GOZ/XSI

[dirtydog]

Over in zbrushcentral they are discussing the forthcoming ver 4, which at this point in time has no XSI plugin for GOZ. A few Xsi users are complaining, perhaps members from this forum could lend a bit of support by posting a reply.

[Hirazi Blue]

Well I just took a look at that thread and I am afraid any more intervention on behalf of the Softimage crowd won't really help. Interestingly enough, as someone in that thread also noted, there was the famous TD Love Tour in 2005 when (Avid|)Softimage and Pixologic still seemed the best of friends.
I was/am tempted to look into purchasing ZBrush4,
but first would have to find out how good/bad
the interaction with Softimage actually is... ;)

[Maximus]

Thats the consequence of a unexistant marketing from Autodesk to push this product, beside the fact i like softimage, its kinda clear AD doesnt do shit to promote it, so why other companies should invest time, money and resource for plugins?

The actual situation on plugin front is depressing, i dont know you guys but the impression i have is this software is being pushed to death. Wich doesnt explain why AD bought it to let it rot in a corner.

Since the acquisition i didnt see a single time AD pushing this product in their "channels" everything was made by the few awesome guys who was working on it since Avid era.

just a quick look at plugins..
render engine, the only whone whos active is 3delight because they are awesome guys at dna, rest is completely cut off

Vray is bein slow like never because Chaos Group itself didnt believe in the software future
Cebas keep saying they didnt get AD to come back to them for the developing for unknown reason
Randomcontrol has no "priority" on developing a working addon for SI2011, i asked them and they answered like that
Maxwell is same story
Mudbox is a mess to communicate with XSI, and if you for example export a normal map from mudbox you get the shiny compatibily tab with 2 options, Max and Maya.
Zbrush is same story now, maybe after all the userbase complain they will make a goZ for xsi, but we always are the damn last wheel and this start to piss people off.

Its been a while and i am thinking to switch completely to modo or cinema, been a while i'm watching how the things going for Softimage, and despite what they say, they are not going good at all.
In this world if you dont advertise anything, your product dies because no one will know it, doesnt matter if you add 3000000 ICE nodes.
Softimage has 1/10 of Max and Maya plugins, it still lacks too many important stuff to be competitive with the other 2, and to be a valid alternative, and this can be brought only if you push the product, and have people know it.
We still dont have a simple solution to shatter things and RBD animate them..in 2010..even blender has it..

/end of whine, sorry for that but the situation is not really the brightest one.. I'm trying to look somewhere else houdini, modo or cinema. Hopefully things will change but you know....its so rare that AD listen to userbase, its so rare things change when money plays a huge part on something.


bye, Max

[Hirazi Blue]

"Softimage isn't dead, it's just sleeping..."
You make some valid points, although some of the renderer plug-ins allegedly under development have been so ever since version 6.
I recall the following quote from 3D World issue 95:

(...) XSI is now set to be made able to interoperate with Renderman, 3Delight, finalRender, V-Ray and Gelato. XSI 6.0 will be the minimum version required to use any of these plug-ins as they're released.

Well only 3Delight has materialized and Gelato doesn't count as Nvidia pulled its plug. But I think you get the point: there was talk of new renderers long before Avid sold XSI to Autodesk... And it's an easy "cop out" IMHO for plug-in developers to just blame it on Autodesk...

But maybe we should reopen a "Softimage is dying" thread and leave this as our dedicated "GoZ for Softimage" thread...
;)

[Maximus]

As i said, its clearly evidence on everyone's eyes, if you dont push your product, dont advertise it, 0 marketing, worse you hide it, how you pretend other companies will be motivated to invest money on developing stuff on it?

List me a single NEW company that was encouraged by Softimage potential and developed something for it, what we got now is what we had since Avid, 3delight is always being well developed on SI because it actually had its own show, under Avid there was more visibility of Soft, bein the real alternative to autodesk products, well thats my opinion.

What i mean is that i didnt see a single encouraging signal about Softimage now, everyone just wants to drop it or avoid it.
People ask for "why softimage"? some users come over from Max and try soft and the first thing they ask is hey where the hell is a tickness or shell modifier? So why i should use softimage?

If AD cant push, advertise, marketing a good Answer for that simple question, software is going to die, not sleep.
Ask yourself, "why cinema 4D", "why modo" i'm sure you'll find a lot of answers by yourself too
We're in a moment where the passion and "sentimental" approach to a software goes to hell when you have deadline and workflow problems, stuff need to work and the worse thing SI has is the connection with the outside world, being render engines, being sculpt applications, being plugin, being everything else, without counting the utterly stupid lack of elemental tools a 4k professional application should have way before ICE. Not everyone can afford to buy multiple 3d applications just because the one you bought doesnt have an elemental tool...

