Autodesk retires Softimage

[McNistor]

[...]You can’t even really blame Autodesk for being governed by greed, as each and every company in this business is governed by it to some extent. It’s called capitalism.[...]

This very often made mistake should be addressed with a simple note: greed is human nature, not capitalism. Capitalism is essentially free market which allows or even empowers that human nature to manifest.
This somewhat small difference makes a big difference regarding how people continue to perceive capitalism which is often seen in an unwarranted negative light because of that.

[Hirazi Blue]

I never claimed capitalism to be greed or vice versa. What I said was that certain companies are governed by greed and what I meant to add was that the fact that companies like that can thrive is a result of how capitalism works.
;)

Lets not derail this thread with too much political/economical remarks any further (and that's also a "note to self")...

[McNistor]

Ah I see, I misunderstood then, my bad.
Indeed, capitalism allows for this situation to occur. But if capitalism works as intended - a real free market, without gov. cronyism and corruption - then this situation is the result of the people choices, to go with Adsk.
The way I see it, the only way to fix this is the proverbial "wallet voting".

I agree. I'll stop with the OT now.

[angus_davidson]

on the retirement part of the thread

http://www.creativebloq.com/3d/autodesk ... e-31411069

[McNistor]

They acquired Softimage because they wanted the devs they say, in order to help developing the next-gen tech. and then they go patching up Maya, a 20 yrs Frankenstein.
Kudos!
I personally think that whoever is thinking that maybe Adsk will innovate and bring Maya or any other of their s/w to a stage where you'd be wowed, is extremely naive. Fool me once, shame on you ... comes to mind.

[bb3d]

Yes, and the reason to retire Softimage and not the other packages was because of the much larger user base, but they never tried to increase Softimage's user base and therefore it's a very lame excuse.
They already have the "next-gen tech", all they had to do was to bring over the few cool Maya features like PaintFX, FluidFX to Softimage, promote it accordingly and the user base would have increased. Now they are presenting "next-gen" features for Maya which are available in Softimage since 3-4 years. It's really frustrating how stupid they are.

Most of what Stefan Didak wrote in his blog expresses my own feelings about Autodesk. Maybe he should visit their HQ?

[Unaided]

They acquired Softimage because they wanted the devs they say, in order to help developing the next-gen tech. and then they go patching up Maya, a 20 yrs Frankenstein.
Kudos!
I personally think that whoever is thinking that maybe Adsk will innovate and bring Maya or any other of their s/w to a stage where you'd be wowed, is extremely naive. Fool me once, shame on you ... comes to mind.

+1

[Rez007]

So, you can still buy NEW seats of Softimage without being a previous Softimage seat holder? It is an expensive solution (Ultimate Suite) but it seems to still be there if you need a seat...

http://www.autodesk.com/suites/entertai ... d-software

[Draise]

GREAT NEWS.. well not for the pocket, but great! I will need new seats this year. I thought I was doomed definately, there still is some hope for a bit, I personally think the software can hold up more than a few years after it's official EOL.

[YKChou]

I have been using Softimage for years now.

While I am still a neophyte, it's sad things turned out this way.

So much more to learn about SI and so much potential...



It's been a great ride gentlemen...

[Phan]

Now it´s June and I am still pissed.

And I still will use SI further. Because there is no package around, that´s really (!) better, in an allrounders view. There are some nice tools, which have nice features, but if you´re used to the SI-Workflow and flexibility there is no alternative. And I surely won´t go the Maya way. MAYA is not the revolutionary technique compared to Softimage. It may be equivalent to Softimage, and some parts which SI doesn´t have, but it has nothing (!) what I do need for my actual jobs which SI doesn´t have. But it has less (ICE) in some important places.

So as I am not really a Softimage Fan Boy (((I am, but pssst))): if there is a package which is really better (and not somewhen in the future perhaps) I will transition to it. Remember: always from the allrounders / small studio View!
And I am sure (!) this revolution won´t come from a big company. It probably will be a ambitious and enthusiastic company concentrating on one product. Something like thefoundry, maxon, fabricengine. Or perhaps something Open Source based. But never a shareholder driven company...

greetings

Stephan

[thorsnuts]

I agree!

long live Softimage

[Unaided]

No other animation 3D software is best than Softimage.
Only Houdini is very powerful, but is more technical tasks and users.

[Bullit]

But never a shareholder driven company...

This silly argument probably politically driven pops again. The demise of Softimage has nothing to do with shareholders, besides all companies have shareholders. And teh public ones have much less power.
Softimage was murdered inside Media and Entertainment. It was bad management and infighting inside it.

[McNistor]

It was bad management and infighting inside it.

How do you know this, do you have a source or are you guessing? Cause I'd really like to read from that source as well to satisfy my gossip needs if nothing else.

[Bullit]

You just have to read what luceric and others have said and between the lines and the mess that was Softimage management in last years with 3 or 4 managers in a very short time. The failed project Skyline by Marc Petit or whatever was called holed Softimage when it took many developers from it.
It obviously all started when Softimagers bought by Autodesk were unable to sell the product inside the company M&E - by this i mean every department inside it pushing for Softimage -. There was also information in mailing list that while selling people would get a cut from each Maya and Max sell there wasn't any to get from each Softimage sell, don't remember or even if it was explained why was that.
You have 2 established camps inside M&E Maya and Max, appears a third more weak but that was being reborn and threatening the existing big dogs running for resources.
Over this there are the other Autodesk divisions and the top management. M&E is less than 10% of Autodesk. Softimage doesn't even register except to say yes or no in the end. Usually for this kind of non essential stuff the bosses usually defer to specific division people.