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• Scripting in Houdini (python, etc)
• Nuke in python
• Maya scripting in python and MEL.
• Softimage scripting (python, etc)
• 3dsmax in python and MAXScript

"...ray tracing and rasterization debate"

I don't think there is any debate at all, RayTracing is by far superior, there is just the problem of computing power.

Anyone (perhaps ask the modelers for the games) who deals with 3D software, knows the benefits of RayTracing for simulating reality (Reflections, Ambient Occlusion, Sub-Surface Scattering, etc)

And once computing power reaches that level it will even speed up the process of creating games because you can let the RayTracing take care of shadows, reflections, highlights, etc instead of manually mapping them.

Take a look at anything LightWave, Maya, 3Dsmax, Softimage, Blender, etc spits out of its render engines, or visual effects in recent movies... granted, that's (as stated a few times in the discussion) years away... but, I don't think anyone is arguing against RayTracing.

(-1 Bastard) ...but...whatever, ive been waiting for real-time RayTracing for years even just within my own 3D applications, nevermind games...

You really shouldn't complain about that... It's a very expensive niche overall, and the prices are still much cheaper than they used to be.

XSI - http://softimage.com/products/xsi/pricing.aspx
3dsmax / Maya - http://store.autodesk.com/store/adsk/DisplaySubCategoryProductListPage/categoryID.10101800

Blender's popularity is no doubt partially because of its 'affordability' :)

And if you want to go into profesional level aps there's

http://www.softimage.com/downloads/XSI_Mod_Tool/default.aspx
http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_download&task=apprentice&Itemid=89 (though if you don't like blender for lack of a standard interface, houdini might not be for you)

Those two, while they do produce watermarked work and have res limitations, are good enough to play around and learn a little bit.. :)

Epic? Ships content in Collada format? Uses it for its own art pipeline?

I doubt anyone would ship it, since it's not suitable for that. I can't find any details of how UE3 actually uses it, so I couldn't do more than conjecture - and most other game developers also appear to keep quite quiet about what technology they're using (at least in public). I've not heard of any other games that have been released yet and are using COLLADA - they claim that "active users" include "THQ, EA, Konami, NCsoft, DoubleFine, Rockstar", but presumably the relevant games are still under development. COLLADA itself is pretty recent, so I guess it'll be a few years before anyone can really tell whether it has survived and found a place in the industry.

Why would you need XML to do this?

You certainly don't need XML - but it does those things already, and it's already understood and supported well enough that you could write a quick Python script to read a model and manipulate the DOM and spit it back out again, which saves some effort compared to writing yet more binary importers/exporters for every tool that has to process the file. There's obviously drawbacks to using XML, but it's not as obvious whether they outweigh the benefits.

unless the tool makers start making Collada exporters, and they do not do things like this

XSI mentions it in one of the main features. (They also mention the dotXSI "standard" - it looks like every modelling program has its own proprietary standard for interoperability... COLLADA is the only one I've seen that's somewhat vendor-neutral (but still flexible enough to handle at least some kinds of real data) - I've heard that Sony saw that the vendors themselves would never agree on any neutral standard, which is why they (as people who want to improve the game development process, rather than push their own tools) had to make one themselves.)

For example, using MAX, stacked skin modifiers get baked how? Answer: however the exporter guy wanted which is unlikely to be the way you wanted it done.

I tried a simple test with ColladaMax, with a sphere and two sets of bones and two Skin modifiers. It exports a scene with a Sphere01-node, using the Sphere01-mesh-skin-skin controller with the Bone05-node skeleton. The scene also contains the hierarchy of bones. It says Sphere01-mesh-skin-skin is skinning the Sphere01-mesh-skin object, and lists the relevant bones and the weights and bind pose matrices and things. It says Sphere01-mesh-skin is skinning the Sphere01-mesh object, and gives more weights and things. And it says Sphere01-mesh is a mesh with certain vertex data. (Incidentally, one advantage of XML is that I can actually look at the file in a text editor and see that reasonably complex hierarchy - the actual geometry data is a horrible mass of numbers, but for small scenes it's quite easy to see what's going on. You could make a visualisation tool for any other non-XML format, but it's helpful if there's no need.)

