subject:"RE\: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios"

Some of people are working in places where they cannot choose their
software but work with what is given :)

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:43 PM, Ognjen Vukovic ognj...@gmail.com wrote:

 I am quite curious as to why there are so many people
 transitioning to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't there
 discussions of numerous alternatives being available, i know each software
 has its pitfalls, and probably the main argument to this is, most jobs are
 done in maya. But do you want to end up at a job where all you can expect
 is overtime and headaches due to your tool falling apart when it matters
 the most?

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:18 PM, adrian wyer 
 adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

  didn't want to chime in on this thread, but can'tresist...



 Graham, we know that as an autodesk representative, you have to, at least
 to some extent, tow the party line

 but you have to face facts, we as Softimage users have had this situation
 forced upon us by a seemingly uncaring software behemoth



 it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle out



 just because the list has settled down of late (it's disappointingly like
 a ghost town in here most days) it doesn't mean the embers of our
 collective anger aren't still glowing away



 occasionally, for many months to come, they will flare up



 I welcome the initiative to help artists move across to maya, even seen
 as a purely financial one from the point of the company that makes the
 'other' software

 And i'll be honest, for every 10 things that i find, while stumbling
 blindly through the maya minefield, that are infuriating, there are usually
 a couple that are pleasantly surprising it's not 'all' bad!



 i guess what i'm saying is keep up the initiatives, hold people's hands
 through this unwelcome transition, and in the long term, they'll appreciate
 it



 but don't expect users not to throw abuse occasionally when you stick
 your head above the parapet!



 cheers



 a


  --

 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Mario Reitbauer
 *Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:02
 *To:* softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 Graham dont take it personal.



 It's maya...

 We don't like it, we probably will need a lot of time to start accepting
 it and maybe at some point some here gonna agree that what maya offers is
 good.



 But right now, the cons of maya are just hitting artists day in day out ;)



 2014-09-10 2:35 GMT+02:00 Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com:

 On 09/09/14 17:29, Graham Bell wrote:

 Personally, I thought I did a great job, but if you guys want to spin it
 into something it wasn’t, I guess that’s your prerogative.

 G


 Oh didn't know you had a take on that event.

 But no doubt yourself and everyone (many well known names) did a great
 job,
 and nothing suggests it was a bad event in any way, well to the contrary!

 It actually looked very informative and like a great opportunity to
 objectively assess how thing were with lots of perspective with many users
 very well versed with their tools.

 Which seems to have been a success at doing just that, in a candid and
 positive setting,


 But if the resulting seemingly very fair, accurate and impartial report
 also confirms a number of things
 (almost everything) we all knew already (both pros  cons),
 I wouln't associate the highlighting of these things to 'spinning'.

 I don't think anything suggested here has been unfair, out of place, or
 not the case.

 .. except maybe the 'killing the wrong product' bit..  cause in NO
 circumstance could there ever be any justification to *forcibly* prevent
 ANY fairly widely used product from being used, regardless if (but
 -especially- if) that product was unique. (pretty darn unique in this case)

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

btw even showing that some tasks will take couple time less to be completed
you can easily talk to the wall as well so stick and hurt yourself int
here ;)

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:54 PM, Mirko Jankovic mirkoj.anima...@gmail.com
wrote:

 Some of people are working in places where they cannot choose their
 software but work with what is given :)

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:43 PM, Ognjen Vukovic ognj...@gmail.com
 wrote:

 I am quite curious as to why there are so many people
 transitioning to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't there
 discussions of numerous alternatives being available, i know each software
 has its pitfalls, and probably the main argument to this is, most jobs are
 done in maya. But do you want to end up at a job where all you can expect
 is overtime and headaches due to your tool falling apart when it matters
 the most?

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:18 PM, adrian wyer 
 adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

  didn't want to chime in on this thread, but can'tresist...



 Graham, we know that as an autodesk representative, you have to, at
 least to some extent, tow the party line

 but you have to face facts, we as Softimage users have had this
 situation forced upon us by a seemingly uncaring software behemoth



 it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle out



 just because the list has settled down of late (it's disappointingly
 like a ghost town in here most days) it doesn't mean the embers of our
 collective anger aren't still glowing away



 occasionally, for many months to come, they will flare up



 I welcome the initiative to help artists move across to maya, even seen
 as a purely financial one from the point of the company that makes the
 'other' software

 And i'll be honest, for every 10 things that i find, while stumbling
 blindly through the maya minefield, that are infuriating, there are usually
 a couple that are pleasantly surprising it's not 'all' bad!



 i guess what i'm saying is keep up the initiatives, hold people's hands
 through this unwelcome transition, and in the long term, they'll appreciate
 it



 but don't expect users not to throw abuse occasionally when you stick
 your head above the parapet!



 cheers



 a


  --

 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Mario Reitbauer
 *Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:02
 *To:* softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 Graham dont take it personal.



 It's maya...

 We don't like it, we probably will need a lot of time to start accepting
 it and maybe at some point some here gonna agree that what maya offers is
 good.



 But right now, the cons of maya are just hitting artists day in day out
 ;)



 2014-09-10 2:35 GMT+02:00 Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com:

 On 09/09/14 17:29, Graham Bell wrote:

 Personally, I thought I did a great job, but if you guys want to spin it
 into something it wasn’t, I guess that’s your prerogative.

 G


 Oh didn't know you had a take on that event.

 But no doubt yourself and everyone (many well known names) did a great
 job,
 and nothing suggests it was a bad event in any way, well to the contrary!

 It actually looked very informative and like a great opportunity to
 objectively assess how thing were with lots of perspective with many users
 very well versed with their tools.

 Which seems to have been a success at doing just that, in a candid and
 positive setting,


 But if the resulting seemingly very fair, accurate and impartial report
 also confirms a number of things
 (almost everything) we all knew already (both pros  cons),
 I wouln't associate the highlighting of these things to 'spinning'.

 I don't think anything suggested here has been unfair, out of place, or
 not the case.

 .. except maybe the 'killing the wrong product' bit..  cause in NO
 circumstance could there ever be any justification to *forcibly* prevent
 ANY fairly widely used product from being used, regardless if (but
 -especially- if) that product was unique. (pretty darn unique in this case)

RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread adrian wyer

as a company, our decision to move to Maya was made for us

 

1. production proven

2. available freelance pool

3. community of users when things go wrong

4. existing freelancers who have knowledge of both systems (Soft  Maya
aiding in transition)

5.third party plugins

6.it's not 3DsMax!

 

no brainer i'm afraid

 

a

 

  _  

From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Ognjen Vukovic
Sent: 10 September 2014 11:44
To: softimage
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

 

I am quite curious as to why there are so many people transitioning
to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't there discussions of
numerous alternatives being available, i know each software has its
pitfalls, and probably the main argument to this is, most jobs are done in
maya. But do you want to end up at a job where all you can expect is
overtime and headaches due to your tool falling apart when it matters the
most?

 

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:18 PM, adrian wyer
adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

didn't want to chime in on this thread, but can'tresist...

 

Graham, we know that as an autodesk representative, you have to, at least to
some extent, tow the party line

but you have to face facts, we as Softimage users have had this situation
forced upon us by a seemingly uncaring software behemoth

 

it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle out

 

just because the list has settled down of late (it's disappointingly like a
ghost town in here most days) it doesn't mean the embers of our collective
anger aren't still glowing away

 

occasionally, for many months to come, they will flare up

 

I welcome the initiative to help artists move across to maya, even seen as a
purely financial one from the point of the company that makes the 'other'
software

And i'll be honest, for every 10 things that i find, while stumbling blindly
through the maya minefield, that are infuriating, there are usually a couple
that are pleasantly surprising it's not 'all' bad!

 

i guess what i'm saying is keep up the initiatives, hold people's hands
through this unwelcome transition, and in the long term, they'll appreciate
it

 

but don't expect users not to throw abuse occasionally when you stick your
head above the parapet!

 

cheers

 

a

 

  _  

From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Mario
Reitbauer
Sent: 10 September 2014 11:02
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

 

Graham dont take it personal.

 

It's maya...

We don't like it, we probably will need a lot of time to start accepting it
and maybe at some point some here gonna agree that what maya offers is good.

 

But right now, the cons of maya are just hitting artists day in day out ;)

 

2014-09-10 2:35 GMT+02:00 Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com:

On 09/09/14 17:29, Graham Bell wrote:

Personally, I thought I did a great job, but if you guys want to spin it
into something it wasn't, I guess that's your prerogative.

G


Oh didn't know you had a take on that event.

But no doubt yourself and everyone (many well known names) did a great job,
and nothing suggests it was a bad event in any way, well to the contrary!

It actually looked very informative and like a great opportunity to
objectively assess how thing were with lots of perspective with many users
very well versed with their tools.

Which seems to have been a success at doing just that, in a candid and
positive setting,


But if the resulting seemingly very fair, accurate and impartial report also
confirms a number of things
(almost everything) we all knew already (both pros  cons),
I wouln't associate the highlighting of these things to 'spinning'.

I don't think anything suggested here has been unfair, out of place, or not
the case.

.. except maybe the 'killing the wrong product' bit..  cause in NO
circumstance could there ever be any justification to *forcibly* prevent ANY
fairly widely used product from being used, regardless if (but -especially-
if) that product was unique. (pretty darn unique in this case)

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Ognjen Vukovic

 But isnt that just perpetuating the problem with circular logic?
Maya is bad  have to use maya because of existing user base, no one else
uses anything else  use maya, contribute to low user base of alternative
softwares   maya breaks  maya is bad...
I do understand that maya is probably the  best option out of the bunch,
its just that i dont think complaining about its bugs on a softimage
mailing list will get you anywhere, especially with how things turned out
in the last year when it comes to feedback from AD.

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:56 PM, adrian wyer 
adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

as a company, our decision to move to Maya was made for us



 1. production proven

 2. available freelance pool

 3. community of users when things go wrong

 4. existing freelancers who have knowledge of both systems (Soft  Maya
 aiding in transition)

 5.third party plugins

 6.it's not 3DsMax!



 no brainer i'm afraid



 a


  --

 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Ognjen Vukovic
 *Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:44
 *To:* softimage

 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 I am quite curious as to why there are so many people
 transitioning to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't there
 discussions of numerous alternatives being available, i know each software
 has its pitfalls, and probably the main argument to this is, most jobs are
 done in maya. But do you want to end up at a job where all you can expect
 is overtime and headaches due to your tool falling apart when it matters
 the most?



 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:18 PM, adrian wyer 
 adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

 didn't want to chime in on this thread, but can'tresist...



 Graham, we know that as an autodesk representative, you have to, at least
 to some extent, tow the party line

 but you have to face facts, we as Softimage users have had this situation
 forced upon us by a seemingly uncaring software behemoth



 it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle out



 just because the list has settled down of late (it's disappointingly like
 a ghost town in here most days) it doesn't mean the embers of our
 collective anger aren't still glowing away



 occasionally, for many months to come, they will flare up



 I welcome the initiative to help artists move across to maya, even seen as
 a purely financial one from the point of the company that makes the 'other'
 software

 And i'll be honest, for every 10 things that i find, while stumbling
 blindly through the maya minefield, that are infuriating, there are usually
 a couple that are pleasantly surprising it's not 'all' bad!



 i guess what i'm saying is keep up the initiatives, hold people's hands
 through this unwelcome transition, and in the long term, they'll appreciate
 it



 but don't expect users not to throw abuse occasionally when you stick your
 head above the parapet!



 cheers



 a


  --

 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Mario Reitbauer
 *Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:02
 *To:* softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 Graham dont take it personal.



 It's maya...

 We don't like it, we probably will need a lot of time to start accepting
 it and maybe at some point some here gonna agree that what maya offers is
 good.



 But right now, the cons of maya are just hitting artists day in day out ;)



 2014-09-10 2:35 GMT+02:00 Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com:

 On 09/09/14 17:29, Graham Bell wrote:

 Personally, I thought I did a great job, but if you guys want to spin it
 into something it wasn’t, I guess that’s your prerogative.

 G


 Oh didn't know you had a take on that event.

 But no doubt yourself and everyone (many well known names) did a great job,
 and nothing suggests it was a bad event in any way, well to the contrary!

 It actually looked very informative and like a great opportunity to
 objectively assess how thing were with lots of perspective with many users
 very well versed with their tools.

 Which seems to have been a success at doing just that, in a candid and
 positive setting,


 But if the resulting seemingly very fair, accurate and impartial report
 also confirms a number of things
 (almost everything) we all knew already (both pros  cons),
 I wouln't associate the highlighting of these things to 'spinning'.

