Originally posted by mikhael
Once again, I completely disagree with Venom. 
for a change
Max DOES have about a billion stupid icons (like Truespace), which makes it hard to find anything.
look at ten of twelve pic of Max UI. remove the create bar ( objects, shapes, compound etc ) coz it's useless. don't use big buttons coz they're... well, big ( can have the same very small ones ). you're left with only the basic commands on the top ( same as LW, but on bottom, and an icon and not a text, big deal ). Ok, that's still too much? hit crtl X. NO ICON LEFT AT ALL. right click in the viewport, a roll out tab appears under your mouse, modif tab. maj+ right click, create tab. etc etc -> can do everything W/O a single icon. Make an UI with less icons than no icon, if you can
Layers are excellent. They provide a clear delineation between objects and they let you isolate geometry from control data. Abstraction is always a good thing.
well, if you like them, max5 has them, no argument there.
Rendering is about setting up cameras. If you're too lazy to set up orthographic cameras ONCE and save it as a scene, you're too lazy to live.
if programmers can't allow you to render in a viewport that exists, I wonder who is lazy on this earth
Character Studio is for, you know, characters. Its not terribly useful for animating leaves, Mjolnirs, planetary systems, business presentations, ship battles, bicycle wheels, machinery, doors, joysticks, books, chairs and just about anything but characters. Animation is much more than just characters.
her... should I reply to that
you can obviously do all that in max ( you hake IK, AK, morpher and all the crap just like any prog around ), so what kind of argument is that? What I say is that with max charceter animation is easy as hell, and it's not in LW
Can't say anyting about physical simulation. I honestly don't know much about it.
don't know about LW, so I just pointed out that max one was nice, no comparison was intended.
Seperating rendering and modelling into two different programs is a very intelligent move. Modeller focuses on--check it out--modelling. It provides you with a focused toolset. Layout provides you with animation tools, etc. You don't have to load a bloated executable into memory that includes functionality that you're not going to use when you decide you want to work on a mesh. When its time to animate, you don't have to have the thousands of modelling tools loaded. If you want to, though, you can load both, and the Lightwave Hub keeps things synchronised between the two. Make a change to a model in Modeller, and the changes appear instantly in Layout. Modify surface data in Layout and the colors change in Modeller.
I'll just reply that modeling is my job, and I'd hate having to switch progs to do a test render coz face it, modeling and rendering are more closely linked than my arm and my hand. And if they plan on bringing everything together in the next LW release, it's for a reason: it's just not practical, you loose time, you lose money. bad capitalist word, bad, bad!
LW Uvs are pretty simple. Hit "Make UVs" and *BAM* instant UV space. Want to segment your UVs? Select the Polys you want to be in the UV space and create a new map. What's complex or "loosy" about that?
KMN complaints were about choosing between planar, spherical, cylindrical, cubic, poly, wrapred, etc UVmappings, ease of modifying the gizmo UV to rotate, scale, mirror and tile the map, and things like that.[/quote]
LW has no video post stuff except video effects. You cannot, say, switch cameras or chain animations together. Arguably, however, this is the sort of thing best done by a dedicated video post program and not by your 3d modeller/renderer.
of course it's not necessary, but it's a plus, and for somebody like me, a studient or anybody who can't afford after paying so much for max, to pay yet another prog, it's definitively a welcome gift. being able to do fade ins and out, video incrustation and the like directly in the 3d software is really helpful.
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