What if Softimage died?

[MauricioPC]

FYI, AD seems to be making a more hard push of Maya to games. This new extension improves in a lot of features that people said it was missing.

http://news.creativecow.net/story/873337

[angus_davidson]

FYI, AD seems to be making a more hard push of Maya to games. This new extension improves in a lot of features that people said it was missing.

http://news.creativecow.net/story/873337

Its now pretty much a no brainer for what to use for our game design course. The send to Unity and the other little tweaks removes all of the things that could have caused us to use Softimage for that course. Even though our 3D Animation post grads still use Softimage its likely that as the Game design students graduate (they will be in year 3 out 4 next year) and move to post grad we will most likely drop Softimage entirely.

So in my particular case Softimage has under two years to come up with sufficient clarity about what it is and where its going to not be relegated to just a fond memory. That simply is the reality where I work.

[MauricioPC]

FYI, AD seems to be making a more hard push of Maya to games. This new extension improves in a lot of features that people said it was missing.

http://news.creativecow.net/story/873337

Its now pretty much a no brainer for what to use for our game design course. The send to Unity and the other little tweaks removes all of the things that could have caused us to use Softimage for that course. Even though our 3D Animation post grads still use Softimage its likely that as the Game design students graduate (they will be in year 3 out 4 next year) and move to post grad we will most likely drop Softimage entirely.

So in my particular case Softimage has under two years to come up with sufficient clarity about what it is and where its going to not be relegated to just a fond memory. That simply is the reality where I work.

With Maya LT, it's clear that 3ds Max lost another field. The new PM is a CAD guy and engineer, so even though they hired Tom Hudson to work on some things, it's quite clear that game and film will not be touched anymore.

So that leaves the broadcast and the Viz market. I think Softimage could thrive greatly in the broadcast market as a viable option against Cinema 4D and 3ds Max. But of course, from what I read from you guys, lots of fixes and updates should be made. But I guess this market would be a valuable addition to Autodesk and they should push Softimage to it.

Then you would have:

- Maya/LT for Games and Film
- 3ds Max for Visualization
- Softimage for Broadcast


Well defined market and propositions for each software and Softimage would HAVE to improve in order to battle the new Cinema 4D features and upgrades.

[satyajit]

FYI, AD seems to be making a more hard push of Maya to games. This new extension improves in a lot of features that people said it was missing.

http://news.creativecow.net/story/873337

Its now pretty much a no brainer for what to use for our game design course. The send to Unity and the other little tweaks removes all of the things that could have caused us to use Softimage for that course. Even though our 3D Animation post grads still use Softimage its likely that as the Game design students graduate (they will be in year 3 out 4 next year) and move to post grad we will most likely drop Softimage entirely.

So in my particular case Softimage has under two years to come up with sufficient clarity about what it is and where its going to not be relegated to just a fond memory. That simply is the reality where I work.

With Maya LT, it's clear that 3ds Max lost another field. The new PM is a CAD guy and engineer, so even though they hired Tom Hudson to work on some things, it's quite clear that game and film will not be touched anymore.

So that leaves the broadcast and the Viz market. I think Softimage could thrive greatly in the broadcast market as a viable option against Cinema 4D and 3ds Max. But of course, from what I read from you guys, lots of fixes and updates should be made. But I guess this market would be a valuable addition to Autodesk and they should push Softimage to it.

Then you would have:

- Maya/LT for Games and Film
- 3ds Max for Visualization
- Softimage for Broadcast


Well defined market and propositions for each software and Softimage would HAVE to improve in order to battle the new Cinema 4D features and upgrades.

+1

[Falam]

You guys do know that BiFrost will be an alternative to ICE for Maya, as someone mentioned in this thread. There working on making things a little easier for the Artist with BiFrost, compared to ICE as I read.

You can't have two things competing against each other under the same umbrella. With the next release of Softimage 2015 coming soon, wait and see approach is probably best taken as many were extremely disappointed with 2014. Lets wait to see what 2015 brings.

[dfp123]

Unfortunately we won't hear a peep about 2015 for another five months. Considering it has been two years with underwhelming main updates and no SAPs, 2015 really need to be huge! An honest step forward to show they are actively pursuing increasing the functionality and features.
If not, long live 2014...

[ace63]

Considering how 2013 was announced as an awesome release with many big features I doubt we will be seeing anything big. Release cycles are way too fast and there are probably not enough developers on the team to bring any new big features.

[Lord Futzi Voldemort]

From here (an interview with Gary Yost from 2010, interesting to read in any case):

http://www.maxunderground.com/the_histo ... udio_pt2/3

- What is your current perception of the CG industry? How has the industry changed since you started developing 3D Studio, and what role do you think 3DS had in those changes?

Hmmm…. Consolidation. When I started it was a highly fragmented industry with hundreds of different small software entrepreneurs developing lots of creative tools, healthily competing with one another. Now of course the Big Three are all owned by Autodesk, and that’s certainly changed the competitive dynamic. Also, when I began doing this many of these tools were very expensive… in the tens of thousands of dollars. We began the trend of cost-reducing professional tools, but that got out of hand for awhile – sort of a commoditization of the market. Customers started to expect an awful lot of functionality for a very low price… lower than the costs of actually developing this stuff. And that put a lot of great engineers out of work. Many have since moved on to other industries. So there’s been a brain drain due to this low-cost price expectation and I feel partly responsible for that. Those high prices in the old days weren’t sustainable though, and it was one of the reasons consolidation happened. Perhaps this was all part of the process. Who knows?