That seems to be fairly close to how it's represented in Max itself. Then you can (/have to) write your own code that loads that COLLADA file (using existing libraries to handle the boring standard bits), and do whatever conversions you want for your particular purpose. It's still a problem if you need e.g. the Character Studio animation curves from Max (instead of it exporting keyframes and you perhaps choosing to fit a curve back onto them) which the exporter doesn't do (because they're too non-standard). At least the exporter is open source and it might be feasible to hack new features in yourself, but it's annoying if you have to do that.

What's the benefit of it over .X for example?

Does

Personally, I'm a fan of Softimage's XSI

It has a free mod tool for those who want to play around and learn the system (also excellent for game mods, hence the name)
It has a personal seat that sells for $495 so it is affordable for people to purchase for hobby/indie game usage.

http://www.softimage.com/products/xsi/default.aspx

I believe that it was also used to make Half-Life 2

If you own Half-Life 2 then you can download the SDK. It comes with quite a few example maps and also the code for the game logic.
There's lots more information at the developer wiki.

You can also get a free version of the modeling/animating software they used, which is called XSI.
http://www.softimage.com/community/xsi_mod_tool/de fault.aspx

Interestingly that Rhino 3D is picking up users.

Does anyone know how the big 3 modellers compare? (I know a lot of game dev studios use Max and Maya.) Also, what about Blender?

While Maya is great for modeling, it's the animation and dynamics tools that really make it stand out. I don't know what apps are best positioned to take Maya's place in these areas. How do Blender's animation tools stand up to Maya's? Anyone tried Project:Messiah? Maybe this will be just the thing to push Softimage back into the spotlight...

Exactly.

XSI is available for both Windows and Linux, but not for the Mac afaik.

Linkage

Taking a look at the System Requirments for the more well known 3D Animation apps we see Alias's Maya and Softimage's XSI run natively under Linux. Which when you are dealing with animations that can take literally days to render for production it's no wonder they'd want to use a Linux machine instead of a Windows machine, I'm sure it cuts the time by at least 30% (totally grabbed that number out of my ass)

So is it news that the big animation companies also use OS X instead of XP too? I think the only big name 3d animation company that is Windows only is Discreet with their 3ds Max software, which I think is really only used for games, can't think of a movie that it was used for.

Sys Requirements:
http://www.newtek.com/lightwave/requirements.php
http://www.alias.com/eng/products-services/maya/sy stem_requirements.shtml
http://www4.discreet.com/3dsmax/3dsmax.php?id=966
http://www.softimage.com/products/xsi/v42/SysReqs/

They use it for background elements though, and work hard to make it look like the rest of the animation.

It started with Mononoke, and continues to this day. Howl's Castle is a 3D animated object, but you couldn't tell it by looking.

In Mononoke, where the boy is charging across the field of grass, firing his bow, the field is CGI, as is the grass. The writhing 'tentacles' on his arm are CGI as well. Watch the extras "Making of" bits on the DVD sometime.

Studio Ghibli has invested money in 3D graphics. They do use it, but they work very hard to make it look like 2D animation

Softimage even has a article on Ghibli and their use of 3D. They have 150 people in that division

http://www.softimage.com/Community/Xsi/Mag/Cs/Volu me_2/Issue_1/Ghibli.htm

http://www.softimage.com/Community/Xsi/Mag/Cs/Volu me_2/Issue_1/media/Ghibli/2.htm

Here's a image of a forest scene from Spirited away, when they first approach the area where the spirits' 'vacation center' is located. Oh nos! It's CGI!

But you can't tell it, can you? Why use CGI? Because for set pieces, for backgrounds, it makes relative movement for perspective pieces easier to animate. It makes deep, rich backgrounds easier to do. Else you have all your characters animated over a flat looking background, with no perspective shifts as the camera moves.

So Ghibli uses CG, but not exclusively. It's merely another tool in their chest.

They use it for background elements though, and work hard to make it look like the rest of the animation.

It started with Mononoke, and continues to this day. Howl's Castle is a 3D animated object, but you couldn't tell it by looking.

In Mononoke, where the boy is charging across the field of grass, firing his bow, the field is CGI, as is the grass. The writhing 'tentacles' on his arm are CGI as well. Watch the extras "Making of" bits on the DVD sometime.

