Softimage 2014

[Nizar]

Seen streaming presentation.

Not so bad... This is the first time Softimage appear like a software of the family, at par with 3dsm and Maya, and not like a Cinderella or plugin

[ojo3D]

I've just lost the Q&A of Softimage. Was it any good?

Lastly, let me ask you guys a thing. I'm a editor and after effects guy. I've always stayed in touch with the 3D news, software and market and as a friend of mine speaks highly of Softimage, I thought I should ask you guys ... I have the student license for autodesk products, meaning that I can learn Maya, Max, Softimage or all three together. Oo

But I was inclining myself to learn Softimage since it appears the most intereresting to me. I'll use it for architectural visualization, product design and motion graphics. Better saying, I will study this topics for when I am able to take freelance work, I buy a commercial license. In my spare time, I intend on teaching my wife so we can produce animation hobby work in short films or something like that. I guess that is the main reason I'm interested in Softimage, because I ready a lot that the animation tools are more robust and "easier"in it. And Blur Studio uses it and I love their animations. o/

The main point of this rambling is that lately I only read doom's day posts in here and I want your guys opinion about investing time in learning Softimage or just go to another app. Keep in mind that I haven't started learning nothing of any software as of yet.

Cheers.

[sonictk]

I've just lost the Q&A of Softimage. Was it any good?

Lastly, let me ask you guys a thing. I'm a editor and after effects guy. I've always stayed in touch with the 3D news, software and market and as a friend of mine speaks highly of Softimage, I thought I should ask you guys ... I have the student license for autodesk products, meaning that I can learn Maya, Max, Softimage or all three together. Oo

But I was inclining myself to learn Softimage since it appears the most intereresting to me. I'll use it for architectural visualization, product design and motion graphics. Better saying, I will study this topics for when I am able to take freelance work, I buy a commercial license. In my spare time, I intend on teaching my wife so we can produce animation hobby work in short films or something like that. I guess that is the main reason I'm interested in Softimage, because I ready a lot that the animation tools are more robust and "easier"in it. And Blur Studio uses it and I love their animations. o/

The main point of this rambling is that lately I only read doom's day posts in here and I want your guys opinion about investing time in learning Softimage or just go to another app. Keep in mind that I haven't started learning nothing of any software as of yet.

Cheers.

My instructor tells me:
If you want a job in the industry, learn maya.
To which I say:
If you want to get stuff done, learn XSI.



(really though, after seeing so many fellow students learn max/maya/xsi and my friend in architecture class learning modo, I'd say: just focus on learning modeling best practices for now, whichever app you use will be fine. If you're doing archViz and product design though I would say modo/max would be a better choice than XSI, I'm not really a fan of XSI/maya's nurbs/subD tools)

[ojo3D]

My instructor tells me:
If you want a job in the industry, learn maya.
To which I say:
If you want to get stuff done, learn XSI.



(really though, after seeing so many fellow students learn max/maya/xsi and my friend in architecture class learning modo, I'd say: just focus on learning modeling best practices for now, whichever app you use will be fine. If you're doing archViz and product design though I would say modo/max would be a better choice than XSI, I'm not really a fan of XSI/maya's nurbs/subD tools)

Yeah ... I've looked at C4D and Max for that. But since I'll probably be freelancing, I guess it really doesn't matter what software I use as long as I get the work done. I would like to make the convenience and put Softimage to do this (surely it can), but as I said, do or try to do animations as a hobbyist. Since I studied film, there is that will to make movies. =]

And after my wife watched Morris Lessmore, she wants to learn either. But I think Maya would be tough to teach and Max and C4D CA are inferior to SI or Maya.

Anyway ... I guess after this events that Softimage got a little love. Maybe the skies are not that grey.

[angus_davidson]

As a person who has taught both Maya and SI to students, SI is definitely much easier, and intuitive for people to get to grips with. Once you master the fundamentals you should be able to use any 3D app after a small adjustment period. Even if the development of SI stopped today its feature set is still very good and will be used and remain valid for years.

As a student you can get the free learning editions so my advice is give them a try. Find the one that suits you best.

The main doom and gloom is far more based on economics. A lot of people are feeling (and in my opinion rightly so) that they are getting very little value for their rather large subscription fees. It looks like all 3 (Max, Maya and SI) all got very light releases this time around, so its not specifically SI.

[ojo3D]

As a person who has taught both Maya and SI to students, SI is definitely much easier, and intuitive for people to get to grips with. Once you master the fundamentals you should be able to use any 3D app after a small adjustment period. Even if the development of SI stopped today its feature set is still very good and will be used and remain valid for years.

As a student you can get the free learning editions so my advice is give them a try. Find the one that suits you best.

The main doom and gloom is far more based on economics. A lot of people are feeling (and in my opinion rightly so) that they are getting very little value for their rather large subscription fees. It looks like all 3 (Max, Maya and SI) all got very light releases this time around, so its not specifically SI.

Thanks for your answer angus. I thought so as far as the releases this year and nothing specifically bad on Softimage.

