What if Softimage died?

[MauricioPC]

I went into a Gnomon Master Class here in Brazil (from their Brazillian branch, Axis), with the animation supervisor of Vetor Zero (the biggest CG/Animation house in Latin America) and he said that if Maya didn't improve, they were considering changing roles and putting Houdini as the HUB in the company.

That leads me to another question ... I'll use the two examples below. Booth uses Houdini extensively. Axis Animation uses Houdini for shading, lighting, dynamics, fx and rendering and Main Road uses Houdini for rigging, animation, shading, lighting, dynamics, fx and rendering.






Keeping that in mind ... extracting Maya and putting Softimage in place would be a win-win situation? I prefer Softimage modeling and animation tools and you have ICE power. Or the combo of 3ds Max + Softimage (used at Blur Studio) could be another solution (but a more expensive one, given that you need to purchase lots of plugins)?

I ask you this because I love FX, but not so much Maya. So I'm thinking of alternatives for FX work together with Softimage.

- EDIT -

You could also argue about a Softimage + Cinema 4D option. The TurbulenceFD plugin is really good and fast and create believable fire and smoke.

[luceric]

The Bifrost project is expected to eventually cover what ICE does in FX and will cover things it does not, but of course that's going to take a few phases. As either explained in the FxGuide article, the first phase is node-based voxel manipulation, visualization, fluid simulation, rendering without meshing, etc, which ICE does not do. There will be other phases after that. The majority of the people working on Bifrost have worked on ICE and therefore are well aware its strength and limitations. The bifrost graph has nodes like ICE, get data/set data, compounds, etc. It's not the exactly same thing, but it's related tech.

[Falam]

^ There you have it ! An ICE Alternative (superior ?) in a few versions from now, 2018, maybe !

[Pooby]

By which time we will have lots of options. Good for everyone.

[MauricioPC]

By which time we will have lots of options. Good for everyone.

Exactly.

Just a side-stupid-note here ... I was rendering a scene via the render region on a viewport and then I discovered I could continue to work (move, etc) on the other viewport without freezing Softimage. Is it possible in Maya? Because everytime I render something in Maya and I move or click on something, I get the impression Maya will crash.

Just tested and it's seen impossible. Maya slows the whole system down. Maybe Softimage has a better resources management, given I was render a scene way more complex than a Maya one?

[Hirazi Blue]

By which time we will have lots of options. Good for everyone.

By which time, however, many of the things we think of as options now,
will undoubtedly have vanished again...

[Falam]

Pooby the community likes your input.

Many will pack up and change direction, many will stay. What works for one person may not work for another person.

500 Post Milestone in this thread, incredible.


To every single person who replied, pat yourself on the back !

Sorry about the handle name mistake Pooby !

[MauricioPC]

Poopy the community likes your input.

Many will pack up and change direction, many will stay. What works for one person may not work for another person.

500 Post Milestone in this thread, incredible.


To every single person who replied, pat yourself on the back !

Since we have more replies here than that thread at Max Underground, that should makes us worthy of the Softimage PM showing up and telling us that everything is going to be ok!

[Pooby]

By which time we will have lots of options. Good for everyone.

By which time, however, many of the things we think of as options now,
will undoubtedly have vanished again...

Well, if you mean discontinued. Possibly, but thats far from vanished. I would never stop using a software just because it wasn't 'in print'. I'd only stop if using it became not the best option.

I just want to use what's best at any given time. At the moment it's definately xsi for me. Saying that I highly doubt that Softimage is what I'm going to be using 10 years from now. I expect there will be far better options around.

However, I think by then The very nature of making 3d will have changed, I think the idea of choosing between maya, max, xsi or modo, etc will seem like an old-school concept. I imagine that everything will be a lot easier to produce with more advanced tools, and more choice and compatibility between pipeline tools ala fabric engine.

In fact, I'm expecting that more and more, I'll be building a lot of tools that I need either myself, or with my team and I'm pretty confident that the process of making of tools will become simpler over time.

[Mathaeus]

Just a side-stupid-note here ... I was rendering a scene via the render region on a viewport and then I discovered I could continue to work (move, etc) on the other viewport without freezing Softimage. Is it possible in Maya? Because everytime I render something in Maya and I move or click on something, I get the impression Maya will crash.

Yeah, SI has unique 'shared memory' feature. With MR or another renderer which allows this.

Anyway, SI always been slick application, but..... that's great if you're independent freelancer. If you want to be employee, from my small experience, it goes reverse. Somehow it's better to don't be afraid of widely accepted, but not bellowed tools. I mean, not bellowed by users. In my life, it was Max's biped, Mental Ray, and..... in future, most likely, Maya.

Personally, I'd believe sooo much more in strength of Naiad, instead of all Houdini solvers together.
Naiad already has strong reputation, by small or big studios, while Houdini constantly seems to be in that sad loophole, praised by nerds or fan boys, nothing else.

[Falam]

Just a side-stupid-note here ... I was rendering a scene via the render region on a viewport and then I discovered I could continue to work (move, etc) on the other viewport without freezing Softimage. Is it possible in Maya? Because everytime I render something in Maya and I move or click on something, I get the impression Maya will crash.