Studio Ghibli has invested money in 3D graphics. They do use it, but they work very hard to make it look like 2D animation

Softimage even has a article on Ghibli and their use of 3D. They have 150 people in that division

http://www.softimage.com/Community/Xsi/Mag/Cs/Volu me_2/Issue_1/Ghibli.htm

http://www.softimage.com/Community/Xsi/Mag/Cs/Volu me_2/Issue_1/media/Ghibli/2.htm

Here's a image of a forest scene from Spirited away, when they first approach the area where the spirits' 'vacation center' is located. Oh nos! It's CGI!

But you can't tell it, can you? Why use CGI? Because for set pieces, for backgrounds, it makes relative movement for perspective pieces easier to animate. It makes deep, rich backgrounds easier to do. Else you have all your characters animated over a flat looking background, with no perspective shifts as the camera moves.

So Ghibli uses CG, but not exclusively. It's merely another tool in their chest.

As far as animation is concerned on Linux, I think the lack of an affordable and high quality video editing and compositing solution is a MUCH bigger problem. Sure there's Shake (now from Apple) but you can get 2 Macs and a copy of Shake for Mac with free render nodes for the 10 grand they charge for the Linux or Irix versions.

On the other hand, the question is about windows. Here's the best freeware list I've found, taken off of the neowin.net forums. These are not guaranteed Clean, but most of them are. Also, you might want to check tinyapps.org, which specializes in SMALL apps (usually not enough space for ad/spyware).
Category 3D Graphics: ----JunkCharactersToDefeatLameness/CharacterCountF ilterForAValidList----
3Delight Free - http://www.3delight.com/index.htm
Anim8or - http://www.anim8or.com/
Aqsis - http://www.aqsis.com/
Blender - http://www.blender3d.org/
gmax - http://www.discreet.com/products/gmax/
Houdini (Free Edition) - http://www.sidefx.com/apprentice/index.html
Maya Personal Learning Ed. - http://www.alias.com/eng/products-services...ple/i ndex.shtml
Now3D - http://digilander.libero.it/giulios/Eng/homepage.h tm
OpenFX - http://www.openfx.org
SOFTIMAGE|XSI EXP - http://www.softimage.com/products/exp/v3/
Toxic - http://www.toxicengine.org/
Wings 3D - http://www.wings3d.com/
Category Anti-Virus:----JunkCharactersToDefeatLameness/Char acterCountFilterForAValidList----
AntiVir - http://www.free-av.com/
Avast - http://www.avast.com/i_idt_1018.html
AVG - http://www.grisoft.com/
ClamWin - http://www.clamwin.com/
Category Anti Spyware:----JunkCharactersToDefeatLameness/Charact erCountFilterForAValidList----
Ad-aware - http://www.lavasoft.de/software/adaware/
Bazooka - http://www.kephyr.com/spywarescanner/index.html
Diet K - http://www.dietk.com/
SpyBot Search & Destroy - http://spybot.safer-networking.de/
SpywareBlaster - http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareblaster.htm l
SpywareGuard - http://www.wilderssecurity.net/spywareguard.html
Category IRC Clients:----JunkCharactersToDefeatLameness/Charact erCountFilterForAValidList----
BersIRC - http://www.bersirc.com/
BitchX - http://bitchx.org/download.php
HydraIRC - http://www.hydrairc.com/
TinyIRC - http://www.tinyirc.net/
XChat - http://www.silverex.org/news/
Category Audio Players:----JunkCharactersToDefeatLameness/Charact erCountFilterForAValidList----
1by1 - http://www.rz.uni-frankfurt.de/~pesch
Billy - http://www.sheepfriends.com/?page=billy
CoolPlayer - http://coolplayer.sourceforge.net/
DeliPlayer. http://www.deliplayer.com/
Foobar 2

I presume that at one point the submiter might use XSI. You may not know it, but XSI is included in the HL2 SDK (abeit a limited version of XSI called Experience). Valve used XSI in making HL2 and are including it in the SDK so that gamers can create their own models.

