Luxology and The Foundry Merge

dtschultz

Pretty interesting news. I really hope some of that Mari tech makes its way over to Modo.

http://forums.luxology.com/topic.aspx?f=3&t=70240
http://www.cgsociety.org/index.php/CGSFeatures/CGSFeatureSpecial/the_foundry_and_luxology_merge
http://www.fxguide.com/fxpodcasts/fxpodcast-229-foundryluxology-roundtable/

MagicSugar

As a freelancer with small budget for tool upgrade, I hope they'd still sell Modo without Mari if they're going to make an integrated product like c4d bodypaint.

If that product actually happens and the upgrade price is still below $600 or close, I won't mind it.

R3D

ooooo Interesting, speaking of Luxology, has anyone used Modo? Hows it fare vs Autodesk's packages?

WarrenM

There are a few threads talking about Modo and who uses it but the short answer is that, yes, there are those who use it and love it.

Dataday

Ryswick wrote: »

ooooo Interesting, speaking of Luxology, has anyone used Modo? Hows it fare vs Autodesk's packages?

I see a lot of posts about how great it is but every time I have tried it, the work flow is just too off the wall. Im sure once you get used to it, its fine.... but one thing I realized when using it is that a lot more steps are often required just to do something. Of course you can create hot keys and your own set up, but out of the box its a lot more time consuming.

The downside to merging with the foundry is their pricing is usually... UP there if you know what I mean and I hope the same doesnt happen to Modo.

keelhauler

This will be interesting.

Swizzle

Dataday wrote: »

I see a lot of posts about how great it is but every time I have tried it, the work flow is just too off the wall. Im sure once you get used to it, its fine.... but one thing I realized when using it is that a lot more steps are often required just to do something. Of course you can create hot keys and your own set up, but out of the box its a lot more time consuming.

Maybe it's just because of my Lightwave roots, but Modo just seems like a completely natural way to work for me. Max and other programs I've tried always seem to introduce a sort of weird distance between the user and the thing they're trying to create, whereas Modo seems a lot more tactile in how the tools respond. Granted, you don't have the crazy power of a modifier stack when working in Modo, though I've honestly only ever wished for it a couple of times.

I'm really not sure what you mean by having to take more steps to do something, though. Can you provide an example? Most of the tools I use on a daily basis in Max seem to actually take more steps than the same ones in Modo. Bevels, polygon extrusion, shell modifier/thicken tool, and UVs in general come to mind.

MrOneTwo

Actually we had this conversation with Dataday in Modo thread (or in something like 'AD products vs Modo). Even though I learned 3d in 3ds max I still can use Modo without problem. Its workflow isn't weird. The concept of activating and dropping the tool is something really easy to catch.

I think this merge can be very interesting. Modos painting tools lack some features. I hope they will incorporate Mari. Never used Mari but heard good stuff about it. I hope it won't be a step further from game art for Modo though. Modo is great but lacks in creating game assets (I recently model in Modo then export to max to set up smoothing groups and export).

WarrenM

(I recently model in Modo then export to max to set up smoothing groups and export).

This is unfortunately the route that I've been taking lately. I just can't get smoothing under control in Modo ... have to use Max for the final export. I wish Luxology would just resolve that rather than working on yet another feature for the renderer.

I think I ALMOST have a working system for smoothing groups but it's not 100% yet. But, of course, if Modo just had a decent interface for it...

igi

How come you people get smoothing group problems in modo? Yeah it's true there's no interface for smoothing groups but still works with fbx and obj exporter.I got no problem when importing to UDK with smoothing groups.Nevertheless,for the some models like weapons it's still better preference to use 3dsmax just for the uses of textool's one-click SG action.

Modo improving day by day,they slowly become a complete package and even more,really exciting to think about the new features foundry would bring and merges with fast and intuitive workflow of modo.

MrOneTwo

igi - yeah I usually uv in Modo (loooove uving in Modo), export, use script to assign smoothing groups to uv islands and export to engine.

WarrenMarshall - on luxology forum someone posted max like interface for smoothing groups
(>>LINK<<)

WarrenM

Oh shit, whaaaat? Thanks man, I'll definitely check that out!

---

EDIT : Where do I send all of my money? This works! Sure, it's just a thin wrapper over the existing smoothing group API in Modo but that's enough. This is enough of a UI that I can live with it.

The only things missing are:

1) Automatically assign smoothing groups based on angle
2) Ability to assign a polygon to more than 1 smoothing group
3) Assign smoothing groups based on UV islands

But I can live without those things for now. Might give me an excuse to do some Modo scripting in the future, actually...

At any rate, the other gotcha I ran into is that when exporting to Unreal you have to use the plain FBX exporter. If you use the 2006.11 version, you won't get your smoothing groups.

But smoothing looks good in UDK and vert counts are as expected. This may be the last thing I need before I set the 3DS Max boat on fire and sail off into the sunset...

igi

@MrOneTwo Really thanks for informing about that,will definitely use it.

@WarrenMarshall well really glad If you can script the number 3,then you'll be my hero

Another strength of modo is the scripts,I can't really think that without them.There's many many scripts for modo and it's really nice to modify the ui or create pie/custom menus for modo.

nyx702

Dang! This seems like a smart move.