Book Thread

[Nizar]

Moderator edit:
I moved these posts over from this thread as they didn't quite belong there,
but still deserve their own thread - HB

Nizar I'm with you and want the Mastering Book ;)

Unfortunately, this isn't a priority, and Sybex (who release the Mastering series), don't interest in it...

[gman]

Nizar do you have any idea why not?

[Nizar]

I don't know why. We can try to mail Sybex about a possible Mastering Softimage, but I think they had much more interest in Maya.
I know, sometime ago, was published a book, The Art of XSI (the most recent book I think, if you look amazon you will find books for softimage xsi 4 and 5, softaimge 2011 corresponds to softimage 9), but cannot find it anywhere.

[Hirazi Blue]

http://www.cgtoolkit.com/artofxsi.htm

Books and XSI: a sad story indeed,
not so much for the lack of quality of the ones that do get published,
but for the lack of quantity of books actually published!

[Nizar]

I send time ago a mail, but they never answer, so, I'm no so confident in buying from theyr online store...

[redmotion]

If people bought them, people would make them.

BTW It's quite possible to self-publish a community-made "Mastering Softimage" book. There are many net companies that allow you to create a book and get it printed (and send to whoever wants a copy). I always thought that was a nice alternative to just straight up donating to a site. "Buy the book".

Personally, I find books secondary to videos for learning. And I think video's are secondary to on-site-training. Books are always hard to follow and require way, way more patience to follow than a video. I think they also contain way less info than videos too. Past experience -> I'd constantly find myself reading, looking up at the screen, only to look back at the book and find I've lost my place. It doesn't take long for me to get up and go do something else...

Books are nice to have while travelling I suppose, but I'd still rather just surf XSI sites on my smart-phone instead. Most phones have a CHM reader now, so you can just copy the Softimage CHM docs onto your phone and read it whenever,whereever. (Bit geeky, I know...) The SI docs are quite good if you actually read them!

[Nizar]

Hey, nothing can beat a good book for me! I like read when I'm on bed or when easily sitting on my wc cup
Serious, Book is many things:
1) A status. All major application has a dedicated book. It is a prestige for the software and for the company. I.E. blender has many books dedicated, and other will release.
2) A book is a big work and worth all single penny IMHO. It is not a 1 hour DVD, where a guy talks on a fast video. A book can be really study, can write on his pages, can turn back and read easily complex passage you need and can doing all without a pc.
3) It is really nice when you have your library reference, old and new books can be consulting anytime you need some info. DVD is really a different format and not so easily

I think needs all (DVD, Internet (fast update resource) and books)

the community book look really nice IMO

[redmotion]

As a reference material, I like the idea of a book.

It would be nice to structure the book in catergories/commands like a programming language reference or dictionary. So you could have "polygons" and all the key commands and actions (shown very graphically with very sparse text - I hate wordy books, I just want to get to point, I don't want jokes or stories about trips to visit my gran or 50 pages about how to call up a primitive cone and rotate it - people who can't cope with this stuff are not right for 3d - go do some knitting!) then we have sub catergories and LOTS of cross references to other sections such DEFORMATION, modify. Kind of like a wiki in a book.

The book could be structured exactly how Softimage itself is structured. This way it becomes useful to longterm/experienced users as well rather than just noobs. When it highlights hotkeys/component names/etc it could also compare to other packages in tables so experienced 3d users can use it as a cross reference to their previous 3d package.

Lastly, it could contain real neat technical tricks in each section graded for difficulty.

That would definitely be a useful book to me.

[Hirazi Blue]

Well, I'm off to do some knitting, then...
I just don't get what's so wrong with words. The whole point of a book would be to fill it with (well-written) words (and some illustrations, where necessary, obviously). If it's best explained only using illustrations, then it shouldn't be put in a book, that's what video (or web) tutorials are for, IMHO

[gman]

I could not agree more Hirazi. Can we start a poll for how many users would like to see a mastering xsi book?
I sent http://www.cgtoolkit.com/artofxsi.htm an email sometime ago as well , and have yet to get a response.

[Nizar]

No one know where can I buy The Art of XSI? CGtoolkit didn't respond...

[Hirazi Blue]

I just did a quick websearch, but the only offer for a new copy I could find was at amazon.com at the old price (way too expensive!)

[Nizar]

Yes, but I'm in Europe, so I must pay a more high shipping cost and Customs duties (90 dollars in total...) amzon uk don't have any copy and I don't find nothing on ebay

[Hirazi Blue]

Yes, I even checked amazon.de which offers some English books...
How long ago did you write to the folks at CG Toolkit?

[Nizar]

first time a month ago, now I registered an account in their store and write again yesterday, but again, no responded.

[Hirazi Blue]

Should have thought of this before, but I just looked at the "News" entries at their site.
I assume it's safe to say, they're quite probably dead... Sorry!