I'm blaming Autodesk as i was blaming Avid and i blame every software house who doesnt market their product, this is a simple concept, you dont market your product -> none will get interest -> none will develop anything for it.
AD is doing way worse than Avid for that matters anyway.

[Nizar]

This is frustration for me... This compromise my desire to learn (and buy) softimage, because Zbrush is my favourite software... Now Modo look more interesting for me
Why pixologic ignore XSI? I see Maximus point, but if SI has a not negligible market quote, why pixologic don't support it? If pixologic don't support, the only reason for me is because XSI market share become to low.

[Hirazi Blue]

@Maximus
Well from the comments of people much "closer to the action" (I believe it was Luc-Eric Rousseau) I gathered Softimage would have probably died under Avid-rule also.
(And as "powerful companion to Maya" Softimage at least gets SOME recognition).
But that's probably besides the point...
Blaming Autodesk for killing the product is one thing. It seems clear to me, Autodesk basically bought Softimage because they could get it relatively cheap, but didn't have a clear idea what to do with it & IMHO they still haven't made up their mind on that.
Blaming Autodesk for third-party developers to not develop plug-ins for it, is a bit overdone IMHO. Like I stated in my previous post some of the renderers (like V-Ray and finalrender were announced/promised when XSI 6 was still hot. Some of the problem seems to lie with the third-party developers themselves. Not all of the problem, though, it's clear Autodesk holds some of the blame. But merely SOME of the blame...
Like I said on another forum in a similar context: just be happy,
Softimage wasn't sold to Smith Micro,
otherwise Softimage would be a "powerful companion to Poser" by now...

edit: And as for marketing purposes, the dilemma Autodesk faces is that promoting Softimage more vigorously would probably only change the composition of their market share (i.e a little more Softimage and a little less Maya/Max), but wouldn't change their overall market share that much. And in the end, they're in it for the money (just like Avid|Softimage for that matter), not to please a diverse user base.
I'm not saying I am happy with it, but what can you do? Blame Autodesk?

[Maximus]

well i'm not blaming autodesk because its a common thing to do, i'm blaming autodesk because after all this time it didnt yet decided what to do with a software they bought, and they dont send good signals at all, as far as i can tell.
Should we just end the chapter saying "hey you know what? we just got unlucky, get over it"
I know that SI might as well died during Avid rule, i'm just disappointed its happening to this great Software i invested so much time and resources on it.

I'm glad its still alive of course, but you know..everytime something new comes out, everytime there is some movement in 3d field, everytime there is something exciting, its always not Softimage involved, this push people away from the software, you know.
What pisses me more is that i have to start from scratch again and learn another software because the path Softimage is at now, is not bright at all.

I'm not sure anymore Soft now can compete with other applications, and to go back to the question "why softimage" i cant give anymore an answer, other 3d packages are too far ahead of "us", they have way to many plugins, engines, tools, that we just dont have without at least having a massive amount of TDs working for you, they have most stuff out of the box.
Without the heavy rock on your head wich is called Mental Ray.
There is no need i list you what Modo or cinema has, Max, or Maya, compared to Softimage, because it is a lost battle, i'm just trying to find the time, wish and mind to get over it and start from scratch with another software..and this is just pissing me off..

So well i took the GoZ bandwagon to explain my depression at the moment on this software, sorry but i sometimes get dragged into those arguments
A forum is a place to talk after all! no offense intended to anyone!

[Nizar]

What pisses me more is that i have to start from scratch again and learn another software because the path Softimage is at now, is not bright at all.

This is exactly my fear... learn a software is really a big task, need not only money, but patience and time. So why start softimage if his future is not so bright as I thought

But the other question is: there is a software with the some SI feeling? the only I never tested is Cinema, the other one don't like as I like XSI.

