No 2013 Advantage Pack

[Bellsey]

I agree on everything you said Bellsay. Now there is one simple thing that occurs and repeats itself over and over with Autodesk, and is really simple.
Why Mudbox is underrated? What part has Autodesk in this?
Because to me the thing is really simple, the performance of Autodesk softwares are simply horrible compared to competitors, and here is where the whole "underrated" thing starts.

When an user download a trial of mudbox and a trial of zbrush and with the same machine observe that with zbrush he/she can subdivide the model to 30mil poly and still sculpting/movin viewport/painting flawlessly, then try the same in mudbox and has terrific slowdowns, made impossible to work, its really quick where he/she goes with.

Its pointless now here to say "depends on what hardware you have" because with the same hardware the other software works. So its Autodesk fault to not improve and optimize softwares for everyone. How comes the other software works?
Also you have a wide range of sculpting brushes in zbrush while mudbox has like 10? Another annoying thing in mudbox is the scale of the model, if the model is small you simply cant sculpt on it, the whole brush strenght/size is completely off.
Same goes for normal sculpting/painting, if you increase your brush size a lot, it'll simply slow down everything.

Those are basic stuff that make people drift away, there is no excuse for those things not to work. Performance always been an autodesk problem and its not going to change.
I took a look at the maya directx 11 viewport in the area, that Monster textured with dof in viewport... then you see in the bottom right corner "1.5 fps" in the viewport.. i mean what?

I'm happy Weta used an Autodesk product instead of a Pixologic (well i dont really care that much to be honest) but that doesnt solve my problems. So might as well put couple of lines in the box product that says "This product only works for big giant studios, not suited for freelancers and average machines".

I admit i've been a little harsh but, it never surprised me why mudbox is underrated. Any forums i've read people complain about lack of 3d brushes, and performance. Since day 1. and Autodesk didnt do anything about it. So yeah not surprised.

Fair points, but making a like for like Mudbox/zBrush comparison is hard to do because though they appear to do the same, they're used differently. Brushes are a big advantage in zBrush but you can add and customise them in Mudbox, and by using VDMs, you can build your own library.
Many people mention the performance of zBrush being faster, that's because it's not true 3D, it's 2.5D, so it therefore runs alot faster on lower spec'd systems. But that's the advantage (imo) that Mudbos has, you're sculpting and painting exactly on your 3D model, you're seeing exactly what you want to see. As for hardware, I disagree, it is all about hardware. If you want good all round performance, with GPU, then you have to seriously think about the hardware and graphics card you're using. There is a point where trying to use a lower end card or system, basically becomes a false economy.

As for the Maya DX11 viewport stuff, I also noticed the comments on the AREA, but I'm surprised that no one seems to have taken into account that these are static images of a seemingly static model. If there's no animation or movement, then the framerate will be low. I thought that would of been obvious.

You're right about performance though, but it is something we take seriously, hence why Maya started to introduce VP2.0. Addressing performance will always be an battle though, as whenever improvements are made, data sizes etc also go up.

Then one morning you wake up and you find out how Autodesk changes things like this:

http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread. ... &t=1064055

This is Autodesk style.
But hey, untill people keep paying, we cant really complain right?

My understanding on that, is that the extension release (just like Maya's), is availiable to active Subscription users only, but some features for the Max one are only for Suites users only.
The Max boys aren't happy though, lol.

[Bellsey]

The days of really big uber apps may be gone, but the days of really big uber suites are yet to come.

That's probably what Adobe said. lol

[luceric]

Zbrush is faster at large things because it's voxels, not actual geometry. it doesn't even use your GPU. it's a blessing and a curse. Mudbox is true geometry and uses the GPU.
Mudbox is also node based.

it's the application everyone wanted a few years ago when they couldn't make sense of Zbursh ui. apparently the winds have turn and now people like Zbrush enough but it used to be a hot debate.

Mudbox was created at weta durning Lord of the Ring production. It's being used by Pixar and Disney as well right now. The goal of the ui design is to keep it as simple as possible, as oposed to adding tons of brushes and knobs. as a result, they are not in a feature war with Zbrush, but rather are going for zen and ease of use. The latest development are with regard to scalability and extremely large textures ( the "gigatexel engine")

[bottleofram]

The Max boys aren't happy though, lol.

Just imagine the shitstorm if they were treated like Softimage users. It'd be truly a sight to behold.

it's the application everyone wanted a few years ago when they couldn't make sense of Zbursh ui. apparently the winds have turn and now people like Zbrush enough but it used to be a hot debate.

"Like" may not quite describe it. "Put up with because its worth it" is hitting closer to home i think. There's also the whole trust issue. As the guy in that max thread puts it, im not interested in sticking all my eggs in autodesk basket - it looks damn hungry lately.

[Maximus]

Just to clarify, i hate Zbrush interface/workflow, if i would have to pick one (not that i have any use in the work i do) i would go with mudbox, its a state of the art painting software and its interface is great.
But the performance (for any reason behind it, 2.5tech or pure 3d) is worse than Zbrush.

[myara]

Just to clarify, i hate Zbrush interface/workflow, if i would have to pick one (not that i have any use in the work i do) i would go with mudbox, its a state of the art painting software and its interface is great.
But the performance (for any reason behind it, 2.5tech or pure 3d) is worse than Zbrush.

If you have a low end graphic card, you'll have to buy a better card, or get used to ZB interface. But that's not AD's fault.

