Hi guys,
I'm working with Maya for a while now, but I feel a lack of new features with Autodesk's 2015 softs. When I see both modo or Blender, I think that these softs have a more promising future than 3ds Max for example. Meshfusion is a good example IMHO. This is just an amazing feature. And the economical aspect is important too. modo costs around 1k $, Blender is totally free, while Maya/3ds Max are very very expensive.
I feel comfortable with Maya, but I think that I can work faster if I completely dive into modo for example. And the economical aspect is very important too. But I ask myself if it's a good idea because I know that 3ds Max/Maya are very used all around the world.
So do you think that leave Maya for modo/Blender is a great idea ?
Feel free to answer.
Thanks,
Samuel.
Note : This post isn't a troll, but a serious question from an humble artist
Replies
It only took me a few hours to learn the basics of Softimage once I changed the navigation to Maya. Much longer with Max because its a completely different beast from Maya and Softimage (seriously, a modifier to change the UVs?).
To put it bluntly, it is completely stupid for you not to learn it, considering how easy it is, and the access you have to videos, and your understanding of one software program.
Not only should you learn every software widely used in the industry, it's pretty much an expectation. Infact, you will learn software for the rest of your career. Your job as an artist will be to always learn new software, always adapt new pipelines, and be expected to know how to use these softwares on Day 1.
Companies want you to be able to join, and then hit the ground running. Quite a few studios are leaning towards only allowing Seniors Artists being allowed the freedom to learning programs AT the job.
Also, not knowing 3DS Max you are limiting yourself to HALF of the jobs in a HIGHLY competitive job market.
In general, great skills can get you a job even if you don't use the native software.
But, you'll always be a more attractive candidate for a job if you already use the software that the job requires. It means a shorter ramp-up period for you, and less time that other artists need to leave their work to help you out. So, using industry-standard software is an easy way to create an advantage for yourself.
So I'll keep using Maya, even if I know that I miss cools functions and features from others softs (MeshFusion for instance).
About 3ds Max, I don't really use it. I just make sure that I know all the basics from it. But the modifiers founded philosophy is quite weird. And in my opinion, this soft is less intuitive than Maya. I don't mean that Maya is better (when I see Lonewolfs's or Paul Pepera's projects, 3ds Max looks to be the ultimate tool).
Anyway as stevston said, this is the man on the chair which is doing art. Not the software. The software is just a tool.