magneto Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 (edited) It seems like Softimage has finally fallen http://www.cgchannel.com/2014/03/autodesk-to-retire-softimage/ http://softimage.tv/autodesk-retires-softimage I am sure there will be a surge of users rushing to SESI for asylum. Edited March 4, 2014 by magneto Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mandrake0 Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 i think sesi need's a welcome package for the softimage user base..... 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest mantragora Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 No, don't fool yourself, everybody will go Maya. Right? I think that more interesting news this week are that Blender got Vray. This should shrink 3dsmax grip on small companies and freelancers even more. And Modo is next in line . 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abvfx Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 I just uploaded this to youtube. Thought it was fitting. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Netvudu Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 Yes. And this one is a bit more than one year-old. http://www.cgchannel.com/2012/09/autodesk-denies-intent-to-kill-off-3ds-max-softimage/ 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magneto Posted March 4, 2014 Author Share Posted March 4, 2014 And it's now official: http://area.autodesk.com/softimagetransition Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
altbighead Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 RIP softimage! i think sesi need's a welcome package for the softimage user base..... but but softimage strong area is viewport modeling,rigging and animation right? which houdini is not good at. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Netvudu Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 (edited) but ICE is very similar to VOPs, and already many SI users are circling around Houdini. A bit more of rigging tools could be the definitive catch for many of them, specially since modelling is actually the most software-agnostic area. Edited March 4, 2014 by Netvudu Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ctedin Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 Houdini not good at rigging and animation? All due respect, but I don't agree at all. Interactive modeling, yes, that needs help, but I love it as an animation system. I'm an ex-Softimage user, and a 2-year Houdini convert. Saw the writing on the wall a year and a half ago. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest tar Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 The title should really read "Autodesk creates new Houdini users" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abvfx Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 (edited) Houdini not good at rigging and animation? All due respect, but I don't agree at all. Interactive modeling, yes, that needs help, but I love it as an animation system. Agreed but it wouldn't hurt to improve things. Viewport is speedy but not so much with deformers (blendshapes at the very least), better UI tools, an tooling in general. It has advances in a lot of areas but lacking in others. But on the whole is much better than what other systems offer. Also as i uploaded the initial announcement video of acquisition, here is a cool video from Siggraph 2006 featuring Softimage|3D v 1.0 done by Mark Schoennagel on an Octane and then switching to an SGI machine. Featuring Godzilla Edited March 4, 2014 by abvfx Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magneto Posted March 4, 2014 Author Share Posted March 4, 2014 On the topic of viewport speed, I think it's unfair to be very critical about it, as Mark is also severely restricted from making major optimizations due to the architectural limitations of Houdini. He is still putting it through the paces to make it one of the best experiences within the software IMO. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mandrake0 Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 RIP softimage! but but softimage strong area is viewport modeling,rigging and animation right? which houdini is not good at. a new viewport is under development the old ones won't be in anymore >> http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_forum&Itemid=172&page=viewtopic&t=30927 organic modeling is weak but the rest is not bad ;-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
malexander Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 a new viewport is under development the old ones won't be in anymore >> http://www.sidefx.co...ewtopic&t=30927 To be clear, there's only going to be one renderer in future versions, the GL3 viewport renderer currently in H13.0. So it isn't exactly new, but is still under development to improve various things (performance among them). It'll just be referred to as "the viewport" 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest tar Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 It's The Viewport, I would use caps! I read that SideFx link as bringing OsX to parity- can't see any other new features there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
symek Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 I hardy see Si users adopting Houdini. Completely complementary mindset. Si is basically 3dsMax done right, it's like modo on steroids. The easier the better. Elegance with a promise of flexibility (which for Houdini users at least easily tours out to be a myth - you can't be flexible and legant at once). The level of abstracting users from the content is epic. Exactly unlike Houdini which keepe you close to a metal by design. Another topic is animation toolset obviously. You can safly assume most SI users are animators enthusiasts spoiled with SI novations. I hardly believe they would appricite Houdini's swamp. Even switching to Maya seems to be a little shocking for them (I have witnessed recently endless "you can't do that?!") . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexey Vanzhula Posted March 5, 2014 Share Posted March 5, 2014 (edited) On the topic of viewport speed, I think it's unfair to be very critical about it, as Mark is also severely restricted from making major optimizations due to the architectural limitations of Houdini. He is still putting it through the paces to make it one of the best experiences within the software IMO. What kind of optimisations we need to modeling like this ? I think we simply need custom state(s) in Houdini. IMO the speed of viewport is good for this kind of operations. Edited March 5, 2014 by Alexey Vanzhula Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magneto Posted March 5, 2014 Author Share Posted March 5, 2014 What kind of optimisations we need to modeling like this ? I think we simply need custom state(s) in Houdini. IMO the speed of viewport is good for this kind of operations. I think the difference is more in the number of available operations. I think silo has a lot of tools but if you look at Max's modeling tools, there are hundreds of them for polygonal modeling, which lots of them are rubbush. But Houdini still needs to add the fundamental ones. Or if they exist, they should be procedural. Also no true edge support is a severe limitation IMO. I don't know about other 3d software, but in Max the poly modeling API is very comprehensive. You can pretty much create any modeling tool you want by coding it. Of course it's gonna be slow because of Maxscript, but it's still perfectly usable in production. In Houdini sure you have VEX, but the modeling API is very weak IMO. Not only we don't have basic utility functions, the geometry traversing functions are also very limited, especially when it comes to edges. This limits the use of VEX for non-trivial poly modeling tools. Python API is better but there are common situations which require you to traverse the whole model just to get the neighbour elements or basic conversation of elements into other types for the current element. Doing it for each elements adds a severe performance penalty which would make it even slower than Maxscript, for moderately hi-res models (50-100K+ polygons). In Max you never have to do this, ever. Of course there are other limitations there which are very embarrassing but as long as you use Editable Poly you are fine On top of that there is managed SDK that's available for a long time which gives you incredible performance with very high productivity. For non-parallel tools, this would obliterate VEX in performance. I wrote very complex large scale tools using it without any problems, in regards to scrambling to find info about how to do something in the SDK. Use the Reflector, find the class you need, read about the type in the SDK (as there are no managed docs) and you are on your way, provided you know C#, .NET and Winforms/WPF whatever else you are using. You can even use other .NET languages that prove to be faster than even C for pure math (never tried): http://abdullin.com/journal/2009/1/6/f-has-better-performance-than-c-in-math.html/ I am not downplaying Houdini, as SESI and I love each other And even with all these problems, I still choose Houdini. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
malexander Posted March 5, 2014 Share Posted March 5, 2014 On the topic of viewport speed, I think it's unfair to be very critical about it, as Mark is also severely restricted from making major optimizations due to the architectural limitations of Houdini. He is still putting it through the paces to make it one of the best experiences within the software IMO. It's okay to be critical of it, that's how things improve. And I have to play the hand I'm dealt There are still a lot of areas that haven't seen much work, the viewport being such a vast part of Houdini, so there is still plenty of room for improvement. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magneto Posted March 5, 2014 Author Share Posted March 5, 2014 It's okay to be critical of it, that's how things improve. And I have to play the hand I'm dealt There are still a lot of areas that haven't seen much work, the viewport being such a vast part of Houdini, so there is still plenty of room for improvement. Fair enough. I just didn't want you to take all the heat as your are sort of the "face" of Houdini if you will, as the viewport is everything That's why I don't know if it's reasonable to expect Houdini to match XSI's gigacore speeds, as I imagine the core of Houdini is still very old and XSI's core was rewritten from scratch if I am not wrong. But if you can match/exceed that, more power to you Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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