[Bellsey]

The Max boys aren't happy though, lol.

Just imagine the shitstorm if they were treated like Softimage users. It'd be truly a sight to behold.

From looking at the forums, there's alot of US guys complaining because I think they've also had to stomach a price adjustment in Subs as well, so it's a bit of double whammy for them.
Personally, and this is just me speaking here and by my own admission I'm hardly the biggest Max fan in the world, but it is odd that the features mention seem to be only available to Suites. Though Ken has responded with some posts that might clear things up.

[dwigfor]

FYI: Mark's presentation is about to start (2pm Tues): http://area.autodesk.com/siggraph2012

[Bullit]

Concerning uber apps, i disagree since the interface is what makes us productive. Sometime ago i had for a day to touch 3dsMax and Softimage constantly, it was a pain. Less complete applications means less productivity.

[gustavoeb]

uber apps, lets see...
blender - check
houdini - check
modo - check

although you might say they may lack one or other feature, they dont seem to be shipping suites anytime soon. Ive heard Luxology's president clearly stating that uber app is theire idea of good design (in his weekly podcast). I myself dont completaly dislike suites, they make total sense if your software company owns like 10 different M&E apps. But it need to be as flawless as it would be in a uber app. Which most of the times, does not happend.

apart from flawlessness (?) the advantage of suites, as I see it, would be that the standalones could be better developed in order to lead theyre markets. and the advantage of uber apps would be to create some crazy workflows like being able to composite textures that you will use in your 3d models... (hey I know a app that can do that )

[bottleofram]

Though Ken has responded with some posts that might clear things up.

Feels like someone was just testing the waters. Once it was clear the monster userbase is not going to be pushed around that easily, they backpedaled out of it.

[j3st3r]

Mudbox was originally developed by two Hungarian guys, here in Hungary, later WETA had interest in the project, and the rest is history. I check mudbox regularly, and I admit that for texturing it's awesome, for sculpting I still prefer zbrush. I do not think that it'll change in the near future, ZBrush just offers me everything that I want (for sculpting). I'm happy that at work I have access to both.

[Bullit]

Gustavo i was criticising the general criticism against uber apps. Sorry to not be clear.

Of course application specialisation has its advantages but that is possible for big studios. A small studio needs to focus in one main application and use it more or less for everything, and in that context ICE is an advantage even if it is not all okay.

[Tekano]

Wow, reading through that thread http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread. ... ge=2&pp=15 I feel a lot of solidarity for our 3D cousins, we have almost the same gripes. Unnecessary suites forced upon those that didn't want or need it. Long time customers ostracised for 'only' being on subscription even though they have owned original the product since the beginning. Minimal updates with more bugs than less between versions. Hardly any new development just plugins haggled over between suites and subs. A massive sense of injustice in a lot of decisions and choices made on behalf of these customers by AD management. I realise that this is just the complainers in that thread and there may be happy large studios that do not complain - but Is this what we have to look forward to?

What ever happened to customer care and loyalty? Squeezing a bigger profit out of beleaguered customers that are noticing the bigger picture, well this isn't a really great plan now is it , but then it seems Autodesk is not such a great company, its attitude is more 'we're so big we don't give a shit about you'. Right now , to me, mayybe because the grass is always sweeter on the other side of the fence, the only company with management that does appear to care about its customers is Houdini. It seems the guys still in charge ARE the developers as well. Softimage (way back in the day) used to be managed by 3D Artists. That was one of the reasons I chose it over Alias/wavefront (as well as being put off by the ugly box buttons ugh!) Softimage was passionate about making art and animation, Autodesk is passionate about making a profit.

If only the Houdini interface wasnt so convulated and damn difficult to learn its POP/SOP/CHOP/VOP stuff in comparison to what already know how its done in Softimage I would have made the change years ago, the price is no longer an obstacle.

[Bellsey]

Mudbox was originally developed by two Hungarian guys, here in Hungary, later WETA had interest in the project, and the rest is history. I check mudbox regularly, and I admit that for texturing it's awesome, for sculpting I still prefer zbrush. I do not think that it'll change in the near future, ZBrush just offers me everything that I want (for sculpting). I'm happy that at work I have access to both.

My understanding was that Andrew Camenisch, Dave Cardwell, and Tibor Madjar were creators of Mudbox and subsequently Skymatter. Dave and Tibor have moved on but Andrew still heads up Mudbox though. You still see Dave doing some stuff though, like tutorials.

[Bellsey]

uber apps, lets see...
blender - check
houdini - check
modo - check

although you might say they may lack one or other feature, they dont seem to be shipping suites anytime soon. Ive heard Luxology's president clearly stating that uber app is theire idea of good design (in his weekly podcast). I myself dont completaly dislike suites, they make total sense if your software company owns like 10 different M&E apps. But it need to be as flawless as it would be in a uber app. Which most of the times, does not happend.

apart from flawlessness (?) the advantage of suites, as I see it, would be that the standalones could be better developed in order to lead theyre markets. and the advantage of uber apps would be to create some crazy workflows like being able to composite textures that you will use in your 3d models... (hey I know a app that can do that )

my meaning of uber app, was that I felt it was unlikely that we would get a single software application that literally had all the functionality of Maya, Max, Mudbox, Mobu, Houdini, etc. There are many packages out there, that are stacked with features, but its incredibly hard to literally do everything.