Filling in the holes-

[slowdive]

I was an avid xsi user until about 2010 ish. when the acquisition occured.

Now I have trouble switching to other software packages- just in terms of time, and also skillset-
because not everything necessarily carries well. One term here is another term there, etc.

Now I decided to take a look at it again,
because well modeling in xsi is great and still do model a lot in xsi.

Now this may look as more of a rant if anything- So allow me at this time to apologize. I just have no idea what to do at this point. For years I've tried to "grind method" on my own and the reality is its not working. Something is getting lost in the translation. All i want to do is learn- and have a job making things!

The times some idea comes together on the screen for the first time is why we still do it right?

I was wondering where I'd need to go to catch up on things. Because I actually do love xsi, despite my financial situation and everything else.
Cant rig anywhere else as fast, cant drop nodes anywhere as fast. I didn't have to go super deep into ice beyond state machines to get some cool things happening.

Ok that last part was not necessary.Cant remember what the code for strike-through is for forums.

But I have forgotten a great deal and that's really unfortunate.

Like Lglass what ever happened to that? ( that was a great plugin and thats probably on rray.de if I looked long enough)

Or making partitions and more buffers for rendering - That one in particular was pretty important I think also. (still don't remember that but looking at vids)

But that got pushed out with stuff from max and maya, in some desperate and possibly pathetic attempt to broaden horizons and be open about other software- which is totally fine of course but its not easy to maintain everything straight without a ton of notes.

Does anyone feel this way? Am I being completely unprofessional about all this?? Have I been looking in the wrong places the entire time???

Ok if you've managed to get this far without being disgusted- well thats great. Apologies for losing my cool. That wasn't right.

[slowdive]

Lookin at XSI Transition Training

https://www.si-community.com/forum/v ... 4432#p4432

[Pooby]

What do you want to know?

[slowdive]

What do you want to know?

Hi Pooby, I honestly have no idea where to start!?

Firstly, thanks for the response. It is appreciated on this end.

You know when someone asks you what you are good at? Well I can't answer that properly. I just do what comes my way and never really have time to look at the big picture. Don't consider myself an expert by any means either.

I learned xsi first about 10 years ago almost- so to leave it behind feels very foolhardy- but at the same time the jobs are predominantly 3dsmax cinema 4d and maya lately.

Now this may not be in respect to everyone else so I can be wrong but that's what keeps coming my way.

Also jumping software packages because of something that I could have overcome myself (whether thru a script or just in terms of execution) well, I'm starting to realize how much everything counts.

I really want to give xsi a chance- I like the software and it feels like home whether its modeling something or just pulling up a render region or something. I will try to get you a better answer, once I've had some time to think about it.

[slowdive]

What do you want to know?

Hi Pooby, I honestly have no idea where to start!?

Firstly, thanks for the response. It is appreciated on this end.

You know when someone asks you what you are good at? Well I can't answer that properly. I just do what comes my way and never really have time to look at the big picture. Don't consider myself an expert by any means either.

I learned xsi first about 10 years ago almost- so to leave it behind feels very foolhardy- but at the same time the jobs are predominantly 3dsmax cinema 4d and maya lately.

Now this may not be in respect to everyone else so I can be wrong but that's what keeps coming my way.

Also jumping software packages because of something that I could have overcome myself (whether thru a script or just in terms of execution) well, I'm starting to realize how much everything counts.

I really want to give xsi a chance- I like the software and it feels like home whether its modeling something or just pulling up a render region or something. I will try to get you a better answer, once I've had some time to think about it.

So update- I think modeling (organic and hard surface) for the most part is covered. Cannot make isometric surfaces though.

Modeling- Saw they added some nice stuff like edgeloop slide w regards to flow normal. and cap. spin edge -that's really nice.

animation and rigging- probably intermediate- with envelopes and building rigs as not a problem. couldn't hurt to look at it again- also remember a lot of tutorials with the words sixbirds although I may be wrong. Forgot working with animation clips and offsets.

Lighting - Tend to use a spots the most with area light on- and portal lights, with a gi sphere. Although this may be old practice by now.
DO not remember HDRI workflow but assume its the enviornment node for passes and or well a mapped sphere. lit scenes manually didnt really have to use FG

Rendering- Always got bonked at this phase. I can make partitions to an extent- know how to use g-buffers to an extent. Making passes seemed pretty straightforward but would like to know a faster way for like "render pass by light" "RGB elements- which is like the max equiv" I kind of got mad at mental ray and myself at this phase, rendering with raytracing always well.. it handed my ass back to me. Could never get it to look right. Forgot/ cannot make override work successful manually.

ICE - novice to adept- never got past state machines.

That's off the top of my head. As honest as I could think of.

If I had a question it'd probably be with adding stuff onto an existing rig/envelope. That rendering partitions/buffers thing would be really useful as well. Or at least what some people have done with it

[slowdive]

UPDATE-

There's another post that I've been looking at by daydream has a lot of interesting links.

gonna try rctools later on see how thats changed.

wish me luck Maybe I should start posting images or something that'd help wouldnt it- was never good at forums.

