Softimage 2012 Experiences

[McNistor]

Unfortunately it does the same thing here. Tested with a 2011 scene and it hangs a few secs more in 2012 until it starts rendering.
What is even more peculiar to me, is that the scene took more time to load in 2012 also. A lot more...

[ActionArt]

I also tested a medium complexity scene I used in 2011 where render times were around 3 minutes a frame and now with 2012 there 3:30 a frame. Using "unified sampling" with similar visual quality brought it back down to 3:05.

So, nothing gained for me plus the nasty lag mentioned above.

The release really wasn't ready in regards to rendering. Hope there's a service pack in the not to distant future.

[kaizer_soze]

Same here, 380 spheres = 13 sec. freezing before actual start to render !
I can't believe this is happening in a final version !

(Intel i7 Quad, 8 GB RAM)

[ActionArt]

Now I've found scenes made in 2011 SAP the won't even open in 2012! Yikes

This is looking worse and worse by the minute. I wonder if they uploaded an early beta by mistake! I left LW because of this sort of thing now SI is doing it. Very disappointing. Well, back to 2011 for me, which has worked well for me.

I hope they get this mess straightened out fairly soon.

[ShaderOp]

I think it's generally wise to treat new releases of Autodesk products like corporations treat new versions of Windows: use it at home, don't deploy it at work until the first service pack arrives. And if previous releases are any indication, I think a new service pack is probably just around the corner.

Doesn't make it suck any less, but look at the bright side: It gives us geeks who aren't on the beta list a chance to play around and maybe have a few cool plug-ins lined up by the time the service pack arrive

[ActionArt]

Very true. Hopefully there's a few ICE modeling tools being tinkered with right now so they're ready when the service pack arrives

Mental Images seems to be up to it's old trick of doing basically nothing and calling it a new version. Can't expect much from them I guess. I was hoping Nvidia would crack the whip after buying them but I guess not.

In my opinion, the basic summary for this release would read something like this:

Here's a new MR that's no better and only half hooked up, here's some new bugs just for fun, and oh ya, you wanted some modeling tools so here's some nodes, go make them yourself.

I suppose every platform has some dud releases, this is one. Lets hope they at least really fixed the famous disconnecting nodes.

[McNistor]

Am I crazy or the tile order when in FG is different in '12?

[Maximus]

its different but its a feature, now when using FG it calculate first the areas where few samples are needed so the image feedback is faster, then it moves to more complicated areas of the image, it should always been like this, i'm glad they implemented it.

[McNistor]

Oh, OK that is nice. I guess.
For testing is useful, but for the final image's render time makes no difference.
So yeah, it's good to have it.

[T.I.M.]

i hope this get fixed like now, it makes impossible to use the software..

I second that.
I was able to test it here . And render it takes forever for preprocessing.And in general render time is slower than 2011.
I tested MR in Maya 2012 and XSI 2012 with the same scene setup same lighting .
512 simple beveled cubes with arch material and one directional light with raytraced shadow on.
In SI took 38 sec preprocessing and 30.93 sec rendering in Maya 14 sec without any preprocessing time. I am using the same mental ray settings.
I don't know what to say.This is HUGE problem.I hope Autodesk are not going to call Softimage, Maya ICE one day......
Let's hope for fast fix.

[ace63]

Same here, 380 spheres = 13 sec. freezing before actual start to render !
I can't believe this is happening in a final version !

(Intel i7 Quad, 8 GB RAM)

I just tested that - takes quite a while on mental ray to start rendering 380 Spheres - about 15 secs or so.
Arnold starts after 2 secs...

Mental Ray again?

[Caveman]

misss_physical is fixed woohoo.

[Hirazi Blue]

Well, I'm starting to think the free for 2 cores version of 3Delight might gain
in popularity in the upcoming weeks (until the Hotfixes arrive, that is),
as 3Delight 3.04 reportedly still works under SI2012.
(I can't confirm this, I'm still waiting for my SI2012 boxed version ).

[rray]

misss_physical is fixed woohoo.

Indeed! I was sure this shader was abandoned so I didn't event bother testing. It's one of the best looking SSS shaders out there.

[eternal art]

Ohh .. my god , this is need a super hot fix !

[Helli]

I don't want to blame anyone.
But who really tested this software (beta testers) not only playing around with the new stuff ?

A Bug like this should be a no go.