@modonauts: some 401 infos

-> http://www.luxology.com/modo/401.introduction/

 

looking nice... hope there is some love for game artists... loved to see vertex colours exporting for example.

Cheers.

 

And another one has been added.

-> http://www.luxology.com/modo/401.light.and.shadow/

 

Round 3:

-> http://www.luxology.com/modo/401.preview.and.final.rendering/

 

Finally :x, next week is about something other than rendering. It was revealed in the modcast yesterday that next week's update is about modeling.

 

Phew, subsurface scattering preview in a matter of seconds...

 

So far this looks like a monster update to me although for realtime 3d development there are still wishes open.

 

It's actually two weeks from their last reveal.

But it's shaping up to look pretty cool.

 

And here is Part I of the new modeling functions:

-> http://www.luxology.com/modo/401.modeling.part.1/

 

...boom

-> http://www.luxology.com/modo/401.modeling.part.2/

 

This time with presets.

-> http://www.luxology.com/modo/401.presets.part.1/

 

Is it only me or...

I dunno almost every time i have to deal with Modo the question arises why can't Unity be more like Modo. The tool handling, the interface, the configuration possibilities, the generous just unpainful licence, the easy update handling just the whole philosophy behind a product and treating your customers.

Without going into details i just wish that quite some aspects could be more dealt in a Lux typical way because as beeing industry veterans it seems that they have learned their lessons and so are doing a great job were others are still stubbron and short sighted. I wouldn't position Unity at the worst in this respect like maybe certain Adobe products but still they could enhance so much more.

Well, just had to say it.

 

Different strokes for different folks. I've owned Modo from 201 and I just can't get my head around it.

I guess it's more appealing to folks who came from Lightwave Modeler, which I never liked.

 

Modo has seemed like a nice 3d app choice for the price but the one thing that has always turned me away for it people say it is very lacking in animation (for instance does not have bones). Is 401 going to give any improvement to animation. Also is 302 (or 401) animation good enough for doing game animations (I would not be looking to create the next greatest 3d animation full length film)?

 

Modo is a modeler/renderer. It has only limited camera animation capability and is meant to be used in conjunction with a full-featured 3d application.

 

I never used Lightwave, but I watched my girlfriend use it for a semester, and don't see modo in it, even though both apps used to have a similar code base. modo is the only 3D app on the Mac whose interface I don't find to be complete garbage, other than Cinema 4D, whose pricing structure I find to be ridiculous, and Blender, whose file browsing system, inability to switch to a Y-up world, and other annoying pieces/parts turned me off long ago.

For a few more weeks, maybe.

What's your preference? I've heard Softimage compares quite favorably, but I never touched it before, because it was on Windows, and I doubt I'm going to touch it in the future, as long as Autodesk owns it.

 

are there any good low cost/free animation applications out there I can use along side modo? Modo price is nice but if I need a "full featured" application then modo itself for me is useless.

 

I haven't heard anything about Modo adding more animation capability, but I may be wrong. None of the previews of 401 to date have mentioned animation. And in any case, it's a long way from animating a camera to character animation.

My software of choice is Softimage. I think it's the bee's knees. Your mileage may vary. Autodesk's ownership doesn't worry me for the moment, but I assume long-term development will slow as it has for Maya and Max.

 

Check out the Softimage Mod Tool 7.5 when it is released in April. It's free and offers pretty much everything that the full package offers. Although it is billed as being XNA specific, that's not the case. With Crosswalk, you will be able to easily export to FBX. If the Mod Tool works for you, then you can purchase the full version when you're absolutely certain it will do the job.

You can get started with the current version of the Mod Tool (based on XSI 6.0), as the biggest addition to version 7 was ICE, Softimage's visual particle/scripting language.

 

You're wrong. :wink:

The Setup and Layout tabs that were revealed several weeks ago now, to me, seem like a dead giveaway, especially because Luxology has not said anything about them, despite lots of poking and prodding in the community.

Bob Bennett, the guy who has been creating the 401 reveal pages, said he's working on the animation page. And the latest from Brad Peebler:

It's completely possible that this kind of thing will be the extent of animation in 401, but I doubt it:

http://video.luxology.com/modo/videoVault/MaterialDnD.mov

 

Well it is completely possible to Modo still may announce animation updates (there are still 2 more button on the preview stuff at http://www.luxology.com/modo/401.introduction/ but of course it seems like the next one will be prefabs part 2 but maybe the last one). Now there has been basically no talk about the animation system with 401 and it seems unlikely that with this being being their biggest release yet (of course every company say that with a major number release) that they are going to do nothing with the current animation system. Now I am not thinking we are going to see the functionality like in motion builder (or whatever really good animation system there are) but some nice basic character animation would be great.