Yeah, SI has unique 'shared memory' feature. With MR or another renderer which allows this.

Anyway, SI always been slick application, but..... that's great if you're independent freelancer. If you want to be employee, from my small experience, it goes reverse. Somehow it's better to don't be afraid of widely accepted, but not bellowed tools. I mean, not bellowed by users. In my life, it was Max's biped, Mental Ray, and..... in future, most likely, Maya.

Personally, I'd believe sooo much more in strength of Naiad, instead of all Houdini solvers together.
Naiad already has strong reputation, by small or big studios, while Houdini constantly seems to be in that sad loophole, praised by nerds or fan boys, nothing else.

Well written article, I agree !

[MauricioPC]

Just a side-stupid-note here ... I was rendering a scene via the render region on a viewport and then I discovered I could continue to work (move, etc) on the other viewport without freezing Softimage. Is it possible in Maya? Because everytime I render something in Maya and I move or click on something, I get the impression Maya will crash.

Yeah, SI has unique 'shared memory' feature. With MR or another renderer which allows this.

Anyway, SI always been slick application, but..... that's great if you're independent freelancer. If you want to be employee, from my small experience, it goes reverse. Somehow it's better to don't be afraid of widely accepted, but not bellowed tools. I mean, not bellowed by users. In my life, it was Max's biped, Mental Ray, and..... in future, most likely, Maya.

Personally, I'd believe sooo much more in strength of Naiad, instead of all Houdini solvers together.
Naiad already has strong reputation, by small or big studios, while Houdini constantly seems to be in that sad loophole, praised by nerds or fan boys, nothing else.

Yeah ... Houdini I would put in the mix for the future. But right now, I think more of Softimage as my go to application and Maya as my VFX tool of choice (with or without the ICE help).

I don't know how BiFrost will come, in what context and if it'll be bundled with Maya or not, but it looks rather impressive. My main goal is to become an Allan Mckay or Anselm V. Seherr-Thoss or Hristo Velev. Basic, freelance guys making amazing VFX work for films and commercials. But I want to do that without the need of using Max (I think Max is sooooo slow that annoys me).

But the main idea is to keep Softimage as the general application as I find lots of things in it more robust. And if possible, finish everything in it.

[Hirazi Blue]

I don't know how BiFrost will come, in what context and if it'll be bundled with Maya or not

Based solely on a feeling in my gut (but to be fair a gut that's often wrong), I have a feeling this magical Bifröst might just as well morph/evolve into Autodesks next big standalone generalist DCC before they're done, scraping off bits of Maya, Max and Softimage in the process. Which actually wouldn't be such a bad idea, I guess.
But like I said: my gut is often wrong, it might just be gastritis...

[MauricioPC]

I don't know how BiFrost will come, in what context and if it'll be bundled with Maya or not

Based solely on a feeling in my gut (but to be fair a gut that's often wrong), I have a feeling this magical Bifröst might just as well morph/evolve into Autodesks next big standalone generalist DCC before they're done, scraping off bits of Maya, Max and Softimage in the process. Which actually wouldn't be such a bad idea, I guess.
But like I said: my gut is often wrong, it might just be gastritis...

You need to drink some tea for that gastritis!

As for a new DCC app, that would be a great idea. But I also find it hard to believe AD would create a new app and risk loose some space of market share. From Softimage 3D to Softimage XSI (since XSI wasn't all round up), Softimage lost lots of places, didn't it? Maya gained room in this transition.

But then again, what app could take Maya spot? Houdini I think it's not there yet ... Modo and the like are quite far.

[Pooby]

I'm also pretty convinced that bifrost will become a pipeline core, which is what maya is used for now. Whether it evolves into a dcc app as we know it is another matter.
I think that having bifrost, fabric engine, Houdini engine etc in development and overlapping in some ways is all good. It shows that 3d software development isn't sitting still and autodesk have competition . Which is different to the impression I had a few depressing years ago.
I also think it highlights a trend toward a less single dcc-centric way of working that isn't fully upon us yet.

[ctedin]

I can tell you from a long time Softimage use. (3ds max user before that) that Houdini could be a worthy successor to softimage. It's much father along in 90 percent of its features than Maya, and in the other bits, a free or cheap modeling system is a good option. Organic modeling is not is strong suit but zbrush is always at my right hand. It's more than just a fanboy opinion, I think. I'm getting used to having free access to the entire data set from every asset and every point on every asset in the scene. This is something ICE can do, although I find its modeling system much more difficult because of its low level operation. I just need to dig deeper. Bifrost system seems promising but vaporware at this moment (although naiad is definitely a very powerful and proven fluid simulator.) I just think Houdini has a proven track record and the parts work almost seamlessly together. The DOP system is just SO flexible and powerful. And, it comes with a very strong rendering system. It's not Arnold, but it's pretty nice. Just my two cents. I've been away from the forum for a while and have missed the back and forth. Have a great week guys.