As for shapes, I've never felt good with soft workflow. A few years ago we asked stargrav to develop us a soft version of BCS. It now works on both platforms and I can't live without it: http://www.stargrav.com/bcs.php
On Fri, Mar 7, 2014 at 9:08 PM, Raffaele Fragapane < raffsxsil...@googlemail.com> wrote: > while a lot of those things can be worked around or simply written, the > lack of a property and parameter entity in Maya will have you up walls. > Attributes can only be owned by nodes, and the sort-of-quasi-workaround of > character set will cuase early baldness in any person trying to use it. > > BTW, if you plan to use Maya go on the small annoying things site RIGHT > NOW and start up-voting the Softimage sensitive issues (proxy params is > there, as is the lack of some fundamental nodes etc.). > > > On Sat, Mar 8, 2014 at 7:05 AM, Eric Turman <i.anima...@gmail.com> wrote: > >> **Workgroups *(Maya's plugin manager..ugh what a mess) >> **GATOR *(I've had Maya users nearly go into a seizure of disbelief when >> I've shown them GATOR in the past) >> **Stacks: Model, Shape, Animate, Secondary shape etc *(so useful to be >> able to partition operations for freezing etc.) >> **non-destructive adaption of modeling work through shapes weights etc.* >> (when >> a client wans a change....man this has been a lifesaver in Soft all these >> years) >> **non-layer approach to dealing with hierarchical inheritance of >> visibility etc* (hide parent in Maya, the whole branch get >> hidden...wait, whut? dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb...yes I know layers...not >> clean when temporarily hiding things while working) >> **Delta referencing with internal and external aspects *(the ability to >> spit aspects of internal and external referencing is amazingly powerful) >> **Constraint Comp *(Maya, why you hide your offset after initial >> constraint?!?!) >> **Neutral pose *(I know that I'm going to get some flak for this one and >> that buffer nulls...erm locators...work but Neutral pose when used >> correctly is wonderful) >> **Proxy Parameters* (so nice for the animators not to have to hunt and >> peck like on Maya rigs) >> **Pass & partition* (instead of the ridiculous render layers) >> >> ....I know that I'm missing a bunch, but that's a quick fire off the top >> of my head. I am not looking forward to using it again. I spent 5 years >> trying to embrace it and it was like cuddling with a porcupine back in the >> stone ages. But I will have to deal with it once more. >> >> >> >> On Fri, Mar 7, 2014 at 1:59 PM, Meng-Yang Lu <ntmon...@gmail.com> wrote: >> >>> This is a possibility with Fabric Engine in the mix for super speed. >>> Here's hoping. >>> >>> >>> >>> On Fri, Mar 7, 2014 at 11:55 AM, Francisco Criado <malcriad...@gmail.com >>> > wrote: >>> >>>> Why not to rename xsi.exe to maya.exe and change the starting screen? >>>> that could be very easy implemented, and voila! all softimage tools and ui >>>> in maya :))))) >>>> >>>> >>>> 2014-03-07 16:50 GMT-03:00 Raffaele Fragapane < >>>> raffsxsil...@googlemail.com>: >>>> >>>> I think the core issue here isn't as much whether Maya can be patched >>>>> or not, it surely can, the core is still functional and respectably open, >>>>> if not without issues (and stability has been degrading compared to the >>>>> past IME). >>>>> >>>>> The problem for a lot of people used to Soft is how much scavenging >>>>> and patching they will HAVE TO do before they are even remotely close to >>>>> having previous functionality. >>>>> >>>>> For the small scale Maya user, so leave us engineers and big shops >>>>> out, having to scavenge for scripts and tools and hacking together >>>>> horrible >>>>> copy'n'paste MEL macros is part of the day to day routine, even for things >>>>> such as opening more than one outliner. That's why it's perceived as >>>>> inferior by a lot of Soft users. >>>>> We can discuss potential all day, and there are certainly things I can >>>>> do in Maya that Soft will simply not allow me to do, but in terms of OOTB >>>>> experience it is pretty F'in disgraceful with all the missing bits. >>>>> >>>>> Rabbit's Shapes plugin and ngSkinTools are bare minimum additions to >>>>> even be able to use it, along side a handful of shelves (Maya's layout is >>>>> another disgrace that requires a lot of old school hacking) that you'll >>>>> have to scavenge from all over the place. >>>>> >>>>> You also have to toe the line between what you can rely on and what >>>>> you can't. >>>>> Maya has a binary lock on versions, so any new major release, and in >>>>> two recorded cases even the .5s, it breaks binary compatibility. >>>>> Soft users take for granted that most C++ plugins and nodes written >>>>> four years ago and never touched again will still work. There was some >>>>> pretty major upset when for the first time a version or two ago some ICE >>>>> fixes "broke" the majority of nodes into requiring recompilation. This is >>>>> par for the course in Maya, compiled anything will NOT work on any major >>>>> version other than the one it was compiled for. >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> On Sat, Mar 8, 2014 at 6:36 AM, Meng-Yang Lu <ntmon...@gmail.com>wrote: >>>>> >>>>>> I've always felt Maya's core performance has been relatively good >>>>>> compared to others. It is incredibly extensible and can maintain some >>>>>> really good performance. The problem that Maya has is having the various >>>>>> components exchange data between each other. Essentially, every node in >>>>>> the scene is holding each other's hand always. These no easy way to hold >>>>>> up data to prevent all the nodes from updating when you make a change. >>>>>> >>>>>> It boils down to how cleanly you can implement these features. There >>>>>> are some legacy things that could go, obviously some complete reworks, >>>>>> but >>>>>> development for Maya is a lot more straight forward than Softimage. >>>>>> >>>>>> My only gripe is that as you build tools for Maya, the plug-in >>>>>> manager gets incredibly messy. Looks like a vomit of ideas over the past >>>>>> 10 years and no search function. And it kinda needs all this garbage to >>>>>> function. >>>>>> >>>>>> House cleaning is definitely in order. >>>>>> >>>>>> -Lu >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>> >>> >> >> >> -- >> >> >> >> >> -=T=- >> > > > > -- > Our users will know fear and cower before our software! Ship it! Ship it > and let them flee like the dogs they are! >
