Aren't you the guy who made the 3D Cat in the Hat animation I saw on the ride at Universal Studios? I also remember some training tutorial videos and a UV mapping tool. ;-)
I'm not sure, but as a casual outside observer this entire thread seems like a trolling job. Nice to see Luc-Eric is still playing the role of agent provocateur. On Wed, Jan 8, 2014 at 5:52 PM, David Gallagher < [email protected]> wrote: > On 1/8/2014 4:42 PM, Luc-Eric Rousseau wrote: > > how many years ago was the BlueSky rigging experience and how much was it? > I remember seeing you as a Softimage fan since very early XSI - perhaps a > Softimage 3D user before that as well? I might be confusing you with > another user. > > The topology updates in Softimage is its best and most unique feature, > along with render passes (property propagation). I think no other app will > ever have this. There are architecture overhead and performance > issue associated with that, though. can't talk about animation without > talking about performance, and referencing. > > > Oh, I hope you're wrong and whatever product comes out of the marriage of > Maya/Softimage/Max has that! > > Yes, I worked on all the Blue Sky movies from Ice Age 1. I rigged for a > few films, then animated, then oversaw the rigs from the animation side. > > Yes, I used Softimage 3D as well. > > > > > Le mercredi 8 janvier 2014, David Gallagher a écrit : > >> >> 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. >> Ith >> >> -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. >> >> >> >> On 1/8/2014 2:30 AM, Stefan Kubicek wrote: >> > To be fair, I weighted a fair amount of characters in Maya over the >> years but I never experienced anything like that. >> When exactly is this happening? The only hickup I ran into occasionally >> was when painting weights, and then undoing that operation, which in rare >> cases does what you describe, but I think they fixed that in version 2013 >> or 2014. I never locked the skin weights, workflow wise I always found that >> highly disruptive. >> >> >> I was quite shocked to learn from riggers in my last job, that in maya >> you have to "lock all bones but the ones you want to weight to via small >> tick boxes" failure to do so aparently causing maya to through random >> influences around... >> >> >> On 8 January 2014 02:22, Alan Fregtman <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> Last time I had to use Maya I would use Crosswalk to transfer the skinned >> mesh from Maya to Soft, do my weighting in home sweet home, then I wrote an >> exporter that saved out my weights in the "*cometSaveWeights*" format. >> Life saver! >> >> >> >> On Tue, Jan 7, 2014 at 6:15 PM, Steven Caron <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> arg, figured it out. >> >> import pymel.core as pm >> pm.select(pm.skinCluster(pm.selected()[0], query=True, influence=True)) >> >> best UI ever! >> >> >> On Tue, Jan 7, 2014 at 2:58 PM, Steven Caron <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> this thread is some what well timed... i am in maya right now. i need >> to get a mesh and its skin/envelope into softimage. i did not rig this >> object and i don't know enough about maya to try and understand it through >> inspection. in softimage i would select the mesh, then select the deformers >> from envelope, then key frame those objects and remove the constraints on >> them in mass with 'remove all constraints' >> >> >