• Check out the Half Life modding forum on xsibase
• Softimage Half-Life 2 page
• SDK Release Announcement
  Valve has released the Source Software Development Kit (SDK) Tools via Steam. A precursor to the release of the full SDK, which will be released shortly after Half-Life 2 is made available, the Source SDK Tools release offers a comprehensive toolset for starting production on Source-based MODs, including Hammer, XSI EXP for Half-Life 2, compiling tools, the Source Model Viewer, documentation on programming, modeling, building materials, and more. For more information, please visit http://www.valve-erc.com/srcsdk/.
• And this is just one of the many users having problems with Ati boards and drivers

I know what I'm talking about

You need to have pre-order HL 2 on Steam to have access to the SDK, right now.

Also, it isn't the "full" SDK. You cannot compile new binaries (IE, new mods) but you can start creating maps (Hammer is included, along with a model viewer) and I'm fairly certain you can compile models (made with XSI, a light version of which can be downloaded for free here).

If you've worked with Hammer or Worldcraft before (or any brush based editor before) you should be in familiar territory. The Snark Pit and The VERC boards can provide some resources for newbies (as well as other sites, I'm sure). The included documentation is actually quite good, though.

Some content of note: There are some models in a directory labeled "C17" (which I assume is City 17) that can be viewed in the model viewer/placed into maps with hammer. Interesting content, though I haven't seen any huge spoilers yet (just things like stoves and cupboards in the directory).

There are two main approaches to this - the "animation splicing" systems, where canned bits of motion are spliced together by a program, and the "behavior" systems, where control programs are trying to optimize some goal. The first major appearance of a good "splicing" system was the baby 'zillas in Godzilla 2000. That's what most feature films are using today.

Kinematic motion generation has been around for years, and that's what you see in games. It doesn't look real, but it works well enough for gameplay. The physics isn't realistic. That's why, from across the room, EA Football looks different from NFL football. Those jerky motions really pop out at you, especially when they're alternated with nice motion-captured moves.

Endorphin isn't as automated as it looks; much manual tweaking of the motion is necessary. Motion Factory has more automation, but it's kinematic. Automatic physically-realistic animation is hard, because you have to solve the robotic control problem. The animation community may yet do this. But they're not there yet.

(I've done some work on this.)

X3D isn't a file format standard. It's some lame web 3D, lets resurrect VRML with a new name, specification.

There are at least two opensource 3d file format standards that I know of developed by actual companies in the industry:

http://www.softimage.com/products/pipeline/dotxsi/ v36/
http://www.tweakfilms.com/main/gto.html

Some time ago, Microsoft purchased a company called SoftImage. Turned out to be a good investment in 3D development and film compositing with a product called the DS.

Meanwhile, in Tewksbury, the Avid Media Composer which ran only on the Apple Macintosh platform was ported to Windows when Microsoft made some investments in Avid. About that time Apple (unwisely) discontinued their six PCI-Slot Macintosh..

When Avid noted that their product was dead-ended because its code basis assumed a raster that was limited to NTSC and PAL television format, they purchased SoftImage's DS in order to be able to easily produce software that will do film and high definition video.

Microsoft doesn't make investments for nothing. I believe I can do something very close to what Microsoft is doing for Mini-DV video on any format of video or film with the Avid DS -- though for a lot more money (something like $120K USD). I would not be surprised if they got the technology from that very old investment.

As a creative person though, I have to say I don't like the fact that the DS-Nitris will probably never run on a Macintosh. We have problems with ours that are related mostly to two issues: Operator screw-ups (expected) and Microsoft Windows XP Professional limitations, many of which do not exist in Apple's current versions of Unix.

Isn't that a sign that it might be time to move away from '98 then?

Quite probably. I'll be building a new PC pretty soon, and it'll probably have something 'hip' and 'modern' like Windows 2000 for games...

Stuff like the Halo Editing Kit and the version of Softimage XSI for Half-Life 2 needs an NT-based operating system anyway, so I really should upgrade. :-)

Anyone know where I can get Win2000 cheaply in the UK? Suprnova need not apply...

now why would you want a cd shooter when you can have a lethal salad shooter instead?!?! ;P

now why would you want a cd shooter when you can have a lethal salad shooter instead?!?! ;P

Maybe for some superduper modelling and 3D work in SoftImage or Maya

Like Appleseed?

There are several projects like this in the works, it's not too hard to find them. In The Animatrix, for example, MANY of the episodes that look hand-drawn (2nd Renaissance Parts 1 & 2) have a large number of CG shots. The most common software used by Japanese FX, animation, and game studios is Softimage|XSI.