With that in mind, how can anyone sane try to get better cash flow with rebates (subscriptions) and bundles (suites)?
Does any one think that has changed since 2010? If AD wasn't completely out of their mind, they bought Si to let it, well not die, but starve.

[myara]

With that in mind, how can anyone sane try to get better cash flow with rebates (subscriptions) and bundles (suites)?
Does any one think that has changed since 2010? If AD wasn't completely out of their mind, they bought Si to let it, well not die, but starve.

I don't get it. What is your point?

I think the subscription model makes planning and sales forecasting easier, it's selling something you haven't created yet (not even announced, or planned). The revenues per license may seem lower but it is more stable. I don't have any AD sales info but the subscription doesn't sound that bad.

Anyway, if (hypothetically) SI is dying, it isn't because of subscriptions or suites.

AD isn't doing a good job selling SI, but XSI wasn't exactly breaking sales records either.

[McNistor]

AD isn't doing a good job selling SI, but XSI wasn't exactly breaking sales records either.

Autodesk's plan is to have all Softimage users (clients) move onto Maya so that they have fewer expenses but the same revenue.
I speculate that the plan of slowly letting XSI rot while trying to convert XSIers to Maya was put in place shortly after the buyout.

Financially speaking, it's a lot better to have N users for 2 apps rather than N for 3.
Trying to sell more of XSI would be in contradiction to that logic and would only perpetuate the status quo - N users for 3 apps.
Judging by the amount of resources Autodesk is pouring into XSI's development, they almost reached their goal. Whatever XSI licenses sell right now, it's only because of inertia and since we're not living in an ideal world, friction will ultimately overcome inertia.

[benoit81]

Financially speaking, it's a lot better to have N users for 2 apps rather than N for 3.

"For fiscal year 2012, Adobe achieved record revenue of $4.4 billion." ( http://www.adobe.com/aboutadobe/pressro ... nings.html )
Whereas Autodesk 2012 revenue : $2.2 billion http://www.wikinvest.com/stock/Autodesk ... ue/2012/Q1

Autodesk try Adobe recipes for making money. I do not think that the best thing to do is stooping Softimage and convert SI users to Maya. The best thing to do is to make the huge Maya base users buying Softimage for ICE. In this business plan ("Adobe suites"), Maya user should find in Softimage a good companion. But they should not enhances Softimage in Maya strong market (see Photoshop poor vector tools, so that Illustrator users can not abandon their soft). So Softimage is develop the way Maya user want (who is the product manager ?) . But even with this business plan, an Autodesk Manager can decide with a nice Excel sheet that Softimage is not profitable.

I have discussed with a representative of Dassault Systems. He told me they had the opportunity to buy Softimage in 2008, but Autodesk was faster.
Maybe it could have been a better option for us.

By the way

Financially speaking, it's a lot better to have N users for 2 apps rather than N for 3.

According the pool, it's not working this way. Current Softimage users stick to their preferred software.

Adobe’s Creative Cloud Surpasses 1M Subscribers, But Q3 2013 Revenue Falls To $995.1M

http://techcrunch.com/2013/09/17/adobes-creative-cloud-surpasses-1m-subscribers-but-q3-2013-revenue-falls-to-995-1m/
I'm not sure that Autodesk best option is folowing Adobe in the "licence cloud" scheme...

[Bullit]

People are different McNistor that is one reason that many corporations have competing products. Killing Softimage only makes Autodesk more vulnerable.

[McNistor]

I know the theory behind having variety between your products in order to appeal to a larger user/client base.
Problem is Autodesk doesn't feel threatened at all right now, they own the market.

[MauricioPC]

Since I heard RodeoFX uses a lot of Softimage work. Amazing reel and shows the power of SI.


Let's hope Modo grows and puts a pressure on AD (and force it to keep with 3 major apps).

[Lord Futzi Voldemort]

With that in mind, how can anyone sane try to get better cash flow with rebates (subscriptions) and bundles (suites)?
Does any one think that has changed since 2010? If AD wasn't completely out of their mind, they bought Si to let it, well not die, but starve.

I don't get it. What is your point?

I think the subscription model makes planning and sales forecasting easier, it's selling something you haven't created yet (not even announced, or planned). The revenues per license may seem lower but it is more stable. I don't have any AD sales info but the subscription doesn't sound that bad.

Anyway, if (hypothetically) SI is dying, it isn't because of subscriptions or suites.

AD isn't doing a good job selling SI, but XSI wasn't exactly breaking sales records either.

The point is, proper development is much more expensive than users are paying at the moment. So when AD lowers the price in whatever way, proper development gets more unlikely.

[Hirazi Blue]

Let's hope Modo grows and puts a pressure on AD (and force it to keep with 3 major apps).

While Modo will undoubtedly grow over the next couple of years, I just can't see it as serious competition to Maya and Max (and Softimage?) and by the time it eventually has grown to its full potential, Softimage will be long gone and forgotten, I'm afraid.