Maya 6 NAB vids 2004-04-24 - By lpiasecki76
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> But yeah, it seems like Alias is doing catch up with Soft in a big way.
> Heck, just about every main new feature in maya6 is from a existing one in
> xsi.
It goes both ways I supposed. Many of the XSI 4.0 new features were also
available in Maya for a long time, but I must admit that they are imho
better implemented now in XSI.
Maya still does many things that XSI doesn't: 3d paint (although not good
but it's there), nurbs tools are much better, PFX are useful, hair seems to
have many options that are not in XSI, they have a completely open hypegraph
(includes access from API to deformers, etc.), 3d widget tool for most
operators, Flash rendering, you can blend animations without using Mixer
(Trax), Maya Fluids and finally two features that are very, very missed in
XSI...
1) Hypervoxel like, density based rendering for particles (Maya Fluids
shader). This is a very, very missed feature that people have begged for for
2 years... XSI particles shading needs a lot of work... period :-(
2) Much better material previews and super high quality opengl rendering
right in the viewport! In Maya 6.0 you can see everything in the viewport
opengl preview: texture layering, specularity, layered multi-textures, bump
maps, even reflection maps!!! It really uses your graphic card to the
fullest! This is a huge advantage and adds a lot to the interactivity. When
I think that my $1000 graphics card is mostly not used it drives me nuts
:-).Also Hypershade lets you see previews of procedural textures and it is
really helpful. I've been begging for it for 3 years now :-( in XSI.
That is why I didn't like the Maya to XSI comparison... because those guys
at Alias were working very hard, given the limited resources they had and
Maya does many thing that XSI doesn't, so it goes both ways. Maya is trying
to add features that are in XSI, XSI is trying to add features that are in
Maya. That's how it's always been. That's competition and allocation of
resources for development.
If you're a Maya 6.0 user, you just got: rewritten Trax with motion
retargetting and redirection, awesome hair, which can be used as skeletons,
falling of feathers, awesome constraints etc. You got super high quality
rendering in viewports (makes me very jealous), MR rendering now supports
blurry reflections, particle motion blur, glow, fur and fluid rendering,
image based lights, you have a PS import that sets up your layers from PS
and it goes the other way, too. Particle deformations that seem to work with
forces (something that XSI doesn't do). You got real time dynamics, 9-16x
Sub-D speed increase, Hypershade organizations and bins, 3d paint on
polygons, many upgrades to cloth, upgrades to polygons tools, Web browser
with MEL linking, and finally smooth deform/move/scale/rotate.
If you're a Maya user, these are by no means small upgrades! They are huge
to the workflow, just like XSI 4.0 includes many features that users missed.
My software is better than your software comparisons are immature, because
they will never end! Companies allocated resources differently and
concentrate on different features. Then the other software users want the
same things etc... It's a part of the competition.
I think both Maya 6.0 and XSI 4.0 upgrades are huge, although XSI seems to
have much faster development. Overall, having such competition is great
because companies will not rest on their laurels and continue to add new
features, innovations, tools etc. In the end it's all good! :-). I just wish
Duncan (author of Maya fluids, PaintFX and now hair) worked for Softimage:-)
Luke
> Unfortunately I can only compare Maya's new features to the few that Soft
> has released, just have to wait and see.
>
> Luke, Good to hear that the RBD are so strong. Was quietly expecting that
> :)
>
>
> Cheers,
> Brad K.
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