As if blender wasn't complex enough

WTF? Compared to what? Softimage? Maya? 3D Studio?

Good high-end alternatives that are also available on Linux are Softimage XSI and Houdini. Both offer free evaluation/learning versions like Maya PLE, with the exception that they're available for Linux x86 too.

Another interesting commercial 3D suite available for Linux is Realsoft 3D, and it's a lot cheaper than Maya or the programs mentioned before.

The basic process for a single character goes like this: 2d concept art, modeling of 3d geometry, rigging for animation, modeling of morph targets (facial animation, faking out muscles, etc.), setup of animation controls, texture coordinate unwrap, texture painting, material creation.

After all that, the character gets handed off to an animator who has the task of making this thing look like its alive. I havn't even gotten into what is involved in creating an entire environment. Suffice to say that there's a hell of a lot of time and effort spent by _humans_ in making this stuff.

I find it amusing that people romanticize 2d animation production. Pretty much all the ink and paint is done not by hand, but by a computer these days . It's not some skilled artist wielding a brus h that's laying down those colors, but a computer, blindly following a user's inputs.

There's also a free version of SOFTIMAGE|XSI, that runs on Linux. SOFTIMAGE is generally considered to be Maya's primary competitor in the high-end 3d graphics industry, though Maya seems to be more popular at the moment (then again, that appearance could just be caused by Alias's advertising). There's also a free version of Houdini. Houdini is kind of a niche product in the cinematic effects industry, very powerful though not as well known as either Maya or SOFTIMAGE.

"Midway through the production of Half-Life 2," says Gabe Newell, Managing Director at Valve Software, "we realized that our tools were hamstringing our artists. We decided that we needed to go find the right set of tools to build the game. We evaluated all of the tools we could have used for Half-Life 2, and, when we looked at the combination of the products and the companies that were standing behind them, XSI and Softimage were head and shoulders above any of the other options."

Anyone who was lucky enough to see the previews of the work that Valve did with SOFTIMAGE|XSI on Half-Life 2 at E3 knows that the team made the right choice. original link w/more info

BTW an example of rendering software that runs on Linux (and windows as well), just FYI.

SoftImage XSI is one example. Has lots of movie examples on its site, and you can download a free demo version. The demo version has no time limits, just it has its logo in the output and disables a few features. Pretty cool!

Give Softimage|XSI a try. The basic hotkeys are standardized, as are the dialog boxes. It takes all of an hour to get used to the basics. Beyond that it may take some time to get GOOD output... XSI gives the user basic tools with which one builds up different effects. Check out XSIBase for a good discussion group, complete with links to tutorials.

Others have mentioned Maya PLE but there are free / learning editions of most of the top commercial 3D apps these days:

SoftImage XSI|EXP

Lightwave Discovery Edition (takes a while for them to mail it, though)

Houdini Apprentice (a lesser known but very powerful 3D app used by major studios.)

It has been my experience that 3D programs have pioneered quite a bit in interface. Just putting all the buttons in a three button mouse to use is a huge start (like XSI). Looking at Maya is a good example of gestures used very very effectivly, but as a lone source of input it doesn't work. A combinations of customizable buttons, using all the inputs available, and prioritizing (assume a certain hand position on the keyboard and put the most inportant keys under it, and work your way out). Using contex creates a very tightly accesible interface. Not everything needs to be available all the time.

I think that using a keyboard is not that far from gestures. How much different is pressing a key than making a gesture, which one has less room for error? How different is holding shift then pressing a key with the same hand?

I think that basically gestures are already how we use computers, and a different input device based on that principal wouldn't be very different, so I don't think that it would be very efficient, because there would be such a switch. I think that mouse gestures are a great tool, it just needs to be implemented thoughtfully and be an accpeted interface tool so that people will stop thinking it is something experimental, and eventually it will get more standardized and consitent, which is half the battle in interface design anyway. So I don't think that for the current state of computers (ie not 3D) the interface really can't, won't, and shouldn't change very much. I think it is more of a software problem than a hardware problem. I also think that truly 3D interfaces are a very bad idea, and should be reserved for the very few obvious applicaitons of them (moving a character around in 3D, etc.). We try to put every interface we have into a 2D space (look at something physical like a reciever, microwave, sound mixing board, oven, combination locks). Only special situations, most of them because of a direct elegant physical connection, have something not deliberatly two dimensional (toilet handle, ice machine from a refrigerator, door handles, faucets).

