@Pooby: I think one should be extremely naive not to see this as a aqui-hire (If I understand correctly what this means). - and in response to your edited post (Maybe we should stop replying in edits ): Yes, that is not good news. Currently working with a small Maya based studio, I have a lot of work picking up their jaws from the floor when I do simple stuff in ICE, maneouver around the interface and set up render passes. Damn shame, as SI really is a good package. But I somehow feel that the need to go all doomsday, due to the lack of a SAP (Which never existed before 2011) is maybe a bit of running down the river to pick up the water and put it on the mill once again.

@Tekano: At the point of aquisition, SI could hardly be a thorn in anybodies toes. Maya dominance on the market was, and is, overwhelming - excluding Max from the comparison. Why AD bought SI is not clear to me, but I presume patents and the experience from creating ICE was the main interest - as well as getting a broader audience for the suites.

And finally: No, the future for SI does not look bright - thank god the package is already so robust that I can make my money with prior releases - but there are alternatives (Houdini, Cinema 4D). Obviously it is easier for me to be relaxed about these issues as I did not build a studio around a software package, and I do understand the amount of money and time invested into doing so, but if we want a software not ruled by economical interests, maybe open source solutions are a better choice.

At least Mark is still optimistic

"Other than that things are really good. The team in Singapore are already doing some amazing work on the next release. I think you’ll all be pleasantly surprised by what the team is going to deliver in 2014 so stay tuned and hope to see you at the show!!"

From his Area blog

I worded that carefully in order not to stir any strong responses from autodesk employees who visit this forums. It would only amount to an unnecessary and possibly ill-fated discussion which should be avoided since nothing new can be said on that subject.

EDIT: corrected myself slightly

@BottleOfRam: You are absolutely right. My bad.
@ace63: Maybe I can put the shades back on now and stop staring into the dark pits

yeah, he said that before the last release, his credibility is at an all time low with me.

Here's a thought: let the Singapore team come up with a set of Bonus Tools akin to the Maya concept. A few scripts, a few compounds, package them as an addon. Way less development time, no full build and warm feelings all around for the new team...

I don't think we need any Bonus tools or whatsoever. Furthermore I think the development team should not be working on stuff that can be achieved through the SDK.
Instead, they should focus on core problems which only they can fix: performance issues (this is one of the areas that I dislike the most about Soft - after a certain number of things in the scene it gets REALLY slow), bug fixes, ICE support for stuff like curves etc.

id love to see some modeling update. Modeling is the first thing everyone has to do still we are left so behind.. i dont get why.
Gave up on rendering btw.

- A sweep modifier that actually works and its not convoluted and buggy to use
- Update to curves, creating a fillet on a curve is just...stupid in soft.
- Extrude with interactive sliders and more options, check graphite modeling tools
- Object paint
- Duplicate with precisions to create patterns
- Advanced snaps and build planes
- More deformers, we have ICE damn.. we can create procedural geometry, have some nice stuff going on like "Clovis Gay" showed for max. Still nothing.

There is really a lot that can be done in modeling.
I dont like the path Softimage took, they just throw at you ICE and you are on your own, build your own tools now.
It would be nice to see some serious updates/development from AD.

So true and would be a great boost for users for sure. Also if the tools prove themselves as worthy, they could be integrated into Softimage like they did with Maya

Like Maximus said, maybe some curve tools, curve cut and blend, connect, chamfer etc. Curve tools in XSI really need love. Same goes for Nurbs

Nothing wrong with such addons but yes Softimage needs an overall overhaul, It feels like it is behind the competition already.