those products to Autodesk than it is if it was for Softimage. How can these two be available with no EULA, but Softimage gets buried and we won't be able to even buy it??? Sent from my iPhone Please excuse typos and brief replies. Thank you! On Mar 24, 2014, at 3:58 PM, Andres Stephens drais...@outlook.com wrote: I hope this too will happen to SI, don’t snuff it out of existence after April 2016... I would throw money into Maya or Max, or an Autodesk Subscription if only I still could use SI on the side - begrudgingly, but I would if I could (after two years and beyond). -Draise From: Chris Vienneau Sent: Monday, March 24, 2014 14:52 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Toxik and Matchmover will be available on Autodesk xchange in a week or two with no eula. You won't need a license to use them anymore. http://apps.exchange.autodesk.com/MAYA/en/Home/Index . cv/ From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] on behalf of Maurice Patel [maurice.pa...@autodesk.com] Sent: Monday, March 24, 2014 3:48 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: An Open Letter to Carl Bass Hi Emilio, I am not sure I follow the question Maurice Maurice Patel Autodesk : Tél: 514 954-7134 From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Emilio Hernandez Sent: Monday, March 24, 2014 3:44 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: An Open Letter to Carl Bass Thank you for your response Maurice. Another question. Are you still going to include Toxic after 2 years if I am new customer? fe. If I open a new studio and I want to buy brand new seats of Maya, MAX? --- Emilio Hernández VFX 3D animation. 2014-03-24 13:27 GMT-06:00 Maurice Patel maurice.pa...@autodesk.commailto:maurice.pa...@autodesk.com: The bundle is a transition bundle therefore it is only for those who already have Softimage to get access to Maya or 3s Max for free Existing customers can also purchase new seats to increase capacity if they need to Softimage is discontinued from sale because we would prefer for anyone starting a career or a business not to do so on a product we are no longer developing. However if you really want it there is an option: Softimage will be in the Ultimate Suite for 2 more years, If you are a student with an accredited institution you should qualify for special discount rate too. BTW - everything has a cost and implementing and maintaining offerings in our systems is not trivial Maurice Maurice Patel Autodesk : Tél: 514 954-7134 From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Emilio Hernandez Sent: Monday, March 24, 2014 2:59 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: An Open Letter to Carl Bass What I still don't understand is why Autodesk cannot still deliver Softimage last version to Max or Maya suite, bundle or whatever name it has. I know they've saying a lot of reasons, but really none of them makes anysense to me. After all we will be buying Maya, MAX seats to get Softimage. It still means revenue from them for a software they are going to stop devoloping, addressing bugs or fixes. Ok. Don't sell Softimage seats perse, but package Softimage like Toxic. Let the user decide what tool he wants to work with. Just keep the Send to Softimage button regardless of the Maya version. This is no additional cost to Autodesk. Is this too much to ask? --- Emilio Hernández VFX 3D animation. 2014-03-24 12:23 GMT-06:00 Nuno Conceicao nunoalexconcei...@gmail.commailto:nunoalexconcei...@gmail.commailto:nunoalexconcei...@gmail.commailto:nunoalexconcei...@gmail.com: So for what I understood you can buy your first license only till the 28th then after this you are able to purchase more. If you have no licenses after this date you wont be able to purchase Softimage anymore... :( So I would suggest you get in touch with a retailer asap, he will be able to confirm this info obviously On Mon, Mar 24, 2014 at 6:19 PM, Nuno Conceicao nunoalexconcei...@gmail.commailto:nunoalexconcei...@gmail.commailto:nunoalexconcei...@gmail.commailto:nunoalexconcei...@gmail.com wrote: I think you have until the 28th March to be able to purchase Softimage for the first time (not a current client) On Mon, Mar 24, 2014 at 4:52 PM, Martin
Re: Softimage user migrating to Maya
Wow. That about sums it up! Hysterical! Sent from my iPhone Please excuse typos and brief replies. Thank you! On Mar 20, 2014, at 9:25 AM, Emilio Hernandez emi...@e-roja.com wrote: índice.jpg --- Emilio Hernández VFX 3D animation.