 I don't think anything suggested here has been unfair, out of place, or
 not the case.

 .. except maybe the 'killing the wrong product' bit..  cause in NO
 circumstance could there ever be any justification to *forcibly* prevent
 ANY fairly widely used product from being used, regardless if (but
 -especially- if) that product was unique. (pretty darn unique in this case)

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Ognjen, people need to spill their soul somewhere :)
Honestly for me everything is still fresh as the day they killed it and as
a matter of fact as the day when AD bought it at first place...

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 1:15 PM, Ognjen Vukovic ognj...@gmail.com wrote:

  But isnt that just perpetuating the problem with circular logic?
 Maya is bad  have to use maya because of existing user base, no one else
 uses anything else  use maya, contribute to low user base of alternative
 softwares   maya breaks  maya is bad...
 I do understand that maya is probably the  best option out of the bunch,
 its just that i dont think complaining about its bugs on a softimage
 mailing list will get you anywhere, especially with how things turned out
 in the last year when it comes to feedback from AD.

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:56 PM, adrian wyer 
 adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

as a company, our decision to move to Maya was made for us



 1. production proven

 2. available freelance pool

 3. community of users when things go wrong

 4. existing freelancers who have knowledge of both systems (Soft  Maya
 aiding in transition)

 5.third party plugins

 6.it's not 3DsMax!



 no brainer i'm afraid



 a


  --

 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Ognjen Vukovic
 *Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:44
 *To:* softimage

 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 I am quite curious as to why there are so many people
 transitioning to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't there
 discussions of numerous alternatives being available, i know each software
 has its pitfalls, and probably the main argument to this is, most jobs are
 done in maya. But do you want to end up at a job where all you can expect
 is overtime and headaches due to your tool falling apart when it matters
 the most?



 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:18 PM, adrian wyer 
 adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

 didn't want to chime in on this thread, but can'tresist...



 Graham, we know that as an autodesk representative, you have to, at least
 to some extent, tow the party line

 but you have to face facts, we as Softimage users have had this situation
 forced upon us by a seemingly uncaring software behemoth



 it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle out



 just because the list has settled down of late (it's disappointingly like
 a ghost town in here most days) it doesn't mean the embers of our
 collective anger aren't still glowing away



 occasionally, for many months to come, they will flare up



 I welcome the initiative to help artists move across to maya, even seen
 as a purely financial one from the point of the company that makes the
 'other' software

 And i'll be honest, for every 10 things that i find, while stumbling
 blindly through the maya minefield, that are infuriating, there are usually
 a couple that are pleasantly surprising it's not 'all' bad!



 i guess what i'm saying is keep up the initiatives, hold people's hands
 through this unwelcome transition, and in the long term, they'll appreciate
 it



 but don't expect users not to throw abuse occasionally when you stick
 your head above the parapet!



 cheers



 a


  --

 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Mario Reitbauer
 *Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:02
 *To:* softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 Graham dont take it personal.



 It's maya...

 We don't like it, we probably will need a lot of time to start accepting
 it and maybe at some point some here gonna agree that what maya offers is
 good.



 But right now, the cons of maya are just hitting artists day in day out ;)



 2014-09-10 2:35 GMT+02:00 Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com:

 On 09/09/14 17:29, Graham Bell wrote:

 Personally, I thought I did a great job, but if you guys want to spin it
 into something it wasn’t, I guess that’s your prerogative.

 G


 Oh didn't know you had a take on that event.

 But no doubt yourself and everyone (many well known names) did a great
 job,
 and nothing suggests it was a bad event in any way, well to the contrary!

 It actually looked very informative and like a great opportunity to
 objectively assess how thing were with lots of perspective with many users
 very well versed with their tools.

 Which seems to have been a success at doing just that, in a candid and
 positive setting,


 But if the resulting seemingly very fair, accurate and impartial report
 also confirms a number of things
 (almost everything) we all knew already (both pros  cons),
 I wouln't associate the highlighting of these things to 'spinning'.

 I don't think anything suggested here has been unfair, out of place, or
 not the case.

 .. except maybe

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread olivier jeannel

For people who have no other choice, I feel the pain of the 
transitioners from SI to MA.
Frankly, if you don't do our particular job with pleasure I really hope 
you're well paid...


Hardly / slowly learning Houdini here, but at least it makes sense.




Le 10/09/2014 13:15, Ognjen Vukovic a écrit :
 But isnt that just perpetuating the problem with circular 
logic?  Maya is bad  have to use maya because of existing user base, 
no one else uses anything else  use maya, contribute to low user base 
of alternative softwares   maya breaks  maya is bad...
I do understand that maya is probably the  best option out of the 
bunch, its just that i dont think complaining about its bugs on a 
softimage mailing list will get you anywhere, especially with how 
things turned out in the last year when it comes to feedback from AD.


On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:56 PM, adrian wyer 
adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com 
mailto:adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:


as a company, our decision to move to Maya was made for us

1. production proven

2. available freelance pool

3. community of users when things go wrong

4. existing freelancers who have knowledge of both systems (Soft 
Maya aiding in transition)

5.third party plugins

6.it http://6.it's not 3DsMax!

no brainer i'm afraid

a



*From:*softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of
*Ognjen Vukovic
*Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:44
*To:* softimage


*Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

I am quite curious as to why there are so many people
transitioning to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't
there discussions of numerous alternatives being available, i know
each software has its pitfalls, and probably the main argument to
this is, most jobs are done in maya. But do you want to end up at
a job where all you can expect is overtime and headaches due to
your tool falling apart when it matters the most?

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:18 PM, adrian wyer
adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com
mailto:adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

didn't want to chime in on this thread, but can'tresist...

Graham, we know that as an autodesk representative, you have to,
at least to some extent, tow the party line

but you have to face facts, we as Softimage users have had this
situation forced upon us by a seemingly uncaring software behemoth

it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle out

just because the list has settled down of late (it's
disappointingly like a ghost town in here most days) it doesn't
mean the embers of our collective anger aren't still glowing away

occasionally, for many months to come, they will flare up

I welcome the initiative to help artists move across to maya, even
seen as a purely financial one from the point of the company that
makes the 'other' software

And i'll be honest, for every 10 things that i find, while
stumbling blindly through the maya minefield, that are
infuriating, there are usually a couple that are pleasantly
surprising it's not 'all' bad!

i guess what i'm saying is keep up the initiatives, hold people's
hands through this unwelcome transition, and in the long term,
they'll appreciate it

but don't expect users not to throw abuse occasionally when you
stick your head above the parapet!

cheers

a



*From:*softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of
*Mario Reitbauer
*Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:02
*To:* softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
mailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
*Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Graham dont take it personal.

It's maya...

We don't like it, we probably will need a lot of time to start
accepting it and maybe at some point some here gonna agree that
what maya offers is good.

But right now, the cons of maya are just hitting artists day in
day out ;)

2014-09-10 2:35 GMT+02:00 Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com
mailto:jasonsta...@gmail.com:

On 09/09/14 17:29, Graham Bell wrote:

Personally, I thought I did a great job, but if you guys want to
spin it into something it wasn’t, I guess that’s your prerogative.

G


Oh didn't know you had a take on that event.

But no doubt yourself and everyone (many well known names) did a
great job,
and nothing suggests it was a bad event

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Ognjen Vukovic

I understand people need an outlet.
But i am with Olivier on this, i just strongly believe that as a consumer
people should have a say in how things progress. If your voice isn't heard,
then take your business elsewhere.

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 1:34 PM, olivier jeannel olivier.jean...@noos.fr
wrote:

  For people who have no other choice, I feel the pain of the
 transitioners from SI to MA.
 Frankly, if you don't do our particular job with pleasure I really hope
 you're well paid...

 Hardly / slowly learning Houdini here, but at least it makes sense.




 Le 10/09/2014 13:15, Ognjen Vukovic a écrit :

   But isnt that just perpetuating the problem with circular
 logic?  Maya is bad  have to use maya because of existing user base, no
 one else uses anything else  use maya, contribute to low user base of
 alternative softwares   maya breaks  maya is bad...
  I do understand that maya is probably the  best option out of the bunch,
 its just that i dont think complaining about its bugs on a softimage
 mailing list will get you anywhere, especially with how things turned out
 in the last year when it comes to feedback from AD.

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:56 PM, adrian wyer 
 adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

  as a company, our decision to move to Maya was made for us



 1. production proven

 2. available freelance pool

 3. community of users when things go wrong

 4. existing freelancers who have knowledge of both systems (Soft  Maya
 aiding in transition)

 5.third party plugins

 6.it's not 3DsMax!



 no brainer i'm afraid



 a


  --

 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Ognjen Vukovic
 *Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:44
 *To:* softimage

 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 I am quite curious as to why there are so many people
 transitioning to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't there
 discussions of numerous alternatives being available, i know each software
 has its pitfalls, and probably the main argument to this is, most jobs are
 done in maya. But do you want to end up at a job where all you can expect
 is overtime and headaches due to your tool falling apart when it matters
 the most?



 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:18 PM, adrian wyer 
 adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

 didn't want to chime in on this thread, but can'tresist...



 Graham, we know that as an autodesk representative, you have to, at least
 to some extent, tow the party line

 but you have to face facts, we as Softimage users have had this situation
 forced upon us by a seemingly uncaring software behemoth



 it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle out



 just because the list has settled down of late (it's disappointingly like
 a ghost town in here most days) it doesn't mean the embers of our
 collective anger aren't still glowing away



 occasionally, for many months to come, they will flare up



 I welcome the initiative to help artists move across to maya, even seen
 as a purely financial one from the point of the company that makes the
 'other' software

 And i'll be honest, for every 10 things that i find, while stumbling
 blindly through the maya minefield, that are infuriating, there are usually
 a couple that are pleasantly surprising it's not 'all' bad!



 i guess what i'm saying is keep up the initiatives, hold people's hands
 through this unwelcome transition, and in the long term, they'll appreciate
 it



 but don't expect users not to throw abuse occasionally when you stick
 your head above the parapet!



 cheers



 a


  --

 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Mario Reitbauer
 *Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:02
 *To:* softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 Graham dont take it personal.



 It's maya...

 We don't like it, we probably will need a lot of time to start accepting
 it and maybe at some point some here gonna agree that what maya offers is
 good.



 But right now, the cons of maya are just hitting artists day in day out ;)



 2014-09-10 2:35 GMT+02:00 Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com:

 On 09/09/14 17:29, Graham Bell wrote:

 Personally, I thought I did a great job, but if you guys want to spin it
 into something it wasn’t, I guess that’s your prerogative.

 G


 Oh didn't know you had a take on that event.

 But no doubt yourself and everyone (many well known names) did a great
 job,
 and nothing suggests it was a bad event in any way, well to the contrary!

 It actually looked very informative and like a great opportunity to
 objectively assess how thing were with lots of perspective with many users
 very well versed with their tools.

 Which seems to have been a success at doing just that, in a candid and
 positive setting

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Martin Yara

I guess, we all have different type of jobs.

In my case, I mainly work for game production. I don't do original contents
(not yet at least), so I have to use what my clients do, and that is Maya
and Softimage.

And because of that I've always used Maya (not very much in the last 4
years due to long Softimage projects). Although I'm quite used to SI -
Maya data conversion, I'm trying to improve my Maya skills lately.

I've done work in Max too but I really don't want to do it again. Ever.

For modeling, Maya is getting better. And after a few weeks customizing my
Maya hotkeys, marking menues, writing a few scripts (well more than a few),
trying some more scripts and plugins, reading manuals, and trying to be
open minded, it's not that bad. Not as fast and easy as Softimage but it
has some pretty cool features.

For animation and rigging, I don't know how much it has changed but I've
never liked it and I don't intend to take any Maya animation job if I can
avoid it so I'm not touching that department yet.

I don't do VFX, so I can't tell anything about it.

Martin




On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 8:25 PM, Mirko Jankovic mirkoj.anima...@gmail.com
wrote:

 Ognjen, people need to spill their soul somewhere :)
 Honestly for me everything is still fresh as the day they killed it and as
 a matter of fact as the day when AD bought it at first place...

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 1:15 PM, Ognjen Vukovic ognj...@gmail.com wrote:

  But isnt that just perpetuating the problem with circular
 logic?  Maya is bad  have to use maya because of existing user base, no
 one else uses anything else  use maya, contribute to low user base of
 alternative softwares   maya breaks  maya is bad...
 I do understand that maya is probably the  best option out of the bunch,
 its just that i dont think complaining about its bugs on a softimage
 mailing list will get you anywhere, especially with how things turned out
 in the last year when it comes to feedback from AD.