I understand that Modo did start out to be a specialized application target mostly modeling but I think that if they can, and I don't know why not, they should expand on the tool sets to draw in a bigger crowd. I mean is Modo right now had some character animation features (like IK, Bones, etc...) I would be trying it out will ever intent to buy it as long as the work flow was nice.

 

Listen to what Brad Peebler says at the beginning of this video:

http://www.luxology.com/video/view.aspx?id=192

Recently, in the modcasts, he has started saying things like "back when modo was just a modeling program". He also refers to 302, the current version for non-beta testing customers, in the past tense ("back in version 302, it was like this") nowadays. I'm quite excited to see why he's changed his tune. 8)

 

I hope they do and I would still put my money on Modo 401 having at least basic CA animation tools like rigging and IK.

A few reasons why I believe this:

1) The underlying framework for CA is already there: deformers, morphs, weighting, etc... All they need to add is a skeletal structure and maybe (at least) a few tools like IK.

2) The guys who are building 401 have implemented these tools/features before. They could probably implement a rough skeletal and IK system in a few days and work out the kinks within a short period after that.

3) They haven't announced ANY new animation features yet. I'm sure they've added "something".

4) I could be wrong, but, during a roll out like this, I don't think you would announce your most amazing features right away. You want to announce features to get people's appetite's whetted (fur and volumetrics), then, the "okay but not so amazing toys" stuff (presets). I don't think they've let the big one out of the bag yet.

I could be wrong, but, the more I think about it, the more I think that it would be insane for them not to have CA in 401 considering that their team has grown since 201/301 and CA should not take "too long" to implement at least something basic that people can start effectively using...

And Remember, I think it was Allen Hastings who went home and wrote in Photon Mapping for 401 in one weekend.

Again just my hopeful opinion,
Nathan

 

Don't mean to rain on anyone's parade, but...
(oh why not? it's fun)...

Remember that Allen Hastings was the principal creator of Lightwave, which is widely regarded to have the weakest character animation tools of any of the major packages. :twisted:

 

I rather have lightwave's animation tools set for character animation than nothing, character animation in games is not like stuff you see from pixar or what not.

 

Have you checked out Softimage? It's widely regarded as having the best character animation tools available and you can learn it for free with their Mod Tool.

 

Yeah, and then when you want to publish a game, you pay 3-4 thousand dollars. This is another point that Brad Peebler has been talking about in the modcasts. Autodesk's sales are down, and Luxology's are soaring, partly because modo isn't exorbitantly expensive.

 

there is a mod tool pro version that you can grab if you accept to pay a premium membership on XNA creator club , this is about 99$ by years, and it allows for commercial work ( what the exact term about , not sure but at least it is affordable ).

And please people stop to complain about autodesk every little time, there are in business from long time have a solid portfolio user , they have theirs pro and cons ok , but game industry still use their tools and get the work done with it ( using fully or in conjonction with other took , be it modo as well )

 

When Autodesk buys something, it stagnates. A good artist can get a lot of great work done, even with an obsolete and rusty tool. And big game companies can afford to buy expensive, established tools, even when they aren't a good value.

 

with teh actual bizness I dont think big game company spend without think about what value will bring package.

there is pipeline , technical constrain and so on .

yes good artist at least only need pencil and paper, but obsolete and rusty tools doesn't integrate sometimes with pipeline and workflow requirement to get your assets , "engine ready ", whatever you use.

anyway , to go back on modo , only for the paint tool , i will certainly have a go for it , also the rendering , as I am not doing only game art..so for teh price and what it offer it is a great deal.

For character animation , no matter pixar anim type or not , want to work efficient and fast ? you will need feature like mocap integration , animation layer / mixer, things that autodesk tools provide and provide well ( As XSI is now part of autodesk i have to say autodesk ^^ ).

 

I quite don't understand the discussion about animation.

Lux started with Nexus and the first product was Modo which started as a pure SDS Modeller, then there came in the Renderer (physical), then Paint and Sculpting and so on. Modo still is a very young software and if you compare it to how other 3d packages progressed in this time frame then it's remarkable how much they were able to realise. More they did this on their own and not just buy eating other software or relying on other people's work.

If not showing up in 401 it for sure will come later on but the thing you can be quite confident about is that once it is in there it will work in a convincing way, at least in an updated version. :O)

Who needs bad impemented features?! I prefer that things might take longer but just get done right then and that's what Lux also favours and quite some time they are able to fulfill this.

A very important aspect which has nothing to do with any feature but yet is so important, at least to me, is the philosophy by a software company and it's products. As i already wrote licences, handling updates, dealing with you customers, don't milk them, treat them like you would like to be treated and so on. All these are very very valuable things and Lux in this respect is ahead of it's competition and not only of theirs.

I instantly give up a feature if i can stick with a companies philosophy instead. Very valuable but might be often overseen because it takes some time (or a few bad experiences) until you dig this.