How does this relate to the article? I think that vastly improved ergonomics is one of last big things we can do to polish off the current state of computer interfaces for some time. The hardware and software have evolved pretty well together.

"Movie-quality" rendering is done in software, often by render farm nodes that don't even have a 3D video card. High-end video cards are used during content creation.

You won't find a GeForce or Radeon on Maya's list of qualified hardware, 3ds max's list of tested graphics cards, or Softimage's list of certified graphics cards. That's not to say that a consumer card won't work, but after spending $2,000+ on the software, plus maintenance, you want supported hardware.

You could also try out Softimage|Behavior. It has much of the same functionality as Massive.

Well this explains the interface from hell.

ingenious but nonstandard user interface

That's one way to put it...

Look, I work with a bunch of 3d apps to make a living, and all I can say about blender's interface is that it sucks. Whoever designed this hodgepodge of icons and textboxes should be dragged out into the street and shot.

Good interfaces are more along the lines of what Maya or XSI have to offer. Blender seems to be another example of crappy open source ui syndrome. It doesn't matter how wonderful the tools are. If the interface is slowing the artist down, then the app is just not viable for production use, and ultimately is nothing more than a toy for hobbyists.

Just found it today, via my gf, which is being showcased at the Softimage XSI Roadshow being the Matrox Parahelia which has a TRIPLE-HEAD OUTPUT....among other things

If only they could afford the $600 to benchmark it against all the other there, eh?

Later
Josh

I'd be using it in Mac OS X

So, um, did any of you guys recommending 3DSMax read this part of his initial query? Um... anyway, if OS X is to be your platform, the only software you need to bother with is Cinema 4D. Get r8 and a nice openGL card (whatever the newest nVidia card Apple will sell you), and you will not be disappointed.

I've been using C4D since version 5, and have been using it in OS X since it has been possible to do so. Cinema is a wonderful piece of software: the modelling workflow puts 3DSMax to absolute shame, the animation system (while still lacking in some areas) is rapidly, and I mean rapidly catching up to the big dogs (check out this site (Mash is a C4D developer) for some really beautiful examples of the leaps and bounds r8 has made in the soft-IK department), and you simply will not find a faster renderer (as far as single workstation rendering goes--I'm sure Pixar's n-cpu PrMan farm offers serious competition).

The biggest downfalls for C4D are a lack of n-sided polys and a lackluster implementation of boolean modelling. These weaknesses, when weighed against the outrageous strengths displayed in nearly every other area, make C4D the obvious choice for Mac users. Shit, I've found the environment to be even more work-condusive than Maya's sometimes... now if only Maxon could figure a way to incorporate something like A|W's marking-menus without legally stepping on some toes...

First thing, you should be careful with your terminology.

A modeller lets you create models and scenes. A renderer turns these scenes into 2D images. A compositor lets you turn these 2D images into other 2D images, and usually also lets you assemble them into single-file animation formats. Don't expect to do any "real" 3D work without at least one of each.

It's confusing because many modellers have renderers built in. They are usually inadequate for complex jobs. (Though, in fairness, one blockbuster 100% computer animated feature film has been made using Maya's built-in renderer, so it's not exactly useless.) However, thanks to the wonders of Open Source, the modeller is now the only part you have to buy.

Here's what I suggest:

• Get Maya Complete. This will cost money.
• Get Liquid, which will cost you nothing. This will export Maya to RenderMan(TM).
• Get Aqsis, which will cost you nothing. This is your renderer. It is RenderMan(tm) compliant, which is the de facto standard for communication between renderers and modellers.
• Get Cinelerra, which will cost you nothing. This is your compositor. (Available only for Linux, unfortunately, but it's free.)

If you find yourself making money with these, you can replace and augment bits if you find them not doing what you want. (For example, replace Aqsis with RDC or PRMan and replace Cinelerra with Shake or After Effects. You can even augment Maya with Houdini or SoftImage if you feel like spending money.)

The key here is to stick with standards so you can drop in replacements into your production line.