[Hirazi Blue]

@Maximus
Please don't get me wrong, I understand your frustration. The present and the near future are bleak to say the least. And for some of it we shouldn't blame Autodesk as such, but the division responsible for Softimage, as some of the choices they made in the recent past has helped killing the momentum surrounding Softimage as a software. Allow me my personal rant: the documentation of the product is slipping (and has been for years). The best example came with the new ICE Kinematics, where the documentation basically said, if you can't figure this out for yourself, you're too stupid to use it anyway (and of course I am merely paraphrasing here).
Even I (as someone who's definitively not an "advanced rigger or TD") can see the potential in ICE Kinematics. But if they don't even bother to really explain it to their own user base, no amount of marketing (if there were any) would help.
The CUDA enabled PhysX acceleration is another thing... Promises you cannot seem to keep are promises you shouldn't make in my book.
What I am trying to say here: there is blame that should be directed towards Autodesk and there is blame that should be directed towards those people we lovingly refer to as "those friendly folks @ Softimage". As some one who cannot afford a switch of software (hobbyist ;;) ) the things that can conceivably be blamed at the Softimage team are slightly more important.
But again, I fully understand your frustration...

To be clear: this was a personal rant, not one as a moderator of this community...

@Nizar - I am not actively ignoring your posts, although it looks like it.
I was writing this long rant while you were posting your last remark...

[satyajit]

I don't want to fuel any Apps war or anything. But I'm really feeling tempted to write at this thread.

Why any Software?

If you remember an old macintosh advert "It's not what the computer can do, it's what you can do with it", you'll get my point why softimage or max or maya or c4d or....

Softwares are simply tools for letting you do what you want to do. I strongly feel there's absolutely no reason to buy any software based on it's features until you find those features are working for your unique mind and workflow. It doesn't matter if it's Animation Master or Houdini, if it works for you, then it's for you. If you know what you are exactly looking for, test that particular feature of these different softwares. And soon, you'll see one of them is made for you.

Why Softimage?

SI has it's strong points and weak points. Again if you find the strong points stronger than any other software and know how to work around weak points, then this question won't be so obvious. In this particular thread we are talking about nonavailability of GoZ plugin and other plugins for SI. And the frustrations for that. Well, SI never has the biggest user base due to the reasons we all know. So, it's natural that plugin developers will put it at the bottom of their priority list. But it's not a weakness of the software. Windows is more popular and it has more developer. But it doesn't mean it's better than MacOS.

Ya, I feel more like a Mac user in a windows world. SI just feels great. If may lose in some fronts, but the where it wins and gives an edge is enough for me to go on. But this is me. The level of granularity Maya or Max offers is not enough and what Houdini offers is too much for me. So, I've found my niche here.

You have to choose yours too. If you are a modeler, and love to switch between sculpting and poly modeling (features of GoZ), you can switch to Maya or Max. Poly modeling is almost same in all the softwares, especially SI and Maya. For me I use Maya keyboard in SI, you can use SI keyboard in Maya to aid the switch. If you find the graphite tool set absolutely essential for you you can switch to Max. Use whatever works, whatever is needed.

Little Biasness!

I don't think future of SI is anywhere bleak. It's the only software that allows data granularity while remaining in the Maya-ish workflow. Architecture of both Maya and Max doesn't allow too much development of that kind. Only SI does. I think SI is the dark horse of AD against SideFX. Letting it die will mean to close doors on this selling point. And open the market to SideFx. A clever organisation like AD knows that.

Also, investing more and more in FBX and interoperability doesn't makes sense if AD plans to settle on one Software. What's the point in that? I think it'll try to divide features in different softwares and make interoperability good. More sales, lesser room space for competition.

But I don't expect this from plugin developers. They operate solely by analyzing user base. So, I don't think more render engines for SI are coming, but that would bother AD too. So, I expect more and more fine tuning of MR. Also, I predict they'd figure some way to translate shader trees between Max, Maya and SI. Impossible? Hey GoZ does exactly that.

[Bellsey]

ok, I'll chip in here, but I don't want a lengthy discussion, as we're moving off topic, I'll try and keep it as short as poss, lol.

Plugins, well this is a tricky one, as their are many different types of plugins. Historically Softimage(XSI) never has had as many external plugins as say Max or Maya. The reasons for this, well I think its not down to any one thing. When I was in production, we never purchased as many external plugins for Soft, compared to Maya/Max, because imo, we didn't need to. We found the software had everything we needed, and we focused on internal pipeline tools instead.
Softimage is just as competitive against Max and Maya, and vice versa. All 3 have their strengths, but also weaknesses, just like the other rival packages from other vendors. Nothing is perfect.

Rendering though, well that's different. The rendering API was never open enough for vendors but for XSI 6.5 it was opened up and there was some good uptake as whats been listed in these posts. However not many of them have really appeared, which is a shame. Why? Frankly I don't know, I'm sure those vendors in question had their reasons which we're not aware of. But just because a company isn't developing a plugin for Softimage, that doesn't mean that the package isn't worth it, or is dying.