Anyway in quite some aspects Unity could learn from them and so enhance both the product as well as the customer experience&relationship.

 

And the presets part II:

-> http://www.luxology.com/modo/401.presets.part.2/

As they changed their selection method i wonder how many will follow. :O)

 

Shouldn't be awake but strange places lead to strange behaviour.

-> http://www.luxology.com/modo/401.animation.part.1/

 

No Character Animation ... Bye bye Modo.

 

Yeah I've been watching the Modo 401 unveil for the last several weeks hoping for character animation... this was the deal breaker for me. It sucks to boot into windows or run XP in a VM just to use Softimage. This was the most promising thing on the horizon for mac. Oh well, maybe next version.

 

That was only Animation Part I, Animation Part II will be unveiled two Mondays from today. They still may not have CA, but, hey, all hope is not lost yet, CA may just pop up in the next two more unveilings... who knows

 

You've got to be kidding me. What else would "Nothing" "To" "See" "Here" be, except bones + other stuff?

They've got vertex maps, and a system for control rigging. All they need is a bone tool, and we're set. I'd find it pretty unbelievable if that didn't show up. Stupid, in fact.

 

Jessy, he's looking to purchase a full-featured character animation software today, not in a year's time.

And, because perhaps you missed it: http://forums.luxology.com/discussion/topic.aspx?id=33659

 

If today, then there was no reason to look at modo in the first place. And it's not going to be a year, evidenced by the skipping of 303 update.

 

well it was not officially announced that CA would not be in Modo 401 until yesterday so that is why he (and I) were looking at modo.

 

Well, that's too bad

Oh well, maybe 501...

 

Where was this announced??

 

In their latest Modcast. See my last post for a link to a forum discussion.

 

Thanks for that link.

This is unbelievable.

In fact, it's stupid.

Screw Luxology. :evil:

 

The modcast pretty much explained why they have choosen this way, sounds reasonable to me. If you prefer half baked short term solutions i think other tools are better suited then.

 

It would be reasonable if they had something to back it up already. I think modo has a lot going for it, but its foundation is a lot less solid than Brad Peebler would like everyone to believe. For one, the documentation does not tell you how to access the basic building blocks of the tool pipeline (such as effectors), and yet, that's supposed to be the proper way to utilize the system. The interface has a bunch of buttons, that are not generalized (see the Deformers tab); that's the way of Maya. It doesn't make sense in modo. Some of these functions come by default with "hotkeys", which waste keys that would be better served with floating menus. Lots of stuff is broken, despite Luxology taking their time to "make sure" everything functions correctly. So I see no reason for them to delay joints/bones. Luxology needs to backtrack and fix/update large chunks of their software, just like everyone else. Look at what they did with painting and sculpting for the 30x series - those aren't great systems, but at least they're there. Might as well do the same thing for bones.

 

Compare how much longer Maya is around and how much it costs, who's behind, ...

I don't hurray everyhting in Modo and obviously i also want to see proper CA support in Modo but from a reality friendly POV this just makes a lot of sense and it follows a reasonable mid/long term strategy which i prefer to the hacks done in other apps over the years. Lux does a phenomenal job regarding their ressources and you can't expect to get a featurefull product out of the nothing from them.

401 is an insane hugh update but yeah it's not everything in it which you might have wanted but again i prefer quality over quantity.

 

For the things I use modo for CA isn't important to me as fully functional and usable paint tools, cause at the moment using large brushes and getting good clean results from image stamping just are not happening in modo. Unlike say bodypaint and 3d-coat. Also I'd like to see on-par FBX exporting like you get in Maya... e.g. vertex colours! and a way to bake to vertex colours.

Luxology loves to tout modo's use in game companies like Id, but not having full pipeline support for game engines is a bit disappointing... especially if you don't have TD's who can whip up a export plugin for you!

So I guess my expectations and requirements are smaller for 401 then some. :wink:

BTW I'll stick to Maya for CA, as there is lots of supporting material for CA in Maya... then again now there is Unity 2.5 i might switch to Vista/Windows 7 so I can use XSI Mod-tool.... :wink:

Cheers.

 

If you're on windows (welcome :O) then XSI definatley offers the best bang for the buck. No crosslicence, no developer friendly licence, less cool here but great here and there and a lot more complete if you compare them today.

With the limited ressouces Lux enhances the product first were it makes sense for the majority of their customerbase and as reasonable CA is not a small one they'll have to add it after 401. I wonder if they plan it for an 40x update or you'll have to wait for 501.

Anyway it's exactly the same story with Unity. I could think of dozens of cool features which are missing in Unity and some of them make their way into Unity over the time others sadly don't (although they make a lot of sense :O).

Earth is still spinning...

Regarding games/iD, what i really love is the Modo material with Seneca. I've never ever saw someone modeling so fast.

 

Also, no such thing as XSI anymore. :wink: