[Nico]

http://zaon.org/forums/showthread.php?threadid=299

can be discussed, but is worth the read.

[Stryke 9]

Can be discussed when a full link, you mean.

[Nico]

ah crap

there, should work better.

[Stryke 9]

I think he's just talking about renderers. I have Renderman (I think), and it's just for rendering, nothing else (I think)

Well, I gotta stand by my Ray Dream. Used to be top-of-the-line, before the company tanked and Eovia turned it into the bastardized monstrosity Carrara. It's just like a slower 3DS MAX without all the plugins. And at one point it had all the plugins. It's got... different tools, has, in my opinion, a better method of mesh modeling (and all sorts of goodies that you don't find until you've been using the thing for years there), has lots of render options for things like cell shading and light balls but can't do caustics or radiosity, has a texturing engine slightly inferior to MAX's but which can be augmented to provide all sorts of freaky-ass procedurals which bring it up to Lightwave level. Downside? It corrupts files so that you can't open them without locking (though you can import them and save again), and isn't all that stable. More so than MAX, less so than LightWave (Save regularly, but don't worry about your computer crashing, and you can generally get a solid half-hour or hour in, unless you're doing something really wierd). And it's about half as fast as either. And the version one later than I have is still sold in spots for about $100. I give it away routinely, though my copy's a little beaten up from too much hard disk corruption.

Oh- and you can draw textures on with a paintbrush if you want- fun, though it's nearly impossible to get anything close to a straight line with a mouse.

[Stryke 9]

DAMN, they're good modellers!

[Nico]

Originally posted by Stryke 9
, and isn't all that stable. More so than MAX, less so than LightWave. And it's about half as fast as either

on that particular part, I'd like to point out the huge stability differencies between the different max versions:
Max3.1  is the worst piece of code I've ever used, it crashes a lot, sometimes corrupts files, is slow as hell, and all that on a 100% legal version.
Max4.1 (haven't tried the 4.2 but I guess it's kif-kif ) on the other end NEVER crashed on me, and NEVER corrupted any save. When I have pbs, it's when windows won't follow ( because ICQ, kazaa  and winamp are running at the same time... win98 isn't the best for multitask... ).
Renderman? man, it's more expensive than max (and yeah, it's just a renderer ).
As for Zaon's dudes it's like everywhere, you have jaw dropping stuff, and you have crap.

[Stryke 9]

I had Max 4. It locked up my computer if I wasn't running at least one program while it booted up. It locked up my computer if I hadn't run a memory-hogging program before I started it. It locked up my computer if I used too many functions too quickly. It locked my computer for utterly no reason at all.

And I said good MODELLERS. Their renders suck.

[Nico]

Originally posted by Stryke 9
I had Max 4. It locked up my computer if I wasn't running at least one program while it booted up. It locked up my computer if I hadn't run a memory-hogging program before I started it. It locked up my computer if I used too many functions too quickly. It locked my computer for utterly no reason at all.

And I said good MODELLERS. Their renders suck.

1) maybe it's not max, you never asked yourself?
2) that's... not true, in fact. I've learned various things for the past few months, and what usually sucs is not the renderer, it's the lightning setting ( so it's the artist's fault ). Yeah, it does require more work. ANyway, Max5 has the renderer from MaxViz, which kicks serious butts, so this is no longer a viable complain.

[wEvil]

I really don't agree with what he says about Mental Ray.

If tweaked, MR is as fast as it gets, its just the default settings are for high quality work and depending on how you layout your scenes, what structures you prefer geometrically, altering in particular the BSP settings will greatly change the rendertime.


MAX Viz uses lightscape, which is OK but it very slow.  It uses traditional radiosity techniques by mesh subdivision rather than Montecarlo/Photon mapping techniques.

IE, that renderer is for hyper-clean architectural meshes, not general DCC work.

As for good modellers, they're a professional studio with more hardware than I care to mention, and you're comparing them to (insofar as KMN, Venom and myself) a couple of students running single machines

[Nico]

Yeah, I should have mentionaed that obviously lightscape had been modified, but you've seen by yourself in the various previews I suppose. Seems quite fast.

[Stryke 9]

Venom: I was referring to the site. Their renders blow. They're either blurry or boring.

MAX I have no problem with, other than the (frequent) lockups. Yes, I'm sure it was MAX. But MAX is also more a modeller than a renderer- try getting anything nice, like radiosity or caustics, in a MAX 4 render. It's not even all that hot at volumetrics.

But anyway. It's fine, in a utilitarian way. And it probably is the best modeller out there- not MY personal favorite, but probably better than it at any rate.