I'm giving them a try and liking a lot of Softimage, so I guess I'll stick to that. After all, the better I understand, the easiest will be to pass the knowledge to my wife.

Tomorrow is the Q&A of Max and Maya and in the end of the day the Unfold, so perhaps we will get a little more SI love.

[Bullit]

Softimage if you learn ICE is also better to add more possibilities to your After Effects animations.

[Falam]

Origami Softimage

[SvalinnAsgard]

This is a great article I was forwarded in an email:
http://www.maxunderground.com/archives/ ... itves.html

Autodesk is failing with their software updates, so now they are looking to make toys. If that is not pathetic enough, you will not believe what sort of toys they are going for... primitives. Yes, cubes and spheres.


Ha... well I believed it. Even though it was an April Fools joke, I would not be surprised if there was some truth to it.

[Falam]

Google got me on Aprils Fools with "Google Nose"

[Chris_TC]

As a person who has taught both Maya and SI to students, SI is definitely much easier, and intuitive for people to get to grips with. Once you master the fundamentals you should be able to use any 3D app after a small adjustment period. Even if the development of SI stopped today its feature set is still very good and will be used and remain valid for years.

I'd also like to mention that knowing only SI does not make it that much harder to get a job. When I was looking, I applied at several places that were looking for Max or Maya people, and none of them cared that I had neither application on my software list. I ended up at a place that bought an SI license for me instead of making me learn something else, so that's cool. And of course now SI is kicking all kinds of butt in the pipeline

[angus_davidson]

As a person who has taught both Maya and SI to students, SI is definitely much easier, and intuitive for people to get to grips with. Once you master the fundamentals you should be able to use any 3D app after a small adjustment period. Even if the development of SI stopped today its feature set is still very good and will be used and remain valid for years.

I'd also like to mention that knowing only SI does not make it that much harder to get a job. When I was looking, I applied at several places that were looking for Max or Maya people, and none of them cared that I had neither application on my software list. I ended up at a place that bought an SI license for me instead of making me learn something else, so that's cool. And of course now SI is kicking all kinds of butt in the pipeline

We have had folks who have worked in maya during our course (they have a choice to do so if they own their own software) and funnily enough there have been two who have been staunchly anti SI throughout the whole course only to end up landing jobs at firms who only use SI. Point is though if you learn 3d by fundamentals and not just by what each item on the menu can do, you can easily adjust. ;)

[EricTRocks]

We have had folks who have worked in maya during our course (they have a choice to do so if they own their own software) and funnily enough there have been two who have been staunchly anti SI throughout the whole course only to end up landing jobs at firms who only use SI. Point is though if you learn 3d by fundamentals and not just by what each item on the menu can do, you can easily adjust. ;)

I agree entirely.

[Pooby]

I don't agree entirely.
To do what I'm doing in any other 3d package without ICE would be unfeasible without extending my r and d periods beyond the point of economic sense.
I work in a character studio that has a maya contingent, and the difference between the softwares doesn't just mean that the softimage people go faster. it means that using ICE we can evolve our deformations in a bespoke fashion during a job, ending up with results that just wouldn't be possible without expensive and extensive pre-planning/coding in an equivalent maya pipeline. That just wouldn't be practical, as you can't always know exactly what you need until you start working into it.
The non linear nature of softimage means that you can keep radically improving and redesigning aspects of a deformation rig even after you've got it up and running and have animation on it.
I know a maya artist who says 'all packages do the same stuff nowadays' which may be technically correct. But the manner in which you have to go about doing it makes the difference between a certain task being easy and fluid or totally impractical to the point where its unfeasible.
Softimage's workflow invites experimentation and evolution during jobs and for me, it is that which separates it more than any bullet point feature set could do. It's the reason I couldn't swap until something else could provide an equivalent speed of flexible workflow and ability to program deformations at speed on the fly.

[EricTRocks]

Well I agree that Softimage has a lot over Maya. There is no arguing that. Let's put the RnD aside and just talk about generalist skill sets as I believe Angus was talking about. If you know the bread and butter skills of modeling, surfacing, animation, and rigging you can transition with a small amount of pain from one to the other because the concepts are the same.

Let's say that Maya had the same type of node graph deformation / particle / topo / kine editor. Don't you think the skills learned in ICE about point positions, vectors, matrices, etc. would be transferable? If you understand how to create the deformer from the fundamental knowledge of the math, you can recreate it in other apps. Whether it takes a longer amount of time to RnD it is aside the point. It can still be done. Obviously we all want Softimage to be the package you do it in, but you aren't always able to get jobs where the company is using those apps. The knowledge you get needs to be able to be applied to whatever app you're shoved in front of.

[ojo3D]

Guys, I just finished download the whole Revi Vivus stuff. Lot's of things. Do you think it's wise to start there for my training? Or should I buy some DT training?

I say that because I had a look and theses tutorials look very straight forward and the base knowledge of Softimage remains the same, I guess.


What do you guys think?

Cheers.