maya everywhere

[mike]

Now it will take only days, that you can get maya with your next "burger or pizza".

8/30/02 Unreal Tournament 2003 To Include Maya Plug-in

AnimationMagazine

[draz]

If only Side FX had the advertising power of A|W. Well they are targeting gamers now and that's quite a large demographic. I was using Maya PLE but eventually got somewhat frustrated with the watermarks in the viewports. Apprentice has been fantastic. I just wish I knew more about programming so that I could really get to experience the power behind it.

[MG]

I agree with all that has been said in this thread so far! (Especially about Houdini Apprentice being far supperior than Alias|Wavefront's 'Maya - Personal Learning Edition').

However I am not upset, or frustrated, at all by these latest developments (of Maya). Because I don't think Houdini will lose it's marketposition.

Why? I mean, compare Maya and Houdini. Maya was clearly a wannabe-PRISMS, that was very visible from the beginning Alias and Wavefront started working on it. Take Maya's node-based architecture and relational modeling. These are just a few examples.

Nowadays I am seeying companies, including Alias|Wavefront, implement more UI features and other "drag-and-drop"-like gadgetery rather than solid, integrated and powerful features such as seen in Houdini. And speaking of UI, I simply love Houdini's UI the way it is! It's very fast and even on lesser systems. As professional user, what else could you ask for?

Oh and, coming back to the games thing that draz mentioned. Gamers and the game-industry are indeed a large group... But Houdini is mainly a high-end film & broadcast tool. The only real-time graphics Houdini delivers/does, via it's magnificent CHOPs, is mainly used for in those amazing disco-parties, live-broadcast graphics etc., as seen on the Elkabong and Derivative Inc. sites. Plus, I must also note that the games Houdini (or PRISMS, in the past) has contributed to are mostly expensive console game projects. Such as featured in those articles over at the SESI homepage. Which is more profitable than making Houdini available for amateur/hobbyist modification-developers, for example.

So I'd say, don't worry. Maybe you should actually be happy for being a Houdini user and being part of a select group. Such as you have Windows and Linux users...

[mike]

Hi Calosus,

You are right with some of your statements. Houdini is an high-level,

high-end package ....

But this doesn't really help, to get new users if all people starts with

3Dmax or Maya. Why ?? THEY GET NO JOB !!

I speak only for the european market and I,m since 17 years in that business ( starting with wavefront 1.2 ). For most of all productionhouses, specially in the german area, Houdini is "only" a particle-effects tool, but the "real" work is done with max,maya or XSI.

I hope this will change sometime

[MG]

But what do you exactly mean? People that are experienced Houdini users won't get a job? or the other way around?

Anyways, CAMF eh? I been on their site. Very nice stuff. Also, those free shaders are very nice I must say!

I myself live also in Europe (Netherlands). Though, I'm not employed yet, since I am still a student. I do know several people in that industry here in the Netherlands.

This is slightly off-topic... But have you ever heard of Cyberfish? It's a Dutch 3D conpany. I've personally met them, which was very cool. (In LightWave meetings, while I was still 16 years old).