Good luck.

For those interested, you can purchase Massive. Stephen Regelous, the brains behind this app, showed it last SIGGRAPH. You can check their website here:

Massive Software

Softimage also just announced their own system:

SOFTIMAGE ANNOUNCES SOFTIMAGE®|BEHAVIOR

actually you're probably right about CAD, but for 3D animation, Maya doesn't run on Solaris - just Irix, Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows NT/2000/XP and Lightwave is only available for MacOS and Windows. Softimage, incidentally, is also available for only Windows, Linux, and Irix, which means you'll be stuck using Houdini. Too bad Houdini's so hard to use.

In addition to all the solid advice given here, I offer this little bit: Get in touch with actual animators, modelers, lighting and texture artists. Get as many as possible, from as many different 3d packages as possible to put the program through its paces. Remember, a lot of these people are not very technically minded and will appreciate a clean and intuitive interface. For a prime example of a great UI look at Softimage|XSI It is easily the most intuitive of many 3d packages I've used.

Some programs out there such as Softimage Have been using reatime 3D API's to draw their widgets for as long as realtime 3D API's have been around. It has been using OpenGl to draw the widgets for at least 6 years.

XSI (Softimage) also runs on Linux. I saw 'em at Linuxworld NY. Neither Maya nor XSI are free/opensource though.

-Sara

i'm a cgi student at the moment, and i talk to industry professionals once in awhile, at siggraph and such. i have a split opinion on the matter of software piracy/software protection. several companies are offering student versions for free, or with discounts(softimage, photoshop).

one of the reasons why software piracy is still present is that these companies cripple their software so much that none of the content generated with it can be put onto a professional demo reel. maya recent strategy, the watermark on all renders, is an excellent work around this issue; it offers all features, plus an employer is likely to appreciate your integrity if its clear that you followed the rules.

in addition to student version's increased availability, software companies are funding more and more schools. softimage xsi has an excellent strategy: train more xsi drivers, market needs xsi, xsi sales increase. everybody wins.

i don't condone thievery, but i also don't condone highway robbery. much of the software seems is in a price range that a production studio may view as nominal, but as a student is much too expensive. i've heard the "it costs money to make these programs, you know" argument a thousand times, and frankly it doesn't cost $10,000(alias wavefront maya 4.0 unlimited) a package to make ANYTHING. these high-end graphics companies are creating software for a high-paying demographic. i believe that they are gradually learning the harmful effects of creating an elitist market.

software piracy probably won't ever go away. too many people like free beer. there's alot that can done to minimize the blow. creating a new student demographic and marketing a seperate package solely for them is a great way to do this.

"Inverse kinimatics" was added to such modeling/rendering programs as SoftImage back in the early 90s. You could "drop" stuff and have it bounce around or blow in the wind or act like jello or whatever. Yes, even fall down stairs.

You just create your model and connect the "bones" (fundimental objects that move) via articulated joints that could swivel in any direction you specify. Then determine what forces are acting on it (gravity or wind for example) and stuff like how the objects interact (do they bounce? or stick?) and then just hit "play" and off it goes...

What's the big deal here?

My favorite UI of all time is Softimage. For being such a massively complex 3D creation environment, they have always cut out the pretty little picture icons and stuck with buttons with actual words on them. Everything is no more than a click or two away, and the learning curve is cut down tremendously when your mind doesn't have to perform some translation of 10 pixel icons into some arbitrary command. Ive never understood the overuse of icons in a UI. If it's a really widely recognized icon or pictogram like tape player play (>) or stop ([]) symbols, that may be faster than "play" and "stop" written out. But little bitty pictures of splines and dots and shapes, dont help you learn a 3D application. We spend hundreds and thousands of years developing an instantly recognizeable library of 26 icons (A,B,C,D,etc) yet we trash them in favor of someones personal idea of what an icon for "bi-rail extrusion" should be. Bad idea. DOWN WITH ICONS, GO TEXT!!!

35mm film is less than 3k x 3k. If this link is right anyway.

They're now owned by Avid.

Actually M$ sold Softimage to Avid quite a few years ago, in 1998. At last year's Softimage User Group Meeting at SIGGRAPH 2000, they showed at the end a beta port of Softimage running under RedHat 6.2.

Just check their website: