Just because I want to fuel the fire, I'll toss in that while the
workflow in Maya is quite flawed out of the box, you can get to more
internals of the scene graph and manipulate it than we have in
Softimage.
On Wednesday, January 08, 2014 4:15:04 PM, Alan Fregtman wrote:
Bravo! Bravo!! :) I echo your exact sentiments, David (though my own
credentials are puny by comparison.)
The operator stack should be permanently on the box as a "hot
feature". We all take it for granted all the time, but seriously it's
one of the best features in Soft.
On Wed, Jan 8, 2014 at 3:10 PM, Steven Caron <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
thank you! thank you! thank you!... i knew i wasn't crazy thinking
rigging in maya is a PITA!
On Wed, Jan 8, 2014 at 11:45 AM, David Gallagher
<[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
I rigged on quite a few characters in Maya at Blue Sky Studios
and now (Softimage) AnimSchool. We offer the well-known
"Malcolm" rig for free.
There is no comparison to rigging in Softimage and Maya--not
the kind of rigging I do. I often assume by now they have
better workflows in Maya, but I'm often surprised to find how
convoluted and limiting the workflows are to this day. Most
Maya people must not know there are better ways of working or
aren't doing the kinds of things I am, because the difference
is profound.
-At any point in the rigging process, you can make edits in
the model stack to change the shape and topology of the model.
After experimenting, you can freeze that part of the stack and
continue on with that new shape, retaining almost every bit of
work you've done.
YOU CAN CHANGE THE TOPOLOGY. YOU CAN CHANGE THE SHAPE FREELY.
This difference is huge. You can work toward completion
without fear of losing work. You can experiment
freely--knowing it's fine if you want to make a major change.
I'm never afraid of losing blendshape work.
And if the changes are really significant, you can always
Gator you're way out of a jam.
-You can do blendshape edits directly on the geometry,
modelessly, instead of on a separate blendshape object.
-There is no comparison with corrective blendshapes. In
Softimage, you go to Secondary Shape mode and drag a few points.
In Maya, I wish you luck. You can install one of several
plug-ins and scripts and HOPE that it works. If the scenario
is simple enough, it might.
Several people here tried to help a student make a single
corrective blendshape on an elbow -- and we're all experienced
Maya riggers. After hours of attempting, we threw up our
hands. There was something in that object's history that was
making the blendshape plug-in fail. The answer is what it
often is: just start over.
-EDITING corrective blendshapes. In Maya, heaven help you if
you want to edit that blendshape later. Start the process
again and make a new one. In Softimage, drag a few points and
you're done in seconds.
-For facial work, being able to make face shapes in
conjunction with the mixer, working directly on the main geo.
To see other shapes muted, soloed as you're working. This
allows you to craft shapes that work for different scenarios,
with just the right falloff. You can make correctives for
shape combinations quickly. In face work, it's all about how
the functions combine to make the range of expressive results.
-The envelope weighting is far superior. The smoothing is just
better, and more reliable. Negative weight painting actually
works.
Being able to make sophisticated weighting allows you to make
lighter rigs, because fewer nodes and calculations are needed.
I can't believe someone actually compared Maya's Component
Editor to Softimage's Weight Editor. I'm stunned.
Sometimes, demoing Maya's envelope weighting, it just stops
working for no reason -- I have no idea why. (Mind you, I've
been rigging in Maya since 1999.)
-You can envelope/skin null objects, not just joints. (Yes,
Maya will let you add other objects as deformers but it is
limiting and causes problems.)
-The tweak tool. You can grab anywhere and it will just get
the nearest point/edge/poly and transform it precisely. Add
the proportional editing and it's very sculptural without
giving up precise transform control. I far prefer this
workflow to the Zbrush approach geared toward paintstrokes.
-In Softimage, you can change the wireframe on shaded opacity.
You can change the point sizes. These mean I can visualize and
work with the shape, not get visually stuck on the tech
clutter like in Maya.
-LinkWithOrientation. Does Maya have anything built-in yet? I
know there are pose readers out there, but they are slow and
3rd party.
-The "smooth preview" Geometry Approximation is better,
faster, and more stable in Softimage.
-Even with the army of tools and plug-ins we had at Blue Sky
Studios, I would still much rather use off-the-shelf Softimage.
-You can select controls without selecting (and highlighting)
all its children. This makes it easier to animate the rig --
just drag selecting will get you the selectable controls. In
Maya, drag-selecting gets a mixture of heirarchy parts.
All this means that I can focus on the ART, the shaping of the
rig, not jump through hoops all day.
As a result, our characters are more flexible and expressive.
