Softimage Composite?

[Hirazi Blue]

Does anyone already use the 2011.5 "freebie" Composite? The only thing everybody seems to agree upon, is that it has a horrible UI, but apart from that it still must have its merits, one would hope. Those of you who have access to the higher-end compositing applications might be underwhelmed, but how about those people used working with the FXTree only, like myself?

[Hirazi Blue]

Well, the overwhelming response to my previous post probably shows that nobody uses Softimage Composite. Strange thing is, that once you've stopped laughing at the UI, it actually seems quite powerful.
Not Nuke-powerful, but certainly a nice younger, slightly more powerful side-kick to the FXTree, if nothing else.

I for one was very amused when I found out
SI|Composite seems to be able to composite motion blur based on motion vectors out of the box
But it's still early days for me (only scratching the surface) and I never was a compositing wizard anyhow...

[Mathaeus]

Yeah it doesn't seems to be widely accepted, even Max and Maya variances.....Probably everyone knows, it's bundled with Max and Maya too. So, in case it won't be in Softimage, people will ask why. I could imagine a long threads here...

At least in my own 'conspiracy theory' , it's not about quality - it *is* a beast. It looks like that AD didn't showed a 'real' interest for this app. They killed Combustion before few years, which even in a wild and poor place where I live, had a few buyers... Then they were expected people to accept a new, not yet finished product, for about five times (I think) "better" price. But, in this field AD has no monopoly, so absolute king of small production is, more than ever, After Effects together with plugins, Nuke for dedicated guys, some Fusion here and there, and it seems that's all, worldwide...

Anyway, as you already said, it's able to do motion blur from motion vector images, even only that should be enough attractive ...

[origin]

Last time we tested Toxic here it had only few basic effects like blur. Its 'free' so it's probably great for people who doesn't own fusion/nuke/ae

[luceric]

Last time we tested Toxic here it had only few basic effects like blur. Its 'free' so it's probably great for people who doesn't own fusion/nuke/ae

That's a very easy error to make. The effects of Toxik are not at the bottom of the interface, in the 'pick list'. That's only some sort of "favorites" list and the defaults are moronic. The effects are on the right side of the interface, opened with the marking menu.

Toxik has all the complex keying tools of flame, lens effects, a 3d comp enviroment, vector paint, expression, tracking and more. More than Combustion. http://download.autodesk.com/us/maya/20 ... index.html

I've tried to get them to remove that damn pick list, but they say it's too late for 2012.. I'll try again next year but I'm baffled why no one on the maya team picked up on this

[enigmafx]

Hey Guys,
First I just want to say, I am not trying to promote anything, I only say that because of what I will say may seem like it

Just so you know, I have been a long time Discreet user and I guess now Autodesk. I have use Composite/Toxik since 2007 release and it is a shadow of what it was and could have been. Yeah they screwed this up big time ;-) I run a small blog, that you can fine at http://enigmafx.wordpress.com. There you will find some help, I hope it will help, on some of the more hidden things.

Anyway, I noticed someone say it is not as powerful as NUKE. Well I have to say that it does not have the same number of Features as NUKEX and it does not cost $8000 either. However, if you do a compare of NUKE and Composite 2012, I would say it is plenty powerful as a compositor. Don't confuse tools/features with power in a compositing app. ;-) I know and use Four compositing apps and composite is at the bottom in regards to feature count, but it is able to composite everything, it just requires a different approach. The biggest thing for people to get use to is the interface. It was said that is was bad, well that is a normal reponse when it is something new. Once you get it, it is very fast. Much faster than NUKE or Fusion. It's caching ability is unique and that is where you will see some differences to your FX-Tree compositing.

Someone also suggested it only has some basic effects. Well it has many options within one tool. such as the blur tool, which deal with blur, depth bluring and vector blur in one tool. You need to remember that NUKE and prior shake break everything down to it's lowest level, so you will have the blur tool and a vector tool etc so what looks like more tools really is not. I should also just mention that NUKE is a solid and very productive compositing tool, but it is not leaps and bounds ahead. Compositing is compositing. What they are doing with NUKEX is a different story, it is a workflow appliance and it does what it does well.