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:56 PM, adrian wyer 
 adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

as a company, our decision to move to Maya was made for us



 1. production proven

 2. available freelance pool

 3. community of users when things go wrong

 4. existing freelancers who have knowledge of both systems (Soft  Maya
 aiding in transition)

 5.third party plugins

 6.it's not 3DsMax!



 no brainer i'm afraid



 a


  --

 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Ognjen Vukovic
 *Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:44
 *To:* softimage

 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 I am quite curious as to why there are so many people
 transitioning to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't there
 discussions of numerous alternatives being available, i know each software
 has its pitfalls, and probably the main argument to this is, most jobs are
 done in maya. But do you want to end up at a job where all you can expect
 is overtime and headaches due to your tool falling apart when it matters
 the most?

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

 And after a few weeks customizing my Maya hotkeys, marking menues,
writing a few scripts (well more than a few), trying some more scripts and
plugins, reading manuals, and trying to be open minded, it's not that bad

this says it all
are you buying program to make your tools or do your job?
because there are already way better tools for making tools out there ;)

Are you buying car without car seat, wheels, engine.. and then putting them
one by one yourself? man it is s OPEN!! :)

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 1:48 PM, Martin Yara furik...@gmail.com wrote:

 I guess, we all have different type of jobs.

 In my case, I mainly work for game production. I don't do original
 contents (not yet at least), so I have to use what my clients do, and that
 is Maya and Softimage.

 And because of that I've always used Maya (not very much in the last 4
 years due to long Softimage projects). Although I'm quite used to SI -
 Maya data conversion, I'm trying to improve my Maya skills lately.

 I've done work in Max too but I really don't want to do it again. Ever.

 For modeling, Maya is getting better. And after a few weeks customizing my
 Maya hotkeys, marking menues, writing a few scripts (well more than a few),
 trying some more scripts and plugins, reading manuals, and trying to be
 open minded, it's not that bad. Not as fast and easy as Softimage but it
 has some pretty cool features.

 For animation and rigging, I don't know how much it has changed but I've
 never liked it and I don't intend to take any Maya animation job if I can
 avoid it so I'm not touching that department yet.

 I don't do VFX, so I can't tell anything about it.

 Martin




 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 8:25 PM, Mirko Jankovic mirkoj.anima...@gmail.com
  wrote:

 Ognjen, people need to spill their soul somewhere :)
 Honestly for me everything is still fresh as the day they killed it and
 as a matter of fact as the day when AD bought it at first place...

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 1:15 PM, Ognjen Vukovic ognj...@gmail.com
 wrote:

  But isnt that just perpetuating the problem with circular
 logic?  Maya is bad  have to use maya because of existing user base, no
 one else uses anything else  use maya, contribute to low user base of
 alternative softwares   maya breaks  maya is bad...
 I do understand that maya is probably the  best option out of the bunch,
 its just that i dont think complaining about its bugs on a softimage
 mailing list will get you anywhere, especially with how things turned out
 in the last year when it comes to feedback from AD.

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:56 PM, adrian wyer 
 adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote:

as a company, our decision to move to Maya was made for us



 1. production proven

 2. available freelance pool

 3. community of users when things go wrong

 4. existing freelancers who have knowledge of both systems (Soft  Maya
 aiding in transition)

 5.third party plugins

 6.it's not 3DsMax!



 no brainer i'm afraid



 a


  --

 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Ognjen Vukovic
 *Sent:* 10 September 2014 11:44
 *To:* softimage

 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 I am quite curious as to why there are so many people
 transitioning to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't there
 discussions of numerous alternatives being available, i know each software
 has its pitfalls, and probably the main argument to this is, most jobs are
 done in maya. But do you want to end up at a job where all you can expect
 is overtime and headaches due to your tool falling apart when it matters
 the most?

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Martin Yara

To be fair, in modeling at least, the last 2 Maya releases are way better
and have some nice features that Softimage doesn't.

My problem is that I still have to deal with the old crappy versions (Maya
2013, 2012). I don't know how they (clients) can still use this piece of
$#!7 !
And like I said in another thread, NEX is a must for 2013 and older
versions.

If you think about it, thank god a 3rd party like dRaster came in with NEX
or Maya would probably still be as crappy as 2013 and older versions.


Martin


On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 9:05 PM, Mirko Jankovic mirkoj.anima...@gmail.com
wrote:

  And after a few weeks customizing my Maya hotkeys, marking menues,
 writing a few scripts (well more than a few), trying some more scripts and
 plugins, reading manuals, and trying to be open minded, it's not that bad

 this says it all
 are you buying program to make your tools or do your job?
 because there are already way better tools for making tools out there ;)

 Are you buying car without car seat, wheels, engine.. and then putting them
 one by one yourself? man it is s OPEN!! :)

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Yeah, and in all those discussions what emerged is that if you care about
character animation, or even animation in general, rigging of a certain
quality, games at large, or face any given market where AD has the job pool
by the balls (which is a staggering majority in VFX and Games), then you're
stuck with Maya.

All the talk about Modo and Houdini is fine and dandy, and while I like
SESI better than AD, and The Foundry at least has proven to have a certain
interest in the VFX client base past the prestige value for marketing,
anybody thinking they are viable solutions when you have to deliver certain
types of projects has simply never worked at scale on those.

Lets be honest, for certain jobs Soft was the ONLY competitor to Maya.

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 8:43 PM, Ognjen Vukovic ognj...@gmail.com wrote:

 I am quite curious as to why there are so many people
 transitioning to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't there
 discussions of numerous alternatives being available, i know each software
 has its pitfalls, and probably the main argument to this is, most jobs are
 done in maya. But do you want to end up at a job where all you can expect
 is overtime and headaches due to your tool falling apart when it matters
 the most?

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

It does make sense from the management and education point of view to bet for 
the current industry standard.

My suggestion, learn Modo and/or specially Houdini to look at the future, 
things are changing fast.

Jordi Bares
jordiba...@gmail.com

On 10 Sep 2014, at 11:43, Ognjen Vukovic ognj...@gmail.com wrote:

 I am quite curious as to why there are so many people transitioning 
 to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't there discussions of 
 numerous alternatives being available, i know each software has its pitfalls, 
 and probably the main argument to this is, most jobs are done in maya. But do 
 you want to end up at a job where all you can expect is overtime and 
 headaches due to your tool falling apart when it matters the most?

RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Graham Bell

I accept all that, and I'm not taking anything personal at all. I'd actually 
flip that point a little and ask some to maybe do the same. :)

The point I wanted to make was, there was no agenda to this training, we 
weren't expecting to suddenly win people over. And using someone like Escape, 
provides a good context of neutrality.

G

From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of adrian wyer
Sent: 10 September 2014 11:19
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

didn't want to chime in on this thread, but can'tresist...

Graham, we know that as an autodesk representative, you have to, at least to 
some extent, tow the party line
but you have to face facts, we as Softimage users have had this situation 
forced upon us by a seemingly uncaring software behemoth

it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle out

just because the list has settled down of late (it's disappointingly like a 
ghost town in here most days) it doesn't mean the embers of our collective 
anger aren't still glowing away

occasionally, for many months to come, they will flare up

I welcome the initiative to help artists move across to maya, even seen as a 
purely financial one from the point of the company that makes the 'other' 
software
And i'll be honest, for every 10 things that i find, while stumbling blindly 
through the maya minefield, that are infuriating, there are usually a couple 
that are pleasantly surprising it's not 'all' bad!

i guess what i'm saying is keep up the initiatives, hold people's hands through 
this unwelcome transition, and in the long term, they'll appreciate it

but don't expect users not to throw abuse occasionally when you stick your head 
above the parapet!

cheers

a




attachment: winmail.dat

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Tim Crowson

That's why we're moving to Maya eventually... other than Soft, it's the 
only end-to-end option out there at the moment. I say 'eventually'... 
it's not like XSI suddenly broke or anything...


Frankly though, AD has shown that it /can /listen to users... for 
example in the really solid modeling improvements Maya has received. So 
hey ho, whaddyaknow, Maya /can/ improve! And if some of XSI's genius can 
survive by being translated into Maya, awesome! Call me naive, but I 
won't be jaded or cynical here, that's too easy. Time will tell, but 
it's evident to me that Maya stands to improve a good bit in the next 2 
years. Whether it actually does or not remains to be seen, but the 
potential is there and I find that encouraging.


I really do hope that AD takes a seriously professional look at what was 
great about Soft and applies some of that to Maya. The tech industries 
in general are so proud to always be improving things and 'making 
progress', and with the demise of XSI a massive step has been taken 
backwards in terms of technology (though certainly not in terms of 
financial gain, but that's not for lack of success on the artist's 
part). The tech isn't lost per se, but it's been de-implemented. That 
just gets me. Don't talk to me about the glorious advances of 
technology when a major player like AD is willing to can stuff this good.


-Tim


On 9/10/2014 9:05 AM, Raffaele Fragapane wrote:
Yeah, and in all those discussions what emerged is that if you care 
about character animation, or even animation in general, rigging of a 
certain quality, games at large, or face any given market where AD has 
the job pool by the balls (which is a staggering majority in VFX and 
Games), then you're stuck with Maya.


All the talk about Modo and Houdini is fine and dandy, and while I 
like SESI better than AD, and The Foundry at least has proven to have 
a certain interest in the VFX client base past the prestige value for 
marketing, anybody thinking they are viable solutions when you have to 
deliver certain types of projects has simply never worked at scale on 
those.


Lets be honest, for certain jobs Soft was the ONLY competitor to Maya.

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 8:43 PM, Ognjen Vukovic ognj...@gmail.com 
mailto:ognj...@gmail.com wrote:


I am quite curious as to why there are so many people
transitioning to maya if you all find it such a pain... Weren't
there discussions of numerous alternatives being available, i know
each software has its pitfalls, and probably the main argument to
this is, most jobs are done in maya. But do you want to end up at
a job where all you can expect is overtime and headaches due to
your tool falling apart when it matters the most?



--
Signature

*Tim Crowson
*/Lead CG Artist/

*Magnetic Dreams, Inc.
*2525 Lebanon Pike, Bldg C, Suite 101, Nashville, TN 37214
*Ph*  615.885.6801 | *Fax*  615.889.4768 | www.magneticdreams.com
tim.crow...@magneticdreams.com

/Confidentiality Notice: This email, including attachments, is 
confidential and should not be used by anyone who is not the original 
intended recipient(s). If you have received this e-mail in error please 
inform the sender and delete it from your mailbox or any other storage 
mechanism. Magnetic Dreams, Inc cannot accept liability for any 
statements made which are clearly the sender's own and not expressly 
made on behalf of Magnetic Dreams, Inc or one of its agents./

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Please, let's be honest Graham, you *have* taken certain barbs at Autodesk
personally, even when they were not directed personally at you or your
co-workers. As Adrian said:

it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle outjust because the
list has settled down of late (it's disappointingly like a ghost town in
here most days) it doesn't mean the embers of our collective anger aren't
still glowing away...but don't expect users not to throw abuse occasionally
when you stick your head above the parapet!

# Personal experience...fast forward if you wish.
Any of the ire and seething hatred that may be shining forth from my
previous emails is directly because I suffered--no exaggeration--suffered
through over 5 years of using Maya from late 2001 to early 2007. I know how
Maya is supposed to be used and its mind-set...and it still sucks. And now,
since April of this year, I have been using the current release build of
Maya after hours and weekend almost 7 days a week and I find myself dragged
back into that swirling vortex of pain and misery known as Maya. It has
caused my blood pressure to leap up over 30 points on the systolic since I
have started to use it. Maya takes so much more work to do the same things.
For example: rigging in Maya sucks donkey balls...I can eventually do the
same things in Maya, but the stupid hoops that I have to jump through are
ridiculous; the complexity needed to achieve the same results is ludicrous.
And the overall workflow of Maya has so much friction that it is
unbelievable that anyone can get any work done with it and
remain competitive.

