Migration to maya/max = turn the other cheek

[amitr]

I used XSI 8 years and discover it after using AD products that was less better in every way possible.

AD has prove to have no Business Ethics.
They shut the development of Softimage, wich is the pipe of income.

So why i'm seeing here "Migration to maya?" post. seriously, WTF ?

If you pay one more cent to autodesk is exacly like turn the other cheek after getting a slap in the face. thats my opinion.
there is in our job more then $$$$, and app performence, and all that stuff. there are people, with feelings and needs. but not for autodesk. for autodesk there is only "optimal buisness model", and f***k all of softimage users that use this tool to create their income and Of course have personal feelings to their tool wich is not a drill or a wood chainsaw, its a spaciel tool Allowing you to create everything from nothing, its magic.

Autodesk act is so morally low, a Lawyer maybe find some illigale action in this move. there is false presentation of future Intent of autodesk infront of their paying customers, and a lot of missleading. I dont know if this App killing is 100% leagal from all possible angels.

I saw more then 4000 Signatures on the petition, those need to be 4000 new subscriptions to AD competitions. slap them back in their faces.

I moved a year ago to Modo because Softimage is dead for me as an artist much before this kill.
those are the reasons i moved to modo, all those reasons are facts not only personal addptations:

1) better viewport, and Although its concider far better then XSI, the modo users crying in the forum its old tech for them. they got use to have best tech in modo.

2) native render that deliver same speed and quality as Vray, in some tests i made for brute force, speed was faster then arnold (learned arnold alot). the renderer is state of the art. its not general propuse as some says, it deliver best quality in any task given. i'm not joking... its armed with alot of shaders, alot of tweeks so it fits any goal needed.

3) build in sculpting tools that are great
4) built in patinging tools, alot of nice features like preasure on the tablet can dicide what FG/BG texture to use. so for example you load grass texture and dirt texture and your hand then become "Lawn mower", harder you push the more dirt it will paint... a lot of artistic friendly nice features.

5) Dopesheet is blended into the regular timeline, speed up simple tasks for me.

6) Retopo tools almost good as in Zbrush, better then in Max for sure.


still missing Animation mixer, animation layer and stuff like that but they promise they will keep upgrading this section of the software.


supporting Autodesk is supporting to have less compititions, less options etc...
thanks for reading and sorry for Bad english.

Moderator edit: I moved this to "Open Discussion". As I have stated in the Migration forum: Read me first“ thread: "This is not a place to criticize the choice someone has made (…).” What you’re doing in this post would seem to be just that. - HB

[adrencg]

The phrase "class action lawsuit" had run through my head. But would there really be any legal grounds for it?

[Letterbox]

The phrase "class action lawsuit" had run through my head. But would there really be any legal grounds for it?

With no prejudiced to any party and speaking in general, it's best not to ask such advice like this on a forum, for a definitive answer with no emotional attachment to the subject, but from a purely legal standpoint, I'd say - ask a lawyer.

[ace63]

It's all going according to Autodesks plans - every cries out but in the end 90% of all people will still migrate to Maya.
People already started to believe the bullshit "we are gonna make Maya so awesome you won't regret it" talk on the mailing list which will probably never happen.
Autodesk lied to us a thousand times before and people still believe them. I started learning Houdini. Autodesk? Never again.

[Nizar]

ace63@ I stay away from maya, but do you know any other package can compete in animation?
Also, you like or not, Maya is the standard to day (sad truth...)

[Hirazi Blue]

@ace63 - Sometimes it is not about believing. I for one stopped believing Autodesk quite a while back. That said, there aren't all that many options, even if it appears to be at first glance. Everybody has different needs and different budgets and to me for instance adopting Maya is a "marriage of convenience", nothing more, nothing less. Sorry, but anyone still truly believing Autodesk after the famous move to Singapore at the latest deserves a medal for gullibility anyway. And still we didn't flock to Houdini then...
Hmmm...

[Mathaeus]

It's all going according to Autodesks plans - every cries out but in the end 90% of all people will still migrate to Maya.
People already started to believe the bullshit "we are gonna make Maya so awesome you won't regret it" talk on the mailing list which will probably never happen.

I didn't believed in any awesomeness in new Mayas, it's just about industry standard. Long time ago I've learned Max because I've heard it is widely used, and I wanted a job. Softimage was an exception, I was a huge Softimage fanboy and SI Foundation was cheap. But sometime around XSI 6 it was clear, how actually is expensive to use this not so widely accepted software.

SI seems to be a leader of 'introductory time' or 'time of fascination' for 3d, somehow comparable to Concorde airliner for jet planes. Best, elegant, faster, state of the art technology, whatever. But, once everything became everyday boring business, nobody really tried to replace it, once it's retired. Today, I think most of 3d users do not want to be surprised that much by new features (this needs more learning). "Turn the other cheek" sounds retro to me... for 'just a tool'.

Also, Softimage is a sort of leader of all other small players. My conspiracy theory will say, that AD intentionally kills SI, just to show how even existence of small players has no sense anymore. If so, it seems to be a very efficient attack. I wouldn't be surprised if only two or three commercial 3d will survive in near future, plus some open source. That is, Houdini and Modo are getting a few more users these days, but in years that are coming, I'm afraid they will need to fight to survive...