There's been mention of both Avid and Autodesk handling Softimage(XSI). Under Avid, there was growth right up the end, however Softimage wasn't part of Avid's core business. And with Autodesk, there is still growth and I'm sure growth would of continued, whoever would of acquired Softimage.

Maximus, I understand your frustrations, but things are not as bad as you think. Softimage is pushed and when I discuss things with colleagues and our sales partners, it gets equal billing with the other products. There's no undertones of forgetting about Softimage and not bothering, far from it.
Of course many will point to the Autodesk message of Softimage being a companion product to Maya as some sign of Autodesk dumbing down Soft, and I've seen the lists and forums on this.

The 'companion statement' wasn't imo, the best choice of words (not sure what is though), but all it's saying is, if you're a Maya house consider added Softimage to your toolset. We all know the strengths of Soft and that there are more Maya houses than Soft. It makes business sense really.
The digital/3D/CG industry we'll call it in broad terms, is changing. We're also in extremely tough times econmically. There's been some encouraging signs, but its still tough for people. People are not suddenly going to rip up pipelines and replace the software that has helped build their business. No one is suddenly going to dump their core 3D software, instead they'll be looking for solutions to plug their pipeline gaps and get their work done.

[Rez007]

Well, it is nice to see that someone from Autodesk actually read this thread and replied.

I fully agree with what Maximus says, and I thank him for being so vocal about the issues. Just becuase he might be one of the few voices that sounds out about the short comings of Softimage, I feel that about 90percent of the community feels the same way...if not, at least I know I do. Every year I keep dumping money into my subscription being fooled by the "marketing" and being teased by postings that say "...I cant say exactly what is coming next but it will be awesome..." and every release that comes out, the same old things are still not there. It is a never ending cycle that I keep falling for. I was once a 3Ds Max user but switched to XSI 6.0 -6.5 during the repackaging scenario, and it seemed very promising under Avid and I thought even-more-so when Autodesk acquired it. Well, so far it really hasn't been that great...I just keep hoping it will.

I have used the surveys, called, emailed my concerns directly to Autodesk, I even recieved a call directly from Autodesk asking how I liked the Subscription Service. I told them I wasn't too fond of it and that the only reason I have it is for upgrading. I asked the person on the phone to have a manager contact me, by any means possible, just to see if they actually pay attention to complaints, and the women on the phone said that someone will definitely get a hold of me. Well, that was 2 months ago, and I am still waiting for a reply.

The above goes hand-in-hand to Softimage as a whole, paying $800.00 a year for subscription (When the others are $500.00???) and asking for simple things like a unit of messure, thickness modifier, and extruding along a normal, never gets recognized. I am beginning to wonder where my money is going too? Did it help fund the free 3D Home modeling package on Autodesk's site...who knows.

As far as how Autodesk markets Softimage...well Maximus is dead-on. I find there to be almost zero marketing. I almost fell off my chair when I got an email saying there was going to be a webcast of the new 2011 features of Softimage. That was like the second email that actually had Softimage relativity to it this whole year, while I get oodles of Max and Maya mailings. For Softimage to not even be listed on the quick links of the main Autodesk page (www.autodesk.com) that is pretty poor, especially when there are multiple choices for AutoCAD. Is it really that hard to add an extra 20 pixels in height to make an extra button?

All-in-all, my renewal is coming up here shortly. I would love to actually see some substantial improvements with Softimage interms of marketing and software dev, or there is a good chance that I will be looking elsewhere, as in Luxology or SideFX.

[Bellsey]

ok, some interesting and fair comments, I will try and give you my take on them....

Every year I keep dumping money into my subscription being fooled by the "marketing" and being teased by postings that say "...I cant say exactly what is coming next but it will be awesome..." and every release that comes out, the same old things are still not there. It is a never ending cycle that I keep falling for.

The fact that we don't mention specific features and when they will release and in which version, is not marketing spin. Unfortunately as Autodesk is a public US company, we are unable to comment on any technology that may be released in the future. There's a whole load of regulations about revenue etc, which I won't bore you with, but these types of things are there to protect you the end user, as much as it does us. I know this sounds like I'm making this up, but honestly I'm not. Other software vendors who are in similar situations will also take this view and this was also the same when Softimage was owned by Avid.

I even recieved a call directly from Autodesk asking how I liked the Subscription Service. I told them I wasn't too fond of it and that the only reason I have it is for upgrading. I asked the person on the phone to have a manager contact me, by any means possible, just to see if they actually pay attention to complaints, and the women on the phone said that someone will definitely get a hold of me. Well, that was 2 months ago, and I am still waiting for a reply.