Earlier this year, before I got into the after-hour freelance, I really
wanted to try and make a positive difference through the beta program to
improve Maya since it is the only viable option to Softimage. However,
every time I sit down to compose a list of all that is wrong with it and
how Maya can be improved, I feel my teeth grinding, I feel the
anger surging and my blood pressure soaring. In such a state, I know that
my suggestions are not going to come out in a constructive manner, so I
have withheld my feedback until such a time where I won't offend and the
effort wont give me a stroke or a heart attack.
# gripe session ended

*In short, doing a job with in 3D with Softimage, even in tight situations,
is fun because, even if it is challenging or there are curveballs thrown at
you, you can feel confident that you will be able to accomplish it with
Softimage. With Maya, not only is it a laborious chore, if something goes
wrong or the client makes changes, Maya has such a destructive linear
workflow that you can quickly find yourself f*cked. It is as arrogant
as Marie Antoinette to think that ADSK has given us an equivelant exchange.*

Please have patience with us, please don't have a flippant disregard for
our very real and pertinent points of view, and try not to take them
personally either. ADSK has injured us and and proclaiming to the list that
ADSK is did the right business thing and that you guys are doing a good job
(I'm sure you are doing your best) does not play off too well.

Sincerely,
-=Eric T.






On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 9:53 AM, Graham Bell graham.b...@autodesk.com
wrote:

 I accept all that, and I'm not taking anything personal at all. I'd
 actually flip that point a little and ask some to maybe do the same. :)

 The point I wanted to make was, there was no agenda to this training, we
 weren't expecting to suddenly win people over. And using someone like
 Escape, provides a good context of neutrality.

 G


-- 




-=T=-

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Greg Punchatz

Graham I for one am glad you did this, I would love for something like this to 
be held at Janimation.

Greg

The future is unwritten- Joe Strummer

Sent from my iPhone

 On Sep 10, 2014, at 11:01 AM, Eric Turman i.anima...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 Please, let's be honest Graham, you have taken certain barbs at Autodesk 
 personally, even when they were not directed personally at you or your 
 co-workers. As Adrian said:
 it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle outjust because the list 
 has settled down of late (it's disappointingly like a ghost town in here most 
 days) it doesn't mean the embers of our collective anger aren't still glowing 
 away...but don't expect users not to throw abuse occasionally when you stick 
 your head above the parapet! 
 
 # Personal experience...fast forward if you wish.
 Any of the ire and seething hatred that may be shining forth from my previous 
 emails is directly because I suffered--no exaggeration--suffered through over 
 5 years of using Maya from late 2001 to early 2007. I know how Maya is 
 supposed to be used and its mind-set...and it still sucks. And now, since 
 April of this year, I have been using the current release build of Maya after 
 hours and weekend almost 7 days a week and I find myself dragged back into 
 that swirling vortex of pain and misery known as Maya. It has caused my blood 
 pressure to leap up over 30 points on the systolic since I have started to 
 use it. Maya takes so much more work to do the same things. For example: 
 rigging in Maya sucks donkey balls...I can eventually do the same things in 
 Maya, but the stupid hoops that I have to jump through are ridiculous; the 
 complexity needed to achieve the same results is ludicrous. And the overall 
 workflow of Maya has so much friction that it is unbelievable that anyone can 
 get any work done with it and remain competitive. 
 
 Earlier this year, before I got into the after-hour freelance, I really 
 wanted to try and make a positive difference through the beta program to 
 improve Maya since it is the only viable option to Softimage. However, every 
 time I sit down to compose a list of all that is wrong with it and how Maya 
 can be improved, I feel my teeth grinding, I feel the anger surging and my 
 blood pressure soaring. In such a state, I know that my suggestions are not 
 going to come out in a constructive manner, so I have withheld my feedback 
 until such a time where I won't offend and the effort wont give me a stroke 
 or a heart attack.
 # gripe session ended
 
 In short, doing a job with in 3D with Softimage, even in tight situations, is 
 fun because, even if it is challenging or there are curveballs thrown at you, 
 you can feel confident that you will be able to accomplish it with Softimage. 
 With Maya, not only is it a laborious chore, if something goes wrong or the 
 client makes changes, Maya has such a destructive linear workflow that you 
 can quickly find yourself f*cked. It is as arrogant as Marie Antoinette to 
 think that ADSK has given us an equivelant exchange.
 
 Please have patience with us, please don't have a flippant disregard for our 
 very real and pertinent points of view, and try not to take them personally 
 either. ADSK has injured us and and proclaiming to the list that ADSK is did 
 the right business thing and that you guys are doing a good job (I'm sure you 
 are doing your best) does not play off too well.
 
 Sincerely,
 -=Eric T.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 9:53 AM, Graham Bell graham.b...@autodesk.com 
 wrote:
 I accept all that, and I'm not taking anything personal at all. I'd actually 
 flip that point a little and ask some to maybe do the same. :)
 
 The point I wanted to make was, there was no agenda to this training, we 
 weren't expecting to suddenly win people over. And using someone like 
 Escape, provides a good context of neutrality.
 
 G
 
 
 -- 
 
 
 
 
 -=T=-

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Right Greg, it is a good thing for ADKS to reach out; they *need* to. Just
because the review wasn't glowing (it wasn't particularly negative either)
and that the list did not grab onto the positive parts doesn't mean you
guys aren't doing a good job. I know Maya will never be Softimage...I would
not want it to be, you'd probably end up with the shortcomings of both
packages that way.  :P

Keep at the outreach and, above all, seriously listen and seek to
understand what worked for Soft users in the Softimage workflow.

Jill  Maurice...you have both been very patient and helpful.

Graham, I apologize for calling you out on the personal bit, it was
uncalled for.

Cheers,
-=Eric T.


On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:41 PM, Greg Punchatz g...@janimation.com wrote:

 Graham I for one am glad you did this, I would love for something like
 this to be held at Janimation.

 Greg

 The future is unwritten- Joe Strummer

 Sent from my iPhone

 On Sep 10, 2014, at 11:01 AM, Eric Turman i.anima...@gmail.com wrote:

 Please, let's be honest Graham, you *have* taken certain barbs at
 Autodesk personally, even when they were not directed personally at you or
 your co-workers. As Adrian said:

 it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle outjust because the
 list has settled down of late (it's disappointingly like a ghost town in
 here most days) it doesn't mean the embers of our collective anger aren't
 still glowing away...but don't expect users not to throw abuse
 occasionally when you stick your head above the parapet!

 # Personal experience...fast forward if you wish.
 Any of the ire and seething hatred that may be shining forth from my
 previous emails is directly because I suffered--no exaggeration--suffered
 through over 5 years of using Maya from late 2001 to early 2007. I know how
 Maya is supposed to be used and its mind-set...and it still sucks. And now,
 since April of this year, I have been using the current release build of
 Maya after hours and weekend almost 7 days a week and I find myself dragged
 back into that swirling vortex of pain and misery known as Maya. It has
 caused my blood pressure to leap up over 30 points on the systolic since I
 have started to use it. Maya takes so much more work to do the same things.
 For example: rigging in Maya sucks donkey balls...I can eventually do the
 same things in Maya, but the stupid hoops that I have to jump through are
 ridiculous; the complexity needed to achieve the same results is ludicrous.
 And the overall workflow of Maya has so much friction that it is
 unbelievable that anyone can get any work done with it and
 remain competitive.

 Earlier this year, before I got into the after-hour freelance, I really
 wanted to try and make a positive difference through the beta program to
 improve Maya since it is the only viable option to Softimage. However,
 every time I sit down to compose a list of all that is wrong with it and
 how Maya can be improved, I feel my teeth grinding, I feel the
 anger surging and my blood pressure soaring. In such a state, I know that
 my suggestions are not going to come out in a constructive manner, so I
 have withheld my feedback until such a time where I won't offend and the
 effort wont give me a stroke or a heart attack.
 # gripe session ended

 *In short, doing a job with in 3D with Softimage, even in tight
 situations, is fun because, even if it is challenging or there are
 curveballs thrown at you, you can feel confident that you will be able to
 accomplish it with Softimage. With Maya, not only is it a laborious chore,
 if something goes wrong or the client makes changes, Maya has such a
 destructive linear workflow that you can quickly find yourself f*cked. It
 is as arrogant as Marie Antoinette to think that ADSK has given us an
 equivelant exchange.*

 Please have patience with us, please don't have a flippant disregard for
 our very real and pertinent points of view, and try not to take them
 personally either. ADSK has injured us and and proclaiming to the list that
 ADSK is did the right business thing and that you guys are doing a good job
 (I'm sure you are doing your best) does not play off too well.

 Sincerely,
 -=Eric T.






 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 9:53 AM, Graham Bell graham.b...@autodesk.com
 wrote:

 I accept all that, and I'm not taking anything personal at all. I'd
 actually flip that point a little and ask some to maybe do the same. :)

 The point I wanted to make was, there was no agenda to this training, we
 weren't expecting to suddenly win people over. And using someone like
 Escape, provides a good context of neutrality.

 G


 --




 -=T=-




-- 




-=T=-

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

I keep thinking about this sentence…

what do they mean by Maya being entirely open?

Do they mean open source software? clearly that is not the case.

Do they mean customisable? because this is not open in my book.

Do they mean open architecture? Because although you can add components 
(plugins) you can't substitute the pre-existing ones (unless I am wrong here)


So… what do Autodesk mean by saying it is designed to be entirely open??


And by the way… why is the Escape studio page now down
http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/

:-///


Jordi Bares
jordiba...@gmail.com

On 9 Sep 2014, at 21:41, Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:

 Maya does not have the eloquence or the innovative interface [which Softmage 
 has] 
 and is overly complex,  but it has been designed to be entirely open.

RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Did Autodesk say that, or somebody else who just happened to be part of the 
show?

When referencing Maya, I've never heard anybody from Autodesk ever say it was 
open.  I've only heard such a statement from users.  Not saying Autodesk hasn't 
said such a thing, just saying I have never heard them say it if they have.


Matt





From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Jordi Bares
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 1:36 PM
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

I keep thinking about this sentence...

what do they mean by Maya being entirely open?

Do they mean open source software? clearly that is not the case.

Do they mean customisable? because this is not open in my book.

Do they mean open architecture? Because although you can add components 
(plugins) you can't substitute the pre-existing ones (unless I am wrong here)


So... what do Autodesk mean by saying it is designed to be entirely open??


And by the way... why is the Escape studio page now down
http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/

:-///


Jordi Bares
jordiba...@gmail.commailto:jordiba...@gmail.com

On 9 Sep 2014, at 21:41, Jason S 
jasonsta...@gmail.commailto:jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:


Maya does not have the eloquence or the innovative interface [which Softmage 
has]
and is overly complex,  but it has been designed to be entirely open.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Cristobal Infante

I was one of the attendees of this intensive 5 days Maya training. Even
though the company I work will probably take the Maya route, nobody forced
me to go, however it was a NO BRAINER to take on this offer.

I have to give a lot of credit to Graham and his team for putting this
together, since it has given me an invaluable insight into Maya. Of course
it hasn't made an expert but now I can open Maya confidently model an
asset and tinker around with the nodes. Most
importantly we can now make an
informed decision in regards to Maya (which I think is crucial).

It's important to note that the training was given by Mark, who was very
neutral and clear by telling us when something was frankly shit, but also
showing us the alternative ways. Maya is a software
ongoing a massive restructuring so it's
necessary to understand that when diving into certain modules (modeling for
example).

Compared to xsi, I've found Maya mainly lacking on the organisational side.
No models, no partitions, No groups (sets but the all live together), No
easy overrides, it's made me wonder how the hell do Maya users organise
they scene (or maybe they just don't ). This is probably the biggest
challenge and it will probably depend on each studio.

I personally believe that people who are able to stick with it will get the
benefits further down the line when bifrost does become
the underlying cog underneath Maya.

Overall the experience was very positive and I would definitely recommend
it to any company thinking of sending their employees.




On Wednesday, 10 September 2014, Eric Turman i.anima...@gmail.com wrote:

 Right Greg, it is a good thing for ADKS to reach out; they *need* to. Just
 because the review wasn't glowing (it wasn't particularly negative either)
 and that the list did not grab onto the positive parts doesn't mean you
 guys aren't doing a good job. I know Maya will never be Softimage...I would
 not want it to be, you'd probably end up with the shortcomings of both
 packages that way.  :P

 Keep at the outreach and, above all, seriously listen and seek to
 understand what worked for Soft users in the Softimage workflow.

 Jill  Maurice...you have both been very patient and helpful.

 Graham, I apologize for calling you out on the personal bit, it was
 uncalled for.

 Cheers,
 -=Eric T.


 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 12:41 PM, Greg Punchatz g...@janimation.com
 javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','g...@janimation.com'); wrote:

 Graham I for one am glad you did this, I would love for something like
 this to be held at Janimation.