[Rez007]

@ace63 - Sometimes it is not about believing. I for one stopped believing Autodesk quite a while back. That said, there aren't all that many options, even if it appears to be at first glance. Everybody has different needs and different budgets and to me for instance adopting Maya is a "marriage of convenience", nothing more, nothing less. Sorry, but anyone still truly believing Autodesk after the famous move to Singapore at the latest deserves a medal for gullibility anyway. And still we didn't flock to Houdini then...
Hmmm...

You are right about this, migrating to either Maya/Max is the most cost efficient in the short term for sure. If they do add a lot to Maya, then great, but I am not holding my breath. I have a feeling once the mood calms down a bit, it will be "business as usual."

I would love to go to Houdini FX, but I think their annual subscription price is quite high - not saying it is not worth it, it probably is, but for freelancers that is quite a bit of change. SideFX is in the best position possible to gain a large user base very quickly, and it will most likely never happen to this magnitude again, especially since Softimage is closer to Houdini, software-wise. I hope SideFX doesn't miss a golden opportunity to increase in size so rapidly, otherwise, I think ace63 will likely be right, most people will just flow over to Maya...

[Eugen]

Also, Softimage is a sort of leader of all other small players. My conspiracy theory will say, that AD intentionally kills SI, just to show how even existence of small players has no sense anymore. If so, it seems to be a very efficient attack. I wouldn't be surprised if only two or three commercial 3d will survive in near future, plus some open source. That is, Houdini and Modo are getting a few more users these days, but in years that are coming, I'm afraid they will need to fight to survive...

I'm not so sure about this, since there's quite a lot of dissatisfaction in both the max and Maya camp, at least more than at Houdini, Modo, Blender, C4D. They won't be going anywhere soon. They have quite loyal userbases, too, and are getting better by the day.

Hard to predict, but if the competition makes swift and dedicated moves now, AD could loose more seats than they probably could like.

Especially for Houdini I hope they listen carefully to the SI user suggestions that are already piling up over there. If they get their UI and modeling shortcomings sorted out, it could become 'the one app to rule them all...'

Interesting times ahead... let's sit back and watch, while continuing using Softimage in the meantime...

[MauricioPC]

I'm liking of what I've been getting in C4D. Just wish Maxon will flush out some cool things for VFX and Games (two great markets).

And April 7th there's v801 of Modo. That could be a game changer and push me to Modo land depending on what they show.

[Bullit]

I think for Softimage the software that all around makes more sense is Softimage for fast output.

Other than that Cinema 4D, but there is still 2 or 3 years to decide.


I am also a person of 2 software- 3ds Max, Softimage, but i think here everyone sort of fed up with 3ds Max and are going to Cinema 4D

[Nizar]

I'm liking of what I've been getting in C4D. Just wish Maxon will flush out some cool things for VFX and Games (two great markets).

And April 7th there's v801 of Modo. That could be a game changer and push me to Modo land depending on what they show.

Brad said 7th april is not something related to modo, but some news about modo are planed soon (he didn't give any eta)

Every modo release are expected like a "game changer", but in all this time they didn't cage nothing in the industry. 801 is the first modo release completely under Foundry, so this time can expect some surprise (I'm a bit skeptical) .

[myara]

So why i'm seeing here "Migration to maya?" post. seriously, WTF ?

If you are in the privileged minority that are able to choose their main DCC software, then good for you. I envy you.

I'm pretty sure that most of us who make a living doing 3D and are going to take the Maya/Max path, is not because we want to, or believe Maya is going to be awesome in a few years, but because we have no other choice as it is the industry standard.

I don't think Maya will ever be awesome, but at least in my industry (games), it is obvious that those few Softimage projects that were in the market will be replaced by Maya soon or later . I haven't heard of a single project that isn't Maya, Max or Softimage based in the last 7 or some years.

To be honest, I don't like Maya, and even in Maya projects I do as much as possible in Softimage and will continue to. Until I find a better tool that is.

Even if I could choose, I don't think Modo is in the same league, yet. It looks interesting enough to consider it as a second tool if / when I have the time and resources to add it to my pipeline though.

[Pancho]

You can add Modo to your pieline without thinking too much about it. Very nice in many areas, but coming from ICE you feel more than crippled in Modo.

[Eugen]

I start to wonder what still justifies the 'industry standard' status of Max and Maya.
Is everybody so happy with them? Autodesk fans, wave!
They must be doing something right after all, to stay on the throne for so long, especially since everybody I know seems to be grumpy about them.
There must be some equivalent to 'dark matter' in the userbase - people who don't care but just push their jobs quietly, never complaining, and there must be many of them.


Talking about alternatives -
any opinion about Cinema4D? Easy to get into, nice, tight, stable. Not too cheap, though.
I would very much like to like C4D, because it's damn close to the Softimage no bs interface philosophy.

The restriction number one in my book is that they still try to swindle their way around parametrical topo edits, but it's better than Modo in that regard.
But depending on your kind of work, this might not even be a problem.
Nothing ICE like, but Expresso and MoGraph are quite a few steps in that direction.

[grendizer]

You can't imagine the amount of "dark matter" guys I've been working with. Kind of "civil servants" of 3D. They use full retard apps but they would kill you if you ask them to change their habits and learn another software, even if it's new tech that would ease their daily tasks.