[dwigfor]

Cannot make isometric surfaces though.

Not quite sure what those are.. Have a look at Dan's Topo ICE Modelling pack.

If you want some learning, have a try at ICE Modelling and ICE Kinematics (brush up on your linear algebra). For ICE Modelling, I would watch Chris G's Bridge tutorial on vimeo. For kinematics, I would read Todd Akita's paper (it's somewhere on here as well as linked to on Mark S's area blog).

-Dave

[grahamef]

Cannot make isometric surfaces though.

Not quite sure what those are..

If it means what I'm guessing, take a look at Polygonizer (either the built-in one or the more advanced one available from Mootzoid).

[Daniel Brassard]

@dwigfor

Look here for some common definitions

http://www.math.hmc.edu/~gu/curves_and_ ... metry.html

Isometric Surfaces

Surfaces are called isometric when there exists a continuous deformation relating them. The helicoid and the catenoid are isometric.

Yes, Dan's topo pack has some of these specially the helicoid.

You can also use one of the preset of a jscript plugin that I wrote that has these shapes as well. The plugin is available on RRay.de

http://rray.de/xsi/ Look for parametric formula. The zip file come with approx 120 presets.

I should really transfer the info from the Area to here for the benefit of the community.

[Hirazi Blue]

si-community classics:
Parametric Sandbox
Dan's ICE Topology Compound Pack 1
;)

[slowdive]

Do you mean in particular this?

https://www.si-community.com/forum/v ... =41&t=3023

---------------------------------------------------------

On another note-

I had briefly mentioned iso's as theres some blended architectural structures which I personally think i'd have a tough time modeling thru poly- at least without a level of precision.

Like if you take the top half of a hyperbolic and extract curves from it- or just as a function after the fact.

So this geometry can then be "tesselated", or just from the quads generate a "framework" ( will stop with the quotes)

A framework of extracted curves can become pipes or mullions. The underlying geometry can become glass via thickness.

You tend to see it alot more in exterior architecture surfacing, these surfaces produced by CAD or RHINO can or cannot be emulated without a considerable level of precision.

Most of the time its imported as ascii into 3dsmax or in an AD format and its enough to then apply materials for render. For years prior its been import- cleanup - hope.

I don't know if anyone considers this of value.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Something else probably irrelevant but-

To control texture nodes of a hard surface geometry ( with texture projections?) placing multiple textures by hand as movable objects with transform

on the edges of say a hard surface metallic object for a dry brush effect. Not necessarily thru the uv stamp / photoshop it method, but actually in the viewport.

Sorry if this sounds like gibberish

[Hirazi Blue]

Do you mean in particular this?

https://www.si-community.com/forum/v ... =41&t=3023

Yes that's the one, I believe...

which I personally think i'd have a tough time modeling thru poly- at least without a level of precision.

Problem is: the modeler of the software formerly known as Softimage|XSI always has been of a polygonal/subD variety. Curves and surfaces were never high on the agenda.

[slowdive]

Knew that back in 2003 when I first started / and it didn't matter to me. Just wanted to create, artistically- make them look cool- convey a message- learn.

but every app has its weaknesses.

Perhaps ice can do what was initially unavailable to the artist?

Probably gonna look at some xsi tuts for a bit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... APtiTgyGAA

[slowdive]

Ok so I did some stuff in ICE yeeaaaaaaa-

1. Managed to get a ice node to show up in the deformers list on softimage.

2. got a sort of fire looking torus thing. so its ice particles with some of the default forces - turb by value,turb by range, ( that curl framework looks rly nice)

but its mostly parroting off of a tutorial video on youtube ( AMAZING FEATURES OF ICE) or something like that.

3.Got a bookshelf to spit out books with rigid bodies. Probably not something I could replicate but I think it has to do with the proximity of intersecting mesh between the books ( which are sets of scaled cubes) looks pretty cool though!

4. update- scene crashed. super.

5. trying to get a rigid body with a hinge to react to ice particles- still DIYing it right now. I'll go about looking it up after I have failed a few tries.

[slowdive]

Ok day three-

1 -got to emit strands from a null object

2- took the preset for the dynamic hair and made a wierd force reaction- it looks like the hairs are whipping around and reacting to the sphere. it kind of looks like solar flares if you hook up a particle emission to it. so thats cool.

3. Based on something i saw on vimeo- there was this guy that managed to procedurally make crystals on a sphere. the compound looks great. havent had a chance to ask him for a reference scene yet. kind of shy.

4. again based on that last one. was able to make a local subdivision tie into an object based on a null. so the grid is the default 8x8 units- and the null basically adds a local subdivide to it. havent tried doing anything fancy but the tesy poly in null was super effective. dont even need the array rly just trying to setup something else.

Get null >test poly in null>>
Get vertex index> -[set in array] > [build array] > [apply subd locally]
get nearby points> -

[slowdive]

Its been a couple days since I last posted. But I haven't given up yet.

saw a vimeo on how a folding op in ice was done looks pretty cool- wanted to do a folding standing crane for a long time now.

i think that will be my next project.