Re: Stand up and be counted
Alastair, This is exactly what is needed. Thank you for stating this (and STARTING this)! Perry On Mar 17, 2014, at 4:32 AM, Alastair Hearsum hear...@glassworks.co.uk wrote: Hello Could I be so bold as to encourage everyone out there to petition the prominent people in their organisations to stand up and make a statement. Outside the list would be most beneficial. Do they have journalistic contacts, open letters etc. The deed may be done but we want to have a voice, if Maya is a choice, into what the development priorities are. And, I may be being melodramatic here, we want them to look into our eyes are they are twisting the knife. Thanks Alastair Hearsum -- 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: Open Letter to Carl Bass
Thank you for letting me know, Chris. On Mar 16, 2014, at 1:24 PM, Chris Vienneau chris.vienn...@autodesk.com wrote: Just to let everyone know Carl got the letter and is asking questions and will write back when he gets into the office on Monday. cv/ From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] on behalf of Leoung O'Young [digim...@digimata.com] Sent: Saturday, March 15, 2014 5:13 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Open Letter to Carl Bass Thanks for taking the time out to write this. Leoung On 15/03/2014 5:08 PM, Arvid Björn wrote: Powerful stuff Perry. If there's one thing this debacle has proved, it's that this community is really is as strong and passionate as I've always perceived it to be. On Sat, Mar 15, 2014 at 4:13 PM, Perry Harovas perryharo...@gmail.commailto:perryharo...@gmail.com wrote: Dear Mr. Bass My name is Perry Harovas. You don't know me, but I am a 10 year Softimage user. 10 years is actually a small amount of time when compared to my peers who having been using Softimage for up to 20 years. I am writing to you because I cannot be silent on this. I have been in this business for 25 years. I started out using Lightwave in Video Toaster V1 on an Amiga computer. I then moved on to Alias PowerAnimator and took the new abilities of that software (over Lightwave) into feature films out of a small studio in (of all places) Newark, NJ. I was an Alpha tester of Maya, before it was even announced publicly. I put up with no docs, breaking code, a renderer that was written only months earlier and barely worked, changing workflows, etc. I learned everything I could about the software, and eventually co-authored the first book about Maya, Mastering Maya Complete 2. I was the loudest, most exuberant fan of Maya on the face of the planet. I couldn't get enough. I worked myself into bouts of sleeplessness in an effort to know more about this seemingly magical application that would allow me to create anything I could dream of. Except, in reality, the word 'dream' is appropriate, because as I took on larger projects and tried to do more work with it, I found one of the largest obstacles with Maya was (and is) that it needs a support team behind it to code tools into either working together, or sometimes, working at all. A good example of this is when I was directing two 30 minute CG children's shows with me and my small crew of 4 other people. We had 6 months to create 60 minutes of animation, including building the characters, rigging them, animating them, texturing, lighting, etc. An insane task given the budget, crew size and amount of animation. But we plunged head on into doing it. Then, after many, many minutes of animation had been done, we found that our characters were coming into our scenes with no animation except their mouth lip sync. Where had all the animation we did gone? Our one technical guy on staff looked into it and happened to find that the animation curves were still there, but had detached themselves from the character rig (his skeleton, if you will). Fortunately, he was able to code up a way to automatically reconnect the animation curves to the rig, saving months of work. We then realized we were not going to be the only people to have this issue. We spoke with Support, and they acknowledged this was a known issue. We even offered to give them our script to help others who were having similar issues. They refused to let us help. We then started experiencing render problems, referencing issues, and a list of other things so long that I can't remember it now. Needless to say, it was frustrating, it prevented the quality from being consistent, and endangered our whole company. We soldiered on, finishing the two shows on schedule, barely, and vowing to NEVER use Maya again. We eventually decided on Softimage|XSI. Sure it was rough re-learning a new application, but it was rewarding in that it worked, didn't fail us, and didn't need a dedicated team to produce work that was better than what we could produce in Maya. This was astonishing to me! Thoughts of Why did we not do this earlier? ran through my head. The power in one application seemed to be nearly limitless. Limitless, that is, until I started Alpha testing Moondust, which eventually became ICE. This was an area I knew nothing about, coding, and suddenly I was doing things that I could not believe. I created a way to have fur just appear on the silhouette of my cartoon dog, in literally 20 minutes of fiddling around with ICE. Even with the lack of documentation at that point, with the alpha, and then beta, status of the software, it was the most powerful tool I had ever used. Bar none. No doubt, No hyperbole. I could not believe what I could now do, just
Re: Open Letter to Carl Bass
Of course you are correct, Leendert. I published it on my Facebook page as the only public thing on there and would love anyone on this list to please add it or send it to anyone you think might help get the word out. You are encouraged to tweet about it, submit it to websites for them to publish, to news organizations, anything. All the help we can get, and give to each other, is very much needed and appreciated. Thank you! Sent from my iPhone Please excuse typos and brief replies. Thank you! On Mar 15, 2014, at 12:19 PM, Leendert A. Hartog hirazib...@live.nl wrote: Well, the true nature of an open letter is that it needs to be published, not sent! Greetz Leendert -- Leendert A. Hartog – Softimage hobbyist AKA Hirazi Blue – Administrator @, NOT the owner of si-community.com
Re: Anyone in the SI list transitioning to MODO? -Please add your mail here
Seriously evaluating modo as all this evolves. Please add me: perryharo...@gmail.com Thank you! On Mar 12, 2014, at 5:55 PM, Mario Reitbauer cont...@marioreitbauer.at wrote: add me in, gonna do the transition to modo and houdini. cont...@marioreitbauer.com 2014-03-11 17:00 GMT+01:00 Ahmed Barakat ahmed.barakat.mail...@gmail.com: I would sure like to take a look at it aabara...@gmail.com On Mon, Mar 10, 2014 at 3:21 PM, Tim Crowson tim.crow...@magneticdreams.com wrote: Yes the lack of non-rigging-related operator stack (not just history) has been an issue for some people who really do like to model more procedurally. In rigging, you'll find that deformers are stacked using Order of Operations, similarly to the operator stack in Softimage, on a per-deformer basis. But that's not the same thing as a construction history, or procedural modeling, which every agrees would be awesome to have. -Tim On 3/10/2014 3:05 AM, Szabolcs Matefy wrote: I am evaluating modo now as an alternative, and it looks really promising, however, I miss the history. But since I worked with LW before SI for four years, it’s really fun to feel a somehow familiar feeling :D From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of David Rivera Sent: Saturday, March 08, 2014 9:23 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Anyone in the SI list transitioning to MODO? -Please add your mail here Hi, I was really touched by some of the in-depth opinions about leaving SI. TD´s perspective, and other users who have dedicated their lives (literally) to build a rock-solid pipeline for studios all around the world using softimage, have really made me think a lot into consideration. So, to cut a long story short, I´d like to know if there´s a thread in the list that´s already being aligned into the Softimage/MODO transition? If not, I´d like to start it off with this post. I´m going into MODO and here´s my email: david_rivera...@yahoo.com Thanks. David Rivera 3D Compositor/Animator LinkedIN Behance VFX Reel --