I don't know anything about this type of follow up or who this person was, so I can't really comment about it. What I will say though, is you shouldn't undervalue Subscription, its not just about getting the latest software update. There's are other benefits, which many people often overlook. It's also the best way, imo, to contact the support teams and log feature requests, although you can do this from inside some packages now.

.......and asking for simple things like a unit of messure, thickness modifier, and extruding along a normal, never gets recognized. I am beginning to wonder where my money is going too? Did it help fund the free 3D Home modeling package on Autodesk's site...who knows.

How are you asking for these things? To whom are submitting these request? Are you using the Subscription Center?

As far as how Autodesk markets Softimage...well Maximus is dead-on. I find there to be almost zero marketing. I almost fell off my chair when I got an email saying there was going to be a webcast of the new 2011 features of Softimage. That was like the second email that actually had Softimage relativity to it this whole year, while I get oodles of Max and Maya mailings......
All-in-all, my renewal is coming up here shortly. I would love to actually see some substantial improvements with Softimage interms of marketing and software dev, or there is a good chance that I will be looking elsewhere, as in Luxology or SideFX

Marketing, the big one. Personally I'm not sure I totally agree that there is zero marketing for Softimage. This is certainly not my experiance, but I'm in EMEA/North Europe, so I can't speak for the other regions, like US or Asia. The webcasts that Mark has done are cool but in many way more for the US. For me, I've already done some reseller events here in EMEA, where I have demo'ed and shown Softimage 2011 to audiences of various sizes, so perhaps there's a slightly different type of approach for marketing for different countries and territories. Could it be better? Sure, there's always room for improvement.

In terms on dev and resource, then Mark made a good comment on his blog http://area.autodesk.com/blogs/marks/go ... ooood_news which I think sums up alot. Things are looking good and I'm liking what I'm seeing so far and for the future. Also you have to remember, its actually hasn't been that long since Autodesk aqquired Softimage, not even 2 years in fact. Coming into a company like Autodesk isn't easy and there's a lot of change, things don't happen overnight, and although it might not seem like it, a lot has actually been done in the time to date.

For Softimage to not even be listed on the quick links of the main Autodesk page (www.autodesk.com) that is pretty poor, especially when there are multiple choices for AutoCAD. Is it really that hard to add an extra 20 pixels in height to make an extra button?

Ok, this is a kinda fair point, but personally you should not take this as Autodesks bad reflection on Softimage, due to the fact its not listed on the main front page. There's a bigger picture here.
Autodesk have a range of great products, covering many industries, Architectural, Engineering, Construction, Manufacturing, Educations, Govenment, Automotive, Transport, etc, etc. Out of all the products, the ones listed on the front page perhaps give the best snapshot of the Autodesk folio and the industries Autodesk cover. Products like Alias Design, Navisworks, Moldflow, Flame, Motionbuilder aren't listed on the main pages either, but they are no lesser product in quality or importance. The front page is just the main entrance to Autodesk and gives an overall impression of what we do, before people go further and find what they might be looking for. Look at Adobe's site, they do a similar thing.

[Rez007]

Hi Graham,

Thanks for taking the time to respond to my post. I am just going to add up a couple of things here that you might have asked in your response.

I do understand that Autodesk has legal obligations in what it can and cannot say. I guess I am really uncertain on just how tight-lipped they have to be. Unless I am mistaken, when ICE was on its way out under Avid, I believe the community at least had some idea that a new partical solution was in the works prior to the actual release of ICE. Also, a while ago before the acquisition, the community, I believe, was at least somewhat aware that Exocortex was supposed to make a fluid solver for Softimage. Under Autodesk that, as far as I know, has been terminated and we are still waiting to even hear if something is coming.

As for asking what features or items that would be nice to have in up-coming releases of Softimage, I have gone through every means possible. Yes, I have done Subscription Center multiple times, and I was even on a couple of BETAs, where I also mentioned some short comings, granted one of those was under Avid. It seems that if the feature you are asking for is not on the agenda or being requested by a large studio, it becomes overlooked to a degree. Case in point, look how long it took to finally get IES lights integrated...those were in 3Ds Max ages ago. It is not like I am asking to have a massive feature added. The ones I mentioned previously surely cannot take that much resources to finally implement.