 Greg

 The future is unwritten- Joe Strummer

 Sent from my iPhone

 On Sep 10, 2014, at 11:01 AM, Eric Turman i.anima...@gmail.com
 javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','i.anima...@gmail.com'); wrote:

 Please, let's be honest Graham, you *have* taken certain barbs at
 Autodesk personally, even when they were not directed personally at you or
 your co-workers. As Adrian said:

 it will take YEARS for the resentment to fizzle outjust because the
 list has settled down of late (it's disappointingly like a ghost town in
 here most days) it doesn't mean the embers of our collective anger aren't
 still glowing away...but don't expect users not to throw abuse
 occasionally when you stick your head above the parapet!

 # Personal experience...fast forward if you wish.
 Any of the ire and seething hatred that may be shining forth from my
 previous emails is directly because I suffered--no exaggeration--suffered
 through over 5 years of using Maya from late 2001 to early 2007. I know how
 Maya is supposed to be used and its mind-set...and it still sucks. And now,
 since April of this year, I have been using the current release build of
 Maya after hours and weekend almost 7 days a week and I find myself dragged
 back into that swirling vortex of pain and misery known as Maya. It has
 caused my blood pressure to leap up over 30 points on the systolic since I
 have started to use it. Maya takes so much more work to do the same things.
 For example: rigging in Maya sucks donkey balls...I can eventually do the
 same things in Maya, but the stupid hoops that I have to jump through are
 ridiculous; the complexity needed to achieve the same results is ludicrous.
 And the overall workflow of Maya has so much friction that it is
 unbelievable that anyone can get any work done with it and
 remain competitive.

 Earlier this year, before I got into the after-hour freelance, I really
 wanted to try and make a positive difference through the beta program to
 improve Maya since it is the only viable option to Softimage. However,
 every time I sit down to compose a list of all that is wrong with it and
 how Maya can be improved, I feel my teeth grinding, I feel the
 anger surging and my blood pressure soaring. In such a state, I know that
 my suggestions are not going to come out in a constructive manner, so I
 have withheld my feedback until such a time where I won't offend and the
 effort wont give me a stroke or a heart

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Jason S


  
  

  Very deep SDK with almost everything accessible, can add or
  replace bits to any part  
  
  very very detailed command log that logs even the littlest things
  you do...
  
  
  On 09/10/14 16:46, Matt Lind wrote:


  
  
  
  
Did
Autodesk say that, or somebody else who just happened to be
part of the show?

When
referencing Maya, Ive never heard anybody from Autodesk
ever say it was open. Ive only heard such a statement from
users. Not saying Autodesk hasnt said such a thing, just
saying I have never heard them say it if they have.


Matt






  
From:
softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On
  Behalf Of Jordi Bares
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 1:36 PM
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @
Escape Studios
  



  I keep thinking about this sentence


  


  what do they mean by Maya being "entirely
open"?


  


  Do they mean open source software?
clearly that is not the case.


  


  Do they mean customisable? because this
is not open in my book.


  


  Do they mean open architecture? Because
although you can add components (plugins) you can't
substitute the pre-existing ones (unless I am wrong here)


  


  


  So what do Autodesk mean by saying it is
"designed to be entirely open"??


  


  


  And by the way why is the Escape studio
page now down


  http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/


  


  :-///


  



  

  Jordi
  Bares


  jordiba...@gmail.com

  



  
On 9 Sep 2014, at 21:41, Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com
  wrote:
  
  


  Maya
  does not have the eloquence or the innovative interface[which
  Softmage has]
  andis
overly complex,but it has been
designed to be entirely open.

RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

I thought the COM/MFC SDK was exposed but users revolted and insisted on having 
a C++ API? (hence the black box showing up around v3).


Matt




-Original Message-
From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Luc-Eric Rousseau
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 1:56 PM
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

well the Maya API is called OpenMaya, so there's that.
Everything is exposed through the API, it's not a blackbox like XSI, where you 
can never get to the real scene graph, menus, toolbars.
Although we kind thought that we would expose it all as a giant COM and MFC SDK 
in the beginning.

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 4:46 PM, Matt Lind ml...@carbinestudios.com wrote:
 Did Autodesk say that, or somebody else who just happened to be part 
 of the show?

 When referencing Maya, I’ve never heard anybody from Autodesk ever say 
 it was open.  I’ve only heard such a statement from users.  Not saying 
 Autodesk hasn’t said such a thing, just saying I have never heard them 
 say it if they have.


 From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
 Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

 I keep thinking about this sentence…

 what do they mean by Maya being entirely open?

 Do they mean open source software? clearly that is not the case.

 Do they mean customisable? because this is not open in my book.



 Do they mean open architecture? Because although you can add 
 components
 (plugins) you can't substitute the pre-existing ones (unless I am 
 wrong
 here)


 So… what do Autodesk mean by saying it is designed to be entirely open??





 And by the way… why is the Escape studio page now down

 http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-stu
 dios/



 :-///

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Paulo Cesar Duarte

Yeah, very strange the Escape Studios page down.
http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/

I agree with Jordi, in how is  this open concept? When I think in open
software, came in my mind Blender open source code, and Houdini in how
deep you can go in customizations and data access.

2014-09-10 17:56 GMT-03:00 Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com:


 Very deep SDK with almost everything accessible, can add or replace bits
 to any part 

 very very detailed command log that logs even the littlest things you do...



 On 09/10/14 16:46, Matt Lind wrote:

  Did Autodesk say that, or somebody else who just happened to be part of
 the show?



 When referencing Maya, I’ve never heard anybody from Autodesk ever say it
 was open.  I’ve only heard such a statement from users.  Not saying
 Autodesk hasn’t said such a thing, just saying I have never heard them say
 it if they have.





 Matt











 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [
 mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Jordi Bares
 *Sent:* Wednesday, September 10, 2014 1:36 PM
 *To:* softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 I keep thinking about this sentence…



 what do they mean by Maya being entirely open?



 Do they mean open source software? clearly that is not the case.



 Do they mean customisable? because this is not open in my book.



 Do they mean open architecture? Because although you can add components
 (plugins) you can't substitute the pre-existing ones (unless I am wrong
 here)





 So… what do Autodesk mean by saying it is designed to be entirely open??





 And by the way… why is the Escape studio page now down

 http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/



 :-///





 Jordi Bares

 jordiba...@gmail.com



 On 9 Sep 2014, at 21:41, Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:



  Maya does not have the eloquence or the innovative interface [which
 Softmage has]
 and *is overly complex**,  but it has been designed to be entirely open. *







-- 
paulo-duarte.com

RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

 very very detailed command log that logs even the littlest things you do...

That's not always a good thing as logging takes time and slows down execution 
heavily.  You don't want performance wasted on mundane or looped items.  That's 
why I like the softimage scripting object model as you can bypass all that 
overhead and spit out information to the log only if you're interested.  Makes 
it easier to troubleshoot too as there's less noise.


Matt



From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Jason S
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 1:56 PM
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios


Very deep SDK with almost everything accessible, can add or replace bits to any 
part 

very very detailed command log that logs even the littlest things you do...


On 09/10/14 16:46, Matt Lind wrote:
Did Autodesk say that, or somebody else who just happened to be part of the 
show?

When referencing Maya, I've never heard anybody from Autodesk ever say it was 
open.  I've only heard such a statement from users.  Not saying Autodesk hasn't 
said such a thing, just saying I have never heard them say it if they have.


Matt





From: 
softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
 [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Jordi Bares
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 1:36 PM
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

I keep thinking about this sentence...

what do they mean by Maya being entirely open?

Do they mean open source software? clearly that is not the case.

Do they mean customisable? because this is not open in my book.

Do they mean open architecture? Because although you can add components 
(plugins) you can't substitute the pre-existing ones (unless I am wrong here)


So... what do Autodesk mean by saying it is designed to be entirely open??


And by the way... why is the Escape studio page now down
http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/

:-///


Jordi Bares
jordiba...@gmail.commailto:jordiba...@gmail.com

On 9 Sep 2014, at 21:41, Jason S 
jasonsta...@gmail.commailto:jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:



Maya does not have the eloquence or the innovative interface [which Softmage 
has]
and is overly complex,  but it has been designed to be entirely open.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

It was mentioned numerous times so far during killing period of SI... end
user and artist DON'T care about open or not, just need tools that work for
their needs.
They don't need tools to make tools but tools to get the job done.

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 11:02 PM, Matt Lind ml...@carbinestudios.com
wrote:

 I thought the COM/MFC SDK was exposed but users revolted and insisted on
 having a C++ API? (hence the black box showing up around v3).


 Matt




 -Original Message-
 From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Luc-Eric Rousseau
 Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 1:56 PM
 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

 well the Maya API is called OpenMaya, so there's that.
 Everything is exposed through the API, it's not a blackbox like XSI, where
 you can never get to the real scene graph, menus, toolbars.
 Although we kind thought that we would expose it all as a giant COM and
 MFC SDK in the beginning.

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 4:46 PM, Matt Lind ml...@carbinestudios.com
 wrote:
  Did Autodesk say that, or somebody else who just happened to be part
  of the show?
 
  When referencing Maya, I’ve never heard anybody from Autodesk ever say
  it was open.  I’ve only heard such a statement from users.  Not saying
  Autodesk hasn’t said such a thing, just saying I have never heard them
  say it if they have.
 
 
  From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
  Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios
 
  I keep thinking about this sentence…
 
  what do they mean by Maya being entirely open?
 
  Do they mean open source software? clearly that is not the case.
 
  Do they mean customisable? because this is not open in my book.
 
 
 
  Do they mean open architecture? Because although you can add
  components
  (plugins) you can't substitute the pre-existing ones (unless I am
  wrong
  here)
 
 
  So… what do Autodesk mean by saying it is designed to be entirely
 open??
 
 
 
 
 
  And by the way… why is the Escape studio page now down
 
  http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-stu
  dios/
 
 
 
  :-///

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

To be fair, the super nitty gritty stuff in Maya requires you to enable
echo all commands so by default it displays about as much noise as
Softimage.

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 4:05 PM, Matt Lind ml...@carbinestudios.com wrote:

  very very detailed command log that logs even the littlest things you
 do...



 That’s not always a good thing as logging takes time and slows down
 execution heavily.  You don’t want performance wasted on mundane or looped
 items.  That’s why I like the softimage scripting object model as you can
 bypass all that overhead and spit out information to the log only if you’re
 interested.  Makes it easier to troubleshoot too as there’s less noise.





 Matt







 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Jason S
 *Sent:* Wednesday, September 10, 2014 1:56 PM

 *To:* softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios




 Very deep SDK with almost everything accessible, can add or replace bits
 to any part 

 very very detailed command log that logs even the littlest things you do...


 On 09/10/14 16:46, Matt Lind wrote:

 Did Autodesk say that, or somebody else who just happened to be part of
 the show?



 When referencing Maya, I’ve never heard anybody from Autodesk ever say it
 was open.  I’ve only heard such a statement from users.  Not saying
 Autodesk hasn’t said such a thing, just saying I have never heard them say
 it if they have.





 Matt











 *From:* softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [
 mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com
 softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Jordi Bares
 *Sent:* Wednesday, September 10, 2014 1:36 PM
 *To:* softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 *Subject:* Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios



 I keep thinking about this sentence…



 what do they mean by Maya being entirely open?



 Do they mean open source software? clearly that is not the case.



 Do they mean customisable? because this is not open in my book.



 Do they mean open architecture? Because although you can add components
 (plugins) you can't substitute the pre-existing ones (unless I am wrong
 here)





 So… what do Autodesk mean by saying it is designed to be entirely open??





 And by the way… why is the Escape studio page now down

 http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/



 :-///





 Jordi Bares

 jordiba...@gmail.com



 On 9 Sep 2014, at 21:41, Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:




 Maya does not have the eloquence or the innovative interface [which
 Softmage has]
 and *is overly complex**,  but it has been designed to be entirely open. *








-- 




-=T=-

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Sebastien Sterling

I think this gesture is cute, but insipid. Are you planning on giving a
weeks worth refresher course to EVERYONE ? or do you think everyone can
come around to Maya in one week?

This is once again about trying to sweeten the larger studios that might
have had an affinity with XSI, looks good as a PR story, fundamentally yet
another way of throwing the blame back on the user, instead of owning up to
Maya's inherent weaknesses and trying to fix them. Yet again OUR fault for
just not GETTING the Maya philosophy.