Composite also has scripting with Python, it has a great unique tool called the pxl tool. It allows for simple scripting to manipulate the pixels within the image. You can create, and modify images with it. You can create you own imaging tools basically. You can create plugins with OFX.

There was a suggestion that the Pick list should be removed. Well I totally disagree with that one It is so much more than a tool list, you can modify it, colour code it, you can put compositions that you want to reference there and PXL tool, and presets. It is a powerful addition. But I will agree it confuses people.

Well, I will agree with everyone that it is not for everyone, many people have their own way of working. You put the same people in front of Flame and they will have the same issues with understanding, due to the way menues are hidden etc, but once you know the speed is there.
Shit, I do sound to preechy... sorry about that. As I said, I am critical of Composite all the time, I just wanted to point out that it is a powerful tool, but it is not for everyone.

cheers

Moderator edit: please use the URL tags - HB

[Maximus]

as i said in multiple posts, I mostly use Composite and FXTree inside softimage, just quick notes to answer globally at what you kindly posted here.

I found Composite really powerful and good, most of the market nowadays is moved by "company X used software Y to create movie Z" so everyone needs the software Y or else you are out of business, wich is kinda normal but retarded in my opinion

Anyway back on topic, there is a general instability of Composite (random crashes etc), i would love AD to fix it for good and to focus their attention to it, it also lacks a lot of examples, tutorials and general promoting marketing (not shocked at all since AD seems to promote and market only 3ds Max). Also it would be nice to have softimage <-> composite workflow.

I'm pretty sure it will never be widely spreaded like Nuke but its a bit of a shame to me, i found it really great and i'm not that skilled with it either, i'm studying it, just because its free and for what i do it has all the tools and more

I'll keep an eye on your blog, thanks for comments.

[Hirazi Blue]

The inclusion of Composite into the Softimage packaging has been poorly promoted IMHO, as there is an obvious overlap between the built-in FXTree, which hinders some people to look beyond that and the fact that Composite has a lot of nice features not included in the FXTree. To those of us able to afford software like NUKE it might justly seem a superfluous addition to Softimage, but even the FXTree users do not seem to have a very open mind about it. The way for instance the Hotfix for Composite hasn't officially been widely announced to the Max and Softimage crowd isn't a real confidence boost either, to say the least. And all that's a shame, as it really doesn't take all that long to get used to the horrid UI (personal opinion) to find the nice tools hidden within.

(PS And yes, I am aware Luc-Eric Rousseau did a tweet about the Hotfix today )

[enigmafx]

Hey Thanks for the reply.

Well, I agree with most of what you have said. The reason I did the blog, so I could help and be critical at the same time.

Yes it has it's stability issues. There was a HF just released. You can find links on my blog for the exact file. If you are using
it with windows, just get the standalone update for it. The thing about composite is that it is packaged with softimage and Maya and MAX but it is the exact same program. So you can get that updated, I have been testing it over the last two days and it is much much better stability wise, except for some issues that I have found prior that still need to be handled. However those are very obscure ones for sure. OVerall most most people I think they will find it useful.

Cheers

[Cacoman]

Ok. I will give it a second try.

[Rork]

Despite the fact that Toxic might be a decent compositor, and is free for Subscription users, everywhere I go I still see Nuke or Fusion.

I know compositing basics are all the same, but moving from Toxic to Nuke might be harder than from Fusion to Nuke or vv.
The times I tried it, it was still very buggy and instable, and workflow/GUI wise it's a big step away from the other apps out there.
Unless you're using Flame/Flint it might not ;-)

For most of the comp work there's the FXTree, and it's performance is still very good. And it's inside a known interface and has familiar workflow.
Choose your poison.... ;)