As for Subscription Services, I agree that there are benefits to it, but the resources and instructional material are not even close to what is offereed for Maya and Max. The support team is great for Softimage and they are always on top of things - I have zero issue with that at all, but to have the membership fee still be $300.00 dollars more than Max or Maya, it will be nice to see that soonly adjusted. Granted if I called support more than twice a year, I guess I could eventually see the added bonus to why the price is higher. But like I said, the support team is great!

As far as marketing goes, I see your point about not being able to list every software package on the main page. However, how is that list determined? Is it the installed user base? The point I was trying to make, is that Autodesk recently acquired a new product, and if they truely wanted to see it succeed, then I would think that they would do everything possible to make sure it is in the fore-front and in the face of everyone to see it until it picks up the acknowledgement of the mass public. If it is hidden, like it currently is now, people are not going to either find it easily, or lose interest in the product. Whenever a new film comes out or an awesome image is posted on the forums or in print magazines, everyone always looks to see what software was used to make it. Then again, if more people who actually use Softimage would post their work, that says it was made with Softimage, that would also greatly help support the software from fading into the background.

The videos from Mark are great, and I always look forward to seeing them. I just wish there would be more - from whomever really. While the Area is a nice idea, there are not too many "current" videos/tutorials published. Now from a 3rd party supporter, which I know Autodesk has no control over, I recently just cancelled my 3D World subscrption because there is hardly anything in there in regards to Softimage. Once in a while there is a tutorial from Ola Madsen, which are really cool, but I can just grab those on his site. 3D Artist magazine doesn't support Softimage at all, and I mean zero! Instead they use dedicated magazine space for Poser. I have nothing wrong with Poser, but they act as if Softimage doesnt even exist. Grab a copy at your local newstand...you will see what I mean. This all goes hand-in-hand to the marketing - If Autodesk pushed Softimage a little more maybe other outlets will also do the same.

Anyway, thanks for your previous reply and I really do hope Softimage sticks around.

[electricgeisha]

Well, it is nice to see that someone from Autodesk actually read this thread and replied.

I fully agree with what Maximus says, and I thank him for being so vocal about the issues. Just becuase he might be one of the few voices that sounds out about the short comings of Softimage, I feel that about 90percent of the community feels the same way...if not, at least I know I do. Every year I keep dumping money into my subscription being fooled by the "marketing" and being teased by postings that say "...I cant say exactly what is coming next but it will be awesome..." and every release that comes out, the same old things are still not there. It is a never ending cycle that I keep falling for. I was once a 3Ds Max user but switched to XSI 6.0 -6.5 during the repackaging scenario, and it seemed very promising under Avid and I thought even-more-so when Autodesk acquired it. Well, so far it really hasn't been that great...I just keep hoping it will.

I have used the surveys, called, emailed my concerns directly to Autodesk, I even recieved a call directly from Autodesk asking how I liked the Subscription Service. I told them I wasn't too fond of it and that the only reason I have it is for upgrading. I asked the person on the phone to have a manager contact me, by any means possible, just to see if they actually pay attention to complaints, and the women on the phone said that someone will definitely get a hold of me. Well, that was 2 months ago, and I am still waiting for a reply.

The above goes hand-in-hand to Softimage as a whole, paying $800.00 a year for subscription (When the others are $500.00???) and asking for simple things like a unit of messure, thickness modifier, and extruding along a normal, never gets recognized. I am beginning to wonder where my money is going too? Did it help fund the free 3D Home modeling package on Autodesk's site...who knows.

As far as how Autodesk markets Softimage...well Maximus is dead-on. I find there to be almost zero marketing. I almost fell off my chair when I got an email saying there was going to be a webcast of the new 2011 features of Softimage. That was like the second email that actually had Softimage relativity to it this whole year, while I get oodles of Max and Maya mailings. For Softimage to not even be listed on the quick links of the main Autodesk page (www.autodesk.com) that is pretty poor, especially when there are multiple choices for AutoCAD. Is it really that hard to add an extra 20 pixels in height to make an extra button?

All-in-all, my renewal is coming up here shortly. I would love to actually see some substantial improvements with Softimage interms of marketing and software dev, or there is a good chance that I will be looking elsewhere, as in Luxology or SideFX.

I totally agree... I have my AD subs coming up in September on all 3 apps SI,Max,Maya and with the lack of Autodesk breathing life into SI you do start to wonder, "companion software" I won't rant about that but you have to laugh.... Mudbox makes great companion software to Zbrush tsk tsk how dare I say such a thing.

Oh well I remain optimistic as someone mentioned SI really is a sleeping giant lets hope AD can figure that out before we all jump the fence.