You seem to be forgetting, no one uses maya out of the box.

It would be nice to see the software grow to reflect peoples needs, instead
of making excuses about why Maya skinning needs to be shit, or why Maya
doesn't need a pass editor, or why the simple concept of show/hide polygons
eludes the dev's to this day ? i mean anyone have any imminent use for a
half baked Flip solver ? I mean I'm sure it's a nice half baked flip
solver...


On 10 September 2014 21:36, Jordi Bares jordiba...@gmail.com wrote:

 I keep thinking about this sentence…

 what do they mean by Maya being entirely open?

 Do they mean open source software? clearly that is not the case.

 Do they mean customisable? because this is not open in my book.

 Do they mean open architecture? Because although you can add components
 (plugins) you can't substitute the pre-existing ones (unless I am wrong
 here)


 So… what do Autodesk mean by saying it is designed to be entirely open??


 And by the way… why is the Escape studio page now down
 http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/

 :-///


 Jordi Bares
 jordiba...@gmail.com

 On 9 Sep 2014, at 21:41, Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:

 Maya does not have the eloquence or the innovative interface [which
 Softmage has]
 and *is overly complex**,  **but it has been designed to be entirely
 open. *

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

I agree Maya API is the strong point, very well documented and superior to 
anything out there (at least that I know) but that is not exclusive realm of 
Maya, you can develop plugins for pretty much any package and although more 
limiting APIs the message that seems to come across is that Maya is open 
(meaning customisable), the rest is not.. which is clearly not the case.

Hope it makes sense

Jordi Bares
jordiba...@gmail.com

On 10 Sep 2014, at 21:56, Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:

 
 Very deep SDK with almost everything accessible, can add or replace bits to 
 any part  
 
 very very detailed command log that logs even the littlest things you do...
 
 
 On 09/10/14 16:46, Matt Lind wrote:
 Did Autodesk say that, or somebody else who just happened to be part of the 
 show?
  
 When referencing Maya, I’ve never heard anybody from Autodesk ever say it 
 was open.  I’ve only heard such a statement from users.  Not saying Autodesk 
 hasn’t said such a thing, just saying I have never heard them say it if they 
 have.
  
  
 Matt
  
  
  
  
  
 From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
 [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Jordi Bares
 Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 1:36 PM
 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
 Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios
  
 I keep thinking about this sentence…
  
 what do they mean by Maya being entirely open?
  
 Do they mean open source software? clearly that is not the case.
  
 Do they mean customisable? because this is not open in my book.
  
 Do they mean open architecture? Because although you can add components 
 (plugins) you can't substitute the pre-existing ones (unless I am wrong here)
  
  
 So… what do Autodesk mean by saying it is designed to be entirely open??
  
  
 And by the way… why is the Escape studio page now down
 http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/
  
 :-///
  
  
 Jordi Bares
 jordiba...@gmail.com
  
 On 9 Sep 2014, at 21:41, Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:
 
 
 Maya does not have the eloquence or the innovative interface [which Softmage 
 has] 
 and is overly complex,  but it has been designed to be entirely open.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Jason S


  
  
I guess it's good our software of
  choice can't be threatened anymore.
  
  On 09/10/14 17:58, Luc-Eric Rousseau wrote:


  Not everything that's said is a threat to your
software of choice.  That everything in Maya is accessible and
changeable though scripting or the API is not meaningless or a
misused of the word Open.
  On Sep 10, 2014 5:42 PM, "Jordi Bares"
jordiba...@gmail.com
wrote:

  

  
On 10 Sep 2014, at 22:36, Matt Lind ml...@carbinestudios.com
  wrote:


  

  “Open”
  is open to interpretation as you pointed out. 
  However, it is not a comparative word as you
  interpreted it to be.  To say the Maya SDK is
  open does not imply the competition isn’t
  open.

  



Exactly my point.


  

  
   
  If
  you want to say Autodesk is trying to send the
  message Maya is the only option in town, then
  you have a point, but that’s not surprising as
  that’s the picture most corporate marketing
  campaigns try to paint regardless of product
  or industry.  Whether they do it in good taste
  is another matter.

  



All I want to say is that saying "Open" does not
  seem to have any meaning.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

 Not everything that's said is a threat to your software of choice. 
 
Our software of choice was killed on March.
 That everything in Maya is accessible and changeable though scripting or the 
 API is not meaningless or a misused of the word Open.
 
No one said being changeable via API or scripting was meaningless, jus the 
using Open in such a context.

jb



 On Sep 10, 2014 5:42 PM, Jordi Bares jordiba...@gmail.com wrote:
 On 10 Sep 2014, at 22:36, Matt Lind ml...@carbinestudios.com wrote:
 
 “Open” is open to interpretation as you pointed out.  However, it is not a 
 comparative word as you interpreted it to be.  To say the Maya SDK is open 
 does not imply the competition isn’t open.
 
 Exactly my point.
 
  
 If you want to say Autodesk is trying to send the message Maya is the only 
 option in town, then you have a point, but that’s not surprising as that’s 
 the picture most corporate marketing campaigns try to paint regardless of 
 product or industry.  Whether they do it in good taste is another matter.
 
 All I want to say is that saying Open does not seem to have any meaning.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Talk about semantics escalating :)

The word open is like saying professional grade, or robust, or a number of
other things that are used because, in context, they fit.

Maya offered more and sooner than everybody else things like listeners, a
robust socket insertion point, an entry point into the main loop and
control over things like it's main event loop sleep, process priority,
exposed the graph to a fairly granular level, and offered early on what 16
years ago was a fairly modern dev model for all kind of nodes in a fashion
similar to what the developers themselves would have access to.

That gap has closed considerably, and in some cases Maya has been surpassed
in open-ness, or at least in what you can comfortably do (viewport work
in Maya is a gigantic pain in the arse in example for certain things, and
contexts are weak, but that's architectural, not blackboxing), but all in
all, if you decide to be objective rather than argumentative about it, it
is the one DCC app out there with the most of its guts exposed to the open
air.

Softimage had made it to a close second and here and there even surpassed
it, and in general while less open, as things tend to be better organized
but abstracted away from the guts, also a helluva lot more pleasurable to
work with (at least on windows). Houdini is a well known disgrace with the
Boost dependencies and with the HDK being largely uncharted and
unexploited, and the wrappers for it being more recent and not much better
than a reshuffle.
Max is single platform and incomprehensible to humans, and the rest of the
apps out there barely cover half the stretch of tasks Maya, Soft and
Houdini can tackle.

All in all, while at (frequent) times being just as pleasant as dipping
your balls in hot tar, Maya is the more open of the lot and has been for
a while, because the abstractions are very thin, and access has massive
surface with a lot of entry points.

For what most people think of when the word open it's used in context it
can lay an honest claim to being very open.
It can't quite say it's intuitive, or pleasant, or well organized, or even
fully featured in some regards, and it's the single most painful software
out there to do prototyping work in for a lot of stuff, but it certainly
isn't closed.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Luc-Eric Rousseau

The definition of the word Open will just morph again until it fits
whatever argument needs to be win.  The opinion that Open necessarily
means open source is a neologism.

There isn't just an API that matches 1:1 internals,   the Maya UI is
defined directly in MEL and it ships with 4 millions lines of source
code in mel and python, distributed in 25,000 MEL and 4000 pythons
files.  This isn't just about being able to write plug-ins, back in
1990s it was a whole different approach to writing software.


On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 7:13 PM, Raffaele Fragapane
raffsxsil...@googlemail.com wrote:
 Talk about semantics escalating :)

 The word open is like saying professional grade, or robust, or a number of
 other things that are used because, in context, they fit.

 Maya offered more and sooner than everybody else things like listeners, a
 robust socket insertion point, an entry point into the main loop and control
 over things like it's main event loop sleep, process priority, exposed the
 graph to a fairly granular level, and offered early on what 16 years ago was
 a fairly modern dev model for all kind of nodes in a fashion similar to what
 the developers themselves would have access to.

 That gap has closed considerably, and in some cases Maya has been surpassed
 in open-ness, or at least in what you can comfortably do (viewport work in
 Maya is a gigantic pain in the arse in example for certain things, and
 contexts are weak, but that's architectural, not blackboxing), but all in
 all, if you decide to be objective rather than argumentative about it, it is
 the one DCC app out there with the most of its guts exposed to the open air.

 Softimage had made it to a close second and here and there even surpassed
 it, and in general while less open, as things tend to be better organized
 but abstracted away from the guts, also a helluva lot more pleasurable to
 work with (at least on windows). Houdini is a well known disgrace with the
 Boost dependencies and with the HDK being largely uncharted and unexploited,
 and the wrappers for it being more recent and not much better than a
 reshuffle.
 Max is single platform and incomprehensible to humans, and the rest of the
 apps out there barely cover half the stretch of tasks Maya, Soft and Houdini
 can tackle.

 All in all, while at (frequent) times being just as pleasant as dipping your
 balls in hot tar, Maya is the more open of the lot and has been for a
 while, because the abstractions are very thin, and access has massive
 surface with a lot of entry points.

 For what most people think of when the word open it's used in context it can
 lay an honest claim to being very open.
 It can't quite say it's intuitive, or pleasant, or well organized, or even
 fully featured in some regards, and it's the single most painful software
 out there to do prototyping work in for a lot of stuff, but it certainly
 isn't closed.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

And all of that doesn't mean much to artist when still after decades of
existence all that power wasn't used to provide streamlined and organised
workflow and tool that simply do its job
without pulling hair, rising blood pressure and shortening life by
significant amount

On Thu, Sep 11, 2014 at 1:33 AM, Luc-Eric Rousseau luceri...@gmail.com
wrote:

 The definition of the word Open will just morph again until it fits
 whatever argument needs to be win.  The opinion that Open necessarily
 means open source is a neologism.

 There isn't just an API that matches 1:1 internals,   the Maya UI is
 defined directly in MEL and it ships with 4 millions lines of source
 code in mel and python, distributed in 25,000 MEL and 4000 pythons
 files.  This isn't just about being able to write plug-ins, back in
 1990s it was a whole different approach to writing software.


 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 7:13 PM, Raffaele Fragapane
 raffsxsil...@googlemail.com wrote:
  Talk about semantics escalating :)
 
  The word open is like saying professional grade, or robust, or a number
 of
  other things that are used because, in context, they fit.
 
  Maya offered more and sooner than everybody else things like listeners, a
  robust socket insertion point, an entry point into the main loop and
 control
  over things like it's main event loop sleep, process priority, exposed
 the
  graph to a fairly granular level, and offered early on what 16 years ago
 was
  a fairly modern dev model for all kind of nodes in a fashion similar to
 what
  the developers themselves would have access to.
 
  That gap has closed considerably, and in some cases Maya has been
 surpassed
  in open-ness, or at least in what you can comfortably do (viewport
 work in
  Maya is a gigantic pain in the arse in example for certain things, and
  contexts are weak, but that's architectural, not blackboxing), but all in
  all, if you decide to be objective rather than argumentative about it,
 it is
  the one DCC app out there with the most of its guts exposed to the open
 air.
 
  Softimage had made it to a close second and here and there even surpassed
  it, and in general while less open, as things tend to be better
 organized
  but abstracted away from the guts, also a helluva lot more pleasurable to
  work with (at least on windows). Houdini is a well known disgrace with
 the
  Boost dependencies and with the HDK being largely uncharted and
 unexploited,
  and the wrappers for it being more recent and not much better than a
  reshuffle.
  Max is single platform and incomprehensible to humans, and the rest of
 the
  apps out there barely cover half the stretch of tasks Maya, Soft and
 Houdini
  can tackle.
 
  All in all, while at (frequent) times being just as pleasant as dipping
 your
  balls in hot tar, Maya is the more open of the lot and has been for a
  while, because the abstractions are very thin, and access has massive
  surface with a lot of entry points.
 
  For what most people think of when the word open it's used in context it
 can
  lay an honest claim to being very open.
  It can't quite say it's intuitive, or pleasant, or well organized, or
 even
  fully featured in some regards, and it's the single most painful software
  out there to do prototyping work in for a lot of stuff, but it certainly
  isn't closed.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

The fact the guts are exposed and available, and relatively robust, doesn't
mean they are pretty, make much sense, or can be combined into a
streamlined user experience.
Maya is clunky and counter-intuitive down to its core and in parts that no
amount of plugins will fix :p

From the simplest things (alt wasted on navigation enormously reducing
piano playing), to the more all-comprehensive ones (selection being a
gigantic joke across the board for both users and 3rd party developers).

