Ok, so after following this thread, I met with some of my colleagues and we sat down to go through the recent pricing announcements and perhaps try and make it clearer, the best that we can. So here goes, however this is just from a Europe/EMEA view. Also to the best of my knowledge this applies to the majority of Autodesk software, not just M&E, though there are some exceptions, I don't know them all.
Changes to the upgrade model for Autodesk software: Basically for those who don't know, Autodesk has pricing models for when someone wants to upgrade an old version of software to the current version, if they haven't been on Subscription (for whatever reason). From February 1st 2013, these models are changing On February 1st 2013, the upgrade pricing model will change so that upgrades from 1 - 3 versions back will increase from 50% of the new licence SRP to 70% of the new licence SRP. Upgrades from 4 - 6 versions back will remain at 70% of the new licence SRP. Upgrades from versions older than 6 releases back will not be upgradeable. Many customers are actually on subscription already, and this continues to be the most cost effective way to keep your software current. Subscription price changes: Autodesk has recently increased the cost of new subscriptions across many product lines - these changes apply to subscription renewals from February 1st 2013. However, there is an exception for Softimage which wasn't mentioned because at this time it is not confirmed. As previously discussed on this list and other forums the Softimage subscription price has changed within the last year, and is only available as a gold subscription (not wanting to open this debate here). The subscription price for Softimage is not expected to increase further and in many cases might reduce back to a previous price. I do not know exact details, but information on local prices is expected soon. And again, I must state that I'm talking from a Europe/EMEA view. I don't have any information outside of that. Multi-year subscription discounts to be phased out: On August 1st 2012, the discounts for multi-year subscription will reduce from 10% to 5% for 3 year contracts and from 5% to 0% for 2 year contracts On February 1st 2013, the discount for a 3 year renewal will reduce from 5% to 0% So that's basically the pricing announcements that Autodesk recently made which were only focused around the upgrade models and Subscriptions. As for anything else, and to the best of my knowledge, there are no further price changes planned at this time in EMEA. Unfortunately I cannot absolutely state that this won't change in the future or that there will not be some exceptions. From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Thomas Cannell Sent: 19 June 2012 21:50 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: price increases? Modo does in fact have the ability to edit and build materials with nodes. Just add them into the Schematic view and connect away. You will still have to use it in conjunction with the tree for certain effects as it won't support everything you can do with tree. On Tue, Jun 19, 2012 at 1:32 PM, Thomas Helzle <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: Steffen, sorry for the confusion - they call it Rendertree as well ;-) While it's not node based (and I really am a node addict myself) this is much less of a problem than I thought, in some areas it's even better. Now that I used it for a while, my old impression (not so different from yours, Steffen) has changed a lot. BTW. Lightwave isn't "layerbased" and never really was, Ronald? Current versions of Lightwave (for many years now actually) have full blown node shading which is in some areas better than XSI (no conversion nodes, yay ;-) ) and less good in others (some factory shaders are a bit simple). But I think the Lightwave Renderer is still top notch and GI is very fast. Again, I don't think modo is for everybody, but IMO it's more artist friendly and -centered approach goes a long way towards getting stuff done fast where the big packages can be a bit long in the tooth. Regarding the price: 20 years ago even a rotating cube was considered awesome and you needed a lot of special knowledge, gear and patience for even the most simple stuff. Been there, done that. But the times are changing and today 3D is no longer something special. I see an inflation happening: falling rates, cheaper, better and faster gear, more people wanting "in" etc. The big tools are up against Blender - with Cycles, Camera Tracking, Volumetrics, Fluids, Compositing etc. today. Very very different times IMO. I can't see how Autodesk prices are cost-of-development driven in any reasonable way. The packages they have already exist. They are noodling around with them a bit, but the last time I saw something really impressive in a major 3D package was ICE in XSI 7. But anyway, I don't want to convince anybody of anything here, it's just that I get the impression of a serious "Stockholm Syndrome" from some of the discussions on this list ;-) Each to his own - YMMV Best regards, Tom On 19 June 2012 12:55, Steffen Dünner <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: 2012/6/19 Thomas Helzle <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> especially their render tree They have a render tree? Node based? Last time I checked, all I found was some sort of layer-based stack that felt somehow "ancient". Can you point me to a tutorial or feature description that shows this render tree? I would be very interested in it. Cheers Steffen -- PGP-ID(RSA): 0xCCE2E989 / 0xE045734C CCE2E989 Fingerprint: 394B 3DA9 9A9A 96C6 3A5A 0595 EF92 EE1F -- ------------ puppetstring.com<http://puppetstring.com>
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