Some stuff it was doing OK or better than most before, ironically, is
getting even better, and some stuff it was a misery to use before has
become usable or at times even quite good.
Some things though, some very, very fundamental things, will always be a
pain in the arse, because that's just the way it is, and the way hundreds
of thousands of people are used to suffer through it day and day out, and
most will pick the pain they know over learning something new.

On Thu, Sep 11, 2014 at 9:46 AM, Mirko Jankovic mirkoj.anima...@gmail.com
wrote:

 And all of that doesn't mean much to artist when still after decades of
 existence all that power wasn't used to provide streamlined and organised
 workflow and tool that simply do its job
 without pulling hair, rising blood pressure and shortening life by
 significant amount

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Cesar Saez

And there we go again...

Don't you guys get bored of having the same conversation over and over
again?

RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Would you rather have the other one about what Softimage can do that Maya 
can’t?  ;-)


Matt



From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Cesar Saez
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 5:06 PM
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

And there we go again...

Don't you guys get bored of having the same conversation over and over again?

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

I don't know, the open thing has been a running theme of Maya for years but
hadn't been discussed very often here, and not everybody has a clear
perspective on it or even what it entails for the end user even if they
don't code.

I don't find the thread completely useless to be honest. Someone will
probably have got something out of it.
On 11 Sep 2014 10:07, Cesar Saez cesa...@gmail.com wrote:

 And there we go again...

 Don't you guys get bored of having the same conversation over and over
 again?

RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

We could start one about open sourcing Softimage, that horse is still
twitching I reckon.

RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

I think people would run the other way if they saw the COM OLE core fully 
exposed.


Matt



From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Raffaele Fragapane
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 5:22 PM
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios


We could start one about open sourcing Softimage, that horse is still twitching 
I reckon.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Eric Thivierge

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 8:21 PM, Raffaele Fragapane 
raffsxsil...@googlemail.com wrote:

 We could start one about open sourcing Softimage, that horse is still
 twitching I reckon.


No we need one about AD selling Softimage to another company...  that one
is always interesting (read, not interesting and beaten to death).


Eric Thivierge
http://www.ethivierge.com

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Bradley Gabe

Aw.. don't make the thread self aware. It was just getting good! I still
have popcorn left. :-(

I might not be contributing anymore, but the rest of you are still keeping
things interesting.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

You underestimate the Internets. Go ahead, start those three threads, you
will still get plenty bites :)
On 11 Sep 2014 11:24, Bradley Gabe witha...@gmail.com wrote:


 Aw.. don't make the thread self aware. It was just getting good! I still
 have popcorn left. :-(

 I might not be contributing anymore, but the rest of you are still keeping
 things interesting.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Eric Thivierge

Is this a good time to bring up Hitler?


Eric Thivierge
http://www.ethivierge.com

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 9:23 PM, Bradley Gabe witha...@gmail.com wrote:


 Aw.. don't make the thread self aware. It was just getting good! I still
 have popcorn left. :-(

 I might not be contributing anymore, but the rest of you are still keeping
 things interesting.

RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Don’t go there.

From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Eric Thivierge
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2014 6:30 PM
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Is this a good time to bring up Hitler?

Eric Thivierge
http://www.ethivierge.com

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 9:23 PM, Bradley Gabe 
witha...@gmail.commailto:witha...@gmail.com wrote:

Aw.. don't make the thread self aware. It was just getting good! I still have 
popcorn left. :-(

I might not be contributing anymore, but the rest of you are still keeping 
things interesting.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

You can't do that, Eric. Godwyn's law should be left to emerge naturally,
not clumsily pushed like this.
Shame on you!

On Thu, Sep 11, 2014 at 11:29 AM, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@gmail.com
wrote:

 Is this a good time to bring up Hitler?

 
 Eric Thivierge
 http://www.ethivierge.com

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 9:23 PM, Bradley Gabe witha...@gmail.com wrote:


 Aw.. don't make the thread self aware. It was just getting good! I still
 have popcorn left. :-(

 I might not be contributing anymore, but the rest of you are still
 keeping things interesting.





-- 
Our users will know fear and cower before our software! Ship it! Ship it
and let them flee like the dogs they are!

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Steven Caron

ya! you can't just throw it out like that...

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 6:35 PM, Raffaele Fragapane 
raffsxsil...@googlemail.com wrote:

 You can't do that, Eric. Godwyn's law should be left to emerge naturally,
 not clumsily pushed like this.
 Shame on you!

 On Thu, Sep 11, 2014 at 11:29 AM, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@gmail.com
 wrote:

 Is this a good time to bring up Hitler?

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Jason S

lol

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin%27s_law
Godwin's law (or Godwin's
Rule of Nazi Analogies)[1][2] is an Internet adage asserting that "As an
online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison
involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1"[2][3] —that is, if
an online discussion (regardless of topic or scope) goes on long
enough, sooner or later someone will compare someone or
something to Hitler or Nazism.
Promulgated by American attorney and author Mike
Godwin in 1990,[2] Godwin's Law originally
referred, specifically, to Usenet newsgroup discussions.[4] It is now applied to any threaded online discussion,
such as Internet forums, chat
rooms and blog comment threads, as well
as to speeches, articles and other rhetoric.[5][6]

On 09/10/14 21:35, Raffaele Fragapane wrote:

You can't do that, Eric. Godwyn's law should be
left to emerge naturally, not clumsily pushed like this.
Shame on you!

On Thu, Sep 11, 2014 at 11:29 AM, Eric
Thivierge ethivie...@gmail.com
wrote:

Is this a good time to bring up Hitler?

Eric Thivierge
http://www.ethivierge.com

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 9:23
PM, Bradley Gabe witha...@gmail.com
wrote:

Aw.. don't make the
thread self aware. It was just getting good! I
still have popcorn left. :-(

I might not be
contributing anymore, but the rest of you are
still keeping things interesting.

--
Our users will know fear and cower before our software! Ship it!
Ship it and let them flee like the dogs they are!

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Eric Thivierge

I simply asked, i didn't make comparisons... So I think we're still in the
clear.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Sebastien Sterling

Man the gray of Maya's UI sure reminds me of Hitler (is that better ? :P)

On 11 September 2014 03:52, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@gmail.com wrote:

 I simply asked, i didn't make comparisons... So I think we're still in the
 clear.

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

That's funny, it was the moustache that did it for me. :P

On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 10:05 PM, Sebastien Sterling 
sebastien.sterl...@gmail.com wrote:

 Man the gray of Maya's UI sure reminds me of Hitler (is that better ? :P)

 On 11 September 2014 03:52, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@gmail.com wrote:

 I simply asked, i didn't make comparisons... So I think we're still in
 the clear.





-- 




-=T=-

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-10 Thread Emilio Hernandez

Or the Youtube video when Hitler decides to buy Softimage in the behalf of
AD??

---
Emilio Hernández   VFX  3D animation.

2014-09-10 22:10 GMT-05:00 Eric Turman i.anima...@gmail.com:

 That's funny, it was the moustache that did it for me. :P

 On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 10:05 PM, Sebastien Sterling 
 sebastien.sterl...@gmail.com wrote:

 Man the gray of Maya's UI sure reminds me of Hitler (is that better ? :P)

 On 11 September 2014 03:52, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@gmail.com wrote:

 I simply asked, i didn't make comparisons... So I think we're still in
 the clear.





 --




 -=T=-

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-09 Thread Mirko Jankovic

In short,

With Maya you workaround, with Softimage you work

On Tue, Sep 9, 2014 at 6:18 PM, Paulo Cesar Duarte paulocdua...@gmail.com
wrote:

 Softimage users having a first experience with Maya:

 http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/

 To summarise, Maya is extremely powerful, as is Softimage. Maya does not
 have the eloquence or the innovative interface and is overly complex but it
 has been designed to be entirely open. Maybe too open for this week’s
 class. This has perplexed a lot of the broadcast/commercials participants
 this week  who want to turn a job round quickly who thrive on the structure
 and organization of the exquisitely designed explorer. Developing their
 pipeline in Maya for these guys will be a tough call but they will have
 left this course with a good understanding of the difference in approach,
 what Maya is all about and what lies ahead of them.


 Cheers.
 Paulo Duarte

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-09 Thread Paulo Cesar Duarte

heheheehehehe... In Softimage you work, with Maya you must find a TD or
search some scripts to start to work.

2014-09-09 13:30 GMT-03:00 Mirko Jankovic mirkoj.anima...@gmail.com:

 In short,

 With Maya you workaround, with Softimage you work

 On Tue, Sep 9, 2014 at 6:18 PM, Paulo Cesar Duarte paulocdua...@gmail.com
  wrote:

 Softimage users having a first experience with Maya:


 http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/

 To summarise, Maya is extremely powerful, as is Softimage. Maya does not
 have the eloquence or the innovative interface and is overly complex but it
 has been designed to be entirely open. Maybe too open for this week’s
 class. This has perplexed a lot of the broadcast/commercials participants
 this week  who want to turn a job round quickly who thrive on the structure
 and organization of the exquisitely designed explorer. Developing their
 pipeline in Maya for these guys will be a tough call but they will have
 left this course with a good understanding of the difference in approach,
 what Maya is all about and what lies ahead of them.


 Cheers.
 Paulo Duarte





-- 
paulo-duarte.com

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

lol +1 Mirko

The problem is still the same Maya demands heavy customization and
maintenance to be serviceable

you can't compare them out of the box or per maintenance cost.

and it will still be a problem for small studios, all of a sudden having to
hire an extra employee, who's only there so there regular team can function.


You could argue this creates jobs, but what it really does is take two
wheels of your car and replace them with wheels of cheese and have a cheese
maker on standby to replace the cheese wheels every time they break down.

Tortured analogy check!

Sorry to TD's, i do not equate you all to cheese makers :P

On 9 September 2014 17:30, Mirko Jankovic mirkoj.anima...@gmail.com wrote:

 In short,

 With Maya you workaround, with Softimage you work

 On Tue, Sep 9, 2014 at 6:18 PM, Paulo Cesar Duarte paulocdua...@gmail.com
  wrote:

 Softimage users having a first experience with Maya:


 http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/

 To summarise, Maya is extremely powerful, as is Softimage. Maya does not
 have the eloquence or the innovative interface and is overly complex but it
 has been designed to be entirely open. Maybe too open for this week’s
 class. This has perplexed a lot of the broadcast/commercials participants
 this week  who want to turn a job round quickly who thrive on the structure
 and organization of the exquisitely designed explorer. Developing their
 pipeline in Maya for these guys will be a tough call but they will have
 left this course with a good understanding of the difference in approach,
 what Maya is all about and what lies ahead of them.


 Cheers.
 Paulo Duarte

RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-09 Thread Graham Bell

Actually that wasn’t the tone (or the point) of the training at all, quote the 
opposite in fact.

G

From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Sebastien Sterling
Sent: 09 September 2014 17:44
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

lol +1 Mirko
The problem is still the same Maya demands heavy customization and maintenance 
to be serviceable
you can't compare them out of the box or per maintenance cost.
and it will still be a problem for small studios, all of a sudden having to 
hire an extra employee, who's only there so there regular team can function.

You could argue this creates jobs, but what it really does is take two wheels 
of your car and replace them with wheels of cheese and have a cheese maker on 
standby to replace the cheese wheels every time they break down.
Tortured analogy check!
Sorry to TD's, i do not equate you all to cheese makers :P

On 9 September 2014 17:30, Mirko Jankovic 
mirkoj.anima...@gmail.commailto:mirkoj.anima...@gmail.com wrote:
In short,

With Maya you workaround, with Softimage you work

On Tue, Sep 9, 2014 at 6:18 PM, Paulo Cesar Duarte 
paulocdua...@gmail.commailto:paulocdua...@gmail.com wrote:
Softimage users having a first experience with Maya:

http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/

To summarise, Maya is extremely powerful, as is Softimage. Maya does not have 
the eloquence or the innovative interface and is overly complex but it has been 
designed to be entirely open. Maybe too open for this week’s class. This has 
perplexed a lot of the broadcast/commercials participants this week  who want 
to turn a job round quickly who thrive on the structure and organization of the 
exquisitely designed explorer. Developing their pipeline in Maya for these guys 
will be a tough call but they will have left this course with a good 
understanding of the difference in approach, what Maya is all about and what 
lies ahead of them.

Cheers.
Paulo Duarte

attachment: winmail.dat

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-09 Thread Jordi Bares

Happy to see the coments form Mark, valuable information and goes to confirm 
what I knew all along, AD killed the wrong product.

:-P

Jordi Bares
jordiba...@gmail.com

On 9 Sep 2014, at 17:18, Paulo Cesar Duarte paulocdua...@gmail.com wrote:

 Softimage users having a first experience with Maya:
 
 http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/
 
 To summarise, Maya is extremely powerful, as is Softimage. Maya does not 
 have the eloquence or the innovative interface and is overly complex but it 
 has been designed to be entirely open. Maybe too open for this week’s class. 
 This has perplexed a lot of the broadcast/commercials participants this week  
 who want to turn a job round quickly who thrive on the structure and 
 organization of the exquisitely designed explorer. Developing their pipeline 
 in Maya for these guys will be a tough call but they will have left this 
 course with a good understanding of the difference in approach, what Maya is 
 all about and what lies ahead of them.
 
 
 Cheers.
 Paulo Duarte

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-09 Thread Paulo Cesar Duarte

General consensus about the rendering of layers and passes in Maya was
'what a mess!'.

How can a software that is a leader in production of Vfx not having a more
sophisticated render layers, the render layers in Softimage is incomparable.

2014-09-09 15:08 GMT-03:00 Jordi Bares jordiba...@gmail.com:

 Happy to see the coments form Mark, valuable information and goes to
 confirm what I knew all along, AD killed the wrong product.

 :-P

 Jordi Bares
 jordiba...@gmail.com

 On 9 Sep 2014, at 17:18, Paulo Cesar Duarte paulocdua...@gmail.com
 wrote:

 Softimage users having a first experience with Maya:

 http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/

 To summarise, Maya is extremely powerful, as is Softimage. Maya does not
 have the eloquence or the innovative interface and is overly complex but it
 has been designed to be entirely open. Maybe too open for this week’s
 class. This has perplexed a lot of the broadcast/commercials participants
 this week  who want to turn a job round quickly who thrive on the structure
 and organization of the exquisitely designed explorer. Developing their
 pipeline in Maya for these guys will be a tough call but they will have
 left this course with a good understanding of the difference in approach,
 what Maya is all about and what lies ahead of them.


 Cheers.
 Paulo Duarte





-- 
paulo-duarte.com

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Because big enough productions can afford to create there own pipline?
Because AD takes the lazy approach of let the clients find there own way
to deal with our shit? cause apparently we need a Flip solver and a shaky
promise that in 3-4 years time we will have something kinda sorta maybe
like ICE, rather then a clean interface ?

On 9 September 2014 19:49, Paulo Cesar Duarte paulocdua...@gmail.com
wrote:

 General consensus about the rendering of layers and passes in Maya was
 'what a mess!'.

 How can a software that is a leader in production of Vfx not having a more
 sophisticated render layers, the render layers in Softimage is incomparable.

 2014-09-09 15:08 GMT-03:00 Jordi Bares jordiba...@gmail.com:

 Happy to see the coments form Mark, valuable information and goes to
 confirm what I knew all along, AD killed the wrong product.

 :-P

 Jordi Bares
 jordiba...@gmail.com

 On 9 Sep 2014, at 17:18, Paulo Cesar Duarte paulocdua...@gmail.com
 wrote:

 Softimage users having a first experience with Maya:


 http://www.escapestudios.com/softimage-artists-take-on-maya-escape-studios/

 To summarise, Maya is extremely powerful, as is Softimage. Maya does not
 have the eloquence or the innovative interface and is overly complex but it
 has been designed to be entirely open. Maybe too open for this week’s
 class. This has perplexed a lot of the broadcast/commercials participants
 this week  who want to turn a job round quickly who thrive on the structure
 and organization of the exquisitely designed explorer. Developing their
 pipeline in Maya for these guys will be a tough call but they will have
 left this course with a good understanding of the difference in approach,
 what Maya is all about and what lies ahead of them.


 Cheers.
 Paulo Duarte





 --
 paulo-duarte.com

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-09 Thread Jason S


  
  

  On 09/09/14 13:11, Graham Bell wrote:
  
Actually that wasn’t the tone (or the point) of the training at all, quote the opposite in fact.

  
  
  May not have been the point of the training,  (highlighting key
  differences)
  but it seems to put in a nutshell Softimage's basic reason for
  existing. 
  
  
  Here is an overview some of the highlighted pros/cons
  
FX  (**)
Motion Builder tools  (*)

Modeling (*=)
Tracks (=)
UV  (~=)
IK  (~)
Hypershade (~)


Rigging and weighting (X)
Interface (XX)
render passes, layers, partitions and overrides (XXX)
'Workflow' ()

  
  Which of course leaves out many (many!) things ..
  
  like TONS of (mostly interaction model) sublteties that you only
  know are there when experiencing say 'less streamlined'
  packages.
  
  and some BIGger things such as general non-destuctivity, 
  or the all encompassing reach and power of ICE, 
  to which unmatched (and more or less contained) Naiad FX despite
  being great, 
  has nothing to do with what ICE can do (anything).
  
  (etc.. ...)
  
  Overall, at the end of the day, things that make your life easier
  and get things *done* very-very fast, with little or no compromize
  on 'power'.
  
  _
  
  
There is a method in the madness, [didn't
  call it 'madness' for nothing] even if
that method needs some rethinking...  [all over]

  it’s all about unlearning then
re-learning   [relearning the complicated way to do
  almost anything]
  
  _
  
General
consensus about the rendering of layers and passes in Maya
was 'what a mess!'
  Which
could very-much describe the large majority of Maya workflows.
(coming from SI)
  
  _
  
  
  And I think that summary similarly puts into focus why people that
  know Softimage, need Softimage 
  (or something much (MUCH!) more like it)
  
  To summarise, Maya is extremely powerful, as
  is Softimage. 
  
  Maya does not have the eloquence or the innovative interface [which Softmage has]  
  and is overly complex,  but
  it has been designed to be entirely open. 
  
  Maybe too open [or too overly complex] for this week’s class. 
  
  This has perplexed a lot of the broadcast/commercials
  participants this week  who want to turn a job round quickly
  [...]
  
  'Perplexing' indeed...
  
  
  
  
  On 09/09/14 13:11, Graham Bell wrote:


  Actually that wasn’t the tone (or the point) of the training at all, quote the opposite in fact.


G

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

What is the point of proclaiming, BUT GUYS ! IT'S SO OPEN :) should
artists care ?

On 9 September 2014 21:41, Jason S jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:


 On 09/09/14 13:11, Graham Bell wrote:

 Actually that wasn’t the tone (or the point) of the training at all, quote 
 the opposite in fact.


 May not have been the point of the training,  (highlighting key
 differences)
 but it seems to put in a nutshell Softimage's basic reason for existing.


 Here is an overview some of the highlighted pros/cons

 FX  (**)
 Motion Builder tools  (*)

 Modeling (*=)
 Tracks (=)
 UV  (~=)
 IK  (~)
 Hypershade (~)


 Rigging and weighting (X)
 Interface (XX)
 render passes, layers, partitions and overrides (XXX)
 *'Workflow'* ()

  Which of course leaves out many (many!) things ..

 like TONS of (mostly interaction model) sublteties that you only know are
 there when experiencing say '*less streamlined*' packages.

 and some BIGger things such as general non-destuctivity,
 or the all encompassing reach and power of ICE,
 to which unmatched (and more or less contained) Naiad FX despite being
 great,
 has nothing to do with what ICE can do (anything).

 (etc.. ...)

 Overall, at the end of the day, things that make your life easier and get
 things *done* very-very fast, with little or no compromize on 'power'.

 _

 There is a method in the madness, [didn't call it 'madness' for nothing] even
 if that method needs some rethinking...  [all over]
  it’s all about unlearning then re-learning   [relearning the complicated
 way to do almost anything]

 _

 General consensus about the rendering of layers and passes in Maya was
 'what a mess!'

 Which could very-much describe the large majority of Maya workflows.
 (coming from SI)

 _


 And I think that summary similarly puts into focus why people that know
 Softimage, need Softimage
 (or something much (MUCH!) more like it)

 To summarise, Maya is extremely powerful, as is Softimage.

 Maya does not have the eloquence or the innovative interface [which
 Softmage has]
 and *is overly complex**,  **but it has been designed to be entirely
 open. *

 Maybe too open [or too overly complex] for this week’s class.

 This has perplexed a lot of the broadcast/commercials participants this
 week  who want to turn a job round quickly [...]

 'Perplexing' indeed...




 On 09/09/14 13:11, Graham Bell wrote:

 Actually that wasn’t the tone (or the point) of the training at all, quote 
 the opposite in fact.


 G

RE: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-09 Thread Matt Lind

Artists should care, but they only deal with what’s in front of them, not 
what’s behind the curtains (buttons/UI).  Therefore to hear ‘its more open’ is 
like hearing a foreign language.  It doesn’t register.

Those proclaiming the openness need to do a better job of illustrating what it 
means and how it’s beneficial – on the artist’s level.  Artists, in turn, need 
to do a better job of learning and understanding the tool they are using to 
create their work – the computer.


Matt




From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com 
[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Sebastien Sterling
Sent: Tuesday, September 09, 2014 1:56 PM
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

What is the point of proclaiming, BUT GUYS ! IT'S SO OPEN :) should artists 
care ?

On 9 September 2014 21:41, Jason S 
jasonsta...@gmail.commailto:jasonsta...@gmail.com wrote:

On 09/09/14 13:11, Graham Bell wrote:


Actually that wasn’t the tone (or the point) of the training at all, quote the 
opposite in fact.

May not have been the point of the training,  (highlighting key differences)
but it seems to put in a nutshell Softimage's basic reason for existing.


Here is an overview some of the highlighted pros/cons
FX  (**)
Motion Builder tools  (*)

Modeling (*=)
Tracks (=)
UV  (~=)
IK  (~)
Hypershade (~)


Rigging and weighting (X)
Interface (XX)
render passes, layers, partitions and overrides (XXX)
'Workflow' ()
Which of course leaves out many (many!) things ..

like TONS of (mostly interaction model) sublteties that you only know are there 
when experiencing say 'less streamlined' packages.

and some BIGger things such as general non-destuctivity,
or the all encompassing reach and power of ICE,
to which unmatched (and more or less contained) Naiad FX despite being great,
has nothing to do with what ICE can do (anything).

(etc.. ...)

Overall, at the end of the day, things that make your life easier and get 
things *done* very-very fast, with little or no compromize on 'power'.

_
There is a method in the madness, [didn't call it 'madness' for nothing] even 
if that method needs some rethinking...  [all over]
it’s all about unlearning then re-learning   [relearning the complicated way to 
do almost anything]
_
General consensus about the rendering of layers and passes in Maya was 'what a 
mess!'
Which could very-much describe the large majority of Maya workflows. (coming 
from SI)

_


And I think that summary similarly puts into focus why people that know 
Softimage, need Softimage
(or something much (MUCH!) more like it)

To summarise, Maya is extremely powerful, as is Softimage.

Maya does not have the eloquence or the innovative interface [which Softmage 
has]
and is overly complex,  but it has been designed to be entirely open.

Maybe too open [or too overly complex] for this week’s class.

This has perplexed a lot of the broadcast/commercials participants this week  
who want to turn a job round quickly [...]

'Perplexing' indeed...




On 09/09/14 13:11, Graham Bell wrote:

Actually that wasn’t the tone (or the point) of the training at all, quote the 
opposite in fact.





G

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-09 Thread Graham Bell

Actually, from what I could tell, there aren’t any direct comments from Mark in 
that blog post.

Personally, I thought I did a great job, but if you guys want to spin it into 
something it wasn’t, I guess that’s your prerogative.


G


From: Jordi Bares jordiba...@gmail.commailto:jordiba...@gmail.com
Reply-To: 
softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com 
softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Date: Tuesday, 9 September 2014 19:08
To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com 
softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com
Subject: Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

Happy to see the coments form Mark, valuable information and goes to confirm 
what I knew all along, AD killed the wrong product.

:-P

Jordi Bares
jordiba...@gmail.commailto:jordiba...@gmail.com



attachment: winmail.dat

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios

2014-09-09 Thread Steven Caron

i think it was a great initiative! remember people are still resentful of
maya

On Tue, Sep 9, 2014 at 2:29 PM, Graham Bell graham.b...@autodesk.com
wrote:



 Personally, I thought I did a great job, but if you guys want to spin it
 into something it wasn’t, I guess that’s your prerogative.


 G

Re: SoftImage Artists take on Maya @ Escape Studios